Automatic drawing based around parade and Bauhaus

to loosen up ideas about design work based around Parade we spey half an hour doing automatic drawings based around Bauhaus. I really liked the automatic drawings I produced. I'd given automatic drawing a shot the other day when on the phone so I slipped into it relatively easily within about 5-10 minutes. I added a lot of geometric shapes having influence from Bauhaus artists such as (insert artist). I chose to use a black sharpie and fine liner colurs because I wanted quite a bold line like what I'd seen in research of artists to look at.

After half an hour of automatic drawing I stood back and took in what id drawn over the pages. I needed to rein in what i'd done and start making a little sense out of them.

Bauhaus artists

Wassily Kandinsky

 

Paul Klee

Johannes Itten

 

lyonel Feininger

Gerhard Marcks

Oskar Schlemmer

Bauhaus documentary

The first thing that I learnt from the documentary was that the movement came from a school founded by Walter Gropius just before the second World War in Dessau. I didn't know this before and was clueless to how the movement was created.

I learnt a number of other things from the documentary such as it was the first for workshop training for artists. it was the first to focus on these skills and the artists were evolved with classes for furniture making, stained glass, fabric making, ect. It was the first time that art students were taught about their materials. These classes were taught by master crafts-men and the aesthetic side to the school was taught by artists.

The school later developed an architecture department headed by Paul Clay. Their first major project was to design a housing estate in Dessau.

How they began to make pieces suitable for mass production led me to feel quite cold towards Bauhaus. They placed an emphasis on geometry and colour.

Almost acting homeless

Today my head isn't working. I don't know if it's because I can't sleep recently or because of uni stress. Either way, I can't think of anything for my project, I've hit a wall. So in an attempt to overcome this-I'm sat in a box. A big cardboard box. I needed to take away outside influences and just sit and forget about everything else. However I've now been in here for about half an hour and I'm just getting annoyed with myself that it isn't working. Hopefully I just need to sit for a little longer. I've got some Doritos, a galaxy bar and water so I'm set to stay for the next hour if I need to. 

Carnival head-piece

When I was researching Carnival I decided on creating a traditional looking head-dress. I found the basic shape i wanted and started thinking about how to make it with the materials I had.

The base around the head was created using strong wire and then the rest of the frame was made using thinner wire to shape and then covering with art straws. The art straws look nicer than exposed wire however when they're bent they do look rough and unprofessional.

 I'm happy with how it turned out and i got the desired shape. 

The frame started looking a lot better and more fitting when the glitter was added. Although this was messy and i had to re-apply it after attaching the feathers because it rubbed off when i was handling it, I'm happy i chose to change the colour of the feather within different sections instead of integrating them together because it looks authentic.

The rhinestones were difficult to add and get right with how small they are but with a little, or a lot, of time i got there. Without the rhinestones it wouldn't look as authentic. I think i may add large ostrich feathers to the back to add height and interest to the headpiece but i'm happy with the progress so far,

 

I intend on looking at other headpieces and even going a little crazier with head-dresses, getting inspiration from people such as the designers who attract figures like Lady Gaga.

Childs-play and the Carnival

The Alternative Miss World  events have had themes for most of their shows and since they encourages creativity we were given the theme of "child-like". This was meant in the way that children see objects completely differently to adults. A cardboard box may be a spaceship and a roll of tin foil may be their astronaut suit.

I started thinking about costumes that kids films had and how fun they looked. From this I looked at events such as Rio's Carnival and Mardi Gras. I absolutely loved the bright colours and how fun they all seemed. I'll definitely be looking further into these events as I would love to create a costume based on them looking closely at their headpieces.

The morning of the Liverpool trip

It's 5:55 AM. I'm cold, tired, nauseous and every inch of my body aches. I could shed a tear I feel that crappy. If Liverpool isn't very good I might actually cry a little. As much as I'm looking forward to it, I also really love my sleep and no doubt will be getting a little grouchy later on when I'm even more sleep deprived. Good luck to the rest of the group.