Inky crepe!

At the moment I'm happily working on the above piece, its about a quarter of the way finished so hopefully I'll have it done by tonight! I got an A2 sheet of card and randomly stuck down some strips of red crepe paper. then using a fine paintbrush and Indian ink I'm painting very intricate layered strands over it all. I'm really beginning to like this piece as it stemmed from my photo-shopped images of hair, as I noticed that pictures of moving hair are blurred and not as intricate as the still photographs of hair. When the ink hits the surface of the  crepe paper, it immediatly absorbs it and suddenly the intricate lines on the card turn into blurred images. This really shows the movement. I chose red crepe paper as it is a pop colour and emphasises action & movement, but the colour really isn't important in this piece, its the ink itself and the quality of the line through out.

Newspaper & Glue & Balloon!

Quite like the paper mache & balloon method, I blew up a balloon and covered it with strands of shredded newspaper using glue and then waited for it to dry over night. I then popped the balloon and pulled it away, being left with the skeleton shape of the balloon made out of the strands of newspaper & glue. I thought it would be interesting to turn it inside out. I really like this method, it is a 3D version of my layering masking tape and so you can see where my inspiration has developed from. I got a LOVELY photograph of the inside of the ballloon which captures all the layers and it was definately worth it. I will definately try this method again in the next week but using different materials!

Toothpick time!

 I was recently looking at some of Tara Donovon's artwork and I was really inspired with the unique sculptures she makes using everyday objects. I was then inspired to create my own 3-D sculpture. I used toothpicks and super glue and I really like the result and the layered sensation its creating, which also reminds me of some of Patrick Dougherty's twig sculptures! I'm going to keep adding on to this sculpture and make a bigegr piece, still using the toothpicks to create an intricate weave like piece.

Seaweed

 I've already made a wallpaper covering a section of my studio photographs of twigs that I took and i'm going to do the same with this lovely layered seaweed i found on the beach in kerry

Back to Basics!

I decided to recreate one of the images of hair that I had photoshopped by using the methods I thought was the most effective in achieving movement of hair. This was the method of using masking tape and paint etc. This time I thought about how I could best achieve this, then I began thinking of the method of batiq, where you block out the colours you want to keep with wax. I realised this could work for me! I began with a sheet of white card and blocked up all the bits I wanted to keep white with strips of masking tape. Then I painted it all blue and again cover up everything i wanted to keep blue with strips of masking tape. Finally I painted it all black and waited for it to dry and then peeled all the masking tape off. I really enjoyed this and I think I will try it again and further develop it

Clay layers

I decided to use clay to try create the layered qualities that I'm interested in. This was a simple process but i think it looked quite effective. I basically just rolled clay into strands and repeatedly layered them in sections on top of each other

Print!

 I finally got down to the print workshop and did a monoprint which I created as a result of my photoshopped images of hair. I had a great time doing this and enjoyed the process and I got the result I wanted with the darker of the prints.

more twigs!

i think im going to make a collage from different pictures of twigs altogether

Colour!

I was still lacking colour in my project and I wanted to explore it more. Through the project I've been mainly using ink and different colour papers eg browns,greys,blacks. So there hasnt been much colour and I wanted to bring it in as hair can really be any colour! I got lots of different colours of watercolours and painted long, overlapping strands on a piece of paper, cleaning my brush before changing colour and I got quite a nice effect. I then waited for it to dry and using a fine tip ink biro I drew tiny black lines on top of the colour strands in the direction they were going in. I really like this piece because it creates depth and the layered quality is present AND I got to bring in lots of colours

Twigs.Twigs.Twigs.

Colour layers!

I decided to try out the paper layers thing again, this time using five of 6 sheets of coloured paper...I think its quite effective and even though it resembles nothing like hair, I do think that it captures the flowing, natural, layered qualities of hair.

Photoshop!

I decided to try out photoshop and found it very difficult and confusing at first...but I finally learnt a few techniques. I took pictures of my own hair, and zoomed in and edited them, changing the contrast and shadows etc, which I thought added a nice effect. This also reminded me of the marrow grass which I'm going to involve in my project

Splattering paint

First I layered masking tape on paper and then I splattered ink and paint on top of the layers and peeled them back which i think creates the flowing, layered movement of hair strands

layering paper

I like the layered qualities of hair, and this reminded me of old billboards, where you can see the different layers of paper underneath. I decided to try out this technique by glueing pages of black, grey, brown & newsprint together. I then rip certain layers back. I think ill try this with more colourful paper/material soon as I want to concentrate on colour and tones.

Paper hair

. I attended a 3-D workshop a few weeks ago and started using paper to try recreate this layered textured effect of hair which im interested in. At first I found it difficult, but I finally found a technique to fold paper so that it twisted and had a nice flowing quality to it. I chose grey sugar paper and brown parcel paper and layered them and intertwining them together which I found very effective and really created the flowing movement I wanted to achieve.