St Clements ¦ Year 1 Level 4 Round Up

I forgot to upload these photos from my end of year exhibition in May. Transition was the collaborative effort from all in my class to respond to the site of St Clements Church and produce pieces which would then be exhibited there.

My collection was very loosely responsive to the site and focused more on my own personal side; through the use of self portraits and the predominant use of text I responded more to my own feelings towards the site. I started experimenting with mixed media portraits and the idea of including text in portraits. Specifically, how text works within a portrait and whether it adds or takes away meaning for the viewer. I also experimented with text within print and printed a series of words. I slowly progressed my project from the subject of identity to the subject of journeys; using my everyday life to reflect and produce work. Through the use of train tickets and maps I proceeded to print and draw on these. I experimented with different methods of printing by making paper stencils and using acrylic to print, printing on different backgrounds, using different mediums and using a traditional lino print machine. I feel that these prints are stronger than my painting pieces as they had a more cohesive layout that fed into my project, whereas the portraits painted seemed to get a little bit lost in the project.

I exhibited my work within the drawers to resemble the fact that I used Sylvia Plath's book 'The Bell Jar' as a basis for my print; the drawers then acted as pages from a book. As you would prise open each drawer as you would a book. My main reason for doing this was because when you lift text off of a page, some sentiment is lost as it is thrust into a new context, by placing it into this context but keeping alive the notion of surprise it allowed me to keep present the "idea" of a book. I feel this worked very well, although I did not see people interact with the piece, I think the notion is what was more important. The idea that a book (or drawer) is there, but you don't know it's contents is the key; if they wanted to read the text then they so could. My project is very much based on how intrigued the viewer is and relies on the viewer to complete the work. I initially had the idea for an interactive piece but I think I might save this for second year.

I think this exhibition demonstrates very well my ability to use text within work, whereas before I would never have thought of it. It also demonstrates that my paintings may not be as strong as I initially thought; yes, they may be bold but they are not strong when you think of the exhibition as a whole. But they did work well as a "leading" piece into the text, by gaining inquiry from the viewer, the idea was that they could then be interested to see what is in the drawers.