Viva – Laura PirklAn insight into my artist practice and my

journey throughout Autumn term

In my past work, I have always been interested in the relationship between nature and humans. Last year, I explored this in a more

alchemic way, focusing on mythological creatures that are trying to find a balance between nature and us, the humans. I wanted to continue exploring this theme of nature throughout this autumn

term, and having worked with sculpture so much, I wanted to branch out and use different mediums/ techniques. I started by

looking into artists such as Tom Deininger and Anselm Kiefer.

Tom Deininger Anselm Kiefer

Collects waste/ rubbish and creates large scale portraits and landscape sceneries, by layering the items to form a whole new creation.

Creates abstract landscape paintings, into which he incorporates mixed media, such as straw, clay, ash and lead. Poems of Paul Celan have played a role in developing Kiefer's themes of the horror of the Holocaust, which he reflected upon with the mixed materials he incorporated in his paintings.

Creating My ‘Litter Painting’

Inspired by Deininger and Kiefer, I wanted to create an abstract panting incorporating rubbish I had found and collected around Reading. Mixing acrylic paint, gold spray, cardboard, plastic, cling film, bean bag filling and cigarette stubs, I created a piece with texture and depth, representing grime as well as the beauty of nature by using greens, browns and golds within my colour palette. Topping off the piece with fake ivy, I highlighted the irony of nature and plastic as a unity. The smell of the cigarettes added another dimension to the piece, making it uncomfortably striking, highlighting my message of pollution in nature.

Finished piece installed by the window sill, to use the wooden structure and outside bushes as complimentary framing.

Pre- Raphaelite Movement/ John Everett Millais’ Ophelia Cindy Sherman

The naturalistic properties and transcendent beauty within the abstract paintings I explored, lead me to research the pre- Raphaelite movement. I loved the characters portrayed and their poetic background stories. I especially liked Millais’ Ophelia, as there is such a rich background from Shakespeare’s Hamlet, as well as hidden meanings in the painting’s representations, like a hidden skull in the bushes. After researching Cindy Sherman’s parodic/ ironic photography, in which she dresses up as stereotypical female characters to subverse these ideas, I decided to re- create Ophelia in a modern and humorous way, incorporating the issue of pollution and littering.

I recreated Ophelia with a video, as I wanted to challenge myself and explore the art of film more. Rubbish instead of flowersVoiceover of Ophelia’s death scene (Shakespeare’s Hamlet) played on top with slow, dark musicTried to find lakes to film in – many polluted – links to issue I'm exploringCouldn’t get allowance for Harris gardens pond – filmed in bathtubBathtub turned out to highlight irony and humour of film

Week 5 exhibition feedback

After exhibiting my abstract ‘litter painting’ and my video of a modernised Ophelia, I was very interested in exploring video work further. However, I started to ask myself what I can do to combine paintings and film? Or, how can I blur the lines between painting and film, to create a unique medium? I also wanted to keep experimenting with ways of subversing traditional paintings and tackling modern day issues with humour.

Bill Viola Tableau Vivant

Bill Viola creates art films concentrating on themes around death, birth and consciousness. He uses audio-visual technologies to make his work so captivating. What interested me about his work is the combination of stillness surrounding the human subjects, with partial movement in the foreground or background, giving the subject this eerie state between being alive and dead. I wanted to use a similar technique of a slow moving, almost steady subject, to create the impression of a ‘moving painting’. Tableau Vivants inspired me in a similar way; the ‘living pictures’ consist of a static scene with stationary actors, placed in theatrical sceneries and positions. I wanted to chose more pre- Raphaelite works to recreate ironically modernised ‘living paintings’

By Amber Turner

Inspirations for my ‘Moving Paintings’

The Damsel of the SanctGrael by Dante Gabriel Rossetti (1874)Concept: To replace the religious grail of wine with a bottle of Vodka and shot glasses, showing the character symbol the number two with her fingers (instead of the symbolic gesture in the painting), to show modern binge drinking in an ironic light.

Venus Verticordia by Dante Gabriel Rossetti (1868)Concept: To replace the apple with a botoxsyringe to reverse naturalistic beauty ideals from the pre-Raphaelite times with contrasting ideals of popular, modern western culture. To capture the character applying a syringe to her lips and pressing down, giving the impression of injecting herself with something that contrasts the natural theme of the original painting.

Making the Backgrounds

The layering I created with painting the background and collaging on top of it using photoshop was inspired by the layering in Kiefer’s work and the abstract painting I created earlier in the term. The mixture of real photographs and paintings adds depth to the background, as well as reinforcing my aim of blurring lines between painting and real life subjects; a ‘moving painting’

Framing My ‘Moving Paintings’

After researching pre- Raphaelite frames, I designed my own frames on cardboard, to install on the tablets my ‘moving paintings’ would be shown on for the exhibition. Adding clay for texture and topping off the frames with gold leaf, I created the last part of my piece to help complete the illusion of a real painting. I also created some detail such as a syringe used in the video decorated with clay roses and packets of roses with serial numbers on it, to reinforce a theme of nature becoming a commodity.

Week 11 Exhibition Parish Hall

Week 11 Exhibition After Dark

Thank You For Listening!

Any Questions?