Crit#2, @Central Saint Martins, 5 December 2008
December 5th, Central Saint Martins
GRADUATE, BA FINE ART, CHELSEA COLLEGE OF ART
My interests lay in Psychoanalysis and Art, and whilst on this inquiry, I was made aware of the associated connotations derived through myth and legend of the female sex being both a threat and means of fear, to man. Alias the virgina dantata. The contributions of Freud and such like have evidently upheld these beliefs and therefore given rise to their being carried through to present day.
Rather than challenge this point I wanted to run with it, and make my own contribution towards the representation of the female sex and in doing so, primarily make note of the responses of the viewer to the work. My aim was to make an independent piece that emphasised the subject in it’s own right.
GRADUATE, PGCert PHOTOGRAPHY, CENTRAL SAINT MARTINS
Based on Aldous Huxley’s “The Art of Seeing”, I have been engaging in a process of re-education to enhance/restore my vision. I’ve based my new series of images specifically on Huxley’s notion of vision being in three stages: sensing, selecting and perceiving.
I’ve been engaging in a process of unlearning old habits of vision and in a sense working backwards from having clear and perceptive vision to now mainly choosing not to wear glasses and beginning a process of learning to see anew.
These images reflect the start of this process – in which I am moving from a place of clearer (aided vision) to one of slightly less clear, yet independent vision. These images are concerned mainly with the sensing stage of vision, and some move into the selecting stage. I envisage the images will move between the stages as my vision changes.
FIRST YEAR, BA FINE ART, SLADE SCHOOL OF ART
There’s a lot about life that we take for granted. That our hearts beat, that we breathe, that with our eyes we see some light wavelengths and not others. And rightfully so, because the world is so loaded with information, that were our brains to try and absorb everything we possibly could, we’d be lamed and uselessly overloaded. You could spend all day processing the information made by your own body in one minute, because we have automatic systems that handle 99% of what goes on in our bodies, we don’t have to. Because our brains are such efficient filters, when someone reveals one of our hidden mechanisms to us, it can feel like uncovering a magician’s secret.
SECOND YEAR, BA FINE ART, SLADE SCHOOL OF ART
Paint is at the heart of my artistic practice. My work is the residue of deep engagement and deliberations with oil paint, but also most crucially my unabashed pleasure when working with it. My paintings are very essentially human; of interpretations and traces of archetypal human forms or the (sometimes unconscious) spaces they inhabit. I am deeply interested in the proportions, dynamism and physicality of the human figure, its capacity to speak, to emote. The corporeal nature of the work reflects my physical and emotional dialogue with the canvas as I confront and then assault it in spontaneous bursts.
I will present selected works painted over the last three months, which reflect the current position of my developing artistic practice and the issues I have to grapple with as a contemporary figurative painter.
GRADUATE, PGCERT PHOTOGRAPHY, CENTRAL SAINT MARTINS
Natalia’s works are concerned with a broad range of concepts portrayed through photography, the search for truth and understanding in the world around, studying not only formal constructions in architecture and the landscape, but looking at psychological states of objects and individuals, and, in the work entitled Set Loose, the broader issue of the environment in relation to globalisation and urban waste. These works contain strong elements of experimentation and a novel manipulation of the medium of photography.
SECOND YEAR, BA ART PRACTICE, GOLDSMITHS, UNIVERSITY OF LONDON
Luis is confused about everything, like he’s certain that his name is pronounced Lewis, but uncertain of which name to present himself as, Rodriguez? Luisignacio? Natxo?
And yet from this primeval confusion different animals evolve, fighting to wrest control from his hands, growing, resting, hiding, screaming to the rooftops. He definitely believes that the artist can and will create a zoo, not a pen.
Stubbornly reserving the right to change his mind, he will discuss unprompted, and advise unasked; secretly hoping someone will build him up or tear him down, with a question, or a word. Today, he is hoping you will. He will be presenting Phase One of the Art Space Project.