1st Semester Assessment Post

Throughout this past semester, my working practise has focused around painting, drawing and other 2D works. Towards the end of the semester, I started to venture into some 3D work, focusing around small clay sculptures that I could base some 2D drawings and paintings around. The main method that I've been making my work with is charcoal drawings and monochromatic paintings, exploring the relationship between layering black and white paint over each other, as well as between charcoal, chalk and eraser.

One of the main themes of my work is "Memento Mori", literally translated as "Remember you must die." The point of the phrase is to remember the vanity of earthly life and the temporary, transient nature of physical goods. My practice revolves around considering that concept and subverting it to create works of art that capture part of the artist, or their essence knowing that everyone dies.

This is why my pre-interim assessment work revolved around the literal depiction of the phrase with figurative representations of skulls and bones, however, an underlying theme of my work is the subversion of "Memento Mori", creating work because the artist knows they're going to die and creates works in order to leave some part of them behind.

"I would like my pictures to look as if a human being had passed between them, like a snail leaving its trail of the human presence... as a snail leaves its slime."- Francis Bacon

This quote from Francis Bacon surmises the essence of what I want my work to be about, for the work itself to feel as if it has snippets of the artist inside of itself, whether that be a physical resemblance or more of an emotional response.

Within this project, I've tried to branch out and experiment more with materials than I did the previous year. I've ventured into creating small sculptures in order for that to feed into my drawing/painting practice, as well as to explore my ideas in a different environment, seeing how something would look from a different angle rather than just a flat, 2D surface.

I've also explored combining my painting and drawing practice by working charcoal and paint into the same surface in order to see how they affect each other.

I found that I had the most success with my large scale charcoal drawings, just in terms of I found it a lot easier to blend with the material and create the kind of atmosphere that I'm looking for within my work.

In terms of artists that I looked at throughout the project in order to help my practise, I researched the works of John Tenniel, Egon Schiele, Oskar Kokoschka, William Kentridge, Alberto Giacometti and Shin Kwangho.