Freerange 2011 at Thruman Brewery

Here are the final installations with my cast prints and a panel presenting the graphic novel 'Replica'. The Calavera 1,2,3,4' have two versions...one with ink on and the other as a plain relief. Each stone is for sale for £150 and the whole series of 4 is ready for you to take for £500. I've been surprised by the reception they're getting from the buyers and I'm really happy these very personal works are understood and appreciated. I hope they will be a pieces people will exhibit proudly.
As for the 'Replica' my piece of living room works so well people don't realise they can pick up the book and flick through it. I might print the illustration in a big scale and sell them.

Calaveras continuum...

Here are etchings I made for casting...the process is on. Busy busy busy....

Replica. PS painting

Just composing the illustrations for the graphic novel Replica. Enjoying the PS painting which allows me to follow my own expressive style of drawing. Nonetheless still it's time consuming. It all starts to take shape. Their need the final retouches but today should be a good long working day. Huraaaa!

Calavera Cast aka Tomb Stone

There it is....my fun times with the mock up cast...Images show various applications of materials...ink, gouache, watercolour, graphite, various gold decorative paints plus some carving, scratching and general mish-mash...now it is more clear to me what effect the mediums will bring, what not to do....and the excitement is growing coz all in all...it will look Great!Now...off to producing more....

‘How to build your own superfiction?’ by Dr Peter Hill. A talk by Artquest on the 12th of April 2011

Going to Peter Hill talk from Artquest I didn’t know what to expect. I recently joined the website which provides artists and crafts people with resource, knowledge and all possible info within the art industry. I was send the invite and thought I’ll see what the fuss is about. No regrets. Dr Hill is a Scottish born citizen of Australia and a successful lecturer. He came out with an idea of superfiction in 1989 and has been promoting it ever since. The basic principle of the initiative is the creation of fictional situations in international contemporary art practice. It builds on the fact of multidisciplinary approach to today’s practices, exploring the gaps between them and filling them up with made up stories/facts. It plays with an idea of Situationist International and Guy Debord’s ‘Society of Spectacle’, Karl Popper’s idea of falsification, Paul Feyerabend’s anarchistic view of science and Thomas Kuhn’s paradigm shift. The projects are full of fun and irony using pastiche as a medium to recycle mainstream artefacts, mass media and pop culture. Dr Hill presented a slide show of his fellow artisans who dwell on the idea of superfiction like Seymour Likely, Servaas, Cindy Sherman or PigVision to name a few.  As Peter Hill says it is a very human to ‘progress through failure’ and I have to admit it was a truly inspirational proposal to rediscover myself as an artist in a realm of pure fantasy and imagination. Humankind biggest gift – Creation!

Here is one of my favourite polish artist working with the idea of superfictions Zbigniew Libera and some of his famous productions with the Lego set that stirred the art scene around the world in 1996. 

Ken's Aunt, 1994
24 dolls in cardboard boxes, [24x] 32 x 8 x 5 cm

Lego. Concentration Camp, 1996, brick set

You can shave the baby, 1995, 10 dolls in cardboard boxes [10x] 55,9 x 20,3 x 25,4

Delivery Bed. Play Kit for Girls, 1996

Delivery Bed. Play Kit for Girls, 1996

Body Master, 1994-1997
two devices, size 115 x 46 x 71 cm each, two advertising posters

Dr Peter Hill in the Artist Room of Conway Hall, London

 

 

..Dear Reader something has been really opportunistic in today's blogging toolbox and all the links to this post started to live their own life...therefore they came in various colours. I'm sincerely apologising on their behalf. Hope this won't stop you from reading....Thank you)

 

Nancy Spero at the Serpentine Gallery 2nd of April 2011

The Serpentine Gallery provides free talks on Saturday’s afternoons about their current artists on display, their work and legacy. On the 2^nd of April Tamara Garb professor, curator and writer hosted a talk about themes connected to Nancy Spero art work. In over an hour she led the audience around the rooms filled with aggressive, explosive and deeply feminine pieces. After a short introduction to Spero’s life and practice she focused on her anti-Vietnam series. Here are the first examples of Spero’s recycled mythologies, symbolic figures and her unique raw, highly expressive but blunt language she will develop throughout her life.  The next expansion in the artist life came through focus on language. Treated as a masculine she again recycled the means of it in her lino prints using alphabet, word and text as decorative elements and a substance of her work. The communicative side of language was eradicated from her art as was oil painting for its association with patriarchal world. Tamara Garb made it clear in her passionate presentation that Spero’s bold stand-up made a voice of female energy long forgotten and neglected to be a part of culture dialogue like never before. 

Unfortunately the talk took place inside the gallery rooms therefore the documenting photography was forbidden. Here are just a few examples of Nancy Spero's work on the display.  

Nancy Spero
Maypole Take No Prisoners II, 2008
Installation view, Serpentine Gallery, London
(3 March – 2 May 2011)
© 2011 Jerry Hardman-Jones

Nancy Spero
Female Bomb 1966
Gouache and ink on paper
86.4 x 68.6 cm
Collection of Barbara Lee, Cambridge, MA, USA

Nancy Spero
La Folie II, detail 2002
Ink, handprinting and collage on paper
184.2 x 47 cm
Courtesy of Estate of Nancy Spero and Galerie Lelong

Calaveras Update..

Here is the first mock up cast...the trained eye can see the principle mistake of a rookie...however that's what the mock up are for. Someone suggested today this looks like a tomb stone and I think I like it. An idea of how to display them starts to blossom too. I think this is really taking the shape I wanted and now I just need to make a series of about 6 different casts and I'll be home. Meanwhile I'll be experimenting with this first cast to see if it can get any better...

Fashion Calaveras II

After a short brake from my 'Death' theme I'm presenting some recent designs. These went quite of a way from being very messy thanks to monoprinting through being cleaned out by photoshop and marvellous masking liquid and arrived at the mixture of both monoprint and flexible methods of cleaning the image. I decided to remove any additional type too leaving just a 'Vogue' header. The plan for these is deep photoetching (probably on zinc) to be cast printed.

Cyanotype

Replica. Graphic Novel

Here are the first storyboards for Replica. The first ones I've ever made so they might be a bit sketchy. I enjoy the process and expect to get better by the number.

HALF- Helmets Abolition Liberation Front

Something done very quickly for the need of intellectual dispute. My very unhealthy and unsafe attitude. Anyone cares to join?