This exercise was about combining sketches and aspects of photo reference into illustrative images that stand in their own context to tell stories. I was stuck for a good while at the start of this exercise. The instructions seemed very ambiguous, and when I referenced how other students have tackled this exercise, there was a great deal of variation in interpretation and depth.
Some people had iterated on existing sketches to make them more 'illustrative', others had combined elements, and others still had done many variations on composition using small thumbnails. I felt like I was in between a rock and a hard place. I hadn't really noted down many words with my initial sketches, so reviewing those pieces seemed like a good place to start. I had identified some particular landmarks, and there were two in particular that seemed to have a lot of stories to tell.
So I decided to start by doing a little mind map, to think about what those buildings were saying to me. I didn't really choose any words that provided juxtaposition. Not that I couldn't have, it just didn't really speak to me.
As I was thinking of words, I deemed to be more naturally drawn to the Town Hall and Market Square. Alton has lost a lot of its market town heritage and character as the years have gone by. The local brewing specialism of the town has faded away and with that a great source of local employment. That's meant that it's becoming more of a dormitory town for commuters. With that, the high street is slowly dying away, like many rural towns across the country.
I did a little bit of research about the building and found out that it had been used for many things before becoming the town hall. It made me think about how that space must have changed in its use over so many years. There was so much history there, so much heritage. It's been the centre of the Alton community for hundreds of years. It still manages to bring people together every year for carols around the Town's Christmas tree.
This got me to thinking about the work of Richard McGuire. In 1989 McGuire created a comic for RAW Magazine [1], which explored a place in situ through windows into time. You can see the comic below
25 years later, McGuire produced his book, "Here" which built on this initial premise and extended it over hundreds of pages and thousands of years. It's one of my favourite books in my graphic novel collection. I love the windows into time, with spreads of the books sometimes sequentially linked to tell little stories (you can almost play them back like a flipbook) but sometimes use multiple windows to tell a story along a theme, like this one:
I then went about trying to do my own visual research for the town hall building. I discovered that it had been a corn exchange (which explains the giant floor-set scales that still sit outside) and the town's fire station! I managed to find old photos to add to those that I had taken. As an experiment, I used Google Maps to gain a perspective of the square from the opposite direction (which I hadn't captured on my route).
I then took this image and blended then manipulated it to try and superimpose some of the historical images I had taken as my own 'windows' into the past. I was really pleased with the results:
This spurred me on, and I found even more references that helped me understand how that space had evolved. I was trying to think about what kind of emphasis I wanted to place and tried to capture images that represented how this area was a hub or the community; how it brought people together.
So then I decided to try my own hand at doing a similar frame to Here, except an external aspect. I used pencil line to give myself a frame of the building, then started to add in the pieces and scenes from through the years. I didn't add too many details, and for the historical elements tried to create imagery that was authentic but imagined.
I was pleased with the windows experiment but didn't feel that I had captured the sense of community and belonging I was after, so I tried something different, and attempted a painting of the Christmas Carols event, which I composed from my imagination, but used my memories, photo and other photo references to bring together.
None of my photos or sketches were taken at night, so it was interesting to pull together my facts with my imagination to create a unique image. I didn't want to capture every detail, but I did want to capture a sense of the light and the thrumming crowd of singers.
I was then inspired to do another little experiment and shake up the perspective completely. In some of my early sketches, I tried to map out the geography of where I was by imagining the scene from above. Given the round Christmas Tree and square building, I thought it was also interesting to take a more geometric interpretation of the space.
Whilst I struggled with this exercise at first, I have enjoyed trying to take a different perspective in trying to solve this problem. I also really enjoyed doing a different kind of painting with acrylic gouache, and I think in time I could get more confident to paint more in this medium.
Doing research for photos that weren't my own actually made it easier for me not to want to copy them directly, and I really enjoyed building up a body of reference knowledge that built upon my sketches. I did enjoy taking things on and developing them in my studio, but I found it difficult to reconcile my desire to create something finished (because I like the idea so much) and just exploring because it was a sketchbook. So at the same time, it feels too rushed and too measured! Weird!
Taking things further for Assessment
In my tutor's feedback, she noted that she really liked the gouache study I did of the square at night for Christmas, saying it evoked a real sense of community. I decided to take this study further at her recommendation.
I wanted this image to show what I had been learning in my curricular and extra-curricular work regarding the use of paint. I have been teaching myself the fundamentals of colour and light using books and online courses from James Gurney. I thought this would be a good opportunity to not only put this into practice for a more finished piece but also try and translate a painterly approach to the digital world.
I felt the composition in the study could improve, and I also did not have the reference I wanted at the angles that I had done sketches for earlier in section three. So I decided (many months after the original exercises!) to go back out and do some photos on location whilst I was running an errand in town. This also gave me the opportunity to see the building at a different time of year and use the viewfinder of my camera to experiment with alternative compositions.
I felt that the last photo gave me a more dynamic composition, and allowed me to achieve a better sense of place. I then searched for the few old photos of when we visited the square for the Christmas carols. It is a fnd memory, being one of the last family activies we were able to do with my father-in-law before he passed away.
My challenge now was paint the image, using the updated composition, but also transpose the composition to a night-time setting, which provided a very different lighting challenge. I wanted it to evoke the time of day, and year. The closeness and community I felt with my family that night. There were certain elements in the photo that, while accurate of that time, wouldn't translate as well in the painting. So, remembering the advice of my GCSE art teacher to "work in the context of the painting", I decided to remove or alter elements to fit the piece. These changes created their own lighting challenges.
I decided to replicate my gouache work digitally using brushes that accurately replicate the feeling of working in that medium. This would allow me to take a few more risks without having to restart the piece if I really messed up! Making my own adjustments to the painting meant that any reference I had would be limited in its efficacy, and I would really have to put what I have learned about colour, light, shadows and reflections into practice. After about 24 hours of work, this was the result:
I am really pleased with the lighting, composition, and use of colour. I have been selective as where to add detail or hard edges to try and focus the reader's eye. I still think that my figures need work, I found it hard to put in dynamic crowds and still get the lighting working well. This is a very painterly approach and I am not sure I would want to work this well all the time, but I learned a lot that I can take forward to my illustration work, as well as personal landscape work which I am a lot happier being a bit more 'fine art'. I am really happy with the pub in the background, and the way I have used the light and shadow to suggest a sense of activity without having to add detail.
I think that in chasing realism, I have lost a little bit of dynamism. To counter this I have thought that it might be useful after assessment to try and re-render this scene in a few different styles, and push past some of the conventions that are restraining me at the moment. See what works and what has life in it. However, I think this will be a nice image for the festive season. At the very least it will make a lovely image for Chrismas cards this year, and I am considering submitting this to a local gallery and paper. The community will be missing this sense of togetherness in the festive season, as I can't see the carols happening this year.
All in all, it's not the perfect image, but it does show my increasing competence with light, colour and composition. With that, I feel it's a successful image for assessment.
References
Bulles, B. (2017). Richard McGuire: right here, right now. [online] BAIN BULLES. Available at: https://bainbulles.wordpress.com/2017/01/07/richard-mcguire-right-here-right-now/ [Accessed 26 Jan. 2020].
McGuire, R. (1989). Here. [image] Available at: https://bainbulles.files.wordpress.com/2017/01/safe_image-php.gif?w=540&zoom=2 [Accessed 26 Jan. 2020].
McGuire, R. (2014). Here. London: Hamish Hamilton Ltd, pp.76-77.
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