Drawing- Final outcome

 This is the final outcome of my journey project for drawing. It is a selection of continuous line drawings suspended on a beam. For me presentation was important and I thought the way this looked further helped the outcome of my work.

Statement- Drawing

The journey project was a difficult process for me. I didn’t have many ideas with what I wanted to do or in which direction I wanted to go. I started this off my going on straight forward journeys and seeing if anything inspired me on the way. I eventually came up with the idea of creating something more interactive. Inspired by the artist Mira Schindel, I didn’t want the final piece to be just a drawing, but instead incorporate drawing into an instillation. The final piece is to be something which feels like you are going on the same journey as well, and I hope that this is what the final outcome shall look like. The drawings are suspended in the air and almost move with you as you walk around it. Although I took the theme of a journey fairly directly, I didn’t want to presentation to be directly straight forward which I believed I achieved.

Mira Schendel

Mira Schendel was a Brazilian artist who through her later years was mostly considered a modernist painter and sculpture. I went to her exhibition at the Tate Modern in London. I found the most recent work the most interesting, especially in the materials that she uses. I didn't realise until later how much of an influence she had on my drawing project.

One of my favourite works by Schendel is 'Variants' 1977. It's an instillation with rice paper suspended in the air with thread. All of the materials she uses are delicate and fragile, and the use and delicate and translucent materials such as rice paper giver her a work a fragile and ethereal feel, as if they stand on the very edge of existence.

The final outcome of my final piece for my drawing project is fine liner drawings on tracing paper, suspended on a beam. It's similar to Schendels work in that we've both used fairly delicate materials and have suspended them in the air. Although I wasn't inspired by her themes, I think I found her presentation fascinating and a nice, more interactive way of displaying some types of work.

Artist talk

Presentation- Minho Kwon
In this presentation, I focused on one particular drawing by an artist called Minho Kwon. I saw his work in London at the Jerwood gallery for the Jerwood drawing prize. This particular piece of work is called 'Neo Tower of Babel' and is pencil on tracing paper.

I was interested by the structural nature of this drawing. Usually anything structural doesn't usually catch my interest but this intriged me. After doing some research on Kwon, it appears that his inspiration for his drawings could have stemmed from the regmented structure of his past in Korea, where he lived for most of his life. He intends for his work to respond to the world in which he lives.

He was introduced to architecture from an early age, so combined the two together to create the juxtaposition between the history and the politics of Korea. The result of this reveals drawings almost resembling an architects blueprint.

"These architectural elements are more than the means to an end; they are capable of acting as a metaphor, thereby revealing the imaginative scope of the work as a whole" Minho Kwon

His work at the Jerwood is a reconstruction of the Tower of Babel, which is something which forms the focus of a story told in the book of Genesis of the Bible. The story summed up is man set out to build the Tower of Babel, arrogantly assuming their technological skill would enable them to reach God. This angered God and to punish man he divided the language they spoke. Kwon's drawings visualize his interpretation of a new Tower. It also shows architecture from the Classical and Medieval through to the industrial and modern periods. The overlaying predictions depict the main sources of power from each of these periods.

Kwon wants to provoke questions such as whether we have already reached God or because of our arrogant nature we will be punished again. His technique of provoking these are to show the traces of human civilization; man's eternal drive towards God.

Feedback
In the feedback, we further discussed the idea that this is Kwon's way of saying human civilisation is becoming too advanced and too arrogant. Questions were asked as to why there was something which looked like a Centar in the drawing. I wasn't able to find any information about this and everyone including myself found it particularly odd that there was something organic in such a structured geometric drawing. My guess is that is has something to link to the religious side of it, perhaps mocking the Christian story by adding a mythological creature in there.

Another thing which was discussed in the feedback were the faint, horizontal pencil lines which went all across Kwon's drawing. On first glance, it looks like they're just used for a backdrop to help construct the drawing. But it was mentioned by someone else that they could have an alternative meaning. With the lines not erased, the drawing looks unfinished. And this could link to the fact that that Kwon's 'Tower' is never finshed, t's still being constructed because of the speed that the human race is advancing.

Life Drawing