Responces and Experiments

This post will show the responses I do from my photographs and primary sources I collected from around Picadilly Circus and Balham. I will be working from photographs as well as collectibles I gather from these places.

The images below show my experimentation of changing the atmosphere of a place by simply changing the light around it. The first three images show an attempt of making the photograph seem as if it was taken at different times of the day. In the first photo, you can see the the sky is clear blue and the other two they look as of if the skybox was filled with gray clouds. When you compare the two, look on the inside of the building. The atmosphere changes completely as well as the mood just from changing the brightness of the background.

The purpose of this experiment was to explore the idea if changing the viewers experience of an image from just changing the light. The experiment was not successful because I cannot expand from this and it wouldn't help me in future progress.

The second experiment I did on photoshop was another light experiment through changing the brightness of the image. This photograph was taken at the Balham tube station. It shows how changing the brightness down makes it feel like a different time of the day.

The image below shows the original. Even from this image , you can see that the inside of the tube station feels very different from the outside. You wouldn't expect it to be that bright or you would at least expect to be brighter inside as well. This image is actually a second where you're about to go out of the tube station. Everything around you goes dark and the outside turns very bright as your eyes try to adjust to the surrounding. The purpose of experiment was to see if a photograph can capture the same experience you get through your own eyes. I was able to capture this experience and then experiment from it meaning the experiment was successful.

I think that this experiment is a combination of the artists 'Whistler' as well as 'MC Escher'. The experiment doesn't link directly with the meaning of their works but the techniques they used. Whistler would use light and atmosphere to his advantage and use it to create a distorted image. I also used the light, but also just as Escher uses impossible building to cause confusion, I changed the brightness of light to change the viewers point of view of the image. As you look from image to image, you believe it's different time of the day , but  at the same time you cannot tell which image is the original.

I can use this experiment to create 3D installations that will link to Whistler and Escher and also use other types of media such as videos, paints or chalk.  

The photograph and experiment below link with two of my artists 'Whistler' and 'Manet'. The photograph was taken in the way Whistler would paint his work. It is distorted which makes the viewer less aware of the objects in the photograph. I wanted the viewer to focus around the shape and light which is the same feature Whistler looked at when painting his work.

The experiment on the other hand links with Eduard Manet. As I mentioned before hand, I am more interested in his techniques rather than meaning in his work. This response was created using chalk. Chalk was ideal because it was shaped like a brick. Manet painted his scenes in a very 3D way where you can look very deep into the painting. In order to do that, he used thick blocks of color that would be pointed into the centre of the painting creating a 3D feel. I used chalk to create this very effect and drew with thick strokes. What this did, was allowed me to quickly capture 3D-ness in the response. As you look at it, you can look deep into it and it feels as if you're actually standing in this huge corridor.

As well as Manet, this is also a response to Whistler. I didn't try to add much detail in this drawing and I also tried to capture the light from the photograph. I used thick coats of white chalk in the corners and then focused the light towards the centre of the image. This has also influenced the 3D-ness of this painting and it almost feels as if you were running through this corridor and everything around you got distorted. 

I believe this experiment was successful and I will carry on creating more of these in later stages using chalk as well as paints, pencils and drawing these in different sizes such as A2, or A5. 

One day when I came back from college, I took blurred photos from outside of the windows in my house. I took them by looking through the glass and at the time, the glass was very wet and it made everything you see look distorted and it reminded me of some of 'Whispers' work and I decided to use those images to create responses. These responses will not only be flat drawings, but I believe I can take these images to create 3D installations by taking the image apart and putting it into sections one by one creating a 3D effect when looking into it. Whistler focused on the idea of shape and color which can be fully explored using installations by adding and taking away from what is already present which also links to another artist 'M.C. Escher who was pulled into the idea of making something look impossible just like a puzzle which doesn't have the right pieces, but yet is still the whole thing.  I also know that Whistler would simplify his paintings and describe them as 'Harmonic' which was why he made them look so mysterious. I want to apply these ideas when creating my responses.  

As a response to Whistler and Bruce Nauman, I decided to do a series of small installations. It was simply an outline of a city and some trees and I placed a torch around this small installation looking at how it would affect it when placing the light from different sides. All the photos were taken in dark in order to focus on the light itself and nothing else.

In the image below, I used the blue carpet of my room to create a watery effect. As you look down at the image, it feels as if you're standing far away from it which means it created a 3D effect. Nauman was an artist who wanted people to move around his neon installations. The whole purpose of his work was to force people to move around in order to explore it's full content and this was achieved with the quality of light. If I moved the torch from it's original place, it made it seem as if you were standing kilometres away from the light source even though it was moved a few inches. 

The image below shows an experiment of putting the torch behind the installation. I used a metal sheet as the background and since it's metal, it was scratched all over and the light made it seems as if those scratches were stars. I found this interesting because when I moved the camera angle, the whole image looked way different. The quality of light changed significally and it turned from dim blue to bright white. It might have been that the metal in the background had an effect on the light which would change the brightness if you looked from another angle.

This is the same image and the only difference here is the position of the camera. The whole perspective has changed and this is just about 15 degrees to the right. This links to Bruce Nauman as he wanted people to experience something else each time they moved around his installation. In these images, you can experience different qualities of light just from moving around it.

Whistler was very interested in the quality of light and not so much in what was in the image. Below, I took a very distorted photo of my installation while having the torch very far away leaving only a bit of light. When you look back at Whistler's work, you can clearly see the light resemblance between his work and the image below. When you do not see anything except the light in the image, you start to take a much bigger interest in the light itself than anything else. It goes into Whistler's idea of 'harmony' in the image

I have researched artists who might do such experiments with paper and I found an interesting sculptor who works with paper and light called Nicholas Wright. The mood he sets in his work is also very similar to Whistler; however instead of paintings, he creates a sculpture that he build around a lamp and when lit up, the whole scene comes to life. What I found very interesting about that is that you can use different color or brightness of light to set different moods for the same sculpture. This is something I want to carry through and I will be creating more responses to Nicholas Wright as I progress.

I created a small light box which I filled with different color filters and created various small responses that I linked to other artists such as Bruce Nauman and Dan Flavin. Both of these artists used different color lights to pull you into various moods created by different colors. I even created a small video as a response to Dan Flavin showing off the variations in color in this set.

Richard Wilson

M.C. Escher

Maurits Cornelis Escher (17 June 1898 – 27 March 1972), usually referred to as M. C. Escher, was a Dutch graphic artist. He is known for his often mathematically inspired woodcuts, lithographs, and mezzotints. These feature impossible constructions, explorations of infinity, architecture, and tessellations.

His artistic expression was created from images in his mind, rather than directly from observations and travels to other countries. Well known examples of his work also include Drawing Hands, a work in which two hands are shown, each drawing the other.

The reason I chose Escher as one of the artists is because his work doesn't focus on the drawing itself, but the way your mind responds to them. He specialises with illusions and impossible structures which are all about confusing the viewer into trying to figure out how that illusion works.

My first impression of this artist was that he was a genius in creating patterns. His first works I saw were the drawings of shapes that would fit between one another leaving no gaps between. I looked deeper into this artist to seek meaning behind his work and found inspiration for this project.

The artist uses pencil to create tonal drawings of impossible structures. The main formal elements are tone, shape and pattern which the artist uses o create depth in his drawings and makes parts of it stand out giving them a 3D effect. This technique helps him create the illusions such as the "Waterfall" from 1961 where the artist creates an effect where the top of a bridge connects to the buttom of the building in a straight zig zag line.

Eschers work links to my research about illusions. This artist didn't use lights in order to create such illusions; however I'm only looking at how he caused the images to trigger your brain into thinking of how to make sense out of an impossible structure. As a responce, I want to explore if I can achieve a similar effect using lights such as glow sticks.

(Waterfall - 1961

Dan Flavin

Dan Flavin (April 1, 1933, Jamaica, New York – November 29, 1996, Riverhead, New York) was an American minimalist artist famous for creating sculptural objects and installations from commercially available fluorescent light fixtures.

Dan Flavin's large-scale work in colored fluorescent light for six buildings at the Chinati Foundation was initiated in the early 1980s, although the final plans were not completed until 1996. The work was inaugurated at the museum's annual Open House in October 2000.

Two parallel tilted corridors are constructed at the connecting arms of each U-shaped building. These corridors contain light barriers that are placed either in the center or at the end of each corridor. The barriers consist of eight-foot-long fluorescent light fixtures, occupying the entire height and width of the corridor. The tubes are installed with space between them, allowing a view through the barrier. Each fixture holds two differently colored bulbs shining in opposite directions. The barriers in the six buildings utilize four colors: pink, green, yellow, and blue. The first two buildings use pink and green, the next two yellow and blue, and the last two buildings bring all four colors together. Two windows at the end of each long arm of the U allow daylight to enter the building and permit a view into the vast landscape.

Flavin was an artist who loved to work with film and different hue saturation's within them. He also loved the huge variations in color and he used light to explore this variation. His work would sometimes consist if the same object repeated, but lit up by a different light. The color of the light greatly changed the way you look at the artwork and gives a completely new feeling than it would of if it was just a single color.

I found the idea of using different color light very interesting and decided to do a few experiments of my own. I took my response to Nicholas Wright and rendered different filters through the light to change the color of the response. I had a cyan, purple as well as a red filter and came up with 3 different responses which all come from the same original piece. The only difference in them is the color of the light and as you look into them one by one, each contains it's own atmosphere and links back to my original idea of light creating an illusion.

Cyan Filter

Purple Filter

Red Filter

I decided to use another piece of media as a response which is video. Dan Flavin often used film in his artwork and demonstrated how different filters of light changed the mood of a room. Carrying from what I had above, I created a small light box. I used one of my photographs of an arcade and used the different color filters to fill the room with various colors. I also made an affect of the light turning on and off rapidly and switching the filters while doing so. I used red, blue and green pieces of fabrics and plastics and placed them at the top and then was able to get light through with various effects.

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Here is the set in different colors:

Bruce Nauman

Bruce Nauman

Bruce Nauman (born December 6, 1941) is a contemporary American artist. His practise spans a broad range of media including sculpture, photography, neon, video, drawing, printmaking, and performance. Nauman lives near Galisteo, New Mexico.

The thing this artist does that made me take an interest in him, is how work with neon lights. My project focuses around lights and how indoor and outdoor lights effect the space as well as people within that space as well as the experience they gain from it. Nauman creates great installation with light that clearly link with what I want to achieve in this project.

Nancy Spector wrote:

"Bruce Nauman defies the traditional notion that an artist should have one signature style and a visually unified oeuvre. Since the mid-1960s the artist has created an open-ended body of work that includes fiberglass sculptures, abstract body casts, performances, films, neon wall reliefs, interactive environments, videos, and motorized carousels displaying cast-aluminum animal carcasses. If anything links such diverse endeavors, it is Nauman’s insistence that aesthetic experience supersedes the actual object in importance. Perception itself—the viewer’s encounter with his or her body and mind in relation to the art object—can be interpreted as the subject matter of Nauman’s work. Using puns, claustrophobic passageways with surveillance cameras, and videotaped recitations of bad jokes, he has created situations that are physically or intellectually disorienting, forcing viewers to confront their own experiential thresholds."

The artist uses light to make viewers want to interact with the surroundings just as you would in a normal public environment. The artist is using light to recreate this experience and keeping that experience within an artwork.

 

Green Light Corridor, 1970. Painted wallboard and fluorescent light fixtures with green lamps

My first impressions of his artwork were mixed. As I looked at his neon installations, I could never capture everything with one glance and within one photo. I had to look at several before I could get around the whole artwork. The image above is an example of that. If you walked into the room through that yellow door, you would not be able to see the artwork. You would have to walk around it to see it fully.

Forcing people into moving around the artwork is also the artist's intent. He wanted to create something that you cannot experience from a single photo or from standing still when looking at it in real life.

His artwork creates a feel of curiosity. Usually when you look at something, you glance at it and move on whereas here, you cannot leave the artwork alone without having to move around it.

The thing I like about this artwork the most is that it's interactive, but at the same time you can't do anything to it. You interact by simply walking in circles around the artwork and looking at it from different sides. You also gain different experiences depending on which side you are looking from. If you looked at it from an entrance, you will see a wall with light behind it, but as you move closer, you realise there is another wall behind and the light is actually in the middle.

I think this artist links to my theme of light and illusion. The artist's work is all about deceiving people and forcing them to move around the neon installation which gives them various experiences. My research in Piccadilly Circus gave me similar experiences on it's own. The Trocadero section is filled with neon lights and the place itself feels like one huge installation in style of Bruce Nauman. As you walk around it, you never get enough experience and it makes you want to stay there for longer in order to get around every part of that place.

Links to other artists:

Bruce Nauman is an artist who works in a similar way to Dan Flavin. Although their intentions are different, they use a variety of similar materials and techniques in their work, The main one being working with neon Lights.

In my light box response, I used a variety of color filters to create different atmospheres. Both Flavin and Nauman used various color neon lights throughout their works and both would use an area or a room which in my case was the small box.

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Responses

Something very interesting I found when experimenting with light and perspectives was the angle that the picture is taken at. Below you can see 2 images which look completely different; however they are the same thing simply taken from another angle. I just moved the camera around 15 degrees and the whole light in the image changed drastically.

It wasn't an exact response where I used my primary sources, but it was something I really found interesting and I think this links into Bruce Nauman because his work was all about different perspectives and allowing people to experience the same thing differently when moving around it. This was clearly demonstrated in this experiment because the atmosphere in the image changes drastically when you look at it from different angles and perspectives.

Primary and Secondary Sources

Picadilly Circus images:

Balham Images:

Balham Video

Leaflets and collected items