Gillian Wearing's Exhibition at WHITECHAPEL GALLERY

RESEARCH：
I tried to use mask to express my theme that related to the concealed emotion of modern people, but I did not find a new way to break the traditional form of mask. Here, I find that Gillian Wearing's masks artworks are very special and powerful to express the similar theme that refers to the personality and inside emotion.

Wearing questions how much we can determine about someone's personality by looking at a person's face and facial expressions. She makes a point to show that the face does indeed determine one's personality. The Truth of Masks, whereby he explains that the mask conceals, yet allows for more. In fact, one may be more truthful through the use of a disguise.Wearing exploits this idea in "Trauma", where she allows people to choose a mask and confess on video. Through the concealment of people's identities (with only the eyes showing), her subjects talk about things that they normally wouldn't. It is unnerving to see tragic and depressing stories told through dispassionate masks. At the same time, however, the mask is liberating in a sense, because it allows the people to say what they want, and not what others want them to say.

The ideas and sketch of my final show

I have done a lot of models for the development of my main peoject. Some of them I showed here, and some of them I did not showed in the blog. All the models were the process of the test and they were very helpful to extend the ideas. However, I want to develop the “building” one to carry on my final show in the future work.

There are two different ways that I try to test for realizing the models into a real space. The first idea is to draw the illustration of the buildings in a large papaer which about the size “2m*10m”. The roll of the papaer could be exhibited like the sketch. It can be seen that viewers can enter the large installation to feel the effect. In addition, another idea is to show the images of the buildings by projectors. There are some photos for testing, I am going to extend and develop the idea with more practices.

Indoor Clouds by Dutch artist Berndnaut Smildeas

Indoor Clouds was a work which I was really interested before, and now the picture of the design is exhibited at the Saatchi Gallery, but it is woeful that I never see the real installation so far. My project focus on how to use space or large installation to express the theme related citylife and urban emotion. So Berndnaut's work is very useful for me to think about the interaction between the simple sign and powerful effect in a space.

In this work, Berndnaut used a smoke machine, combined with moisture and dramatic lighting to create an indoor cloud effect. The few people who have seen the clouds in person would consider themselves very lucky. Each cloud only exists for a moment before dissipating. 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a3PxxEoW7ZA&feature=related

Site Specific Oil Installation at the Saatchi Gallery by Richard Wilson

Site Specific Oil Installation: 1987, used sump oil and steel, dimensions variable

Richard Wilson is one of Britain's most celebrated sculptors. He is known for his interventions in architectural space which draw heavily for their inspiration from the worlds of engineering and construction and are characterised by concerns with size and structural daring.

Here, he show a large installation at the Saatchi Gallery. I have been to the gallery several times, and I went to see this oil pot every time. We know that water always express the meaning of 'quiet' and 'static', but Richard Wilson make people feel motionless by the uesd sump oil. The space make me chokey, static and quiet and it is also attract me by the daring structural of the space.

John Stezaker

When we had the tutorial or workshop in class, tutors often mentioned the artist John Stezaker. This time we have chance to see his amazing collage works at the Saatchi Gallery. It is really different to see the real one bot only google the images in the internet. I was surprised with the exact connection of different images and the illusion of the collages.

The exhibition introducted that Stezaker focuses on the concept of portraiture, both as art historical genre and public identity. Using publicity shots of classic film stars, Stezaker splices and overlaps famous faces, creating hybrid ‘icons’ that dissociate the familiar to create sensations of the uncanny. Coupling male and female identity into unified characters, Stezaker points to a disjointed harmony, where the irreconciliation of difference both complements and detracts from the whole. In his correlated images, personalities (and our idealisations of them) become ancillary and empty, rendered abject through their magnified flaws and struggle for visual dominance.

When I did my former project "Lost in life", tutor suggested me to see John Stezaker's work. At that time, I researched a lot of his collages, expecially the portrait works. When he changed a part of a portrait, used another person's head or building and landscape to replace, it looks like missing emotion of a person and someone lost something in life. That is related to my theme and it is useful to do more research.

Sketch，ideas

Signs and Shapes in Hong Kong

I took those photos in the easter break in Hong Kong. I am interested in the signs on the road. There are a lot of yellow lines, and the color and thickness are very strong. Just like the simple shapes show a powerful vision. On the other hand, it also show an image of the city .

Sketch，ideas

Here, I kept doing my models and tried to test more expressions. This idea refered to the meaning of cage. I wanted to express that urban people’s life looked like an illusory cageling. It can be said that there are a lot of constraints in the stressful urban life. People feel unfree and chokey.

Just Sketch, Just Inspiration

Lost something...

"Brain Activity Exhibition" by David Shrigley at the Hayward Gallery

We visited the Hayward Gallery, and saw an amazing exhibition that is David Shrigley' work. Brain Activity is Shrigley’s first major survey exhibition in the UK and covers the full range of his work, extending beyond his drawings to include photography, taxidermy, sculpture, animation, painting, and music. In addition, Shrigley presents a number of new works created especially for Hayward Gallery, all of which are characterised by their varied use of humour and his abiding impulse to ‘communicate as simply and directly as possible’.

He is best known for his humorous drawings that make witty, wry and sometimes dark observations on everyday life. His deliberately crude graphic style has an immediate and accessible appeal, while simultaneously offering insightful commentary on the absurdities of human relationships. This part is really helpful for me, because my project is also about the real emotion of human and refers to research the new form to express it.

Shrigley's artwork engages our brains as much as it excites our sense of humour. There are a lot of objects and space design attracted me and give me inspiration to do my work.


http://www.davidshrigley.com/

http://ticketing.southbankcentre.co.uk/find/hayward-gallery-and-visual-arts/other-art-on-site/tickets/david-shrigley-brain-activity-61752



David Hockney's big picture at RCA

David Hockney is an English painter, draughtsman, printmaker, stage designer and photographer, who is based in Bridlington, Yorkshire and Kensington, London. An important contributor to the Pop art movement of the 1960s, he is considered one of the most influential British artists of the twentieth century.

I visited RCA and saw his exhibition. It is a really hot exhibition in London, and we waited in the queue for almost 2 hours. After the visiting, I just want to sey it is worthy for waiting such a long time, because it is really nice exhibition, which was a big visual journey. Such the amazing colours!

I like the video work very much, it had the very happy tempo and light vision, that the music, dance and colours had a nice connection and interactions. In addition, he put a lot of screens together and made up it as a whole video work. That inspire me a lot about the form the a video and the way of expression.

http://www.hockneypictures.com/

JUST SKETCH

The ideas, sketch of "human mask"

Street Graffiti at Old Vic Tunnels

The amazing street graffiti at old Vic Tunnels.

Street Culture in London

I think London is an amazing city that full of nice street cultures. Here, some photoes i took at the different streets in London, which inspired me and attracted me too much. The free forms of collage and drawing, really funny!