list, findings, and other rambles

I sit here and list all I need to do. Investigate further: Action Research, Narrative Research Methods, Plan interviews with educators, students, and contemporary artist using film based methods.  work on my methodolgy section, my literature review section (the fun part!). I also have to make an example of the image transfer project I'm doing with my photography students. It's Chihuly inspired. Between all my students should end up with about 1260 pieces. We also have to begin working on our Gold Leaf prints and we have two shows coming up......My student in 3rd hour has to finish her prom dress made out of fabric we transferred pictures (she took through out highschool about her life during that time) before prom which is April 14th. Continue experimenting with prints made from objects found in nature and all students need to continue their digital portolios (scanning prints, bios etc.)  So I start searching and searching online and BINGO! The perfect interview with Jerry Uelsmann (2007), I have always been inspired by his work but his story and what he says about his teachers really resonates with myself. Like him, I had teachers that not only let me experiment but encouraged me to investigate ideas that were otherwise and by some, "not photography".  Now I have a few students continuing to push these ideas as well. I'm so excited every day to discuss, brainstorm, and experiment with them. 

In my teaching practice I tell my students that photography is more than just a picture. I challenge them to think of what this means to "record light".  I try to encourage them to think of the camera as a tool, like a paint brush.  To see it as just another means or medium to express their interpretation of light, shapes, experiences.  I want them to see that they aren't here to just make good pictures, but to use the camera, processes and materials to express their interpretation of the world. When we have "presentations of work" I don't allow them to say things like, "Here's a picture of a tree" it's more like, Here's this thing, it's vertical and has this texture running up and down it and then there's this bulbous stuff going this way and that way kind of attached and light goes in and out and there's pattern and shadows etc. This tends to get them away from seeing photography as just producing a picture, a copy of reality but that the processes and act of photography are just as important.  

Anyway, where was I?? Oh yes,  in the interview Uelsmann says, "I fell in love with the alchemy of the photographic process and to this day, watching that print come up in the developer is magic for me. I still find it a wonderful, challenging experience. It’s also a kind of personal therapy for me just to engage in that process".  I second that!!

The sixth sense

The sixth sense expands our sense of sight, hearing, smell, taste, and touch- giving a greater sense of perception as we interact with our environment.

Ephemeral, subliminal, veiled… highly personal… unseen, unheard, unfelt by others.

For this piece, I was interested in the shadows created by a light source as it was moved over the canopies. Photographing it added a mystery that wasn’t present during its creation. The process of moving the light around became rather spiritual in a way… soothing…calming…ritualistic...experiencing the sixth sense.

Sixth Sense

As I was thinking about my Sixth Sense project, I wanted to incorporate all of my senses to create my intuitive piece. Using Photoshop, I layered my 5 images, overlapping and with a translucent application of each plate. The black in the piece represents my sense of hesitance and insecurity. The intense colors (my confidence) battles my insecurities.

For the sixth sense project, I went at the work with the mind frame of the sense being interpreted as intuition.

This was the beginning of my six sense project. I used a combination of plates from our previous "senses" because I feel that we rely on these senses in trying to inform our thinking and influence our intuition. I tried using oil paints to pull the print and I felt like it came out a little light. Almost like a ghost. So I decided to work into it with oil paints.

This was the result. I tried to allow my intuition and gut reaction to guide each decision I made and not think about these decisions when working into the piece. I think it was an interesting result as intuition guided my color choices and decided what marks I made and where they landed on the image.

Steph's Sixth Sense

My biggest challenge has always been to slow down and simplify. While working on the sense of smell I created 2 different plates. The first was a memory of the smell and the second the actual smell. The second plate was much simpler and more contemplative. I simplified. Those concepts of slowing down and simplifying translated into "shut up and let the print speak" for this final project. So for this plate that is what I did.

I spread all the prints I had made in the week at UF out on my studio floor and listened to what they had to say. Three prints reveled themselves as belonging together beyond aesthetics.

"The Sixth Sense" collage art work is a combination of a double run calligraphic print inspired by my sense of touch (foreground), a single run of my second smell inspired plate (middle ground), and a single run of a different touch inspired calligraphic print (back ground).

Individually, each one of these prints was missing something. The meditative dual figure was finding inner peace alone and separated from the world, while the two calligraphic prints were raging with energy, yet emitting two different vibes. My quest then became to merge the peaceful with the chaotic to find a meaningful balance.

The negative space in the foreground print alluded to an eye within the textures that would reveal the meditative figure if allowed to be removed. So I began carving away at the print. I soon realized that I just needed to put "critic" aside and let the print speak for itself and guide my knife. By allowing myself a few moments of silence I could finally listen close enough to hear what my eye wasn't seeing.

After thinking about it for a while, I decided my "sixth sense" would be synaesthesia itself. "Aesthetic" essentially means feeling, as opposed to its opposite "anaesthesic", so I interpreted "synaesthesia" rather liberally to mean mixing and combining sensual response. Using our senses in our individual ways and combinations is how we construct our own narratives. I tried to challenge my own artistic narrative by combining media I normally don't; using less-than-finished prints I added charcoal, pastel, and collage.

Day 1, Week 2 - Printers Story