Market Makes Misery unit4 fmp

Image | April 28, 2024May 31, 2024 | Nhturner

a drypoint market sceen, drawn with a new electric scriber

from the look of this print I am having a successful time in Shepherds Bush market, I am drawing twice a week in the market and getting to know the stall holders ( Market traders)

i have slowly gained the trust of the very closed market people. I have especailly been attracted to the array of goods, clothes, fabrics, watches, pots, pans, vegtables

I have been drawing on site and working on a series in the studio

and yet I struggle to see how to capture my feelings and thoughts of the market, about the market workers and their lives, the produce they sell and its story of world trade, and the aetctics of the customners and stall holders.

I am planning a series of prints, and some panamric pastels, similar to the tryptic I produced at the end of Unit2

I have also been contemplating how to capture some of the assorted chaos of the stalls and the rigid reptation of others

It is a vivid but drab, ordered chaotic, confusing place and it is probably not a surprise to myself that I am often bewidlered as to where this project is going. I have a limited amount of time, and still wonder if I should abadon monochrome for a burst of colour, should I try a collection of photgraphs, or rely on my drawings as a document. I feel very pressured in my self directed work, and a little lost. I guess this is not an unusual creative issue, we look at the complete finished work without understanding the volumes of sketch books, and destroyed fauilures that preceded them.

a visit to the Felix Topolski archives unit4 fmp

Image | April 25, 2024May 31, 2024 | Nhturner

the Topolski archives are kept in Felix Topolski’s former studio a railway arch by Waterloo station.

Felix Toploski RA 1907-1989 was an expressionist artist, and more famously an illustrator and draftsman o, Born in Poland and working in London from his early 30’s Topolski’s easy line, dynamic curiosity and energy led him into a important chronicllor of the 20th Century.

Liberation of rome, June 1944 private collection

As an offical war artist toploski travelled on eastern western fronts, and was a witness to the liberation of Belsen concentration camp.after drawing the Queens coronation for the Polsih Government, Topolski began a a fortnightly print that became an annual ” Topolski’s Chronicles” from 1954 till his death

in Volume 1 Topolski set out his agenda

I HAVE KNOWN FOR A LONG TIME THAT I MUST START THESE BROADSHEETS SOME DAY. MY REASONS, THOUGH PERHAPS COMERCIALLY UNSOUND, ARE GOOD ENOUGH FOR ME: I HAVE AN URGE TO DRAW LIFE AND TO COMMUNICATE MY PICTORIAL CHRONICLE TO MY CONTEMPORARIES; AND, HAVING BEEN PERSUADED THAT I AM GOOD AT TRAPPING THE SPIRIT AND SHAPE OF OUR TIME, I ASSUME THAT SUCH A CONTINUOUS PANORAMA, WHEN COLLECTED AND PRESERVED, AS I HOPE, OVER MANY YEARS, WILL BECOME A UNIQUE DOCUMENT. THE CONTENT WILL NOT BE SUBDUED BY ANY RULES ………

queens coronation from Vol 1, topolskis chronicles

Topolski’s fast line and easy to recognise style made him a popular illustrator in the 60’s and 70’s

topolski’s wife and daniel, and illustrations of dublin shows that his rapid pen ibelongs to more than a cartoonist

Topolski’s work has fallen out of favour as the life he captured and the brillaint portraits he made are ignored, as the life of Britain in the 60s and 70s are forgotten.

I visited hte Topolski archives as I love his line and his rapid style of drawing, how in seemingly chaotic lines he forms a coherent form. I am also interest in how he used his art to report, and as a former reporter I hope to be able to capture life with my pencil and pen

UP TO MY ELBOWS IN PLASTER OF PARIS, A REAL LESSON IN TRIAL AND ERROR

Image | February 17, 2024 | Nhturner

Planning a statue, , finished in plaster but with a core of an aluminum armature, a mass of reused polystyrene, cardboards and newspaper.

to find the dimension and placing of the arms I made Atlases globe first. A strong plastic beach ball, about 60 cm in diameter was covered in palster infused bandage, the smae method as an old fashioned hospital cast. Dipped in water and then laid on the ball, I had left it in a plastic mesh net that gave the bandages some adhesion. They dried to rigid within five minutes, but remained wet to the touch for several hours.

i realised I should have paid better attention to the recent Tate exhibition of Rodin’s plasters for his final casts, including Balzac, The thinker, the gates to Hell

rodin’s collection of hands in plaster and terracota.

I had left the exhibition with an interest in how Rodins studi used his dressing gown dipped in plaster to cover Balzacs body, and that several of the burgers of Calais shared the same hands

I Having decided to cover the dried bandages with plaster of Paris to strengthen the ball ( and also make it significantly heavier) I watched this deeply reassuring video from David Stead with some very useful lessons in making a sculpture .

I struggeld with the poaster of paris, I learnt how difficult it is to make it the right mix, too much plaster, too much mixing and the plaster sets very quickly. I learnt after wasting several kilos of plaster

I learnt how to mis and apply plaster carefully, that I will need hundreds of meters of plaster bandages to cover a 120 cm statue, That plaster weighs and I will have to build an armature sturdy enough to suppo

I have to seriously work out the center of gravity for the work. The globe weighs around five kg so I have to really strengthen the ankles and knees and fix the feet very firmly on heavy blocks. I am relived to have the dimensions of the globe as I can now build the armature. I have a choiv=ce to either connect the hands to the arms or the globe. After Davids You Tube I will make the hands from thinner more maliable wire

Distortions and illusions

Image | January 12, 2024January 12, 2024 | Nhturner

To add dimension to a 2 Dimensional picture plane, artists use a variety of techniques to achieve depth. Perspective and tonal variety are the most common and successful tools, but in some forms of narrative drawing and painting illusions are used. In Monday’s lesson I learnt how to draw a realistic hole and a curved letter using perspective techniques and shading.

foreshortening is common in graphic comics and novels, we drew each other in class using extreme perspective, feet appear three times the size of heads to give very satisfying satisfactory illusions

At the end of last term we worked on extreme points of view, an ant and a birds eye view, I have looked at chess pieces for a charcoal drawing

How much do I love charcoal

Image | December 30, 2023 | Nhturner

Christmas thank you cards, i love charcoal as a tonal medium soo much, it makes me wonder why I use up my time with any other medium. There’s always 2025 though !!