IN PROGRESS - Task 5 - Exploratory Project - Outline

Deadlines:

• Monday 12 March: Tutorial AR
• Monday 19 March: Tutorial DK
• Monday 26 March: Exploratory Project - Challenges and Learnings - Seminar
• Monday 23 April: Group Crits 1/2 cohort
• Monday 30 April: Tutorial AR
• Finish: 11 May upload images by 24.00 for group evaluation and seminar on 14 May
• Monday 14 May: Exploratory Project Seminar / evaluation
• Monday 4 June: DEADLINE FOR PRACTICAL WORK SUBMISSION - End of unit review AR/CW

AimEncourage greater speculative and experimental approaches to visual research and making.Emphasis on risk taking, risks that are personal to you.  Curiosity and suspension of your usual judgement are crucial. Reflect carefully.Choose an area to explore that will challenge you.You may need to change your plan as you go along.Not expected to produce fully resolved work;The quality of the exploration is key.Outline Project PlanUsing the structure below, produce an outline project plan to be discussed in tutorials on 12 March and uploaded to your MA journal:

1. What are your starting points? – be specific 
   • What am I thinking about?The fundamentals of the Everyday - to date practices has addressed a concern for the decay of social decorum and the prevalence of neglect for the Everyday. - systematic disintegration leading to encasing the chaos in a confined space. How is communication and daily practices affected in environments where these vary due to cultural expectations? Is this discord accepted and how?Looking at: the bourgeoisie and their elevation from the everyday. Does this elevation exists today: does status or wealth create a simplified routine?; what are the commonalities and differences according to sociocultural factors?; or are the basic components of living so intrinsic that routines are fundamentally equivalent? Lefebvre, Rhythmanalysis creates a science of analysing daily rhythms,  inherent in my work. How do the rhythms of daily experience filter in to art? how has this shown up historically? how this affects artists and the current market?Whitewashing, genre, inherited genres (gender, race, age, class), control, space, confinement, touch, personal space, routine, space of routine, repetition, chaos, fragmentation...
2. What are you curious about? 
   • What am I reading, what is drawing me in? What artists am I curious about? What materials am I curious about? What techniques do I want to explore? Currently reading on Colonialism, deconstructing Colonialism, post-Colonialism, Orientialism, 'whitewashing', the narrative of history, identity politics; these subjects specific to the gulf or UK 'commonwealth' - that term in itsself. Coexistence and intergroup cooperation. Transience, permanent impermanence, 'migrant, expat, national'. Time and consumption of time in routine. Routine, culture and place. Negotiation of routine, time. The chaos of routine, how routines are shaped, deconstructed and reconstructed. Textiles and routine, domesticity, the sense of touch and everyday life, pattern, repetition and fracturing/fragmenting.Artist in the region, looking at pattern, similar concepts, or materials? Whats more important to my practice? Can I find artists that come under all of those headings? Do I use contemporary artists, peers? or art historical references? Do they need to be highly successful or can they be emerging?Books, layers, lines, disruption, neutrality, binary, repetition, paper, paint, wet, dry, encrusted, texture, touch, comfort, weight/wait, time passing. fabric, stitch, fragility, density, opacity, fibre, cloth, natural/degradable, dissolvable...
3. What strategies will you adopt? 
   • How Am I going to do this? Be structured and methodical, keeps clear notes - probably best to use this platform so it's in one place. Feel self conscious about that but can use passwords. Keep to the timeline, reference it regularly, make a time planner to map out slots during the weeks to accommodate each task for the course and other commitments. Thank goodness reading groups end this week! Photograph, document, upload, repeat... 
4. What are your personal risks?  
   • What scares me? Is it practical risks, theoretical risks or personal/private risks? This scares me... being distracted. Not producing enough, not understanding or misinterpreting the task or feedback. Underachieving, I know what I am capable of but seem to hold myself back, becoming self critical and apprehensive until I give up as it feels like the safest option. Comparison scares me, wanting to achieve and understand things in the manner of my peers. 

1. What challenges do you anticipate?  
   • Time, organisation, overwhelm, distraction, feelings of imposterism, insecurity, comparison, fear.  
2. Plan an outline programme over 13 weeks; build in time for reflection and evaluation: 
   • Week 1 Feb 18th Complete Mapping the territory, print large scale mindmap to work in to, use to outline concepts, generate ideas and moving forward. Produce outline plan first draft, produce some experiments regarding initial thoughts from current practice. 
   • Week 2 Feb 25th Begin research reading and gathering, use Textile reader (Hemmings, 2012) and Everyday Reader (Highmore, 2002); texts related to touch, histories, colonialism, colour, routine, textile usage. Explore artists already working around my exploration (also links to contextual study).  Continue production experiments, break process down and source materials. 
   • Week 3 Mar 4th  Reflect on current production, note relationship to readings, additional areas to explore or possible changes in direction etc.  
   • Week 4 Mar 11th Continue with production, once each moment of production is 'completed' as such, reflect immediately to stay on top and also revisit and compare with previous productions - Mon 12 Mar: Tutorial AR  
   • Week 5 Mar 18th Be aware of burn out or possible stopping points, challenge with an activity from the list provided to move work in to another dimension/area/scale/technique. Mon 19 Mar: Tutorial DK  ART WEEK DUBAI 
   • Week 6 Mar 25th Production, again being aware of reflection, and managing the other course commitments, refer to course-mates for progress and feedback, communicate strengths and weaknesses and possible areas for consultation Mon 26 Mar: Exploratory Project - Challenges and Learnings - Seminar  
   • Week 7 Apr 1st HALF WAY POINT good time to review the current body of work, what is successful and what isn't. Can anything be 'rescued' or needs to be cast off? is it fulfilling the initial concept and ideas? Does it need to? Has it produced new ways of thinking? Changed direction? What unexpected things have emerged? Have I challenged myself? Does this still feel safe? How can I take even more risks? Prepare for making day. Create a list of questions to pose to group for structured and meaningful feedback. Sat 7th Apr: Making Day 
   • Week 8 Apr 8th Production, again being aware of reflection, and managing the other course commitments, move forward using findings and feedback from making day. 
   • Week 9 Apr 15th Production, utilise activities list if stuck or needing an extra challenge. Prepare for Group crit next week. 
   • Week 10 Apr 22nd Production, self reflection and future planning. Prepare for tutorial with AR next week Mon 23 Apr: Group Crits 1/2 cohort 
   • Week 11 Apr 29th Production, again being aware of reflection, and managing the other course commitments, move work forward using critique from tutorial  Mon 30 Apr: Tutorial AR  
   • Week 12 May 6th Reflection and assessment of progress, prepare for group evaluation, clarify thoughts and findings, plan for future development of practice Finish: 11 May: upload images by 24.00 for group evaluation and seminar on 14 May  
   • Week 13 May 13th  Deadlines for contextual study and PPP, thinking about submitting work for assessment, evaluate progress and outcomes. Mon 14 May: Exploratory Project Seminar / evaluation - Mon 4 Jun: DEADLINE FOR PRACTICAL WORK SUBMISSION - End of unit review AR/CW 
3. Meet in a small group at least twice throughout the project. MZ, RF, KVW - GCC collective (although that is an actual collective that exists so may need a new name!)

Suggestions for Activity from project brief:

• immersing yourself in a subject or narrowing your subject
• breaking a habit or acquiring a habit
• generating lots of visual ideas from one source or trying the same idea again and again
• changing scale, mass, speed, volume, orientation
• moving into colour or moving into monochrome
• testing materials or learning a new technique
• using drawing or photographs of existing work to rework pieces
• combining, juxtaposing or sequencing existing work
• encouraging ambiguity, taking risks, doing something open-ended, pushing a piece of work as far as you can
• collaborating with someone or something else
• responding to an artefact or archive
• producing a series of experiments
• constructing work from multiple parts
• exploring collapse and disintegration
• borrowing strategies from other fields

Project evaluation  Use the following to structure your evaluation in your MA journal, feel free to amend or add categories/questions. What did you discover?What went well and why? What did not go so well and why? Comment on what have you learnt about:

• Your making and thinking process
• Your use of resources
• Your capacity to take risks
• How you cope with problems and challenges

How will you use what you have learnt in the future?You will be asked to share your experience of this project in one-to-one conversations with others in the group.

IN PROGRESS - Professional Practice Plan - timeline

Deadlines:Monday 19 Feb: Visual Methodologies SeminarMonday 5 March: Tutorial CWMonday 14 May: DEADLINE FOR SUBMISSION13 weeks.....Professional Practice Plan (PPP)A working document that starts in year one and continues until you finish study. It is intended to act as a career plan, it is continually revised and kept current over the length of the course.In year one, the PPP is between 500 – 1000 words. Submitted for assessment in June 2018.The plan should be written to include the following, which should be used as a guide and is not exhaustive.1.A summary and map of your practice in professional terms.2.A plan that sets out your aims for one year ahead, three years ahead and five years ahead. It is about dreams and aspirations, but needs to be realistic.3.Includes identification of networks, notes on the need for skills or facilities acquisition, appropriate ways of presenting your practice (e.g. website)Each year the plan is re-worked, amended and added to.Headers for document:Profile BIO: Katie Venner-Woodbridge (b.1982, London, U.K.) is a conceptual mixed media artist living and working in Dubai, U.A.E. Venner-Woodbridge’s work explores the ways in which pattern and routine facilitate human life, but also the ways in which breaking patterns and systems can provide both opportunity or discontent. Through disassembling and reassembling patterns, her work examines anxiety and disruption as both positive and negative forces. It challenges the boundaries between beauty and awkwardness, and between manageable quiet spaces and the uncomfortable containment of chaos. Venner-Woodbridge has exhibited in various group shows in both the U.K and U.A.E.Personal DevelopmentBusiness card - important for networking in Gulf region.CV – relevant to artWebsite – katievennerwoodbridge.comSocial media links – insta, behance, twitter, fb, pinterest, dribble, blogs - how to develop them, which to develop and whyonline sales and promotion: society6, drawback, redbubble, pattenbank etccritical practice programme at tashkeel: funded opportunity.apply for residences and open calls etcComplete MA - most importantlyCommunity Future plans – applications: sikka, , Artist In Residence, research, postsecret (how do I get in), Critical Dialogues, CAD6.0, Project space M Proposal, JJ proposal residency, arts related job for stimulation.Research Proposal for ProfDoc - explore research further and make it more specific to arts.consider making it more focused. a smaller question. Contact tutor on course as she has offered mentorship regarding future application. feedback has already been very promising and was considered for supervising team.Reflection Need to put in time frame and concrete goalsbe aware of personal needs and development deficiencies.utilise help availablehave more confidence in what your doing and don't stop due to lack of confidence.Practical Issues Finances, location, access, family. TIMEself-doubt.career and availability of time and resources while managing job and family.

13/02/2018 - Process: scale

Up scaling work from the hand-bound book overlays using a domestic printer and adobe acrobat to tile print the images. The smallest images in the photgraph below are A4, the middle image is ink on paper, a fragment drawn freehand, from the page that was then scaled up in the printing process.Using a scrap length of muslin, the cloth I favour due to its transparency, I taped to the largest image and utilised various colour markers to trace out  the different fractured patterns. This is prep of density embroidery testing. 

12/02/2018 - Task 4 - Mapping the Territory presentations 2 (Mine) - Intro to Task 5

notes and observations from presentations and discussion

Thoughts sparked by other peoples presentations:

RT - accordion book - cutting pages - context of local artists - those she is interacting with - wish I had thought of that, but also know that I didn't because it's not how I work.

TB - maps - volume - height - mountains - this course feels like climbing a mountain - The wanderer Society by Keri Smith <3 - boundaries of scientific and human knowledge - walking, is that the work? or its relationship to the work? process as work itself EC - clothing - the space your in - walking in space

My presentation:

Les Bicknell notes and progress

Mapping my everyday path - the urge to Frottage! A compulsion - to violate the paper before I write.

The only space big enough to work horizontally

Whole body movement - mind-mapping is a physical process for me, music and movement are needed to create rhythm to facilitate order - I discovered this on foundation when we had to play ‘musical painting’ and dance around paper strapped to the floor - it is a practice I don’t use often due to space restrictions but it feels magical!

Notes and layout notes to be processed - bare feet on the floor and tea are necessary!

The path dissected and reordered again - transplanted to studio to be worked on

Messy and uncomfortable - disjointed

The reason I don’t like mind-maps

Transplanted into a digital programme MindX - can save as pdf

White text on black background makes it simpler and clean/organised layout creates harmony

I feel more fulfilled by renegotiating the information in to this context - all processes are needed at this point

Section of map - four key interests of practice - discovered through this process and the continual re-working

Interlinking is happening

Artists and art history ‘timeline’ - my timeline not an actual one, how they relate in my thinking as per Elkin -

My personality requires permission to veer from rules and what I deem as expectations so these texts and activities are invaluable to me

Theoretical and critical - starting to bring in research and reading - possible avenues to explore and also reading list - need to add the interlinks

More on the headings under Critical and theoretical

Additional branch - materiality - interesting as I am encountering a standstill in practice - almost a ‘to do’ list for stuck moments

The comparison of a white background and black - I will be getting a version printed to pin to my studio wall and develop by hand further - a continuously growing and developing document.

Comments:

R: with actual territory - part of the place & movement

Learning a lot about the way you approach the task - travelling through the mindmap is like travelling through the work - a sense of where your ideas come from & what influences you alongside how it influences you and your interpretations of it.

From Chatbox:

E: a real sense of trying to get order to your thoughts in your task

K: I love the tiles, that looked beautiful.

E: you would also love the'cartographies of time - a history of the timeline' by rosenberg and grafton

K: My pleasure, it definitely shows how how your mind operates.

P: Your final slides made me think of electrical circuits.

R: I was hoping that I could see your mind map on the frottage...but maybe it will be too
confusing.

EC: it seemed you started out and moved in and then in your chart you moved from in to out

K: It is interesting that you and Jessie used your own territory in some way.

J: walking seems to be a theme today!

R: I'm going to add it to my map!

T: The process as ordeal is understandable. Well done for fitting so much in! I know I'll keep adding bits to my map as I figure more out.

Task 5 - Exploratory Project

Small group meetings throughout task.

undirected, vague, can be unnerving

• Les Bicknell - Richard Serra - list of verbs - doing - discover - what you want to do.
• Stewart Geddes - several pieces at once - moving - reflective
• Scanlon & Grivell - how can we intervene? who with? how can we play? what form will it take? what form now? and now?....

mirror - what reflects back on yourself - Hassan Sharif notes - I made this comment

Keep it alive - not resolved work - quality of engagement. quality of exploration

personal risks - suspension of usual judgement - choose something that will challenge.

making work - carrying on your practice

Whats the question? whats the risk? whats the challenge?

If your struggle is to make something that may be the greatest risk

go back to mapping & feedback & comments - what keeps coming up? what are you 'itching' to do?

words - thoughts - research - digesting research - eating it up? - consuming - time, knowledge, etc.

PROCESS

what can I find? What can I explore?

foam - embroidery around, stitching to fabric - glass tubes embroidered - fragility & transparency  - fine fractures - life, time, consumptions - rice - candy - food stuffs that are glass like and delicate.

'research proposal' - outline - see questions - personal responses.

list of activities on brief sheet

GCC group for discussions

David Kefford for tutorial.

05/02/2018 - Task 4 - Mapping the territory Presentations 1 - Intro in to context - notes for reference

notes and observations from presentations and discussion

Thoughts sparked by other peoples presentations:

- a 'thought dump' - More questions than answers - 'Post Photography' after the photo, what you do with them - immigrant - emigrate - migrant - the right of voice - it is relevant but can you comment?

- Physicality - notes from presentation to feed in to context map - frustration due to lack of challenging critique - lovely that its supportive commentary, just backing up ideas - no challenge, no push back - how to move forward with a pat on the back?!

- Questions - De Certeau

foundation for the contextual study -

Purpose - VALIDATION - proving our work is relevant by providing context - context - companions - new perspective - context - your work in context - research & development, critical analysis - what are other people doing in the similar field (concept/material etc), why do you stand out and also fit in?

RT - an artist statement plus validation

KO - the way we work our mindmaps is similar to the way we work our practice - So valid - how I work- created the responses to questions - broke it up - reconfigured it - broke that up - reconfigured - then translated in to digital output

Workshop - bring ideas - get on with it

active bibliography - exhibition catalogues, journals, bookmarks

12 march - tutorials - draft title - enquiry, key points, quotes, images - 2 A4 side of 'research' or starting material

29/01/2018 - Visiting Lecturers - Scanlon & Grivell

notes from lecture made on tracing padPhotos below:Using the tracing paper have another aspect to note taking, allowing them to literally overlap and intertwine.Below are the individual pages, scanned and manipulated to show contents clearly.

15/01/2018 - Visiting Lecturer - Stewart Geddes

Visiting lecturer Stewart Geddes 15th January

'Shippen'; 30cm x 23; oil and paper on panel

https://stewartgeddes.weebly.com/painting.html

My mixed notes from the presentation provided by Stewart Geddes:theory & research - overburden of research and academia - character & relevance for fine art, needs to be debated - visceral experience of life has had as much impact on work.wood panel - 5ft- a thing made of substance, colour, paint - formative reason to choose to be an artist. Do children have a tendency to patterning? Is that something I am drawing on?Dyslexic - didn't get acknowledged until adulthood, disproportionate number of dyslexics in art school. having an issue with that mechanism & compensated linguistic forms take over such as art.1970's-1980's 50/50 split @school on gender, mainly male teachers - feminism was debated. - acknowledge that artist & teacher influences are male.Alfred Stockham - tutor @uni, sail boat image - teasing out the personal visual vocals of the studentMichael Canny - <3 michaelcanney.co.ukPeter Lanyon - cornish artist, St IvesAlbert Irvin - hayward gallery - John Hoyland link, tutorial @uni, - 20yrs later in London, noticed a 'Bert Irvin' in a house through a window - his daughter was a neighbour. She invited Geddes to party and introduced them - friends ever since. Now organising a retrospective. - - - An effecting experience - Intimacy, meeting people etc - work is a representation of the consciousness of a person - engaging with people/culture etcPatrick Heron - article of his home, Eagles Nest, famous for light, gulf stream, warm etc. experienced first hand, austere, light filled and displayed an aesthetic attitude - their attitude to live and how they lived.Josef Albers - colour theory portfolio - taught by colour theorist, Bauhaus - German/American - Johannes Itten - Bauhaus & design & fine art practice - the staff were celebrities - few students came out of it.Black Mountain College - John Cage, Rauschenberg, Cy Twombly, Merce Cunningham - ChoreographerThe Secret Lives of Colour By Kassia St ClairColour: A Workshop For Artists and Designers 2 by David Hornung, Michael James Colour theory - how the eyes see the opposite colour on the colour wheelColour and Meaning: Art, Science and Symbolism by John Cage

Mark-making in Textile Art: Techniques for Hand and Machine Stitching by Helen Parrott

Unremitting urbanmetropolis - abruptness of the city - not sprawling - Dubai - Sharjah joined - Abu Dhabi - distance -

Richard Long - Bristol - mud pieces, with 2nd highest tides

Body, Object, Land -

Figure, Still life, landscape - Do I relate to landscape? I guess I do.

Lanyon

Alfred Wallis - discovered by Ben Nicholson, wood - Stewarts Image - landscape - Albers influence - tryout a freeing - registration - practice catching up with thought etc

creating a rhythm - coming to terms with an experience - 'Just Doing' - Is he a Stuckist?

 Happenstance - valid - showing motion - alluding to with - the unstable sign;-Benno - marble dust - layers -found image captured in photosfound paintings - reconfigured and different axisfinding the work in the process - proposition that is considered but also a point of departureepiphany moments -conceptual underpinnings - critical judgement and intuitionthe painting is the essay - not the essay about the paintingwhen something surprising happens.

'Super Drug'; 75cm x 220; acrylic and collage on panels

https://stewartgeddes.weebly.com/

Stewart Geddes asked if we would think about the following questions before the session. My responses are in pink.1. Why do you make art? Do you have early perhaps even childhood experiences which have influenced you? people? ways of communicating. I have never really wanted to do anything else. I have apparently always been creative, and encouraged to be that way. Perhaps its because the quiet activities of making art as a child meant it was encouraged as an only child to keep me busy. It certainly has aspects to do with how I interpret the world around me both visually and cognitively. I interpret patterns in my sight, and utilise the structures of organisation and rhythm to remain focused and not overwhelmed. I see patterns between the words in texts and need things to be aligned and clean to take in the information. I was always the artist, always and still am the 'creative one' in the family.2. What critical points of change have taken place in your development as an artist in your ideas and your making, either intellectual or experiential? In 2016 I began working in the context of a shared studio space and undertook an artist professionalism course which allowed me to move from confessional art to art with political and social commentary. My practice then made a huge leap in intellectual development, being informed by academic texts and data rather than purely self-focused experience.3. What role does colour and its absence or presence play in your work? This is a question I have asked myself and my peers recently. Colour is absent from my work as I am conveying thoughts and asking questions regarding the quotidian, rhythms, social structures and to some extend identity politics, to add colour and the mixed/varied symbolism it holds, I feel will confuse the work and muddy the context and how it is viewed. 

09/01/2018 - Exhibition - 'In Residence: Christine Muller & Fay McCaul', Tashkeel

Artist In Residence programme bought designers Muller and McCaul in to the studio spaces at Tashkeel. Muller, printing specialist, aided Mobius Design studio & Swiss design collective Weltformat in production of their collaborative exhibition WeltformatDXB at Dubai Design District during design week. With the aid of studio assistants she printed all the large format posters for the Dubai section of the show. McCaul was in residence for three months and provided workshops and talks while working in the studio.Fay McCaul:Specialising in knitted and fused textiles using wood, wire and plastics.        Most of her work was transparent, luminous or structured in a way to enhance, move or shield light in internal spaces. The repeats were beautiful and called out to be caressed, thankfully something that was not frowned upon in the exhibition.Christine Muller:After the emmense and intense paper printing of Weltformat DXB Muller produced her own works, inspired by the islamic patterns she encountered here in Dubai, on silk flags whose construction was outsourced.    Most of the pieces had the format of flags local to the Gulf nations, and the use of fine silks gave a luminous subtly to the prints. The audience was encouraged to move through the flags, so that they would float and swirl in the gallery space. The colour palette really felt indicative of the region, the luscious golds, sky blues and rusty sand colours.The exhibition made me question my production or lack thereof. What am I afraid of? What am I trying to stop and why? Why am I restricting my production to small scale pieces? Is it space? of lack of vision?