READING: Jacques Ranciere

The Emancipated Spectator

“To be a spectator is to be separated from both the capacity to know and the power to act” (Ranciere, J, pg. 2) I’ve found Ranciere’s writing about ‘The Emancipated Spectator’ to be very helpful in understanding my own and other artists ideas. The spectator’s role in interacting with an art piece is very important as they create all the meaning without any prior knowledge of what they are looking at. The audience uses a combination of previous experiences to translate and interpret what they understand in the artwork. 

When Ranciere talks about the spectator being separated from the capacity to know and the power to act, I believe he’s talking about combining the act of looking and doing into one experience you have with an art piece. By looking you are doing some of the work for the artist in the sense that you are talking for them about their work.  

I want the viewer to interact with my art work. Walk around, in, out of different parts. This will give them the chance to view the work from all angles and notice that the work isn't one sided and i have created a whole new object out of these recycled materials.  

MY WORK:

For this work I was just testing other installation ideas I could do. 

I want the work to interact with the space more than how its is against the wall. I'm interested in adding an active quality where the audience and move in and around the art. 

Against the wall the interaction with the work becomes limited. 

IDEA: Painting & Sculpture

The way in which i paint strongly relies on the formal structure that my work is painted on. What i am painting on becomes more important than what i am painting. 

I have a strong interest in painting and its relationship to sculpture and how paint can give new life to something old. 

The formal shapes, textures and colour of the object i use to paint on are often mimicked throughout my painting styles. I always have a constant conversation between the material painted on and the marks i make onto that object. How that mark will influence the next mark made and so on.  

MY WORK:

No Name,

2012,

Wood, Metal, Piping, Fabric, Plastic, Thread, Paint, Wire, Tape and Wall Filler.

From my last work i did a lot of research and have made a few changes. 

I've decided on what materials i want to use and that is building site materials. Materials that could be found on the inside and outside of a building or house. The materials and objects i have selected already come with lifetime of previous use, they are covered in marks and traces that influence the way in which i change them. 

I wanted the installation of my work to show a strong conversation between the materials and the process of making I've been having. Each piece of work has a conversation with the last work creating a flow between the formal qualities of the work.

There is so much to look at with is work that i think i need to pinpoint the conversation i want the viewer to have with the art.

As i look at my work I feel there is a strong conversation going on between the work I'm making and architecture within an everyday setting. There's a temporary feel that comes with placing pieces against the wall and using tape and wire to hold things together.

The dominance of the pink I think takes away from the rest of the work as it doesn't fit in with the industrial setting my materials are from.

ARTIST: Jessica Stockholder

http://www.jessicastockholder.info/index.php

.

1991

(A)wire mesh acrylic yarn, wire and metal bar
(B)two pieces of plywood laminated together with cloth and two hinges and acyrlic paint

 .

1994

wall bracket, bias tape, window sashes, acrylic yarn, plastic orange, wire and hinges

 With Stockholder's work i feel like i can relate to her ideas about materials and how they interact with one another. She is influenced by the materials first them she places them within the gallery context. She is inspired by recycled materials and their colours, textures, shape and size, which is also what inspires my practice. 

IDEA: Trashformation

I read a book called Transformation by Lloyd Herman that talked about many of the ideas i use in my own work.

"Today, virtually everything costs more, so it makes sense to recycle materials, adapt buildings to new uses while preserving their architectural intergrity, and make new products from old ones."- pg. 10

Im interested in this idea of giving new life to an old product. 

" 'ready-made' a common object raised to the level of a work of art through the process of appropriation- but it was preceded by simple assemblages made from more than a single "found" object."- pg. 12

The idea of using borrowed elements in the creation of new works. 

I really enjoyed this reading as my main idea in my work is to create a new way of looking and interpriting a recycled object. 

These objects/materials come with this already established meaning but through my own work i'm trying to maybe not change but add more, developing the ideas behind this objects previous existing meaning.

I become inspired by the form qualities of the material, the textures, colour and shape. 

MY WORK:

No Name,

2012,

Plaster, wood, pins and paint on wall,

100cm x 80cm.

For this work i started by reacting to the traces and marks left from my last works. The formal shapes and how they interacted with one another gave me a starting point. 

I decided to use materials that are found around the studio or in the buildings structure itself.

I wanted to experiment with these materials and install them in a new way that differs from their traditional use.

This work also uses the idea of interaction with the setting and the audience. The way the work is installed it forces the viewer to experience the studio wall in a new way that differs from their usual everyday experience.