Experimentation – Karyn Easton

Mar 08

by Karyn in 3d, Artists, Collaborations, Experimentation, Lectures, Low Residency, Unit 3 Blogs, Workshops 0 comments tags: 3d, Artists, Collaborations, Experimentation, Lectures, Low Residency, Unit 3 Blogs, Workshops

Low Residency Day #1

All Things Pink – We had lots of fun today! Alex Schady put on a fab pink themed workshop. If I’m totally honest I struggled to get my sculpture to ‘work’ exactly as I wanted it to, but it was still a great session! I got a little sidetracked by some of the materials I was using. I became quite absorbed by the layers of plastic that I could create. However, the project brief required the sculpture to hold a smartphone. Unfortunately my sculpture was a little flimsy and my phone very heavy, so it was a recipe for disaster. Luckily my creation just about managed to make it to the end of the day. Below is a picture of Alex Schady in the photographic studio wearing his sculpture. I really liked Alex’s creation, which was a much better and more solid design for holding a smartphone. Shots of My Creation Below are some shots of my strange pink layered sculpture. Sadly it really struggled to hold my heavy iPhone. However, I did manage to shoot some video. Textures I was really intrigued by the textures created by the plastic layers of my creation. So when […]

Hanging Around

Choosing a Suitable Stringing Method – Choosing suitable materials and a hanging method for my mobile has to be one of the most challenging aspects so far. I’m way beyond my comfort zone with this! Noah one of my fellow students shared a link by the creative force that once was, namely David Bowie. Im going to put what he said here so that when I struggle I’ve got a point of reference to start things moving again. Today, having produced enough mobile elements to explore hanging and stringing I started running into multiple problems. Some of these included: 1). What kind of stringing method would I like to use 2). How do I arrange the elements neatly enough so that the viewer understands them as binary. 3). What materials should I use to actually string and hang the mobile? 4). Will a smaller prototype actually translate into a much larger one? The problems above were to name only a few. I spent the evening trying to source suitable hanging materials. I managed to source a very good older pdf on the subject of mobile making which helped a lot! How to Make Mobiles How to […]

Nov 19

Epic Making Session

Yaacov Agam Inspired Work – Over many months now I have been wrestling with a myriad of ideas. In my Study Statement I was keen to develop a new form of hybrid human, digital and AI art. I also wanted to include an element of mystery and discovery whereby elements of the work were hidden. During my search for inspiration I came across two artists that particularly resonated with me, namely: Alexander Calder and Yaacov Agam. I particularly liked the idea of movement and mobile art seen in Calder’s work. Indeed I was so taken with his work that I went to visit the Tate Modern to see some of his pieces there. However, Yaacov Agam’s work really did inspire me. In his Artist’s statement he says: “My aim is to show the visible in a perpetual state of becoming”. I think this is a beautiful way in which he describes his work. However, I personally would liken it to, showing the visible in a perpetual state of change. Given the nature of the subject matter that I’m exploring, his work for me very much aligns with this notion of change as well as ‘becoming’. Below is a short […]

Oct 05

by Karyn in Abstract Art, Ai, Animation, Artists, Experimentation, Ideas, My Work, Patterns, Problem Solving, Risk Taking, Tasks, Unit 2 Blogs, Videos 0 comments tags: Abstract Art, ai, Animation, Artists, Experimentation, Food for Thought, Ideas, my work, Patterns, Problem Solving, Risk Taking, Tasks, Unit 2 Blogs, Videos

Grotto Print Ideas #1

Print Ideas & Adam Bridgland (Jealous London) – Today we had an interesting talk about the ‘Grotto Project’ formerly ‘Merch’. Adam Bridgland from Jealous London came along to share some insights and revealed a lot of useful information – see a selection of his slides at the end from the talk. I’ve just been looking at the deadlines and I’ve realised that I really do need to start moving on this. Some very interesting takeaways from the talk included answers to questions such as: what was a popular poster colour? What kind of images sold well? Adam suggested that blue was a popular colour and skulls, butterflies and cute cats seemed to do quite well. Unfortunately the human form, unless comprising a skull did not seem to fair quite so well. I’ve produced many digital images over the years, but the thought of choosing just one singular image to print has really made me think. I have some interesting macro photographs of oil on water hanging on my walls. One was bought by a large Australian advertising company, one hangs in the local hospital and one appears on an album cover. Even Adobe use some of my work. Therefore I can’t […]

Sep 24

A Mental Derive Part #2

Picking Up Where I Left off – Ever since my first mental derive, it was always my intention to recommence this particular project. now that the second draft of my research paper is nearing completion, I feel I am better able to return more fully to creative activities. Since part one of my mental derive, I didn’t totally abandon this project and I experimented with suspending some of the circles on a sheet of acetate between some thick heavy duty white elastic. Below is a gallery showing the results. This is a project I’d like to return to at some point, but I don’t currently have the correct materials. The acetate was far too thin and buckled under the strain of the elastic. Therefore thicker acrylic is possibly a better choice. The patterned discs/circles also had a habit of ‘pinging off’, so a better method of securing them is required. However, I do think that there is room to develop this project further. Moments in Time and Space Each black and white patterned circle/disc above, is a collage of many little moments in time. For this reason I wanted to trial another form of suspension. I am particularly […]

Jun 13

by Karyn in Artists, Culture, Experimentation, Food for Thought, My Work, Photography, Unit 2 Blogs, Videos 0 comments tags: Artists, Culture, Experimentation, Food for Thought, my work, Photography, Unit 2 Blogs, Videos

Barcelona Graffiti

Barcelona – Graffiti Capital of Europe? Is Barcelona the graffiti capital of Europe? Within only a short walking distance, the 1.15 minute clip below exposes the shear volume of street art around the city. In many cases residents have turned what is obviously a problem into something much more creative. They appear to have given up on trying to clear the graffiti. Instead, there is a sense that it is not just part of local society, it is in fact now embraced by it. Below is a video short highlighting the sheer scale of the street art. Calling it graffiti feels almost unkind because many of the colour schemes and designs seem carefully crafted as opposed to simply scrawled. Interestingly, the famous street artist Banksy has his museum in Barcelona. I wonder how much the colourful street art/graffiti clad surroundings influenced his decision? Barcelona – Graffiti Capital of Europe? One thing that particularly struck me while photographing all of the graffiti were the times that people seemed to have matching graffiti with clothes or other items. Below are some examples where people’s outfits or items matched the graffiti surrounding them. Maybe the graffiti was affecting their fashion choices […]

May 06

A Temporary Distraction

The Annual College End of Year Film – Each year for the last few years I have been invited to produce our college end of year film. It’s a long and quite complex task because it has to really showcase our department. It needs to appeal to parents, staff and students alike. Unfortunately because it is such a massive undertaking, my research has had to go on hold for a little while. However in a couple of weeks I am due to fly out to Barcelona, so hopefully I‘ll have plenty of travelling time to catch up on my studies. In the meantime, I thought it would be interesting to document my film making process. Each year I write all of the script, edit all of the video and use character animation software to enable animated characters to read the story’s narrative. Often I also need to shoot my own video in order to help with the story and to fill in any gaps. In fact I’m responsible for it all! Over the last two years I’ve used a character I named ‘Horace ‘Boris’ Hedgehog’ (trust me, by watching the previous 2 films, his name becomes clear), this year it […]

Apr 18

Zoom Session 22 (Sukie Sagoo-Reddy)

Emerging Dialogues Through the Positioning of Textile and Visual Arrangements – I would really love to visit the college more often to do many of the workshops on offer. I often find myself thinking, if only I had my time over again? Therefore, whenever I get the opportunity to participate in any kind of workshop, be it online, or face to face, I’m always really excited. This week was certainly no exception! For a long time now I have been working both photographically and digitally in the flat 2d world of screens. However this week it was all change. Sukie Sagoo-Reddy ran a thought provoking/food for thought workshop with us today. She took us through her Powerpoint presentation that was packed with both information and tasks for us to complete. As usual I screen shot some of her slides as I find this a useful way of storing information for future reference. I think that I will definitely be revisiting this. Alongside Jonathan’s zoom session about the concept of a derive and the Processing Programming workshop, Sukie’s workshop also has to be one of my favourites to date. I don’t think that I’m particularly good at 3d but I am […]

Apr 04

by Karyn in Abstract Art, Ai, Ai Chat, Animation, Artists, Experimentation, Food for Thought, Ideas, My Work, Photography, Unit 2 Blogs, Videos 0 comments tags: Abstract Art, ai, Ai Chat, Animation, Artists, Experimentation, Food for Thought, Ideas, my work, Photography, Unit 2 Blogs, Videos

Time of the Signs

A Physical Derive – Shortly after we had our Zoom Session 18 I decided to try out the concept of a physical derive. My DSLR camera was at work, so I headed out armed with only my smartphone. I had no preconceived ideas about where my walking or my thoughts would take me, I just decided to physically wander. On reaching the end of my street I was greeted by the huge sign for our local Funeral Director plus a plethora of road traffic cones and more signs around it. I began to wonder about signs? At first I thought about taking photographs of purely negative signs, but then I thought, what about information overload? Even in a short walk to the end of my street I had already encountered many signs packed with information. I began to wonder what the ratio would be between negative and prohibitive signs and more positive and informative signs? Brixham is a small town and in my opinion ‘rammed to the rafters’ with signs, would a busy city centre be better or worse as a comparison in terms of signage? Then I began to wonder if there was a correlation between the variety and […]

Feb 17

Jason Schulman – Inspired Work

Hidden Light and Colours – I particularly admire the work by Jason Schulman. I discovered him last week and ever since I stumbled across his work I have been absolutely ‘sold’ on it. Schulman records light with his camera across the entirety of a film. His work has been incorrectly likened to that of Hiroshi Sugimoto’s ‘Cinema Halls’. Schulman explains more about this in his interview with Dominic Jaeckle. Although the process of recording the entirety of the film is quite straightforward, it appears that Schulman is somewhat a pioneer in the area of recording films. I am a huge fan of slow shutter techniques, which I believe were used in the creation of both Sugimoto and Schulman’s images. Therefore I could not resist experimenting further using the work of Schulman and Sugimoto as a starting point. I find the notion of light being recorded and compounded into one image very appealing. Generally we never see light compounded in such a way so as to reveal a multitude of hidden colours and tones. Throughout my project I have been searching for the ‘hidden’ in whatever shape or form that may take. Schulman’s work reveals the beauty hidden in compounded […]