www.dawltonbarn.co.uk

www.dawltonbarn.co.uk

Monday 28 March 2011

New Work

Pairing the palette back to monochrome, once again I am exploring mark upon surface and the crude science of chemical and molecular bond the ink particles make within the protein and carbonate structures of the gesso. Marks penetrate the surface, repetition, over marking to point of initial trace obliteration, only to be revealed in the archeology of removing thin surface layers to uncover and lay bare the raw initial marks of my play.

Tondos bought from Chromos are the new obsessions.

My daily pieces continuing with a sparse brevity of line or colour that have a focussed relevance to my machinations. A little like musings on the back of fag packets or beer mats, when desirous of overcoming a block or planning world peace. It never leaving your mind until you fathom it out on whatever surface, at whatever time, in whatever form; text, scribble, lexicon of symbols or motifs to be enlarged and lived with on a different scale and pushed further with the luxury of time.

Work commitments are looking to end shortly with a return to attending to the journey across the drive to the studio. However I am left questioning a continual conundrum of the preciousness I feel I sometimes place upon the time in the studio, the materials to which I feel wedded and whilst mark making is a fairly new discipline for me; "how quickly I feel I may have become a 'Company Thinker'?"

So I continue with the sketch books, and permit into the mix; iphone images, margin notes from a meeting, questionably random doodles and perhaps a beer mat or two into the enquiry process and aesthetic decisions.

Friday 25 March 2011

An Eastern Touch

A new home to a small gestural graphite drawing from the 'Studio Collections'.

Friday 18 March 2011

Move it, Freeze it, Write it!

Class window, x-ray montage

Screen printed t-shirts/costume for dance workshops

I have started working with a dancer and a group of year 5 students on a Creative Partnerships project for the Royal Opera House in Grays Essex. We are enquiring through a movement and visual arts project how to improve students confidence in and have fun with literacy.

We have been exploring with the group the structures and processes of the body that inform movement and our thoughts and feelings towards creating shapes, 'body sculpts' and dance moves around a class led topic.

Dance moves, drawings from observing a full sized skeleton, animating the skeleton through space, interviewing the skeleton and creative story writing were offered alongside the designing, cutting and printing of stencils for their t-shirt costumes. Session 1 of 3 completed with surprising outcomes and eager anticipation of the next.