Emilia Royal: Blue Whale

In this unit is decided to research and visually investigate the Blue Whale. I based my findings on the mammals skull structure and baleen plates. With a lot of experimentation with different media and techniques I decided on a clay like substance to create my final piece showing the depth of my research in a sculpture. In this blog I would like to share some of my works.

Wire Whale

This is an experiment I did where I created a basice silhouette of a Blue Whale made completely out of one flowing piece of wire. For this I used a reasonably thin piece of wire and bent it into shape using tools so that the outline is smoother and the corners are as sharp as I need them to be. I included the main features in the silhouette such as the tail and the largest based body.

Tin Can Whale

I created this tin beer can Whale when we had a very eye opening visit from 'My Dog Sighs'. I searched the streets of Portsmouth to find a squished or battered up piece of litter, I found this slightly crushed beer can and brought it back to the studio. After looking at the can and thinking of how I can transform it ino a Whale, then the idea came to mensure to make the large flat end it's mouth with all the balien plates showing as if it has its mouth wide open. I created it by painting with acrylic pains on top of the can.

Lino Print Blue Whale

To create this lino print it took a lot of thought as to which technique I need to use in which to have the whale be manly ink. I used the technique where I scrapped away all of the water areas and the details so that the only parts that got inked up was the whales skin and the sky. I wanted the water to look like it was moving around the Whale so it didn't look motionless and I did that by leaving in some areas of lino that could pick up ink, it turned out exactly how I wanted it to.

Clay Skull

This is my final piece that I created to represent my findings, it is a clay like material that has been shaped into a Blue Whale skull and then I added paper strips to create the baleen plates. I decided to do this as it is something most people are unaware of how it really looks, so I decided to show them the deep down look of a Whale skull and how the baleen plates look attached to it without the rest of the whales featureskin there to distracted you. This turned out exactly how I wanted it to.

Carina De Sa - Leopard

For my Research Methodology project I had chosen a Leopard, they are attractive elegant animals with have a great amount of strength and fierceness to them. The leopard appears in Shakespeare's play Richard II, page 175 "Lions make leopards tame,""yea, but not change his spots." A metaphor for someone who is incapable of changing their ways. From this I experimented ways in which I could portray their wild instinctive nature.

After having 'My Dog Sighs' present a lecture, he later did a workshop which consisted us going out and picking litter from the streets to then create our animals from it. I really enjoyed making the leopard in a 3 dimensional representative model, its fierceness is shown threw the opening of the box showing off the teeth, as if it were growling.

Here is one of my experiments where I played with the idea of having a 2D images in a 3D model.

For my final piece I continued having 2D images that made up the foreground, middle ground and background. I photographed the model and edited it using Photoshop to emphasis the 3 dimensional effect. I did this by adjusting the focus point and depth of field that blurs out what is in front of the camera and focusing on what is behind.

Megan Macdonald - Bat

Shakespeare's Animals

For our Research methodology project I chose to look at the bat, I've always been fascinated with them but have never had the chance to explore them in more detail. The bat features in Shakespeare's play Macbeth, act 4 scene 1, where the witches use it's wool as part of their infamous brew. Because of this I started to look further into the bats role within the supernatural world and why they are so frequently associated with the world of witchcraft and the occult.

Bubble bubble toil and trouble

Fire burn and cauldron bubble 

*

Eye of newt and toe of frog

Wool of bat and tongue of dog. 

Lino print of a bat's skeleton 

For my final piece I produced a lino print of the animals that the witches include in their gruesome brew.

Lino print of a bat's skull

Saffron Wain- Deer

This project was focused around animals within the theme of Shakespeare. I focused on deer because of the mythos and themes surrounding them and I was interested to know what kind of direction Shakespeare use them in.

I discovered that Shakespeares focus on deer was the hunting of stags, as that was a common sorting event of the time. However, the hunting lead to other themes, such as the pity one gets for the hunting of a deer; for example in Hamlet the line "let the stricken deer go weep" references the great pity that comes from a deer's tears.

Deer's tears were actually seen as quite powerful and to actually catch and kill a deer was a great feat. To see a deer shot was fascinating to women of the time and when a hunt had caught their prey it was tradition to cover your hands in the creatures blood (which is used by Shakespeare for reasons other than hunting). All these things come together to show a reverence for deer, an awe almost that is still carried on in modern times as seeing a deer much more rare; probably because they are hunted considerably less.

 This project was also a good way to research the anatomy and build of an animal, as before I had focused my studies on people. I used paper as a way to separate and analyse the body parts of a stag.

I also found it important to study into forested environments, and this was for two important reasons. One, obviously this is where deer live and are found so giving context to the animal was crucial. Secondly, this environment would not have changed since Shakespeare's time, so whether you see deer as rarely seen ethereal creatures or targets for a hunt, you'll be seeing them in the same surroundings that the people of Shakespeare's day did.

Shakespeare’s Animals.

Ruth Alderton 

Bears,bears,bears,in this unit its was all about bears. I had overheard that ‘the bears’ were the most frequently quoted animal in all of Shakespeare’s repertoire, however after a few hours of internet searches all i found was a stage direction ‘exited pursued the bear’ from the dark comedy ‘A Winters Tale’. A winters tales explores many themes of love, lust and most of all jealousy(to me) amongst many different characters .I began to look into the emotion jealousy as i suddenly realised how strange and powerful jealousy is. The part of the brain which makes us feel  jealousy is near to the part of the brain which makes us feel anger and arousal this maybe why we sometimes get confused and even fall into denial about how we feel. Anyway, it got me thinking that maybe i could personify this emotion by using the bear.

Lino cut Workshop

During this unit i also explored different types of mediums and really enjoyed Lino print and felt i understood the different techniques that i had never been bothered to try before,it was a good way of getting me out of my comfort zone. For my final piece I illustrated a range of characters from Shakespeare’s plays which are known for their jealousy with the characteristics of bear, using watercolours . I often used watercolours as they a great to blend with and i feel that they fit comfortably in with my style of drawing. I thought this was a interesting way to round up my project as it portrayed both the bear and what the bear represents in the appropriate setting.

- First stages of my final piece -  'A winters tale' (Leonte,Polixenes and Archidamus) 

                        Personifying a bear into 21st Century teen, drawn then edited on Photoshop  

Holly Seymour - Hummingbirds

For the Research Methodology I decided to look at Hummingbirds, within my work I wanted to depict it in a way to portray the animal in its naturally beautiful and intricate way. I used the quote from Shakespeare's play The Twelfth Night, Chapter 4 (Mistress Mary) "And, like a hummingbird, she flutters, a sparkling fleck, sportive and seemingly insouciant"

I experimented with printing as a technique for the project, Overall I made around 7 different lino and woodcut designs of Hummingbird also including a large square lino with a series of birds hovering together.

 As another experiment, I looked at mark making and creating pattern within the birds feathers and body.

For my sparkling fleck element in my project, I hand beaded this humming bird on a embroidery hoop, This is to reflect the iridescent look most hummingbirds have and wanted to capture that with this method.

Skye Jackson-Smith - Barn Owl

For the Research Methodology Unit, I decided to focus on the elusive Barn Owl.

I was drawn to studying the Barn Owl as I felt they tied in nicely with Shakespearian literature as owls have a reputation throughout the 15th & 16th century as being omens of death. 

I researched into the meaning/symbolism of the barn Owl in different cultures and they are mostly considered a sign of bad luck and quite frequently they are seen as a warning sign that someone is going to imminently die.

I found a reference to an Owl in Macbeth "It was the owl that shriek'd, the fatal bellman (2.2.5-6)" which supposedly relates to ringing of "the dead bells", which was a form of hand bell used in Scotland and northern England in conjunction with deaths and funerals up until the 19th century.

The owl is therefore referred to as the fatal bellman as it shrieked upon the murder of Duncan.

For my final piece I decided to design a Tarot cards to represent the fortune telling of the owl, I decorated them with silver & copper foil - one to represent night and the other to represent day.