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PRESENTATION - things to possibly stuff it with!

IPS: “I found myself blabbing about Poland for the past year and to everyone I meet”

- Your developed pictures + pictures from your iPhone - Notes from iPhone - DISCO POLO (Tarzan - Tarzan) + Mister Bialegostoku (both embedded videos) - MALUCH - change of idea - LOUIS THEROUX as a God of showing peculiar societies  - Write It! contributing with skills. Working with text will be useful (maybe some examples of best ones?) - CCCP Cookbook as a similar agenda - some drawings of existing idioms and why they are failing plus notes of idioms! (fav ones?) General - minute per image? From one bead to another, through the thread, possibly working on 7 different titles.

Write It: I think nope?

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Group Tutorial 26/01/17 (tears)

- Contextualising the irony. A thought. A quilt. A bed sheet, stitched on, draped. Illustrations curated. ‘The Railway is my home’ as a title. A1? 594 x 841 mm 3 book covers.  Strangeness of the images.  Is it banal, is it weird? Does the communicate the genre? Does it speak for itself? Image based thinking or experimenting with the media?  Thingies:  Robert Breer - stop animation.

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TASK LIST - SCARY.

- Write It - 3 book covers, quilt

- presentation - due for 07.02

- Commission - Readers and Writers Festival Illustrations, Polish Writers/Polish Themes Illustration and Kids & Moms Reading Illustration - - - Stockwell Together Research and ideas!

- B&W Now What Logo 

FAR FUTURE: - learn how to mono print - Now What laser cut badges (some were designed a little bit)

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Ideas for the commission. Rubbish scribbly post. To be edited.

- reader and a writer. Writer is writing, reader is reading and there’s connection between them. Black, sparkly (dotty) background. Moon. The link could be cut out pieces of old book (the one you bought with George). - Stockwell together - RESEARCH ABOUT ETHNICITIES - people chilling on pink, fluffy clouds, stereotypically, but not negatively representing different ethnicities?  - TEXTURES, TEXTURES, TEXTURES. 

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I’m lost! Okay, need a catch up here, let’s be quick! My life has just recovered from a turmoil, an art block after very unproductive, yet indulgent Christmas (Winter? After all, I spend a wholeness of 4 weeks being a sloth) Break and million and two other distractions coming along the way every single day. So! If I had to catch up with all of the notes I scribbled down in ancient manner in my ugly, chewed-up by the insides of my bag notebook, I would possibly not move on with my Write It Project (still need to do it), but let’s say:

I’M HAPPILY HEADING TOWARDS SOME KIND OF FINAL IDEA:

- meaning: fake book covers for fake book titles for The Railway library, containing puns and peculiarities from my ever lasting The Railway experience

So, I need to do lots of illustrations. I am free to go all over the place with my ideas

My IPS is crying, because it’s been alone for such a long time, but I’m slightly shifting off the initial idea, which is actually kind of exciting and perhaps a form of giving up the bigger picture - need to think about that in depth!

ALSO WHAT ABOUT THE POLISH IDIOM STUDIES, HUH? Completely detached myself from that. Need a help of a friend(s) to find out which ones have NO equivalent or much different use of metaphors/images/allusions to them. (I’m highlighting this as I feel guilty.)

I have a commission coming along, and that needs WORK WORK WORK (at least research and inspiration seeking in next couple of days). In a nutshell - literature, writers, readers, book, libraries, symbols of the writing/reading, technique decisions, first try outs to be TAKEN CARE OF.

Most recent, freshly baked illustration to give this post an image: An illustration for a cover of a science fiction book called A Portal to the Dark World - a Summertime Human Body Pickling Temperatures - by Melting Brains.

NOW ABOUT THE IMAGE FROM THE TOP: I think I’ll get a crit on that, so I’m not posting my own personal feedback. But it’s enjoyable and I’m surprised how much I feel comfortable with coming back to the digital means of creations, since the style I’m developing now is basically a digital collage - I’m cutting out shapes instead of drawing them, which doesn't require a graphic tables, gives it more of a nicely occurring randomness of a shape, let me reposition objects a thousand times and give me a million of colours to work with! Also, in previous try outs I started scanning the textures, which is also nice to work with. (THE VOCABULARY - SO ELOQUENT). Here I’m more plasticine. Let’s go back to creating.

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As I realised that next week I'm doing a market organised by Poles Connect, and despite the fact I already promised myself I'm giving up with bringing anything new, simply trying to sell out all of the printing (both digital and traditional) I made in past few decades satisfying enough to not feel shameful about, the barely breathing ambitious side of me spoke out loud saying - you need to produce something fresh, and unrelated to the any of your course work, so you can delay rest of your duties. Therefore I booked a laser cut appointment 24 hours before it was supposed to happen and unable to design anything new, I scavenged through my old projects and found a... cat. Alright. Let's do it. Fairly speaking, painting those little creatures gives me an ultimate pleasure and it is such a satisfying stress reliever, something I guess I need from time to time. What I've learned: me and laser cut machines are best buddies. I needed to get into the flow first, to be reminded by the technician what all of the weird buttons actually do, but once I set it, I watched, smiling, my little kittens being born. I cut some of my eyes too, knowing how well they did in the last, but they are not painted yet, and fairly speaking, they might just stay as they are. Photographs to follow. Does it contribute to anything at all? Yes! I guess. Today I painted some of the kittens in the shapes indendified with our future external show, and I'll donate them to be sold on the DIY Hackney Market so we can hopefully earn some money on them (pls). Future actions: I need a varnish - stupid me almost forgot that watercolours tend to smudge when presented to water (duh) so in order to make them durable for more than one day in rainy London, tomorrow I'm having a Homebase trip. And most of it all, they're supposed to be badges. They need a pin on the back! Hopes? For people to buy them so I can be rich. Joking. I'm an artistic spirit, I don't need money.

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Write It! Project - letterpress workshop 22/11/16

Please forgive me the quality of this video, it’s another snapchat video, made in a rather rushed manner, because the workshops lasted only for 2 hours - well, I could've come back after the lunch break, but then hey, I wouldn't be here - and I am already behind with the journal entries.

So, today we had a letterpress workshop which thank God I had a go at in the second year, otherwise the limited time we had today in the workshop would be completely consumed by being lost in the room full of typeface and pieces of metal of unknown purpose.

Having words prepared previously (they were supposed to be extracted from my text about The Railway) I just quickly grabbed the letters and based on my previous experiences I started laying the font out. My words were: SMART COOKIE and TINY BUGS. The first one a warm up and most of its visual impact depends on the colour of the paper I’ve chosen - and once again, it’s from my never ending pile of the origami paper, thank you, Amazon, four pounds plus postage (Prime has finished some time ago). The second one I am more happy about - as taking the literal meaning of the words TINY and BUGS, I laid out a tiny typeface (12pt) and some dots, representing the bugs. They look nice on a big square chunk of paper - just like real tiny bugs. I printed them on some scrap yellow paper too, wishing I had some more.

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Linocut 21/11/16

So, yesterday, despite all of the fire burning under my feet (meaning dissertation, barely touched IPS and a course project) I decided to go to the linocut print depot. Why?

Because I feel like I am not producing enough work, which is solid and to grasp on. I am bored of sketches on the origami paper. Time for a proper, old-school printing day. And as I keep things casual and truthful here - I was simply hangovered. I think I wasn't able to do much anyway.  But, not to be too free in my creating, I decided to take one of my Write It try outs and turn it into a print, so I could tell myself I am actually making any progress. Here is the original version:

And soon after I transfered the drawing onto the lino, I realised this is not an easy drawing to be cut out, especially if you haven’t eaten anything on the day and your hands are shaking with delirium tremens. 

Therefore I could’ve been at least sensible enough to start with less important parts of the lino to get a hold of the chisel but no - I started with the nose! And then I moved on to the mouth! Therefore there are bits and pieces of the lino which are not up to my standard. But after I while, I overcome my bodies reluctant reaction to the yesterday’s consumption of the alcohol, and here’s the negative with the first colour on:

I only managed to put two colours yesterday, which is good because too many layers would be to heavy to dry and the print could be forever sticky - I made that mistake before. The only reason why I haven’t done this mistake yesterday because a) I was slow and stupid yesterday so I did not have time to print the third colour on, b) Simon told me not to do it - but it’s a learning experience, eh?

And here’s my snapchat story, in which I tried to keep a track of the process. However commercial snapchat is, I like it as a short video reportage of the work I am doing on the day, which is quicker and better than making 314 photos and then having to spend 4 hours on choosing them and editing.  What I’ve learned:  Although I produced some linocuts back in the past, I realised, that my knowledge - was gone. I felt lost and I asked lots of basics questions. After that, I realised, it’s okay to be more confident and independent in the printing studio - I wasted time waiting for Simon to come and tell me what I knew already, but was too afraid to proceed on my own. But I had a full on revision on lino cut printing and now I can make more prints without tiptoeing around the depot.  How does it contribute to the Write It project?  It does not, apart from being another piece of work to stack on underneath the umbrella subject of The Railway. It did have a good impact on my own self though - as I got quite enthusiastic as the so far existing outcome, I know I want to print more!  ...and never do the dissertation again. But this is not good.  The end of the entry! 

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A bit of a display.

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Illustrations made on 16/11/16

Although liked yesterday, this drawing at the moment deserves to go to the bin. After a substantial amount spent on re-editing it in Photoshop, because I felt like it is not good enough, I still can’t develop any warm feeling for this piece of work. Which is shameful, because this is the house in which I spend most of my life.  What I’ve learned - that not all of the ideas might work and it is important to notice that a bit earlier, so the time is not wasted on producing a finished piece of work you want to set on fire after. On the other hand, I realised that juxtaposition of my real home and The Railway, slowly becoming a new one opens new questions and challenges. How does it contribute to the Write It project - as said before, it gave me a new strand of thought. I want to draw my real home somehow overlapping with The Railway.

Thanks God, I still like that one. Although I though depicting a bed as a symbol of homely token and a bit of intimate insight into my existence could be cliche, it somehow achieved both of the challenges stated above - as a bed is a place of a place where my head finally shuts down and the thinking stops, therefore a relieve and it is a very personal depiction of a part of my room. What I’ve learned - finally I got a grasp of how to create a mood and a choice of colour contributed to that a lot How does it contribute to the Write It project - it is one of the tokens. I need more tokens of my new home. I want this kind of intimacy and atmosphere to appear in the future creations.

A straight on study from the picture I made with my brick camera for 5 pounds. Drawn effortlessly, mindlessly - and although hated yesterday, today I think that the playfulness I reserved for drawing architecture and interiors (simply not finding copying detailed realities worth focusing on for longer than 20 minutes) works well - and Photoshop helped a little bit to give it more of an individual, functioning illustration character to it than looking plainly as a sketch.  Did I learn something new? Not really. The quality I developed for drawing interiors and architecture I obtained last year on letter press workshops I dedicated to Polish socialistic building.  How does it contribute to the Write It project - helped me understand the space of The Railway and might be helpful in future depictions of the interior. Apart from that - it does not contribute much.

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17/11/16 - just after the Short Future Workshops.

It is going to be very difficult to pin point the results of those workshops, as I think I am genuinely left with no hope for the future at the moment.  The ideas I have for my career as an illustrator are too vague. If they are anyhow more specific, they feel fake and unachievable.  I need to finally take the grasp of the reality and learn how the skills I got during my residency in Camberwell are going to contribute to paying my rent. I cannot die in The Railway, exhaling my last breath while pouring a pint.  What I need to learn/improve/find out about/make a decision about: - opportunities I could pin point down with a description and a name of a possible employer  - find out what I can actually do - my website - because it is just disgraceful - I need to book an appointment with Adamina Turek or/and talk to my dear friend Ola - business cards are at the moment a complete joke - they also need refurbishment - start seriously thinking about quitting The Railway, knowing that I’m too week to accept the changes and I get to love people too much (however it is still too early to actually take that step, I need to prepare myself mentally) - although it might sound unrelated to the subject - finally sort my mental health out - as it is a reocurring issue, often an obstacle in my self-development - make sure in whatever I am going to do from now on I dedicate myself fully - have hope, be positive and confident about myself Questions that need to be answered: Who do I really want to be? What is going to be the next step after graduating? What my assets are?  Who I can collaborate with?  Where I can find people to collaborate with? Utopian pep-talk to myself: Be open-minded. Listen. Look out for opportunities. Be dedicated. Be focused. Never stop learning. Never give up. Always do your best. Be humble, but be confident. Work hard.  The end of entry two.   

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16/11/16

Today I tried to focus on a dissertation and after doing a minimum extracted from a minimum - meaning just copying my own notes into a new document and reading about half an article -  I moved to the Write It project, knowing that this kind of procrastination from the humongous essay will not make me feel guilty for the rest of the day.  Today I produced 3 illustrations.  As I decided that my Write It project from now on will focus on The Railway becoming my home (and as I am reluctant to admit so), therefore my illustrations will circle around: the process of that - depictions of my room, as a surroundings which give me safety - objects associated with homely, fuzzy, warm feelings as according to myself, therefore very subjective - sentimentality - tokens of The Railway - over-flamboyant metaphors from the text extracted before (for now, least inspiring topic to follow) Knowing I like to work with a still image, shamelessly quite often taken from the first page of Google Images, I decided to work with the pictures I developed from my whale sized Kodak camera, as I knew many of them are dedicated to The Railway or my room, or the objects in my room. It’s been a second day when I am undergoing such experiments.  Today I produced: A depiction of the FAMILOK (German built workers house typical to Silesia) and the house I was living most of my life, being partly a sliced picture (with the shameful redness of the thumb put on the top of the lens cut out) and the rest drawn from the... Well, Google Images. Circling around - SENTIMENTALITY. Comparing the two homes - the real one and The Railway, a home in progress.  A study of my bed. As I decided before, I will try to work with shades of blue in my illustrations dedicated to this project, simply because The Railway is mostly blue both inside and outside, and I also painted my room blue, successfully filling it up with blue decor too. Circling around - HOMELY OBJECTS.  Bed is the place where I dream. Where I rest. Where I think about my real home. And where my new home has its centre. It was quite new to be so accurate in my drawing, as it is more of a study than interpretation, a long forgotten means of creation. And I flunked, quick study of the interior of The Railway itself. I did not learn much from that illustration, however it might be helpful in future try-outs of depicting the inside of The Railway. What I’ve learned:  I still can sketch and I’ll try to bring it to my practice a little bit more often, as it might be helpful in something I call layering lately in my head. Having not much time to produce in general in last two weeks, I am hungry for creating pieces of work which require more focus and attention, which grow organically as I create them - not only a one line drawings which are like fireworks - 10 minutes and all of the fun is gone.  I am a little bit lost - hoping on having more time for creating over next few weeks, I hope I’ll find the right path soon.  The end of entry one. I’ll try to follow it with some pictures. Tomorrow, I hope.  

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First entry - loose list of objectives and a promise.

Starting a journal! I know it’s late and uni has been on it’s full fire for some time now, but it’s better now that just before when I realise it’s actually required.  We are going to be straightforward here:  At the end of everyday spend in the studio I will be writing about: - what I’ve produced - what I’ve learned - and some reflections.  Let’s also stay flexible - ‘you’re free to change your mind’, as Mr Gore sings in Compulsion.  I need to start scanning my work on the go, and actually having this kind of a habit would be very good for my online presence.  Let’s start.