The Last By Hand Posting

I’ve been working on my final project still and unfortunately all of the pieces aren’t quite finished yet. As I’ve been mentioning, I wanted to create an Andy Warhol-esque compilation of silk screening attempts. I thought it would be interesting to put my own spin on his more familiar work.

For those of you that are not familiar with his work, Andy Warhol was a key figure and innovator of silk screening art and commercial art. A piece of work that people are most familiar with is the color-block portraits of Marilyn Monroe, with his Cambell’s Soup can a close second.

I’ve used his work as inspiration for my final By Hand Project attempt. I went through some old photos and decided that I wanted to silk screen a few of my favorite memories through images. I thought that this would be interesting because to anyone viewing the images that is simply the feeling that they evoke: images. But for me, these images represent very fond times in my life and make the ephemeral tangible through art. I very much liked this idea, especially since a portion of our class readings from earlier this semester discussed ephemeral art and the motivations of the artists. I liked that instead of creating something that could be washed away, or melted, or erased over time, that I am taken something that could be lost in its own sense and making it something more permanent. I think that my motivation for this final project is to create a physical memory that can be viewed and recounted. Each one of these photos represents a moment from my past and I can freshly recall everything that was happening at that time when I look at these photos. I think that this personal connection to my craft has made this project so meaningful.

In the beginning I think that I was focused more on the commercial/retail aspects of silk screening. Unfortunately, I found little pleasure in that work because the end result was not satisfying and the process just seemed monotonous. This final project, however, has been the most fun that I have had with this project all semester. I guess I was trying to take my project in a direction that it didn't want to go in. I'm very pleased that I decided to take another route with my final attempt.

The final pieces won’t be finished in time to post the completed project via my blog, but I will be bringing the final piece into our class for my presentation. Until then, I am posting some of the images that I am silk screening so that the final project will have something to be compared to. I altered these photos in Photoshop.

UPDATE: For some reason the website is having a difficult time uploading my images. I will keep trying but it isn't looking good for my photos :(

Still working

I am continuing on my final By Hand project that will be finished by the last blog posting. I am working with multiple screens to create a collage effect of images and colors. It is a long process that has taken even longer than I would like due to my other course work and having a job.

I’ve also decided that for my final project that I am going to pull out all of the stops. I want to incorporate a lot of color and just have fun with it. The screens take the longest to complete, with all of the printing, tracing, marking, and blocking out the negative spaces. I have a very busy work and school schedule this week so it is really going to be a challenge to get this project done.

I’m really looking forward to the end result though. It will be rewarding to complete something that is truly for myself. Wish me luck!

A Work in Progress

As I noted in my last blog post, I am a little unsure of where my project is going, but I am focusing on an end result: a culmination of what I have learned throughout this process. The process itself is so time consuming that it isn’t very rewarding to just create something for the purpose of creating something.

As I also mentioned in my last post, I am thinking of channeling some inspiration via the work of Andy Warhol. I’ve been playing with some images in Photoshop to see how I can get the best variation and contrast from the images. Instead of focusing on just one image, as I was thinking before, I thought it would be fun to use a variety of images and form them into a sort of collage effect.

What I am working on now is turning these images into screens so I can transfer them to a surface (the surface is still undecided at this point). I don’t want to work on a small scale either, as I have previously been doing. I think I want to use multiple screens of different colors and different images to create something that is not what silk screening is conventionally used for. This project will require a more artistic approach that will then be mixed with the crafting element.

I want to use a found object as a surface. Possibly something that no longer has a use for me and is just taking up space. Or maybe something that someone else has thrown out like a broken piece of a door? The possibilities are endless and I am looking forward to finally creating something that sums up my experience with this project and myself as a crafter.