Over the last few weeks I’ve definitely immersed myself into the photographic side of printmaking. I feel that I’ve committed quite a lot of my precious “experimental” time to it so I have to see it through now.
I don’t know how to judge theses pieces though, I keep panicking thinking that I’m not experimenting enough at this stage, but I then remind myself THIS is experimenting. It’s just not what I anticipated when I came into printmaking, but isn’t that the whole point of experimenting, you go places you hadn’t expected. I had imagined myself to become an abstract expressionist, or go to A0 sized images, but not taking photos and stop drawing. I am disconcerted, which I should embrace! I hope I’m producing enough work though, quality over quantity. It all takes a lot of time, I’m very dependent on technicians expertise when it comes to photo etching and polymer etching and I have to be patient. A week can go by and I’ve barely produced any work.
I’m not sure whether I’m pushing my photographic prints though, or where I’m focusing next. Victoria Ahren suggested I look at the artist Dryden Goodwin, which I think could transpire to be extremely helpful. His work is really interesting, he uses traditional methods of drawing, mixed with video, instillation and interview but all predicated on traditional creative and social values. He talks to people, he looks at history, he uses a pencil and picks up a camera. And significantly, why Victoria suggested I look at his work, he combines the photographic with drawing.
I’d already thought about using my red monoprints of the blood vessels of the brain as a part of a layered image and this artist has already been doing it. Exciting and a bit annoying, truly nothing is EVER original.
This has been my first opportunity to try out my press. My aim is to get to know it, find out how my inks, paper and set up all works together so by the time I’m back at college in October I’m confident to experiment and try out new ideas. It felt utterly surreal and wonderful printing in my own studio, even if the results were dubious.
I tried the Cranfield oil based water soluble ink and a German oil based ink. I didn’t feel there was much in it so will stick to the water soluble stuff.
My water bath using a squeegee to get rid of excess water left my paper too damp, so I need to understand why. I’ve not had that problem in other studios using that technique.
My blotting paper is too thin. And it’s a nightmare to get each print into the blotters after every print. I need to reorganise my space somehow…
I did manage a relatively nice clear, sharp print by the end of the afternoon. It’s great not being in a hurry and learning by trial and error.
I’m not sure about the blanket it came with but I’ll persevere.
I’m going to try adding water soluble oil to the ink next time to increase its viscosity and see if I can get a bit of a grey tonal range in the image. I felt it wiped off completely and left me with a very black and white print.
Here it is in all its glory, a very old, but significantly SMALL, print.
The next think will be to try etching a plate using copper sulphate. That’s more scary, but it’ll open up so many possibilities!
As for my research over the last week, I’m reading more about the Abject in art, reading “around” Julia Kristeva, I’m not sure her actual work is hugely easy to digest, but I’m going to try. I’ve read a long interesting chapter from a book by Whitney Chadwick on the Legacy of feminist art. This has lead me to the artist Ellen Gallagher who’s work I find fascinating. It’s connecting me back into Kwame Appiah’s writing around the problems of a subjective identity. And her ideas relate to an almost anthropological gaze. You cannot take any claim of what identity for the individual or group means too literally. It all needs unpicking. I’m still building up ideas and what’s really inspiring me about Gallagher’s work. I plan to visit the Tate Modern so I can see a few of her pieces first hand.
Another artist that’s come more to my attention from the Chadwick book, Women, Art and Society is Susan Hiller. She actually did study anthropology and collates all sorts of objects, pieces, video and instillation to create her pieces. Why not really challenge what representation is. Surely it’s not really possible to define who we are, what we are in a few images or cultural artefacts.
I really question why we want to be considered different/as separate from some, but the same as others? Why do we feel that gives us definition, identity? Why can’t we embrace being similar? Why is it significant if we have light or dark skin (we read so much into these signs), how can that possibly tell us about that particular person? It can tell us about their DNA perhaps, but not what their likes or dislikes are, or their passions or fears or ambitions are.
As I’ve put up my Question of Beauty piece for the interim show I’ve felt like going back into the workshop for the last time this academic year and doing something new. So I chose copper. I want to understand how different it feels to use compared to zinc and how this could be used in my work.
I drew in three self-portraits, in a Grecian style, I had this Objet d’art idea in my head. The aim was for them to have a sculptural feel, but the heads to not have the expected expression of passivity expected of most sculptures of the female face and form.
I drew into hard-ground then did a series of aquatint dips. The image was meant to be subtle, but that wasn’t the result! The shadows all contrast too highly; my lightest tone is too dark and my darkest tone is too dark (apart from the background). However, the actual aquatint was really deep and uniform which is perfect, but I wanted the faces to be lighter and pop out of the black. I’m going to work on softening the contrast by hand with a burnisher and see what happens. Copper is lovely to draw on and my lines are very clear. If it’s line work I want then it’s definitely worth using for a final project where I can justify the price.
The final etching of my heads Preliminary sketch to the etching
I’ve had lots of ideas this week around the small passport sized image in relation to my daily self-portrait. I’ve been really reassessing the image as a medium of communication since seeing the Cindy Sherman exhibition. I’ve got lots of exciting seedlings of ideas. I’m considering using the same size format and drawing very detailed images of myself and then using the idea of the hapic and optic to interfer with the image, I have no idea how. It maybe on the plate itself or as a part of the image as a whole. I’m also going to incorporate photo transfer of some old photos of myself and see how they might work within these ideas.
Once I’ve finished printing my Claire photo-etchings I’ll strip off the emulsion with the help of a friendly technician (if there are any left in college after all the changes that are a-happening), hard ground them and draw back into them. That will be interesting. It’ll give the piece layers and interfere in that haptic/optic way that I want to explore.
The Cindy Sherman exhibition had a massive impact on me, much more than I’d anticipated. or maybe it’s a culmination of reading, looking, thinking and doing.
I found a fascinating book on Gillian Wearing in the NPG bookshop, her masks are resonating with my unfinished clay mask self-portrait. Perhaps I’ll now finish it.
The breath of Sherman’s work is extraordinary and the depth of it is inspiring. It’s humorous at times too, which makes the work all the more impactful because it highlights how ludicrous the portrayal of womanhood and femininity are in the media.
Below is Sherman’s humorous take on a 70’s magazine cover.
Women’s magazine cover
Sherman’s version
Ideas, Ideas, Ideas
The annotation was really helpful and informative at the exhibition so I’m actually pasting the text straight into the blog so I can refer back to it when I need to.
I’ve copied a piece from the show below because it’s the part of her work that’s really resonating with me.
Especially in regards to my daily self-portrait. How “honest” are these selfies really. A portrait will always be composed whether it’s taken using a camera or painted with a brush.
On her historical portraits…
There are things we control, construct and ‘perform’ (thinking of Goffman) at a conscious level when we present ourselves in public, but there’s also actions, looks physical traits that we don’t consciously control. But when I’m choosing to visually record myself on a daily basis there will always be a constructing even if in tiny ways. The way I flick my fringe, what I’m wearing, the lighting, whether the photo is in focus, as soon as I pick up the camera there’s a potential audience (is that of interest to me in itself?!). We do this in all our social interactions too; are we only truly ourselves when we’re along. It’s getting very existential in my house.
So do I go with this, in a Sherman-esque way. Do I highlight this self-invention in any self-image.
Do I dress up and really perform my daily selfie? After all is that any further from an “honest” portrayal of the self than my deadpan photos.
Is it truth I’m trying to get at here, representing women, myself more truthfully and accepting, even embracing, the flaws of my skin and flesh and humanity!
I like the idea of continuing to use the passport image to try out these ideas. Incorporating an aspect of time passing, a narrative element to my work. That’s the direction I feel my piece for the interim show is hinting at.
Would my self-portraits be more truthful if I stripped back all signals of conscious identity signs such as jewellery and makeup and then taking the daily picture without looking at what I’ve taken.
Alternatively the performing or reenacting is enticing me. I’m considering going back over old photos of myself growing up, when I was “testing out” my identity. I think there’s a series of work that could be based on the passage of the development of the relationship with my body and becoming a woman. The re-enacting would be based on actual photos of myself a different stages of maturity, but obviously me at 36 dressing up as myself at 8, 10, 15, 20. How would it feel to do that and try to produce the face I had to that camera pointing at me at that time.
The truth of any image is always suspect, my thoughts after seeing the exhibition also go back to Jo Spence’s family album work and perhaps is partly inspiring the idea to trawl back through old photos of myself. Especially those photo booth ones: what you did to examine your “look” before the dawn of mobile selfies.
There might be a photo transfer of the old image next to what I’m reimagining too. I love this whole idea. I feel free within this to produce the work beyond the photo and etch or chine collé (or similar) the images because it’s all an interpretation-it’s all an illusion. How can we possibly express all of who we are or what Woman is in one or two images. All I can do is try to reflect on who I am and hope it speaks to others.
Victoria Ahren’s talk on the interrupted space springs to mind at this point and the use of the Haptic and Optic in an image. I have so much to absorb and pull into my work.
In conclusion…
I feel I’ve set out, based on my experience at the Sherman exhibition, two avenues I want to explore based on the idea that an image is always constructed and a persona is always being acted out,
One, to counter act this by highlighting it with costume and re-enactment and make the construction of an identity clear to see. I can challenge presumed visual truths through this self-representation in this format.
Or,
Two, produce my passport images of the selfies based on trying to get as close to an honest depiction of myself as possibly by stripping back all makeup, accessories, etc. I’d hope to visually express that this is me, woman, naked of cultural paraphernalia and it’s ok!
This is where I am with the repeated image. I think it’s so impactful.
This morning I went to see ‘Kiss My Genders’ at the Hayward Gallery.
Identity-whether in relation to gender, race or religion-is such a big topic of conversation right now. This discussion was based mainly around non-binary and trans identity. Although I have no real experience of either of these topics I felt a strong positive vibe in the exhibition and some of the photographs were thought provoking. Particularly the photos by Peter Hujar. I’m not particularly sure of his intention when we took these photos of actor John Heys (below) but these among others seemed strange and at times amusing. Strange because it’s not “usual” to see men dressed as women “dressed up” so to speak and humorous because in a light hearted way it literally exposed the conflicted and politicised meaning of just being in Western society.
The photos above reminded me of the socially constructed nature of what is acceptable and what is not in society. Why is it verging on the funny to see a man dressed up to the nines and pouting, but not funny when it’s a woman. Why is it sexy if a woman does it and questionable when a man chooses to?
My feeling is that these particular photos highlight how ridiculous it all is, after all it’s humans that create these rules of social engagement so why can’t we break them, subvert them and ultimately change them to suit the individual. Will society break down, is that the fear? If we break gender rules then maybe the patriarchy could be next.
Another question that the exhibition raised is whether transgendered men dressing in the way that was described in many of the images doesn’t really help Woman’s cause. I felt the stereotypical image of the feminine was overwhelming. So many of the images reinforced the idea that femininity is stilettos, tight fitting clothing and lots of makeup and nail varnish. I’m aware that quite a few of the people photographed were drag artists, but the problem still remains for me. The message that men, women, bi or trans people can wear what they like, be who they want to be is positive, but I think there needs to be more acknowledgement that in doing so (in this exhibition at least) there might be inadvertently a reinforcement of the old stereotypical-sexualised image of the feminine, which does nothing for the cause of stripping away binary ideas of gender roles.
Dan has been in this week curating our interim show. I don’t have much feeling towards the piece I’m putting up, in fact it wasn’t the piece I’d intended to put up, but have decided on the 12 small photo etched prints. It’s saying something interesting, maybe it IS helping me clarify what I’m “saying” in my work, but it’s not an example of a well crafted print. My vanity would like something impressive up there, whereas it’s the smallest and most unobtrusive piece in the show. It’s next to Pippa’s multi-faceted work and looks a little sad. Maybe that’s appropriate though, I’m thinking about the struggle for identity in a society which is driven by appearance. My piece looks dwarfed by the impressed all singing all dancing piece next to it.
I’m feeling a little lost this week if I’m honest, I’m right in the photographic process, I’m gaining insights (as above) but there’s a frustrated bit of me that needs to produce something that involves my unique skills. Yet I don’t want to abandon the photos entirely, they’re kind of working for me, but the result is I’m stuck and don’t know how to move my process on to incorporate both desires for this work.
I need a plan! Next week I have to try and produce the twelve photo etchings again on white paper, because I hadn’t planned for this to be my interim piece I didn’t worry too much about the paper so it’s off white, which isn’t right for the exhibition. Then I can think about my next steps. What I’m producing isn’t necessarily coinciding with my thoughts and research. This is the nub of my worry.
The process of photo etching starts out with an image on acetate much like in photopolymer, but after exposing the image to the photo sensitive plate it’s then etched in nitric acid. The plate is zinc, which a photo emulsion, unlike the much more delicate plates of photopolymer. This time I edited the photos and put a bitmap of my choosing on them. I am pleased to have made that call for myself rather than relying on someone else to do that part of the process.
I used one plate to produce all these passport sized images so they would all be identical and make the process of producing them a lot easier. Once it’s been in the acid for approximately 2 minutes to open bite the image, it then gets an aquatint and further time in the acid. This is process that I relied on the technician to help with because it’s hard to see what the acid is doing. But I’m learning what to look for on the metal.
On reflection it should have been double aquatinted because I’m finding it hard not to wipe out the ink from the plates, but I’m feeling this is a part of each image being slightly unique and actually fits my brief for this piece.
We cut each image out once they’d been etched. I spent a lot of time getting the edges of my plate smooth s o that there would be a deep edge to each small plate. I want them to be reminiscent or passport images, fixed identity. Then each one is different, suggesting that identity actually isn’t fixed.
I’ve been trying to really dig deep and focus down on what the right research question is for my work. I have formulated a rough title and had the go ahead from Leora to start thinking more about the most relevant artists for the title.
‘To what extent has the self-representative nature of the work of artists 1, 2 and 3 helped the drive toward the emancipation of women from the Beauty Myth as defined by Naomi Wolf.’
The artists I’ve been researchinghave been pretty numerous and I can now consider each one in relation to the above question, which I think will alter the artists I finally choose and may even change my question slightly.
At the moment I’m thinking of,
Jenny Saville
Jo Spence
Guerrilla Girls
Cindy Sherman
Frida Kahlo
Alice Neel/Suzanne Valadon?
I also find the Forty Frida’s by Ellen Heck really interesting and relevant, but I can’t find much on her and need to ask the library.
Then there’s still Glenys Barton the sculptor. Her multiple faced sculptures are fascinating but I’m not sure her work could be considered overtly challenging to female stereotyping, maybe she has contributed through her sculpture though.. Frida Kahlo may not have consciously gone about trying to emancipate women through her work, she’s had major influence on women’s art and the male gaze and one of the few women to really break through into the art world. I don’t know enough about Frida Kahlo to form an option yet. Other artists are more obviously involved in the feminist movement. However, I don’t think it’s necessarily that the artists have consciously gone out to change people’s thinking around the plight of women’s equality, but the fact that they’ve had some influence on the movement to one degree or another is the important issue.
This ‘self-reflective’ aspect of my research question links into my own work, which I see moving in that direction, where I’m trying to understand and reflect on myself through the art I produce. What are truly my own actions and which are those that are in response to how I think I aught to act, or how I feel I aught to be seen, or how I desperately don’t want to be seen! My identity feels so caught up in issues of women-hood, self-worth and confidence in my abilities (and my body).
This week has has been in part frustrating, but also illuminating in many ways too. I am reading a lot, in the workshop a lot and thinking a lot. There’s bound to be confusion as a result, but I’m hoping there will be some clarity on its way!
What I’m fighting with is how I hone down and choose one tiny aspect of all the research and reading I’m doing/thinking of doing. It’s impossible for me to cover all areas and my work isn’t really going to progress until I narrow my field of vision and realise that all my reading and interests in identity and femininity aren’t going away because I choose to focus on one area for the duration of my MA.
I’m having my on identity crisis within all of this, the reading is forcing me to be more honest about my own relationship with my body image which is not the best or healthiest at times. Naomi Wolf made a brilliant point in The Beauty Myth, which is if women choose to wear makeup, be athletic or wear certain clothes because it makes them feel great or is fun, that’s very different from the reasons women mainly spend so much time and money on their bodies and appearance. If I feel good for running and keeping fit for it’s own sake that’s great, but if I feel guilt and feel self-hatred for NOT doing it, then there’s a problem. There is a problem. I’ve not got time for “body maintenance” right now and it’s a massive psychological challenge for me because I instantly go into self-hatred, why do I do this, am I really that discussing? Where does this come from? It really hurts me and slaps me back down. This is certainly not a part of the MA I planned for, but I’m trying to use these feelings constructively and learn from them and maybe it’s an opportunity for my work to inform who I am and what I am.
Moving away from my personal crisis and back to what I’ve been doing in the workshop this week. I’ve taken the photopolymer and moved it on a step and produced the work shown above. I’ve mixed feelings again about the process but as I get more familiar with it I feel more connected to this image. Initially I felt it wasn’t my work, it was a series of photos that anyone could put together and has taken little skill on my part. However I think I’m putting myself down, on reflection it’s very indicative of my work and if I look back at my sketchbooks I’ve been working of this sort of multiple format for a long time and actually I feel I’ve partly resolved it by using photos. I gaining expertise in process that I didn’t have before and I feel confident this will inform my work moving forward.
This looks like my work, but in a different format. It’s not anyone’s, it’s got my stamp on it and actually that pleases me. I do work in a pretty subtle and simple way and I’m coming to have more faith in that. I need to stop feeling pressured into emulating other more confident artists approach to working. My way is as valid as anyone else’s. until I have confidence in my work I won’t get anywhere.
In using an individuals daily make up regime, repeating these monotonous images, I’m try to highlight a wider issue of self-representation and femininity in a image driven society. Femininity doesn’t just happen, it’s coordinated, worked on, a daily ritual/chore/grind. The work isn’t trying to say whether this is right or wrong, but women are certainly programmed and pressurised to be a part of this regime of maintenance. I also think men are more and more pressured to think likewise too. This doesn’t serve the individual terribly well because this idea of the perfect body will never be realised and it’s certainly a battle in my life.
In Jo’s notes from last weeks tutorial she noted that the photopolymer images were interesting in their ‘deadpan‘ appearance and ‘honesty‘. Having that tiny positive feedback has helped a lot because I think underlying all my portraiture has been the feeling that there needs to be more honesty in the look and the composition of women’s bodies, which is why Jo Spence’s photographic autobiography work resonated so much. After all human interaction starts with a look, from birth and every time we interact socially (Simon Schama has written an interesting introduction about this in his book, ‘The Face of Britain: The Nation through its portraits’).
The idea of rethinking the visual image of women, portraying women in all their naturalness, more “honestly” would be very satisfying. Women in different ages and multiple “looks”, beautiful their that diversity, produced with an honest eye. This might be the way I start honing down my research paper question. I’ve realised all my research cannot go into my work, it can inform it in a broader sense, but I need to choose one aspect of the feminine or identities that will really drive my work forward.
Both Alice Neel and Jo Spence have painted and photographed themselves as older women. Older women are under represented in the media and arts in a mainly passive role. Where are the strong, powerful, aging women represented. I am aging, I’m 36 and very aware of the lines on my face, I’m not sure these are things men of my age are overly worry about?
If this re-evaluation of beauty and female identity in portraiture is where I’m going then the artist Emma Hopkins would be a great person to try and talk to because her portraiture is honest in the kind of way I see my work being. Not brutal in the way Jenny Saville’s can be.
Portrait by Emma Hopkins
There’s also the work of Frida Kahlo that would seem odd not to discuss both in my research paper in regards to self-representation and that layering of identity I’m so interested In exploring in my own work. The Guerrilla Girls are feminist activists to strive to interrupt the Beauty Myth on a large public scale
Having been told to “stop drawing” in the group tutorial I’ve started to think about the photos of the make-up series in a new way. It makes an interesting film strip when I stick these small images together. Photopolymer seemed like a good process to start with because it’s maintaining the integrity of the photo but I can still play with how I present them. I decided to started with only three images for this experiment because of the expense of the plates. I chose them carefully to represent the before application, the application and the result.
What let’s this done is the quality of the photos, they were taken as reference shots and it’s only the middle one that I feel really works tonally.
I plan to try putting gold leaf on the background of the figures. This triptych has ended up being somewhat reminiscent of a religious alter-piece and I think it fits well with the idea of an exalted beauty, something women have been taught to worship, something that will elevate them in their lives. It’s a myth, to some, religion is also a myth.
My feelings towards this process is mixed, I like the result in that it looks grainy and printerly yet is a photo and still looks like one. I also think I could use it in conjunction with other processes and other images very effectively. But I don’t like the lack of control I had over the actual process, I didn’t feel I could put myself into the print, it was someone else transferring it onto a film, it was a machine exposing it onto a plate. Perhaps what I do to it next will alter my feelings towards this process. The size I chose to print at is also interesting because it’s small making it feel like an intimate image.
If I’m honest though I’m desperate to get back to what I am good at and what makes me want to be an artist in the first place, drawing, printing and painting.
Each image is 7×3.5 cm
Marigold Plunkett 