henryharveydandp

[henryharveydandp]

Evaluative Statement

- THERE IS A VERSION WITH IMAGES IN THE POST BELOW -

Henry Harvey D&P Level 2 Professional Practice Evaluative Statement

Throughout this year, my understanding of my work and the professional context which it is situated in has expanded massively. I have found many of the sessions in this module influential and helpful in identifying a possible pathway for my future. I wouldn’t have been able to formulate well-informed career path choices without engaging with the sessions and the things I learned from them, especially Tessa’s professional practice workshop series.

 This series of workshops helped me better understand the process of applying for jobs, how to find the jobs best suited to my skills and how to prepare for an interview. They also helped me to figure out a few pathways for my future by approaching the task from a different angle to what I have tried before. I found it helpful to look back and determine what my core values are and what else I find important in my life, before trying to figure out a career path. For me, this was making time for my friends and family and my other creative outlets, such as music. Approaching the task this way was not only easier, but allowed me to make informed decisions based on what I know I’m good at, whilst making room for other important areas of my life.

 Having always struggled with reading and writing and after being influenced by artist talks and the PP workshops, I concluded that working as a technician in a school or college or working in a print studio helping artists edition their prints is something I would enjoy doing as a job. I always considered struggling academically to be a big set back in my employability, but after exploring other options with Tessa, I realised I was just looking down the wrong career path for myself. Because of my ADHD, I struggle with slow or passive jobs and I get easily distracted. Either of these career paths is suited to this because they are fast-paced and constantly evolving hands-on jobs. Not only would I enjoy these jobs professionally, but I also think both of these jobs would benefit me in my practice as an Artist because I would be around creative people all day, constantly helping others explore the most effective way to make their ideas happen. Being around new ideas all the time will naturally feed into my creative process and I think the experience would be similar to working in the studios at the Arnolfini. These Jobs would also provide access to printmaking facilities which I could use for my work.

 A life goal I Identified in the PP workshops was to become a specialist in a skill. This was something Catherine Ade showed to have done in her Artist talk. Before this talk, continuing in art education post-grad wasn’t something I was considering, but seeing how specialising in Lithography and going on to do a specialist degree course has benefited her career in printmaking opened my eyes to the possibilities continuing with education could open up for me. Having such specialist knowledge, It was clear from her work that she was specific when choosing a process, ensuring that the visual qualities associated with each process matched her intentions for the piece. This is something I feel is crucial to my practice and continuing with education would not only better inform me on process, but also open the door to my potential career choices. Catherine’s talk was also what inspired me to learn more about lithography. Although this is a practical skill, I think understanding the potential of a process in important when trying to place my work in a wider professional context. After my degree, I am now considering applying for the Royal Drawing School or a specialist printing MA.

 A key exhibition this year was John Walker at the Ikon Gallery in Birmingham. Whilst the artwork itself wasn’t necessarily to my taste, I found his approach to process interesting. Walkers’ work was minimal and his marks were carefully considered. When I am painting, I tend to overcrowd the space which squashes the colour and takes attention away from the important areas of the piece. What I really appreciated about Walkers’ work, and have since adopted into my practice, was his appreciation for space. Having value for intentional areas of less detail gives the colours and marks room to breath, resulting in more powerful artwork which was especially clear in Walkers’ larger paintings. The inspiration behind his work is the world around him and how he fits into it and I think his use of scale clearly shows this. The work conveyed a sense of discovery and exploration, especially through repetition of key shapes and the enormous scale of his paintings. Since this exhibition and seeing works on such a large scale, I have had a much greater understanding of the relationship between scale and the reading of an artwork. I think this is clear from the way I have varied the size of my works per the intended meaning.  

In my blog, I said that when looking for a studio space the most important thing for me was a big wall space. Upon further reflection and taking into consideration the current changes in my practice because of the coronavirus, I have realised that the most important thing for me in a studio space is to share it with other artists. Whilst it is still crucial to have adequate space to paint on and make my art, I am struggling to keep up the momentum of my work without being in a supportive creative setting. Despite always being reminded by creatives no longer in education, I never appreciated the value of being surrounded by other artists and the support that comes with that. A few people I would love to share a studio space with post-grad would be Marie and Beth Goodwin. Marie and I discussed the possibility of renting a studio space over the summer to keep momentum in our work and give ourselves the best chance for success in the last year of our degree. Although this isn’t looking possible at the moment, I think the three of us are an excellent match for sharing a studio. We regularly discuss our work with one another and provide alternative views on creative decisions being considered. These two people have pushed me creatively as an artist and despite previously being terrified about trying to find my place in the world as an artist, the thought of continuing to work with them after my degree makes me excited for this challenge.

[henryharveydandp]

LINK TO EVALUATIVE STATEMENT WITH PICTURES

You can’t upload documents to tumblr so I have attatched a dropbox link to a pdf version with images included below.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/17poo6339eqxyeq/PP2.pdf?dl=0

[henryharveydandp]

Pieces submitted

Initially I only planed to submit one piece, but after reading into the Aesthetica art prize and looking through the application form, I felt it was encouraged to enter more than one piece. Athough the two pieces I submitted work well together, upon reflection I wish I had only submited the landscape one. When the paintings are together they contextualise each other which removes the ambiguity. This is something I really enjoyed about the work in this project because, although they are quite dark and personal, other people find them beautiful and I find the contrast between the intended meaning and the reading of the work interesting.

When selecting the work, It was clear that I don’t give much consideration to the presentation of my work. The application form asked to specify any displaying requirements for the pieces, which I dont have. Although this isnt necessarily a bad thing, I feel like the majority of my work isn’t “exhibition ready” because it has wonky edges or messy borders. This is something that I need to start including in my studio practice.

[henryharveydandp]

The two pieces I applied for the Aesthetica art prize with.

[henryharveydandp]

Filling in the application form

When I started filling in the form, I immediately realised that I wasn’t prepared to start intergrating my art into a professional context and setting. The application form asked for links to various artists’ social media platforms, including Facebook, Twitter and Instagram as well as a website. Although I did attend the Weebly workshop, my website has very little information on it and even fewer pictures of my work, past or present.

As someone who doesn’t use social media in the digital age, I am starting to notice the draw backs of not having an online presence. In this situation, It would have allowed the applications team to have learned more about my process, ethos as an artist and contextualise my work.

Since starting the application, I have made an Artists Instagram account to showcase my music and art. When it comes to getting your work out there, I think instagram is the best platform because it is visual and interactive. Although I strongly believe that unless it is a digital piece, art needs to viewed in person, having some point of reference for my work online will make it easier for me to continue applying for competitions and prizes next year. This was a big step to start taking action with professional practice. In previous blog posts, I have been making plans for my future but this was an active step in the transitoin from student to professional.

Other steps I could take include:

Properly photographing all of my art from my first two years of my degree

Updating the information on my website and adding the photos, organised by project

Making a Facebook account

Linking my social media platforms and my website so that they are accessible from within each other.

Keep note of the dimensions of each piece

[henryharveydandp]

Aesthetica Art Prize

I chose to apply for the Aesthetica Art Prize because of the openness of the rules and criteria for entry. Although the website states there is a specific interest for works based on the ever changing world, any genre, process or theme was welcomed for entry. Both of these things attracted me to the competition because I wanted the oppertunity to showcase my current work instead of having to make other artworks seperate from my project. A lot of the other competitions I looked into were too narrow with their entry requirements, asking for a specified outcome depicting an appointed theme so the Aesthetica art prize seemed a natural choice for me.

[henryharveydandp]

A photocopy of 2 pieces of work I found particularly inspirational from Richard Daveys’ talk on Anthony Whishaw from the book Anthony Wishaw: Works on Paper

Top: Kissing, 2004

Bottom: Urban Flood iii, 2004-2008

[henryharveydandp]

Richard Davey on Anthony Wishaw

Richard davey is a writer on art from Nottingham Trent University. He came in and delivered a thought provoking talk on his most recent book on Anthony Whishaw entitled Works on Paper.

A comon theme of the talk was the difference between a painting and a drawing, especially focused on the question “can a painting be a drawing?”  It’s clear that this was a long conversation between Davey and Whishaw through the title of the book. When approached about writing a book about his drawings, Whishwaw was reluctant because he felt them insignificant to his practice. By calling the book works on paper the oppertunity to include many works that Whishaw considered paintings was opened up.

This question is something I have thought a lot about since this talk and was an interesting topic of discussion among my coursemates with almost everyone having a different interpretation and opinion on the matter. For me, irrelavent of material, definition or process, a painting is simply something that I can not draw from reference or memory becuase it has no physical representation. By this interpretation, I believe that a painting can be and often is a drawing and I refer to a lot of my paintings in conversation as drawings. 

Something I found fascinating which justified and validated my current work flow was that Whishaw’s drawings are from memory or imagination. Seeing and hearing this gave me the confidence to take on a project about feelings that I would have been too scared to do otherwise becasue of a lack of physical reference material. Regardless if it’s from imagination or memory, the fact that there is nothing visual to look at for reference makes it more challenging to draw and requires a greater visual understanding of what you’re drawing. It was clear from his work that Whishaw understands line and what he is drawing. Most of his drawings were very free, being playful and expressive with the lines with only one or two key lines tying them together, allowing the drawing to be interpreted as what it represented.

Davey spoke about the functionality of different processes. We looked at Rembrandts’ work in response to John Constable’s cloud studdies. His etchings were used to explore what he saw and his paintings were more solid, showing an understanding of his thoughts. The note I made just says “allowing the materials to explore.” Choice of material using work to inform what to do next is something that I now consider fundemental to my practice, as discussed in the previous blog post.

Whishaw did a multiple works exploring a water which I found fascinating. At the time of this talk, I was still considering which direction to take my project and some of the imagery I saw in these works helped consolidate my thoughts in my head. It was one of those lightbulb moments where you see something and then it clicks. What I needed to understand before undertaking my project idea was what a sense or normailty would look like - how to depict nothing happening with no imagery, just the sense opperating with an empty mind. Seeing how Whisaw had interpreted the water and the marks on the water took me back to the last project I did about water which, despite me not feeling the project was successful, was the perfect source of this feeling. It’s moments like this where the importance of visual research is empasised to me and I consider this kind of primary research to be far more powerful and moving than any form of secondary research could ever be.

I found the more meta works to be so powerful and different to anything I have seen before in the way they were explored. To fully understand an artwork it has to be seen in person so I had tickets booked to go to this exhibition in London on the 20th of March, however due to the coronavirus situation, this obviously didn’t happen.

[henryharveydandp]

A change in print

Through exploring new processes this year, my thinking and ethos on printmaking has changed. I think this is a natural extension from the shift in how I have been exploring my ideas.

In first year, I was imediately drawn to dry-point and intaglio printing processes for the quality of line of produced, the dark, graphic quality of the print and the texture of the paper after printing. All of this was perfectly suited to my ideas at the time, exploring beauty in destruction. For me, etching captured perfectly what I saw as well as what I felt, in a similar way that charcoal is an emotive medium, but etching has a crisp clarity to the final product that isn’t generally associated with charcoal.

This year and especially in this most recent project, moving away from external observation, as well as the discovery of lithography, has shifted my approach to printmaking. having never done lithography before this year because of the snow last year, this was my first time exploring it. Instantly I was drawn to the process for its advantages over dry-point; capturing graphic and expressive lines, but in a painterly fashion. Instead of being limited by the matierial like I often found with dry-point, lithography is an imediate extension of the drawing and because it isn’t an intaglio process, the paper is still flat after printing, a quality which with my current working style I am really enjoying. As I have been working with paint more, I have been exploring the impact of large expanses of  flat colour and the way in which they respond to one another, exploring the conversation between them and how this is affected by the addition of other colours. As a result of this, Lithography has become a natural extension of painting for the smoothness that can be achieved in the colour as well as its ability to produce tonal variation. The combination of this with graphic line work and marks that can be made have, for now, firmly rooted lithography as the final step in my work flow, the final outcome.

With the current theme of my work and the importance of boundary within my painting, using litho as a way of prodicing a final work seems to be the best and most effective way. Scale is important and whilst paintings can be much larger and engrossing, I have found that scaling down and concerntarating the work into a smaller space doesn’t negatively impact the way the work is read. Having to view a smaller work closer gives the ability to view the whole piece in the same glance which keeps the balance of colour and markmaking across the piece clear. With printmaking, the sense of boundary is strong and integral to the reading of the work and the clarity makes the meaning behind the work absolute and easy to interpret.

With the current situation lithography is out of the question, so whilst I can’t continue this way of working I have found this whole experience powerful and motivating. Material and process have always been important to my practice and these choices show my awareness and understanding of the context of my work as well as a respect for letting the meaning of the work take control of the choices, ensuring my intentions are represented clearly.

[henryharveydandp]

Royal Drawign School

A couple of students from the Royal Drawing School came in to give a talk about the postgrad drawing course they offer on a scholarship.

The course supports students who still want to explore drawing within practice. I consider myself to be a drawer, so this is something that really interests me and I am considering applying for after third year. A lot of my work this year has been less literal and more feeling based or representational of something that is invisible, and as a result, I feel I have lost out on a lot of drawing in the traditional sense of the word. Drawing underpins my practice and I find the thought of continuing to learn for another year exciting. Studying in London for a degree course isn’t nescesarilly the best choice because classes are too big and you would’t get the same contact time as a course based anywhere else in the country, however for a postgrad course I think it would be a good idea. London is the artistic capital and there are oppertunitues there that just aren’t available in Bristol. Even this year, I have found that if I am looking for exhibitions, I will have to travel to London most of the time. For a course which aims to allow drawing to evolve in the contemporary art world, I can’t think of a better place to be based. Thinking about life after this course, the industry connections of the school and the people that I could meet whilst studying there would be a great oppertunity to find jobs within the creative industry.

The way the course opperates sounds suited to my learning style. They offer skills based teaching and as someone who struggles with being sat down and listening for too long with nothing to do, this sounds really good. The course sounds full on but flexible, with a choice of 3.5 to 5 days a week and at least 21 hours of teaching time each week. This also sounds suited to me because I need to be engaged with a project to be able to keep the momentum. This is something that has become particularly clear with the current coronavirus situation and the inability to use the studio that comes with it.

The biggest attraction for me is that there is no written component to the course. Currently, I find myself beyond frustrated with the written components of my degree. As a creative, my skills in academic writing are somewhat lacking and have always held my grades back back because I always end up getting a low mark in the written modules, bringing my overall grade down. As much as I understand that a degree is an academic qualification, which means there has to be an element of written assessment, It’s still frustrating when it seems to be irrelevant to my progression and detract from the time I could be spending on my project. In the real world as an artist, the only writing that is essential is descriptive, for writing abou myself of a piece of work or reflecting on the work completed in a project and this course seems to be more in line with life as a practicing artist.

The main modules of the course are:

Drawing in the studio

life drawing

drawing the unexpected

the studio room in colour

drawing the body clothed

drawing the head

Drawing from art

dawing in the national gallery

drawing in museums

Drawing London

London by night

drawing on the Thames

drawing a pathway through London

Studying 1 painting in the national gallery for 5 weeks and making work based on it

Drawing Londons rivers

For me this seems a perfect mix. A balance of studio based drawing and making studies out in the landscape or city is important and I know from experience that I tend to do most of my drawing in the studio. Something that I find particularly exciting, that I could start considering now is studying one painting for 5 weeks and making work based on it. I am acutely aware that for me to stay interested, I have to move relatively quickly when it comes to exploring ideas and as a result, there is often much more that could be explored and discovered on any given theme I am looking in to. I can see how following a sustained investigation would benefit my progression as an artist.

There was also emphasis on drawing from imagination and using print as an extension of drawing which i find exciting. I find working in different ways really important to the progression of a body of work and it’s encouraging to see they share a similar ethos on printmaking.

If I was to be accepted onto this course, I think it would act as both a transition year between university and life as an artist, and a continued form of learning.

[henryharveydandp]

Creatives into business - Tessa Webb

Tessa ran a series of workshops which helped me identify what sort of job would suit me, helped prepare me for job interviews and gave me an insight into how to run a buisness as an artist.

Up until these workshops, I have never thought about how to sell artwork, should I chose to start doing so. It was also good to hear some advise for how to manage your money and pay taxes as a self employed person. Some of the advice Tessa gave which I found helpful or hadn’t considered before was about factoring in the time spent looking for work when calculating a cost. Although this seems self explanatory and obvious, I always overlook the amount of time it can take to find work when setling on a price. Another great piece of advice for someone considering working self emplyed was to put away a third of all money for taxes becasue it’s easy to get caught short.

Thinking about preparing for an interview, these workshops showed me how to breakdown a job description to find out if it would be worth my time applying to. Looking at a job description, I can now break it down by looking at the specifications and, using the information on Tessa’s handout from the workshop, identify where I have the relevant skills, experience or qualification to back up the requirement. The final section on the sheet, which I havent considered when applying for jobs before, is stating how the previous experience, skill or qualification can be beneficial to the company. Having this kind of information prepared before an interview ensures you seem prepared and most importantly shows commitment and confidence, two key skills when looking at a list of applicants post interview.

I have always struggled with reading, which I now know is down to having ADHD and dyslexia and thought this to be a major setback in my employability. After a section of the workshop identifying which career paths would be most suited to me, I feel more confident with struggling with reading becasue I can take a career that is more hands on. I identified two main career paths based on my current passions, skill set and core values, which were a musician and a chef.

[henryharveydandp]

Student-led Group Crits

Studio practice is an integral part of an art degree and after a while of many people not coming in to use the studio space and feeling lonely in the studio, Myself and Beth Goodwin decided to put on group crit sesions. The sesions were informal and above all encouraged people to come in for a catch up with their peers. Although the advice given in tutorials is great, sometimes all you need is something as simple as saying an idea out loud to be sure of yourself or understand how to approach it, this was the idea behind the sessions. I found it really beneficial to have this kind of creative conversation with my peers because, not only did I get a broad range of ideas and advice in relation to my own work, but I also got to hear what everyone else was working on and the advice they were given by our peers. Working in a big studio space, It’s clear the subtle influences we all have on others’ work and sharing in a big group was good because it was a more direct source of ideas. Not stealing other peoples topics, but when listening to how everyone was tackling issues creativesly within their work, often a solution to my own problems would pop up. A good example of this would be my use of colour. In the first semester, A lot of my paintings were very simple and minimal and i’d often find myself in a position where the piece was finished but needed a different colour in a specific area to tie everything together. In this situation, I had ideas as to what colours I could use, in this example it was a pale blue painting and I was contemplating a barbie pink patch. After hearing other people talk about how they read the painting as it was and hearing a few different colour suggestions, I was confident that the colour I had chosen was the right choice.

we only managed a few of these crits before Beth moved to Belgium on erasmus, and seeing as she is the power house and driving force behind the second years, I haven’t kept up with running the sessions. Recently I have been talking with Joe about restarting the sessions in third year. Something we both miss from first years was is the drawing workshops run by Lucy where we would do an excercise unrelated to our projects. This would keep making art fun as its very easy to get cornered in your own projects. An idea we had was taking it in turns once a week between those who want to to lead a workshop of some descript for 20 minutes or so befoer a group crit. A lot of people are considering going in to teaching and for those who arent, developing your presentation skills isn’t a bad thing regardless.

Thinking about life postgrad, I think getting into a habit of sharing once a week is a good practice to keep up. I like the idea of working in a shared space and sharing ideas with others once a week ensures that I set my self achievable goals every week and also gives me new ideas, Both things that will keep my work moving forwards. I also really enjoyed setting the session up and giving other people feedback so I think I would be good at running workshops in the future.

[henryharveydandp]

Alumni Talks - Where are you now?

Listening to past Drawing and Print students talk about their routes into the creative industries was probably the most important contextual learning experience for me this year. Previously, I have found it challenging to think of life as a postgraduate artist because I find the uncertainty and unpredictability of the trade a scary thing to consider and I don’t like thinking about how I might be struggling for money in the future. Since the talk, my outlook on life as an artist has changed completely and I am excited by the challenges of living as an artist. Money The first point that I really took on board was how most people don’t have art as their primary income, at least to start off with. Almost everyone who spoke had a non creative job as their main source of income, apart form those doing applied art jobs, like art therapy. Something someone said that really stuck with me was that it was easier to do a job that doesn’t require too much brain power, like working in a call centre, so you still have energy and motivation to make art when you come home. This isn’t something I would have considered without being told because I really enjoy active and busy jobs, like working as a waiter or on a bar, but they do leave me tired and unmotivated to do anything else when I finish work. Taking this into consideration, I think this is a really valuable piece of advice fore me to consider when I start looking for a job that will completely support me financially after my degree. I think age is a big factor in financial stability as well, if you’re married and your parter has a high earning job or you have money saved from working for many years before your degree, you probably won’t need to work to fund your projects, whereas younger graduates, like myself, are often broke coming out of university and need to work to support their creative projects. A lot of students said they ran workshops. Although they aren’t a reliable or very frequent you can still charge a good price per head and make a good amount of money in a short amount of time. Because workshops are often short, they are a great way to support yourself with on the weekends or evenings, alongside working. Another creative way of funding yourself is making small things that are desirable or practical to buy, like mugs, posters, postcards and prints. Relationships Another point a lot of people made in one way or another, is the importance of both coming into the studio every day and maintaining good relationships with course mates as they are often to people you should look to first when looking to rent studio spaces. A great thing to think about when looking for a studio is what you need from the space. I work big and on the walls, so when I look for a studio space, I will need to find somewhere with big walls and enough space in front of them to step back and view the work as a whole. Something I hadn’t considered is how people go in different directions postgrad and if I stay in contact, I’ll have connections within a broad range of areas to support myself with whatever pops up. A piece of advice that would be really helpful to me is to try and start or become part of a collective. Something that a lot of people missed was having other artists in close proximity to discuss their ideas with. This year, especially since this talk, I have started being stricter with my studio practice, I try to come in everyday and talk about my work with other people regularly to keep my ideas open and more importantly, build a support network I can use in the real world. Context within the work Something I do a lot is only drawing a section of detail and leaving the rest of the space blank. This looks good in a sketchbook but I hadn’t really considered the draw backs of this if I wanted to present them in a show or to use them to inform future works. Often artists leave time between working on things which doesn’t really apply to me now as a student, because all of the projects are time sensitive and have clear deadlines, but going forwards I can see the importance of clearly documenting my ides at the time. Competitions Another thing I was unsure about trying to ‘make it’ as an artist was how to raise your profile and make people aware of my work. This is where competitions come in. Not only does winning a competition often come with a sum of prize money, which is a great way to fund projects and materials that would be too expensive otherwise (someone bought a kiln), they also offer the opportunity to have your work recognised within the industry. I haven’t entered a competition before because I never feel satisfied with the work I make, but I know this is a common thing and I should just go for it anyway. The best advice for entering competitions was to make sure that it is relevant/specific to my work flow or media  and to milk it if I win. After winning an award it’s good to try and get interviews or articles off the back of it to keep raising your profile and stay in the loop with whats next for you.

TOP TIPS Rinse UWE’s facilities whilst you still can! Come in everyday Take good photos of your work Enter competitions Use UWE enterprise office resources Use the Tutors Be part of a collective