Damien Hirst

After my tutor  looked through my work and saw I was headed down towards the decay path he suggested that I should look into Damien Hirst. At first I weren't so sure since I've never been a fan of his work at all, as interesting as it seemed, I just found him to be quite arrogant and lazy as an artist; but after looking into his work and taking out his books from the library I decided to give his work a try as I discovered his work can be interesting. He does seem like the perfect artist to look into to help motivate new inspirations since his work is quite diverse in themes as the pieces that I have looked at involves raw meats and flies, medicine/pills, trash, diamond encrusted skulls all of which relate to my theme.

Hirst's themes of morality, life and death, religion, wealth and decay; all coincidentally are very well suited to the direction I want to take my project, thinking of textile sampling in ways that can contrast these themes within these different areas, creating textures which look as though it deteriorates through burning, ripping tearing which will all present the downfall of fame. But also with the more glamorous side of fame with samples with gems and embellishment also; so the contrast will hopefully be gradual but obvious at the same time.  

 Damien Hirst (http://darkroom.baltimoresun.com/2012/04/pop-art-icon-or-con-artist-damien-hirst-exhibit-opens-at-tate-modern/#1)

Damien Hirst - Waste Twice (http://www.damienhirst.com/waste-twice)

Damien Hirst - For The Love Of God (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/For_the_Love_of_God

Decaying Dump

The Saatchi definitely inspired me to look into something more interesting which is mould, decay, deterioration which I think works perfectly with the themes in the 'Valley of the Dolls' books when the stars get to the end of their careers and are depressed alcoholics who have hit an all time low. Because of this I want to explore decay and the similarities it has with the rise and fall of fame as it starts all perfectly formed, well presented, fresh and new but then eventually over time and once neglected, can begin to shrivel up and change its colours to then end up mouldy and unable to go back to its old form. This interpretation intrigues me to further pursue the idea and look into mouldy fruit which I can play around with and hopefully transform later on as I still want to keep the glamour and fame involved throughout. 

Saatchi: Virgile Ittah

When I visited the Saatchi I was as always expecting to be inspired and love everything I came across as I have never been disappointed by any exhibition that has been on. When I went there was the 'Pangaea: New Art from Africa and Latin America' which was a great exhibition packed with graphic army paintings, boulders, and huge insects. 

What attracted me the most were the human wax sculptures upstairs which seemed perfectly formed from the head but seemed to deteriorate towards the bottom half of the body which inspired me so much for this project. 

The thought of 'deterioration' as a word and theme seems to work perfectly with what I am working towards or can become something more exciting and interesting. Looking at this sculpture alone springs millions of ideas to mind of how I can progress the theme of my project like the deterioration of the body alone can suggest the downfall of fame from good to bad. Therefore I might look in to decay and work out a way to involve it into this project which is an exciting new route for me.

Saatchi: Virgile Ittah - Dreams are guilty, absolute and silent by fire [own photography]

Fame and Misery

From the research I have done so far I have started to narrow down the themes to make it easier for me to concentrate on my project. Till now I had been looking at 'The Valley of the Dolls' which I enjoyed looking into through the book and movie then finding strong bonds through the Richard Hamilton exhibition which helped me move on to the next part of my project.

Fame and misery seems like a great place to carry on from as it was a main point within 'Valley of the Dolls'; seeing the rise and fall of these women through their similar journeys through fame and their downfall nearing the end. Which is why I want to move on and focus on fame and misery because I can literally find meaning and reason from so many places to expand my research from diamonds to coal I can run off anywhere with this new sub header which I look forward to expanding on.  

Own concept board

Highs and Lows

Keeping with the fame and misery I experimented with luxury leathers to sample with and create the contrast of both sides of the scale which dauntingly follows the main characters Neely, Anne, and Jennifer in Valley of the Dolls. 

Whilst at my work experience placement I managed to grab a few leather scraps which were being thrown away that I thought would work well with my concept of fame, luxury, popularity to misery, lows, torment. With those scraps I wanted to show the clear distinction between them by either glamming them up or ruining them. I done this by adding gems and jewels to the some and burning and tearing the other samples to suggest the difference in an obvious matter. 

Own sample photography

Own sample photography

Own sample photography

Own sample photography

I quite enjoyed putting the gems together and playing round with them since I've never worked with anything as feminine and sparkly which is why I mostly wanted to go down that route and slightly mix and explore a new aesthetic in this project. 

After sampling with the gems I begun using the gems to glam up and sharpen other pieces to kind of create a different feel on something that had a more sad appearance. 

  

Adding these gems almost brighten up and glamorise these miserable portraits which were originally album covers but couldn't find which band. Nevertheless I love the idea of playing about with creating different emotional connections and almost up-scaling images or fabrics to have a new appearance. 

Facing it

After visiting the Richard Hamilton exhibition at the Tate I was inspired to create portrait collages influenced by some of his work. I chose to do this as it linked well with the idea of looking into the lifestyles and 'many faces through fame' concept I had just looked into.

I knew I wanted to keep the collages glitzy but odd all at once because I want to separate the ups and downs of fame in most of what I will create. The glitter card is what helped keep the fame element in both collages because of the sparkle and glamorous connotations which come with glitter. I used images of the 'dolls' from the movies, cutting up their features to include into my collage such as the hair and eyes which I feel keeps the 60's vibe alive in both pieces.

The left collage is the one I feel more closer to the highs of fame with the diamond/jewelled mask and alluring eyes which represents fame in a more glossy way. Whereas the one on the right suggests a more depressing route with the drink being poured into the mouth with is a image I feel highly effective to the contrast I am trying to show. 

Using these collages I also created some prints for me to sample and play around with. Layering the images is almost a automatic route I go down whenever creating prints because I like mixing the scales and changing up the colours to create an interesting outcome. However because I feel my prints are almost repetitive and similar I have decided to maybe try a different technique for this project, or maybe only use print in a subtle way. 

Own collage photography

Own photoshop print screen shots

Own photoshop print screen shots

Own photoshop print screen shots

Richard Hamilton

To help me expand on ideas I visited the amazing Richard Hamilton exhibition at the Tate modern which was so packed with different installations, collages, paintings that we left the gallery buzzing from everything we had seen. 

The installation I enjoyed the most and spent the most time at was the weird hallucinogenic bright box room with spinning wheels and optical illusion like painted walls and soft floors which was a crazy piece that really helped me with maybe slightly gaining an insight of how it felt to be buzzed up like how the lady's in the book would be; but maybe not enjoying it as much as I did. 

The next few rooms weren't as enjoyable but nevertheless inspired me to grab a few ideas to try out myself as Hamiltion's art pieces seemed to be created from the 50's/60's onwards there were many pieces I could relate to my project. Such as collages and photography ideas and effects which really got me involved with thinking of how to present my work in more colourful and interesting ways.

 1. Illusion Box Room ( http://www.fadwebsite.com/2014/03/03/review-richard-hamilton-ica-tate-modern/ )

2. 'How Richard Hamilton went pop' ( http://wineandbowties.com/art/how-richard-hamilton-went-pop/ )

   3. Urbane Images ( http://www.tate.org.uk/whats-on/tate-modern/talks-and-lectures/urbane-images-richard-hamiltons-impact-today )