Theory and Context Term Two (application letter)

For this project there is a choice between three briefs all of which are different and allow for aims and objectives to help the community. As part of this unit I had to write an application letter for the project I wanted to do. Here it is;

Claire Barber                                                                                       Evangeline Beatrix McNichol

University of Huddersfield                                                                  e.b.mcnichol@hotmail.co.uk

                                                                                                                         16^th February 2014

Dear Mrs Barber,

I am writing to you to apply to do one of the community briefs available to me in my Theory and Context module.

First choice: Archival Interventions project (Lee Mills)

Second choice: Textile Thinking project (Penistone Line)

Third choice: Innovations in Giving (Home Started Pack)

My first choice is the Archival Interventions project (Lee Mills) I am interested in the brief although knitting and crochet is not my primary specialism. I am fond of both knitting and crochet and when I get the time I enjoy working on my own knitting and crochet projects. In addition to this I have some experience in archiving; this took place during some of my past work experience when I was given the task to archive past exam papers in subject and date order. I also had the task of reorganising various storage spaces and stock. I think I would be effective on this project because I am able to work efficiently on my own for long periods of time and I am self-motivated. I also have some experience in designing posters for promotion and I have proficient skills on Photoshop, which I could use to promoting Lee Mills and getting it some more attention. I think working on this project would help me to build my independence and I think I could do well on this project because I am a logical thinker and can organise consistently. I am really interested in learning about how archives work as I am considering applying to museums and galleries for my placement year.

My second choice is the Textile Thinking project (Penistone Line) I was attracted to this brief because I enjoy working with children and I think I could bring some professionalism to this project due to having experience of working with children before; this took place when I was a teaching assistant at a drama school, my specialism was mentoring the younger students, (ages 5-7) getting them to perform and helping them to build their confidence. With research, planning and regular communication with contacts I believe I could contribute some effective ideas for this project. I am also curious about the possibility of developing my own work for the Penistone Line, especially with Le tour France approaching, I can see this would be a good opportunity for me to get my work seen by a large amount of people.    

    

My specialisms are embroidery and contemporary practitioner; I tend to take a textile art approach though lately I am also interested in functional pieces as well, which may be a useful interest for the Lee Mills brief as I believe it will include functional and non-functional pieces. Although embroidery is my primary specialism I am also inspired by other specialisms, and I find it an exciting prospect to possibly have the opportunity to explore them too.  

Thank you for considering my application,

 Yours sincerely

Evangeline B McNichol

Theory and Context Term One

The research topic I am interested in for my theory and context module is well-being. After looking up the meaning of well-being, I found out that it can have associations with depression and anxiety. I immediately became interested in this research topic as I can relate to it, because I have suffered from this myself. I understand the symptoms and how a person can feel, and I am interested in ways in which the symptoms could be aided.
My specialism and role is embroidery and contemporary practitioner. I needed to find a way to combine my specialisms into some research methods, and because my specialisms are quite creative and practical, I knew my methods would be too. Having already heard of this therapy it came to my mind from the start, ‘Art Therapy’, a way to address symptoms of depression and anxiety in a practical and creative way. I just needed to research depression, art therapy, and find some texts that would help me to develop my research methods.

I came up with three research methods which can be read about in my report. My intention was to find ways in which textiles, primarily embroidery in an art therapy context, could aid people with depression and anxiety.  I believe I have come up with some sufficient methods, but like I said in my report I can only speculate, and without practical research I cannot say for certain if my methods would help.

Visit to New York

Early this January I took a trip to New York with my university. There was a basic itinerary but the idea was to plan my own days and do what I wanted to do. On the first night we went to the Empire State Building just as it was turning night.  By the time we got up to the viewing level it was dark but I could see all the lights on the ground and buildings. It was so beautiful and so high up, the amount of coloured lights, shapes and structures I could see, it was such a sight and not something I will ever forget.

I also saw the Statue of Liberty which was again so beautiful.  I can’t believe how close I have been to such a famous icon, it was an amazing experience. As well as seeing the sights I also took a trip to Premier Vision, a large textile trading fair, it was an interesting and valuable involvement. I now have a better understanding of how business is conducted, and it was inspiring walking around the stalls seeing what fabrics are being sold at this time. With being a contemporary practitioner, trends are not something that often come into my work so I don’t think I took from it the same as a commercial designer would, but I still find it an exciting experience that I am so pleased I took part in.

Another thing that I saw was MOMA (Museum of Modern Art) which I very much enjoyed. As well as seeing new contemporary arts I saw many famous pieces too, including Van Gogh, Klimt, Picasso and one of my favourite artists Niki De Saint Phalle, which was very exciting. I also went to the Natural History Museum where I saw a piece on the  suffragettes and bought a cushion saying ‘votes for women’, which makes me very happy as I often have a feminist approach.

I went to Central Park, walked the Highline, went shopping and went to Brooklyn, all of which I enjoyed very much. I can’t say what I enjoyed most, as it was all so amazing and a lot to take in, but I can say I am really glad I went, although I had some troubles adjusting and being out of my comfort zone. I think ultimately I did very well, and I now have some amazing memories.

BA Route (an investigation throught drawing)

As I mentioned in a previous blog I can choose BA or BSc as my degree title. I have always wanted my degree to be BA, so for me there wasn’t much of a choice as I already knew. For the BA brief I have to write a research question in which I will answer by drawing, and I also need to support this work with a five hundred word statement.
I am going to start mind mapping some ideas for this task. I already have my question proposal, which could change completely or just develop. My question is ‘What patterns and textures can be observed on fabrics under close inspection and magnification?’ I am interested in what fabric textures look like up close. It came to my attention that there are so many patterns and textures that are ignored or simple not seen because they are so small; I want to draw attention to these textures. The way I am going to go about this is to firstly take some high quality photographs as close up as possible. The first way I can think of doing this, is by using the micro lens on a high quality camera that I can borrow from the University, this will allow me to take some photographs getting an effective zoom in. The other thing I could do which was suggested to me by a tutor is, in Manchester there is rumoured to be a place that allows people to take pictures of things under a microscope. Whether this is still available to me I don’t know, but I intend to find out, and if it does exist I will be going along to get my photographs.
When I have my photographs my next step will be to draw them. I can’t say what media I will be using until I see the images or what drawing style I will take, but I do know that I would like to closely observe the textures and try to interpret them.

Yorkshire Sculpture Park Project

The brief was to create four designs for cushions with ideas interpreted and developed from a selected exhibit at the Yorkshire Sculpture Park. Through research and media explorations the final designs where to be hypothetically sold at the Yorkshire Sculpture park shop.
Through doing this brief I have discovered and artist that has become one of my favourites, she is Niki De Satin Phalle. I originally got inspired by her work at the Yorkshire Sculpture Park when I saw her piece ‘Buddha’ which I then went on to research as inspiration for my cushion designs. I found that she takes a feminist approach like I do and instantly she became my focus; I found some of her other works such as her ‘Nannas’ which are large brightly coloured sculptures based on the female form; they are voluptuous and symbols of femininity.  She also took inspiration herself from Gaudi’s Parc Guell in Barcelona and created her own monumental sculpture park which she based on the Tarot cards.
One of her most famous feminist pieces is ‘she: A Cathedral’; it is 80ft by 30ft. This piece is very individual and bold both in its colour and forms but also in its nature. The way it has been designed makes the viewer pass through the woman to see the rest of the pieces by entering the vagina. This is still quite a statement today, but in the sixties I imagine this was quite outrageous.

After finding this research I needed to start using her works to inspire me. I was particularly drawn to the surfaces and patterns she created in her sculptures. From this I stared zooming up onto images of her work and drawing from that to make my own designs. Some I painted some I collaged, and then I started interpreting them into embroidery. I chose to work with leather because not only was it complimenting my designs, but I also saw it as a way of expressing gender roles within my work. By using leather I was suggesting hypothetical questions such as ‘Is leather seen as feminine or masculine?’, ‘Is leather classed as feminine or masculine by its texture and appearance or by its colour? e.g. to a person that classes leather as masculine, would a piece of bright pink leather still be seen as masculine?’

The final thing I needed was a context for my designs to be presented in, and I found the perfect one. A brief that was asking for designs to be used for something known as ‘Humpties’ which are foot rests much like a cushion. The brief laid out requirements and templates, which I followed and used as my way of presenting this project. I scanned my embroidered samples inspired by Saint Phalle into Photoshop and refined them ready for the templates.

I am really pleased with the research I did for this project and for finding an artist that I love, however I would have liked to have spent more time on my designs to make them stronger. I really struggled to manage my modules together, at the time of this brief, and know I could have done better with the practical side of the designs if I had had more time, although I am quite pleased with some of my drawings.

Packhorse Project

This project involved me responding to a site specific space with the theme, cloth and memory. Taking inspiration from artists that exhibited in the Cloth and Memory two exhibition at Saltaire, this project focused mainly on the journey and personal response to the space and interpretation of the theme.

For this project I took the theme quite literally and responded to the thought of cloth and memory. My idea was about faded memories.  I used primary source interviews with my mother and grandmother, as my research focused on what textiles means within my family; I was curious about what textiles my family and I had done.  I remember making dolls dresses with my grandma which became the imagery I used for my embroidery. I used quotes from the interviews to inform my imagery. Text was quite an important feature in this project because I used it as a material to suggest a memory. My intention was to distort the text by scrunching, folding and manipulating the fabric to suggest a faded memory, because the text is not clear. Another thing I did to suggest a faded memory was dyeing yarns to stitch with. I dyed small parts of the yarn all the way along so that when I stitched with it, the colours faded in and out much like a memory does. I wanted my work to be displayed in a secret and intimate space within the Packhorse, partly because of the inspiration took from Jeanette Appleton, who exhibited in the Cloth and Memory two, and used holes in the wall to exhibit her work. I wanted an intimate space for my work because a memory is stored away in a person’s mind and I wanted to make links to this by placing my work in a discrete space. I used knotted fabric trailing away from my pieces to suggest that a memory is escaping a space within a person’s mind and being remembered.

I enjoyed this brief and felt like my piece had a specific meaning. I was also pleased with the quality of my work with it being the first time I had used the Amaya sewing machine; I was impressed with the kind of work it can produce. 

Embroidery Workshops

In my embroidery workshops I learn a wide range of techniques. I learn techniques ranging from hand stitch and needlecraft, to working on the domestic sewing machine and industrial sewing machine. I also learn smocking and other material manipulation techniques, including ways to make three dimensional textiles. As I mentioned in a previous blog, I also use the laser cutter and various printing methods such as sublimation printing with the heat press onto synthetic fabrics, printing onto hard materials and flat materials such as acrylic, cork, acetate, leather etc. and customizing fabrics with dyeing techniques such as tie dye and dip dyeing.

Through this year I have been documenting the techniques I have learnt in a tech file. I had a little bit of difficulty deciding on how I wanted to present this work. A lot of people use a sketchbook, however I find this a hard method to work with because all the samples need to be stitched in to the book, and some are too big or too wide and it ends up annoying me, so I know I didn’t want to work like this. Another way of presenting my work that I thought of was to present my samples on separate sheets and write my processes on the back, which I did attempt to start, but after a while the samples got too heavy for the paper, there was not always enough space to write my processes, the sheets were not fitting on the paper, and it was getting all squashed and cramped in my file so this was not working either. So after refinement I have an alternative way of presenting my work, I now have a box with all my samples in it they are all labelled with a number and technique. Alongside the box I have the sketchbook explaining all the techniques with photographs of the samples and titles matching the labels, so that each documentation can easily be found. This is working a lot better for me; nothing is getting squashed, the samples can be viewed effectively and my processes can be documented neatly and understood clearly.