Our aim and objective of the brief are based upon our visit to the National Portrait Gallery, and Karl, our Course Leader’s, engaging and stimulating presentation. We were to use the exhibition to trigger rapid brain thinking, which resulted in me picking three people from the presented list, in which I analyzed and investigated their personalities and then created a final piece, communicating my interpretation of their personalities. Each outcome of personal visual art must be different from the other two.

Screen Shot 2018-01-06 at 17.44.05

NATIONAL PORTRAIT GALLERY

The National Portrait Gallery’s annual Photographic Portrait Prize exhibition, showed extremely interesting and diverse imagery, poignant, impactful, and deeply meaningful. However, I felt that the execution of the works were all too similar in terms of experimentation.

In visual imagery, we are dependent on the communication of the outcome. I believed that the images that were displayed at the exhibition lacked something, perhaps development in the use of colour, lighting, and experimentation rather than getting the “perfect picture” to deliver their message and which delivers visual imagery with a bigger impact to the audience. I just felt we’ve seen in commercial advertising, that you can exercise the theory in photography or “self-portraits”, through practicing communicating the message.

Due to copyright restrictions and the artist’s privacy and difficulty of accessing the images, there only a handful I could gather.

2400 (one of them is human #1 mi) — One of them is human, Mijia Tammi, 2017

Designer, Mijia Tammi photograph appealed to me due to the face and how realistic this AI Form is. It’s so close to looking almost human, along with the help of the light source. Her visage shows a beguiling face, which I thought was a pretty cute and attractive woman, who, when I realized she was an android, afterward, cringed the hell out of me after that discovery.

DOlRAKgXcAENtXL- (Sento bather - Simon Urwin) — Sento Bather, Simon Urwin

Simon Urwin’s photograph of the man in the bath house was an interesting one. When I first saw it my first thought was the relationship between the human and camera was fantastic, and the reality, with the model’s posture (Sentõ Bather) and facial expression looking depressed and disappointed to say the least.

embrace baud postma — Embrace, Baud Postma

In Baud Postma’s photograph Embrace, the form and poses of the models provide you with a mystery and although this is a portrait in some way, its unique in that it’s different to the rest. You cannot read the body language and expression; also there is a lack of environment.

MG_8897_REV2 Cig Havey

This image was not displayed in the exhibition, but the images of the hand pressing down on the net, is interesting, and with how the light is bouncing back on the net. The colour of the model’s dress or smock, makes me think of the classic Silk Cut adverts created by Saatchi and Saatchi, of torn purple silk that I saw at the Can Graphic Design Save Your Life? exhibition at the Wellcome Gallery, which I recently visited for my Graphic Design in Context module. The tobacco manufacturer’s came up with many interesting visual images to get round the ban on advertising smoking.

PORTRAITS

“A portrait is a representation of a particular person. A self-portrait is a portrait of the artist by the artist”- Tate

Portraiture itself – was “a very old art form going back at least to ancient Egypt, where it flourished from about 5,000 years ago. Before the invention of photography, a painted, sculpted, or drawn portrait was the only way to record the appearance of someone.”(Tate, 2018) Furthermore, there is much more to portraiture than meets the eye of the beholder. “Portraits have always been more than just a record. They have been used to show the power, importance, virtue, beauty, wealth, taste, learning or other qualities of the sitter. Portraits have almost always been flattering, and painters who refused to flatter, such as William Hogarth, tended to find their work rejected.” (Tate 2018) As we can see, portraiture was a form of early visualisation, arguably from early cave paintings and also that which was often communicated from the wealthy elite who commissioned artists to paint them to show off their wealth and illustrate their power. Now, if we fast forward to today, when millions of people have access to creating portraits through today’s technology, the camera phone, which is pretty much in everybody’s pocket from Tottenham to Timbuktu. We are living in the age of the ‘selfie’, where billions of self-portraits are the order of the day and inventive users of the apps available on their smart phones have taken over from the recherche knowledge and skills of feted legendary professional photographers like Robert Mapplethorpe and Diane Arbus.

3 PERSONALITIES

James Baldwin

Picking James Baldwin for me was a must. What I found interesting about his life was his mother never mentioned his biological father. His mother later married a Baptist minister named David Baldwin. However, James developed in spite of conflict from his step-father, who had eight children of his own and who was very cruel to James. Despite this, James followed in his step-father’s footsteps, in serving as a youth minister.

Whilst growing up, his taste of English literature or creative writing, progressed, which resulted in Baldwin publishing several poems, short stories, and plays in magazines at such a young age.

During his time, he encountered several encounters of discrimination, stemmed, from being rejected from countless job opportunities because of his race. After being fired from his job in New Jersey, he struggled to make ends meet.

His first novel ‘Go Tell It On The Mountain’ was loosely an interpretation of his autobiography, focused on his life growing up in Harlem, and the issues between his Father and religion.

Despite the surroundings he was brought up in, the manifesto of beliefs and status in the 70s-90s, Baldwin was open about his homosexuality with both men and women, his id wasn’t aware about.

His personality and thoughts on expressionism are things I would like to explore, along with Baldwin growing up in Harlem, getting a feeling for his lived experience.

Richard Serra

I wanted to investigate his work even further, from implying his “verb action list” in the Installation project. One of the things that I found interesting was that he incorporated steel into his work. This was first triggered or inspired when he was younger and sparked his creativity serge while spending his time in the shipyard construction-site where his Father worked.

Serra’s training didn’t start off in art, his major was English literature from the University of California. During that period, he supported himself working at the steel mill, whose components, he would use later in his career. In further educating himself, Richard continued with an MA at Yale University, where he trained with contemporary artist Chuck Close and Brice Marden.

My direction on the Serra portrait was heading towards that aspect or focusing on his creativity, where there is no description of it, however, but using the incorporation with holographic foil-blocking technique.

Jean-Michel Basquiat

From visiting the recent exhibition from the Barbican “Boom For Real” and watching the BBC documentary Basquiat: Rage to Riches, his life was very interesting and his conceptual thinking and personality were beyond his years.

Born in Brooklyn, with Haitian and Puerto Rican parents, his diverse cultural heritage was one of the many sources of his inspiration along with jazz.

Due to his urban setting and the nature of New York City, Jean-Michel turned to street art, and developed a new artist name “Samo” were he would spread cryptic messages, challenging the way society is heading and by so doing challenged the manifesto on public property.

His artistic skills developed and created a new movement of Neo-Expressionism, which influenced him, and a new style of art, more of an experimental side brought a new perspective of art, rather than the practical side of classical art.

From understanding his personality, I wanted to incorporate collage, and the use of warm colour to represent the expression, as we were mature and knowledgeable about art as a subject.

COLOUR PSYCHOLOGY

The idea of applying colours is something that I want to incorporate, in an article by Anna Gloth, Connecting with Colours, she suggests that ” Viewing some colors is proven to physiologically affect the body, which influences emotions. Warmer colours, especially red, can raise a person’s blood pressure and stimulate the brain, which may be why they are considered passionate, exciting colours. For the most part, the reason people tie certain emotions to certain colours seems psychological. People’s feelings about colour can mimic how they appear in nature. Yellow may be seen as energizing because the yellow sun provides energy. People see these connections and associate the relevant emotions to the colours. ” (Gloth, 2012) Gloth adds ” Viewing some colours is proven to physiologically affect the body, which influences emotions. Warmer colours, especially red, can raise a person’s blood pressure and stimulate the brain, which may be why they are considered passionate, exciting colours. For the most part, the reason people tie certain emotions to certain colours seems psychological. People’s feelings about colour can mimic how they appear in nature. Yellow may be seen as energizing because the yellow sun provides energy. People see these connections and associate the relevant emotions to the colours. ” (Gloth, 2012) A research paper The Impact of Colour on Website Appeal and Users’ Cognitive Processes demonstrated the powerful impact colours have in modern day society. “Research conducted by Walters, Apter, and Svebak suggested that there are two levels of felt and preferred arousal: high and low. More specifically, some colours serve to arouse and excite an individual, while other colours elicit relaxation. Despite the fact that there is no precise theoretical rationale for explaining this exactly, how a colour might affect feelings, evidence to indicate that colours do indeed influence individuals’ feelings, and attention judgement- such as shopping intentions and perceived usability.” (Bonnardel, La Biot & Piolat, 2011)

Screen Shot 2018-01-09 at 14.37.49 — Color Psychology Emotion Meaning Poster, Graf1x, 2018

ARTIST

Fashiolista

Screen Shot 2018-01-07 at 16.28.16 — Fashiolista

Fashionista online magazine focused on manipulating and incorporating a foil holographic effects, which I can use in describing Richard Serra’s creative spark, as a reference to his personality.

tumblr_n3h7xgB62u1rptssro1_1280 (IKO MIZUHARA) — Francesca Pozzi

Francesca Pozzi ‘s technical skill to use and manipulate colour and visual effects to stunning visual work which I could manipulate light and colour to portray someone’s personality while balancing the composition figure and surroundings.