Consumerism My ideas for projects this year have not gone to plan, they were mostly just versions or books or illustrating movies, nothing seem to have any substance or context, there was no driving force behind the idea. After the mock Viva it was clear that I needed to decide on a subject matter as quick as possible and go head first at it. While discussing my Viva with that tutors we pulled out a character from one of my drawings that stood out the most and decided that I should run with it, The character is a fat, slothful pig like humanoid creature, it was also discussed that the character could be a good representation of what we as humans are today and how lazy we are becoming etc. This idea then stemmed towards the idea of Consuming and Consumerism and the fact that we as the general public are constantly either doing things to make our lives seem easier like buying fast food or spending money on things we really don’t need, no one is happy to settle for the basic things in life anymore people need to have the best version of everything. I thought that this ideology could be represented well in my work as I like to work with hideous figures and monsters and It would be good to portray back to the viewer that they are actually the monster. I started getting my imagery down, just any ideas I had in my head to do with consumerism and being lazy and being ignorant to the world around us. The things i came up with were pointing out just how stupid it is that we seem to be completely ignoring things that actually matter in the world. The idea behind this first image was that people now seem to take their phone out to take pictures or videos of something bad happening before stopping to think if they should help or sometimes without realising if they them selves are in any sort of danger, I notice this most on the internet, if something bad happens in the world you now hear about it online before its even reached the news. The second image was actually supposed to look like the monster was actually morphing into the shape of a sofa but it ended up being more of a projection of what the human in the picture really is or more a personification and exaggeration of his attitudes. This was another one of my initial ideas, the point of it being that people will change their fashion or lifestyle just because a blog or a magazine or an advert tells them to. I was targeting shops like “Urban Outfitters” where I have shopped so I know the type of consumer that go in there. It was at this time that I managed to swindle a larger working space, I have always wanted to work bigger and with different materials and this was the perfect opportunity, I had an idea to create some large wood cutouts, The reason I was going to go big is because I wanted to almost shove the subject in the viewers face, and I know that it might not be obvious what the context is and in a way I like that because it would give the opportunity for the viewer to look at the image and not realising that I am criticising them.. These were the original ideas for the cutouts, the idea was to have 3 pig like humanoid creatures that were in some way shape or form indulging in some sort of consuming, the 2 headed creature has one head that is old and another that is new and fresh symbolising that the creature needed to grow another head to increase its intake. The second is the creature on all fours appearing to be sniffing the ground, I figured that it would symbolise the apparent need to get the newest item of clothing, tech or anything. The third one is a creature with a massive stomach but is still trying to consume more. I am using the word “consume” in the sense of actual intake of food etc and also in the sense of purchases and combining them both. Some progress shots of getting the wood ready for illustrating. Ive had some experience in working on large pieces, and on previous works I have used paint and brushes which although I could insert more detail, it just wasn’t practical in the time that I had. Deciding to use spray paints is something that I have wanted to do for a long time, I like the colours you can get (bright, bold and neons) and the way it sits on the wood. It also compliments my way of working very well. I made a few of these time lapse videos to show my progress of spray painting my boards, I found this method much quicker and it also gave me more freedom when going to do the details on my work afterwards. I think at this point it is worth saying that I decided on the “pig” like features for the face of the creatures as I immediately associated them with gluttony and greed and the fact that they will devour anything they are given played well with my concept of consumerism, they are also enjoyable to draw when adding skin fold to skin fold to skin fold to skin…..and so on. I am extremely happy with the finished products, The colours used are striking and catch your eye that and them being life sized which brings the viewer into the creatures world which is actually technically ours. Personification A few ideas have been thrown around of instead of making the user or the viewer the “monster” or consumer, making the object into a monster, I had a lot of trouble with this because I could not make anything work. Trying to turn magazines, or burgers or television into a monster but also something different from anything done before. In my times of being a fan of monsters I have seen the fast food menu into a monster been done a million times and the same with television. One item i landed on was shoes, I think the different shapes of shoes would be an accessible landscapes and canvas for me to turn into a creature… (Please excuse the choice of song it had been a long day..) Finding a way to still keep my “….style” of drawing and painting while tackling a subject that I would not normally look into has been very rewarding, it’s a shame that It took me so long to discover context but also I feel good knowing that at the start of the year I had no direction at all and finally everything came together.

Year 3 PDP. (Dissertation Procrastination). Second year flew by and to be honest I was not happy with it from start to finish, out of 4 or 5 projects we were given I feel like I only enjoyed one of them – Limited edition. This summer was spent getting back into drawing once again and enjoying it for myself instead of changing the way I work to fit a brief. I have also started researching and figuring out my dissertation content and topic – It will probably change again…. A trip to Cornwall over the summer and seeing a sculpture of Greek god Dionysus has inspired me to look at Greek myths for my projects. Living in Cardiff over summer instead of moving home has given me time to bounce ideas around for projects and work with like minded people and has certainly helped with my confidence going into 3rd year. Looking at different Greek myths – Hercules and Dionysus, I have done working on wood and also at a larger scale work based around these, and to a “style” that I am happy with is getting my interest in illustration back on track. This term I hope to be at university more – even though it is at a new campus which is an hours walk away, I will try to not let this stunt my drive to go in. First week back and we have an all day group crit session with all 3 lecturers – the deep end. They went well and I think a rise in confidence about my works content and execution has hopefully impressed them. – The idea of going into university more has also slowly diminished, because I want to work larger scale its hard to find a space that is secluded and big enough – resolved by letting the lecturers know my plan to work from home and to keep in contact with weekly updates and critiques….I should start my dissertation. Dissertation My hate for writing is putting me off starting my dissertation, also my initial idea is now no longer gripping me. The initial idea I had was to look at why we like being scared, and why would we keep going back for more, this idea has been laying stagnant for a while since summer, I think this is my lack of interest….I have decided to look at the content that scares us instead, the best way I can relate this to me and be interested is horror films, which then once gain developed into monster films. A big Factor I have noticed between monster films is the changes in animation styles used throughout and also how this has effected the monsters outcome……(wait a minute)…I have finally found something I am interested in that I know I can write about and research on, Monsters & animation – This has also made me hit another speed bump as I have found a subject I am interested in but I don’t know how I will make it fit to the type of question – art piece and 6000 words. RESOLVED – I feel like I can write much more on this topic so have changed to go for 8000-10000 word question. My plan is to compare and contrast monster movies and their remakes to find out what style of animation effects it in different ways the films I have gone for are Clash of the titans, Godzilla, King Kong…I am sure I will end up watching more along the way…whether they will help or not we have yet to find out. Through watching the films I have realised that the animation style used directly effects other aspects of the monster and the film – design, realness, on screen presence – this widens my research and also gives me greater ground to discuss. I probably should have started writing a long time ago, no excuses. I will make a start. As I am working from home, Going in for a 10 minute feedback session doesn’t feel worth it, I also feel like I actually take in information more If it is written so keeping in contact with my tutor via email has been a great help, I think one of my main problems is wondering if I am doing something wrong and needing some sort of affirmation. I need to work on my confidence in writing – READ & WRITE MORE! The bulk of dissertation is done, using time at my quiet job to watch films and take notes has helped me loads, I know this isn’t ideal but I need money to live! Just thankful that the xmas rush is over and the shop is quiet. Word count up to standard, content I am happy with….working under pressure has always been one of my strong points, but this has resulted in me doing very little illustration work for this entire term, I have ideas just feel guilty That I should be doing dissertation every time I pick up a paint brush. DONE AND BOUND!, dissertation is complete with just under a week to go, Slowly looking over it just in case there is something I have left out or spelt wrong, finally I am thinking about illustration work. I want to work big, REALLY BIG, but also need it to take up less time, The gods and myths are still content I want to explore, It is hard to do this without factoring in religion which is often a touchy subject that I find hard to empathise with… I am looking forward to the next few months but am afraid they will go very quickly, I don’t want to let time get away from me and at the end of my time at Cardiff met be left with the feeling like I could have more with it. I have a huge list of things I want to look at, research and attempt. Stop procrastinating and get on with it. Once My dissertation is handed in along with my drawing guilt Its head down from now till May…LET’S DO THIS.

Field. Limited Edition I was eager to get into this project once it finally came round, firstly because of already completing the “Beyond Fiction” brief i was excited to be back within a mixed group of students, we were told as a mixed group that basically we could create anything of our choosing, i immediately liked the thought of freedom while also still getting the feedback and knowledge of a mixed group from other disciplines. It was quite an easy choice for me to make for what my outcome was going to be as it was something I had been interesting in doing for a long time, My idea was for a DIY zine, based off monsters, eg Frankensteins monster, Dracula and Mummies, from that point the ideas were flowing, I had planned on creating fake advertisements for monster themed businesses, some comics and odd illustrations here and there. I spent a lot of my time away from university as most of my inspiration for my drawings comes from films, toys, comics I have collected, this created some problems such as lack of communications and also gave off the impression that I was not interested in the subject or even not creating any work, which was simply not the case. I started creating small ideas and comics that slowly came together into the collection you can see below. We then had a group lecture/discussion on what is the value of our work, cost wise and as an object, without actually having printed any work, or figuring out how many copies I was going to make I was left with thinking how much I have paid for Zines in the past, but then I had to take into consideration the cost of printing and posting and also I didn’t want to over print as I could just be left with a huge printing bill and a bunch of my own zines. I eventually decided, after looking at how big and the prices of other zines were that 20 pages would be a thick enough zine to charge £5 for including postage and packaging. At this point in the project I had thought I’d shot myself in the foot a bit, considering the theme of my zine was based around monsters I thought that my market was exclusively people who are interested monsters or monster movies, without even thinking that people just enjoy illustrations, humour and creativity, no matter the subject, This led to me finally picking a title for my zine, “That’s Not Scary!”. I find that it fits in with the theme but plays off the tongue and cheek nature of the whole thing. As a group we were then offered the opportunity to sell our products at an event being put up in the Chapter gallery and cinema in Cardiff, this gave a sense of time and urgency towards my work, this was the first proper hurdle I faced, with getting everything printed myself I had no idea how much ink i was going to need or use, turns out it was quite a lot, with the ink ending up costing me £70 including a full day walking around trying to find the cheapest ink I now needed to sell 14 zines just to break even. I also hadn’t considered the actual time to print off 400 separate sheets of paper one at a time, cut them, bind them and leave spacing for any mishaps that happen. Finally I had 20 zines printed, bound and put into cellophane bags to give them a professional but still DIY look. I had wanted to add some limited prints and stickers to the packs you can see below, but with lack of funds and time this was something I would have to look at in the future. With a few days to spare before going to sell our stuff in the Chapter Art Centre I decided to have a go at making something 3D to accompany my zine, I decided to create a point of sale object to display my zine at the sale, Ideas were thrown a round in a small group of housemates of what I should do, from getting a fog machine in to create a mysterious atmosphere to even digging up some sole and creating some sort of system where I would put my arm through out through the top and hand the magazine to the customer like some sort of hand coming up through a grave. I eventually settled on someone less elaborate but still on theme, I would make a coffin that I could prop up that would show off my zine. I started off with a shoe box and made it up as I went along, and seen as it was my first go, I think it went quite well. Obviously it didn’t look like a actual wooden coffin but a cartoon version of, which went along nicely with the contents of my zine, also lightly poking fun at a subject sometimes deemed unfunny, Death. When it actually came around to using the coffin though, i decided not to, one coffin on a plain desk wouldn’t seem as eye catching as I’d first thought, A small group of us were situated in the front hall of the Chapter Centre, I had advertised it online to my friends and other artists, but the customers we were trying to sell to were not people looking to buy art, they were just passing through, or had come for food, or were taking their child to a dance class. Some people then thought the whole idea was a waste of time, but I think that it was a good experience to get to know your audience and at a first chance to sell something, although eventually I did manage to sell one copy, all be it to a friend, it was still a sale. By this point I had already been posting my zines on various blogs and social networking sites to build up some up and once I posted my actual shop page I managed to sell 12, this was a great confidence boost and also as I was posting the zines out myself it was interesting to see where my stuff had been seen and where it was going. Since the project has finished I have carried on posting zine related posts and eventually got stickers done for some guerrilla advertising to create a recognisable image I can almost use as a brand for me. This project really gave me a chance to see what the world of selling your own work is like by putting a personal attachment to it and a physical price on it, it also gave me the opportunity to experience short turn around times and expenses. I think that every group should get the chance to experience this type of project and I also think that I would be more motivated in my subject if this was the type of out come we were asked to create more often.

Year 2 PDP, 50% more casual than last year. First year went quick! opened my eyes to new ways of making marks and making my mark, hoping that I don’t fall into another rut or dry ideas. Spent the summer going back to drawing things that inspire me, MONSTERS!, but as the presentation for the summer project was approaching I’d realised I’d fallen into the trap of drawing subjects with no meaning or surroundings or purpose, “Things live in places”. Constellation designated day has swapped from first year*, This will not be good for my work time table…..at all, I understand that I need to commit my time to university and to illustration, but I also need money to buy food and pay bills which my student loan doesn’t even come close to. *NOTE – Thank whoever created Blackboard. Started off well, convincing myself to put 100% in and to not be put down by the subjects of the projects, and also to not overthink things and just DO things. I get myself stuck in a loop of trying to think what the tutors want to see and not want to see and just thinking “well they won’t like that”, I don’t know whats happened between college/foundation to university but I seem to have lost the ability to make decisions. THIS MUST STOP. CONSTELLATION Made the option to take Understanding humour in the context of art and design with Theo Humphries as I have heard good things from first year and also didn’t want to be stuck doing something I have completely no interest in….this soon backfired as my work time table was hard to change, so a lot of my actual time spent looking into this subject was on either blackboard or from housemates who have also opted in. But nether the less I have enjoyed reading up on the subject, It was a weird to finally realise that things are “funny” because we as humans perceive them that way either by its resemblance to man or the way we made it….also the introduction of “Anti jokes” into a lecture. “What do you call a grammatically incorrect horse?” “An horse” Subject matters I have once again become stuck in my rut of thinking stuff will not work or be appropriate this time in the form of a Charity brief, this may sound slightly wrong but I’m finding it hard to think about a charity or concern a actually cared about or that has affected me, I ended up picking a frog charity out of sheer desperation to get a project out of the way. This went brilliantly as you can imagine. I have now re done my charity project, ready to submit. After a brief discussion with Amelia I have picked a cause which has affected me recently, Dementia. I have talked about my experiences in depth during the project blog posts. It was an odd one, nice to get a project together, working differently to an actual outcome, but also a sad one due to the subject matter being close to home. HUMOUR Laughing at or with, looking at the fine line between what makes a joke funny and what makes it offensive, I’d heard someone say before that “all jokes are offensive, that’s why they are funny”, I disagreed at first and though of an example – “Two balloons floating in a desert, one says to the other, “watch out for that cactusssssssssssssss” And I thought that’s not offensive, but I suppose it is if you’re a balloon, I may be thinking to deeply into this… but it once again goes back to the point of putting non human objects in human situations and that’s why it’s funny!. I have always tried to convey humour through my practice, I with me its just executing it creatively that is the problem, something can be funny in my head but not funny on paper, I don’t think a joke should make you angry or offended, It’s a joke. FIELD YEAR TWO! Was NOT looking forward to field at all, the thought of being thrown in a group of unenthusiastic people again was getting me down, BUT the chance to read over and then chose a field group was exciting, to be in a group of like minded people from various other disciplines would give me a chance to broaden my mind, This was the most inspiring work groups i’ve been in so far, everyone was pushing and helping out with great ideas, no one was afraid to talk up. “Beyond Fiction” made me look at things for not what they are but what they might have been or what they might become, creating a story from fact and fiction was great, and instead of seeing just sketchbooks and flat paper in the crits, to working models and vases, really opened my eyes to the things i don’t even think about doing. I created a small comic outlining the way we as humans just kill things without thinking, it was more humerous than it sounds. “Limited Edition” with Chris Glynn, getting the chance to create anything you want, understanding what it gives to an item to be “limited” and then being able to go out to the public and try and sell your creation, LOVED IT. It gave me the boost to do something I have wanted to do for a long time, Create a DIY zine about monsters…..yes monsters…even managed to squeeze in the comic I did in the first field group. This has given me the drive to keep drawing for this and even sell out of the zines online! As I approach the end of easter, I do worry about if third year is going to be as quick as the past 2 and if I feel like I’ve managed to get what I wanted to get out of this course. ONWARDS AND UPWARDS!

Charity poster – TAKE TWO After looking back over my charity project I decided to completely re do it and think of something that I actually care about and that had an effect on me the past few years. My gran has Dementia, which has slowly been getting worse over the past few years, once it started we all knew it was there, but we didn’t realise how fast it could progress at any time. It was just after christmas 2013 that we noticed it was getting worse, My gran couldn’t recognise her house and sometimes her family. This resulted in her needing care 24 hours a day, which my aunty was trying to do. As this was not logical at all we’ve had to move her into a care home and empty her house. I try and see her as much as possible, and when I do I find it hard to think how much she must struggle to now remember what THINGS are or who people are. Its very hard to see her get confused at the sight of people that have known her their whole lives and I wanted to portray the confusion and loss in my work. These were the really quick original first sketches I did, I was trying to portray the mind as a home with the lights on, playing slightly off of the term “lights off but no ones home”, I know this may seem like I’m taking the piss, but thats where my mind went!. I also quite like the idea of a crack in a lightbulb portraying the lack of ideas or thinking ability. These were the first colour attempts, I’m using clashing colours and lines that lead astray as I wanted to create that sense of confusion and the feeling of frustration when you try to remember something. The black is is there to represent the “dark parts” or the mind the bits that due to dementia we can no longer access, also represented by cracks or lights out etc. Im not sure why I painted these all with the eyes closed, It might have been a sub conscious decision thinking back to when ever I am really trying to think of something I close my eyes. These images pop to me, Im going to use these as a part of my final outcomes, I would like to incorporate some text to portray my message further or to maybe confuse the viewer even more. I also think that I would like to use a QR code somewhere on my poster, and possibly not even use a charity logo but for the user to be intrigued and go find out for themselves. These are the three posters I am working on at the moment, I like the fact that they are almost hard to look at bus also make you look and find different things within the image

Field. Beyond Fiction I was not that excited to start this project after my experience with first year Field I was expecting it to be another failed experiment after getting put into a group of people who were not interested in working as a group, but after a first brief I found out that it was the whole group that was mixed and we were working alone within this. After finding out that the main objective of this project was to go beyond a story or this case it was an object or selection of objects. We were told to go out and find random objects and stories which we could then link together to create a narrative, obviously the more objects the better as you would have a greater web of links to create a story with. Before we even got started with this we did a small day project which is something that James Green does by creating a collage everyday, we were told to create two images one of the present and then one of the future. The images I created were of the village where I live in the present, nice and peaceful and then the obvious opposite when in the future, Cthulhu rises from the deep and destroys the world, this linked into the idea of going beyond fiction and how the lecturers wanted us to create fiction within fact. This happened to nicely link in to the work I was planning on on creating as well as it links in with the giant squid story i found on the internet. Going back to the object finding project, I found this small bust of a seemingly happy man with very charicturesque features, I decided to link him into a story i was creating around the giant squid. It took me a while to actually getting around to doing the plan for the narrative for this project, I didn’t really know what the point of the story was going to be, I then decided that I should create a character beyond what the bust shows, almost like the portraits of kings and queens of past were always far more glamorous than the actual subject, so I wanted to go around the thought of this bust was of a scientist/explorer who had killed the last giant squid years ago, and the people would love him, But deep down he has a darker side (obviously, he’s killing things for fun). Once i had that idea I just hit the ground running and jotted the structure for my idea down on some tissue paper while at work . I know these don’t seem like much but this was enough for me to work on and to know where i was going with my story, I decided I was going to draw and ink each tile individually, and that they were going to be just smaller than A5, I made the decision to work this size as they would be easier to scan in as a group to edit and also to save time when making the originals. As it stood in this state the story went that the Scientist/explorer had killed the last giant squid many years ago, it goes onto showing him dissecting the squid and to be getting some sort of enjoyment out of it, then finding out that the squid was pregnant proceeds to stamp on all the squids eggs, but one gets away and escapes to then be found years later in Japan, linking back to the website article I found. in the form of a small comic, with no real dialogue but by portraying the story just through the images, this means I will have to make sure the images are well thought out and clear to understand and also flow as a story, even though the story may change as I go though. So far this project has taught me about looking to find and create stories out of things you wouldn’t normally and also thinking of working towards an outcome as a finished project. Eventually I got though all the tiles, 45 in total and then it was on to scanning them in and piecing them together on photoshop. as you can see in the image below the stack of tiles looks quite good as a physical project on its own, I would also like to see them laid out as they are as the comic. I went with mainly Black, green and yellow ink for the colours of the real world, everything that was perceived as normal was one of these colours, then when the dissection and slaughter of the giant squid begins I added reds and blues symbolising that along with being a bloody event but also to I’ve the feeling of it being not of this world. I added a black frame to each image as well which I got from inspiration from reading through “Nobrow” comics, I really enjoy the idea of it being a window and us being able to see into the window of a different world even if it is still our own. Below are each of the pages finally stitched together and in order. After this I just had the cover to do, I wanted to stick with the same colour way and tile theme, maybe using a tile from the comic and adding text. I landed on this and also added the title “Squids are not gross”, this came from a conversation i had with a lecturer where I was trying to walk about my idea explaining that the Man is the real monster in the story and before I could even get through it my lecturer said “Er Squids are gross”, which was completely irrelevant to my story but did give me a good name. I really like the way these have come out and also having the opportunity to actually have a point to my illustration and not just pointless monsters, And its a weird thought to know that the point I have actually made is that Man is the only real monster, And Im not trying to come across preachy but its true. This project has opened my eyes up to what others can help with, It was enjoyable and helpful having the input of people from different subjects and has opened my mind for the next field project.

HEART OF DARKNESS Trying to find my way by doing illustrations quickly and finding that things don’t always have to look “Done” for them to be finished.

Charity Poster – Woodland Trust – FROGS Found this project quite difficult to get off the ground, mainly because, and not to sound cold hearted but I couldn’t find a charity that I was interested in or that I would link to my work. After extensive browsing of the internet and leaflets I;d settled on frogs. frogs frogs frogs I found myself getting into my old habit of trying to make everything look to done and finished, So i reverted to my idea and study drawings and scanned in some of the ones i felt worked best These were my outcomes, not to garish but subtle enough for you to look and try and figure out what the image is.