Tag: collaborative

Design Process Reflective

Design Process Reflective

by turquoisecho ♥ 0 Leave a Comment

On the last Friday before half term, we were placed into groups and asked to research an assigned colour in order to put the Design Process into practice.

Our colour was gold, which was a pretty cool one! We separated ourselves into different tasks and reconvened about an hour later to brainstorm and see what ideas we liked.

We created two finished things: a large golden collage full of positive things associated with gold – that is, abundance, gold in nature, authenticity, holiness, etc.

I apologise for the quality of this picture. Usually I take a lot of pride in nice photographs, but this was sent to me by a teammate who was kind enough to stay behind and take pictures.

We also created a smaller cardboard box entirely collaged in gold as well, but dull and empty on the inside. This related to mankind’s hubris and greed in relation to gold. For example, King Midas suffering as he turned everything he touched into gold, or the Spanish Conquistadors committing mass murder in the pursuit of gold.

Unfortunately, I don’t have an image of this! The presentations ran over early and although I didn’t bail out and leave, I was running late for a train and booked it out of the campus before taking a picture. If I can grab it in the studios, I will attach a picture soon. However, it was more about the process than the finished result.

How did I find it? Well, team is a bit of a four letter word to me. I find working with other people to be very stressful and in a way this was no different. Often in a group and faced with a big task, people will flounder a little. I took charge and asked who wanted which task so everyone had a purpose. I also suggested the time to meet up again and discuss ideas, and time management for most of the afternoon. This is somewhat a coping mechanism for me, so I feel a little in control, but I continually worried that I was coming off too strong or bossy.

Was it purposeful? I want to say yes… any practice in collaboration is good practice. I get in my own head so often, I know collaboration is a good way to yank me out of it.

Chance and Sequence Reflective

Chance and Sequence Reflective

by turquoisecho ♥ 0 Leave a Comment

This project was all about creating fine and abstract art based on the laws of chance. We took part in four activities. I’ve detailed exactly what we did in my reflective journal, so I’ll just upload pictures and critically reflect here.

String drop felt like quite a silly activity. In reality, I like what I created with it a lot.

How could I take this further? I could use the activity of “dropping” paper shapes onto magazine images to select images and shapes to collage with. This would force me to randomly select textures rather than carefully cutting out images I found appealing. I thought that if I coloured in the spaces in blocks, it could create quite an appealing background to another illustration or drawing. I could simply repeat the exercise with grass, straw, leaves or other natural material.

This was geometric randomness. I don’t really like this as a piece of art on its own.

How could I take it further? I thought I could do this with more limited colours, e.g. blue, purple and pink, to create a random piece of art that was slightly more aesthetically pleasing.

This was the collaborative, instructional drawing. I had a blast actually doing this exercise. I’m getting to quite like letting go of control in collaborative exercises. (And I never thought I’d hear myself saying that!) Things happen that would never have happened if I’d worked on my own.

How can I take this further? I could collaborate again with friends – e-mailing or swapping drawings to work on for each other.

The conceptual emotional drawing was fun again, because I jump at any opportunity to introspect and write about what I’m feeling. I like the composition of this a lot, and the stricter colour scheme made me feel better from the earlier drawings.

How could I take this further? Well, I actually made Jamie complete an identical exercise that night. I have his art and I might turn it into a larger piece, so that they could exist in a series.

Finally, I created some random poems using dice and newspaper clippings which you can see in my sketchbook. These really were nonsensical at times… I don’t know why, but I suppose I thought I’d create something super edgy and deep! They were still fun. I might create a few for my reflective journal or put a twist on them for something fun to do.

I do hope I’ll do some more work related to chance, even if just a small aspect of something else. It’s nice to leave the thinking to the laws of physics and probability!