Fine Art A Not Very Fine Day 21st October

A Not Very Fine Day   21st October

Another Tuesday and the start of a new subject to get our heads around. This time it's the last of the four subjects, Fine Art. At the very start of the course Fine Art was the one I thought I was going to specialise in, but after I have finished the other three I'm not so sure. I have enjoyed each one in different ways, so the big decision depends on the next two weeks.

The lesson started with a quick talk about what is Fine Art? We came up with paintings, sculpture, installations and events, film and photography. We then had a discussion on where you'd see art. You'd think there wasn't many places you could see art, but there are. Art is not just in galleries and museums, it's in caves were the first paintings were made, to the streets we walk down, in schools and in our homes; art is everywhere. With a very wide range of different ways to approach fine art I was interested to see what we would be doing.

With the talk about what fine art is over, it was time to get down to the brief and what we were doing for the next two weeks. The first week we'd be split up into groups of three to interpret a painting and create an installation. In the second week we would each take the same painting and individually interpret it whilst putting a modern twist to it. We were then shown three paintings, one for each group, and we could discuss and find out a little about the paintings before we were assigned to them. The three paintings were The Ambassadors by Hans Holbein the Younger painted in 1553, The Raft of the Medusa by Théodore Géricault, a French Romantic painter, painted in 1818–1819, and finally Melancholia 1. This was not a painting, but an engraving by the German Renaissance master Albrecht Dürer in 1514.

It was very difficult to hear with the heavy rain on the roof. We had to stop for a minute as we couldn't hear a thing anyone was saying. 

After the rain stopped we were then put into groups of three. Each artwork was then given a number and we had to choose a number and we were then given the painting that was assigned that number. I was in the very last group so we were just given the one that was left and that was the engraving Melancholia 1. This was the hardest to interpret, not only because it was in black and white, but also there were so many things in it to find the meaning of.

With our painting assigned we then had to make a large mind map, writing down parts of the engraving that we might use or might be important, as well as any ideas we had. This was very difficult as I had lost my voice and had to try and get my ideas across to the others. I found this very frustrating at times, but manged in the end.

A lot of the engraving had instruments that are devoted to measuring, like an hour glass, scales and drafting tools. There were also a lot of other objects that could have many meanings, like an angel and keys, a dog, and intruments. Along with all these things was a very odd shape that took up a lot of the space on the engraving. I later found out it was a rhombohedron. As soon as we looked at it we saw what looked like a face or skull. We didn't know if it was just the printer adding to a copied photo, we let it go.

We had a talk about what this could all mean. With Melancholia meaning depression, we talked about how that could have something to do with the artwork. We thought that it could have something to do with the angel trying to find out something, or work out a problem and that's why there were so many measuring tools. The number 34 came up a lot as the numbers on the chart all added up to 34, no matter what way you looked at it.

With a lot of work to do we had to make a start on setting up the space where our installation would go. I started moving some of the big boards to cover the corner so I could put black paper over it. We all agreed that it needed to stay black and white like the engraving and that the feeling of depression and sadness was important. While we did that we talked about how big we wanted it and what should go into it.

With a lot of ideas flying around, I tried to make sure I told them as much as I could; a difficult task with no voice. The idea of having the angel and the town in it, and then all different tools, we didn't want to just recreate the artwork so that idea was rejected. With a lot of ideas flying around there was still a couple of things we needed to sort out, but before we could it was the end of the lesson.