Andy Warhol: assignment # 1

Our first assignment for assessment is to create our own work related to the subject of appropriation and repetition. When working on this piece I was thinking about pop stars and how they all feel like coming from some kind of moving assembly line.
To emphasize their template-like story I decided to produce a digital work by simply cutting and pasting faces into the same dress as if it was manufactured by a robot.
I called my work Pop Star Production.

Andy Warhol studies: blotted line technique

Andy Warhol used 'blotted line' technique during his commercial work in 1950s which became his signature style:

As I tried the technique, I quickly learned that it is not as easy as it looks. Very tricky! Too much ink and you end up with a big blot.

 Once you are done with line let it completely dry before coloring...

Andy Warhol studies: rorschach paintings

  

 My inspiration: Rorschach

From MOMA site: "This painting belongs to a series modeled on the famous "inkblot" test invented by the Swiss psychiatrist Hermann Rorschach. Whereas the actual test provides ten standardized blots for a patient to decipher, Warhol invented his own, achieved by painting one side of a canvas and then folding it vertically to imprint the other half. Ironically, Warhol originally misinterpreted the clinical process, believing that patients created the inkblots and doctors interpreted them: “I thought that when you went to places like hospitals, they tell you to draw and make the Rorschach Tests. I wish I’d known there was a set.” Because of this misunderstanding, Warhol’s Rorschach series is one of the few in which the artist does not rely on preexisting images."

 Working on my own Rorschach :-)

Andy Warhol course

 

Started online course 'Warhol' delivered on Coursera by University of Edinburgh. Very engaging, lots of information, friendly crowd from all over the world!

January work

Art in Lisbon

Black cobblestone 'drawings' are signature of Lisbon. 

Graffiti in the northern Lisbon

 Oh, how I loved those running bunnies with carrots! Forgot about overcrowded subway as soon as I saw them :-)

Little men

 

Re: cardboard sculpture

At the end I decided to 'decapitate' my Frosya (this is a name my mom gave to this piece) and have instead two individual parts...for now :-)

Cardboard scultpure. Part 2

Cardboard sculpture. Part 1

Clay scultpure class at Gardiner Museum of Ceramics

Untitled

Tertiary Care

The Abstraction Method of Problem Solving

Just when I feel drawn to abstraction I came across a construal level theory (CTL), an interesting study by psychologists Yaacov Trope and Nira Liberman.

"People are capable of thinking about the future, the past, remote locations, another person’s perspective, and counterfactual alternatives. Without denying the uniqueness of each process, it is proposed that they constitute different forms of traversing psychological distance. Psychological distance is egocentric: Its reference point is the self in the here and now, and the different ways in which an object might be removed from that point—in time, in space, in social distance, and in hypotheticality—constitute different distance dimensions. Transcending the self in the here and now entails mental construal, and the farther removed an object is from direct experience, the higher (more abstract) the level of construal of that object. Supporting this analysis, research shows (a) that the various distances are cognitively related to each other, (b) that they similarly influence and are influenced by level of mental construal, and (c) that they similarly affect prediction, preference, and action..."


The theory has important implications for creativity. Must read!
http://psych.nyu.edu/tropelab/publications/TropeLiberman2010.pdf

Insomnia (#1)

Things Unsaid

White Fish

This collage was inspired by my friend's passion :-)

Collages

When I don't have much time, but need to switch to something creative at least for half an hour, I do collages. They free your mind and do not require a lot of preparation. You can just use whatever you have handy.

 The last collage was inspired by Eddie Herder. I love her work!
You can view some of her collages here