Aggie Zedd's Studio Visit April 10, 2013

 

What I took away from some of the ideas and the work Aggie Zed shared during our evening together:

   I like her philosophy about how she starts drawing…she  begins and feels free to fail to get failing out of the way.  The failing can free you to move forward. Her drawings and paintings resemble the form of her sculpture. Looking at her the drawings makes me question which came first the drawings, paintings or the sculptures.  Her drawings are muted but yet they have a rich color.  She draws very loosely and it gives the appearance that her ideas flow easily. She stands and uses her full arm to make loose strokes and marks while drawing and painting.  Dripping is fine and good.

   I enjoyed her idea of leaving open space purposely in her sculpture.  I enjoy the negative spaces that I see in the wire forms. I appreciate her sharing that she has used the wrong paper or materials when she was drawing or painting but that was okay.  One doesn’t need to be too stuffy about their work.

   I appreciated her critique of my work.  I need to put more of myself into my work.

“You work out of what you know, and in order to reach other people, you really have to work out of what you know." This is a quote  from an article in which  she was interviewed and this is essentially what she told me Wednesday night.

      Another excerpt and quote from the article-

“…But instead of calling herself a storyteller, Zed thinks of herself and her work as a catalyst. "I'm like the person who shows you one page of a story and lets you guess the rest. I see my paintings that way, like you're opening a book at one page, and hopefully you think there's a whole story there, and you'd like to know what it is," she says. "I think it's great to just come into the middle and be provoked to think about it." I can also relate this concept to my critique because I need to make art which one would want to look at and ask what’s the story.

Art Collected from FB Posts

Russ Warren Video (on generating ideas and samples of his work.)

The pieces I have chosen are  the ones that do not reflect his cubist Picasso influences.  These are more "Tim Burton" like. I like these creatures he has created.  They are whimsical but a little bit scary. I like the spindly,  gaunt, scary shadows. They create  a bold contrast with their black forms against the color backgrounds. They also create a crowd like feel in the paintings.

Russ Warren Talk on How to Generate Ideas 
Video. Helpful.

Visit to Les Yeux Du MOnde (Anne Chesnut) (March 2013)

Anne Chesnut. Ginny and Her Shadow from the series Canes Venatici, 2013.
digital print, image size 21.5 x 19.25 inches

Anne Chesnut. Car Caroli from the series Canes Venatici, 2013.
digital print, 21.5 x 19.25 inches

Anne Chesnut. Shoo Fly and Southern Fly, 2012.
digital print, image size 12 x 19 inches

Close ups of Chestnut's digital prints.  These prints are very large in real life.  I like the use of her maps, constellations,  and grids in her work.  Then she has images of animals, bees, and other natural objects layered in contrast to the linear influences of the maps, etc.  I wondered how these would look being straight out layered collage.  How would the element of texture affect the final result? (note maps are of Albemarle County Roads and neighborhoods)

Anne Chesnut at Les Yeux du Monde 

Little Work

Birch Plywood as substrate, blue Createx acrylic, gel transfer over white acrylic(too perfect), covered with gel medium and then attempt at Arabic script carved into gel medium while wet.  Acrylic washed over dried gel, wiped off. Gel pen and white charcoal drawn into markings to bring them out. (I will try painting over image then taking end of paint brush to draw script next time while wet. Used gel medium to achieve texture.)

Works in Progess. Trying to transcend materials.

 Birch plywood, stained with blue watercolor, transfer of graph paper, transfer of photo image.
Work in progress.  Working on transcending materials.  Too much like collage.  I am making images that are becoming too precious and I have not been transcending the materials because I am attached.  Must push forward.  I so like the texture so far.  I want to keep that going.

Work in progress.  I like the grain of the wood peaking through the watercolor.

 .

Work in progress.  Need to transcend collage feeling.

Work in progress.  Images collaged onto stained birch plywood. Too precious.  Work it Donna!

Beginning work. Birch plywood painted with Createx blue acrylic.  Area where figures are were painted with acrylic paint.

 

 

 Transfers applied over dry acrylic.  They were too perfect.  Had to distress and obfuscate images.

Work in progress.  Still too collage like ?...think so.

Completed week of March 27

 300 lb. paper , gel transfer graph of graph paper, gel transfer of photo images, white tissue, translucent paint, textures  created with various items into wet gel.

Birch plywood, gel transfer  of photo images, white tissue paper, translucent paint, gel imprinted with various items while wet.