I had a successful studio day today... I wanted to work with an old iPod I took apart. Once I very carefully took this apart I wasn't sure on where to go with it so I began to play with it. The parts that interested me the most was the circuit boards. Circuit boards have always baffled me in understanding how they actually work but I've had a fascination with looking at them for some time. They look so intense that I initially thought to draw one but what would drawing a finicky copy of a circuit achieve? This led me to thinking, after several drawings later, to do the opposite... In a 'you can't beat em, join em' attitude. After feeling somewhat defeated by the circuit board I eventually decided to create this drawing, where I used long cocktail stick as my implement! Armed with this I created an ink and pva glue concoction, put my board coupled with the paper on the floor to create a loose drawing focusing hard on the circuit board.
I chose the stick at my implement because I figured a brush would be too controlled. I wanted something that would suit the fluidity I was looking for. I felt the need to make a free, fluid image after the controlled, tight drawings I was making which were getting me nowhere. It was almost as though I was rebelling against the complexities of the circuit board. These are the similar reasons why I chose ink instead of paint for example. Ink to me means a thin, watery solution that is very adaptable. I chose a large A1 sheet of paper so I wasn't limited in my mark making.
I made a happy accident when creating this drawing! After I'd completed it I realised I'm more interested in those lines which travel from the pot of ink/pva. I like how it shows my physical journey of moving around the page and the fluidity of the mark making. I've let the material loose on the page which almost has a life of it's own! I would like to further this explorative technique and see what happens. I cannot say where it will take me without experimenting and allowing the material to speak.
The most interesting part of my image are the explosions of line from the ink pot which bursts into it's own fragments. It's very much alive, dispersing out into the white expanse... attempting to get as far away from it's potted prison. I am more engaged with this part reflecting the physical process rather than the marks that represent the circuit board.
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Jackson Pollock in action!
http://pictify.com/242500/lee-krasner1908-1984-and-jackson-pollock1912-1956 |
I felt very Pollock-esq when making these drawings. His abstract-expressionist paintings are very important when speaking about art therapy in itself. One cannot ignore Pollock's volatile life, filled with alcoholism and bouts of alleged depression.
His art practice including his action paintings are very much that of action, energy and movement. This is something I long to suggest in my drawings. This is why I have decided to (after further exploration on this scale) to use a much larger boundary space.
I haven't decided whether this be a larger sheet or roll of paper or even a canvas. This is an issue I will address at a later stage. Pollock paints with not just his hand and paint brush but his entire body; this makes me think about art therapy in his use of full body art. The perhaps cathartic feeling he got from his paintings is an issue to ponder. His paintings seem like they can go on for an eternity if they weren't confined by the canvas walls, '...they have no apparent beginning, middle, or end. We feel they could go on forever.' (Kaprow, 2003 p.159)
I think my work has a touch of this... I feel like it could go on and on although it does have a quite obvious growth of energy stemming from the ink pot, unlike Pollock's work which has a kind of uniformed sense of chaos.
The sense of disorder is also of significant balance, 'the heated jabs, swipes, and flowing body movements that we read from the rich surfaces slowly neutralize one another and cool off. A calm stasis results, balance and sublime.' (Kaprow, 2003 p.159). I agree with what Kaprow is saying here, although there is a certain disorder to the works (as in my own) there is an evenhanded approach. The many gestures are equalised throughout the canvas. My drawing opposes this notion, I have taken on a more balanced composition in that there is a balance between negative and positive space rather than this uproar of paint vs gesture.
Was he creating these images as a reaction to his personal life? The way he expresses a huge sense of chaos and mess, playing with the boundary of the canvas. Pollocks use of the boundary makes me think of my clinical placement working with children... will my potential clients be pushing the boundaries of art making? Maybe Pollock was searching for boundaries by using art in this way.
Am I searching for the boundary in art? I am definitely trying to push them!
Pollock's drip paintings have no sense of boundary, expect that of the canvas of course. The paint itself isn't contained within any sort of pattern, system or conformity.
'The effect of energies in a state of becoming replaces the formalist's arrangements of poised, completed configurations... rejecting one set of formal elements and procedures, Pollock established another.' (Kaprow, 2003 p.159)
Bibliography
Kaprow, A (2003) Essays on the blurring of art and life: Expanded edition. London. University of California Press Ltd.
