Ai Wei Wei at the Royal Academy of Arts

Ai Wei Wei at the Royal Academy of Arts 

The very first exhibition i went to before the start of my third and last year on my Bachelor degree in fine art was the Ai Wei Wei exhibition taking place at the RA. 

Ai Wei Wei is an Art phenomenon, he has reached far out into the world with his voice against political issues and stunned us as he tells us about his life. 

What ill do is show you a few images of this exhibition but i really recommend that if you're not too late, you should go and experience this yourself. 

His work truly fascinated me, this was an exhibition you just don't forget about. 

One thing the RA did that made the visit even more pleasurable was that in every ticket purchase was a free headset audio discussing each piece individually plus some other interviews, documented images and videos about Ai Wei Wei and his life. This headset secluded us away from the audience and noise and kept us completely focused on the exhibition itself. I found this extremely absorbing. 

I always wanted to see one of these vases up front, this was a first. 

I find it fascinating how Wei Wei can destroy something so fragile, unique and historical simply to give birth, create, translate it to this contemporary piece of work. 

i mean the vases he paints on or dips in industrial paint are Han Dynasty Urns or Neolithic vases that can be dated back 5000-3500 BC. 

Looking at these, it made connections toward my current practice which revolves around street art, graffiti. Graffiti on walls are continually destroyed to reproduce new work, this is how i see it. For something new to be created something first has to be destroyed. To create is to destroy. 

Marble work... beautifully executed. 

By the way, this cube above me is made out of tea leaves... yeah... tea leaves. 

Jade Handcuffs, he discusses his time when arrested by the police.

This was  still performance/sculptural piece, inside every box is a stage made by Wei Wei to describe his time when held by officials. Peek inside the boxes to see, almost like peeking into his life, his past, his timeline, to this time. 

Very detailed

I can say that this was my favourite exhibition this year of 2015, no doubt. An experience no person should miss. 

Central Saint Martins - My Foundation Year

Central Saint Martins - My Foundation Year 

Im only going to do one blog entry about my entire foundation course at Central Saint Martins showing you only a few pieces of work that i experimented on and what i ended up focusing on. 

I decided to do a foundation year because i truly didn't know which area of art i wanted to pursue in, i mean i liked all the areas. Product Design, Architecture, Landscape design and Fine Art. 

As the course went on i steered towards Fine art, however i didn't steer towards one principle, i worked with all the principles involved in fine art. 

Just one example of a sculpture i made, i was working and merging domestic products and fusing them together to create something out of the ordinary, in this piece i wanted to see how people would react to this product, Would they still carry it like a beer or use the handle? 

Sculpture:

I also did some photography, in this piece i was inspired by the controlling affects of colour, the colours came from a traffic light but the idea of this was: do the colours make you think a certain way about a photograph? 

The subjects within each photograph are rather random, but the focus is on the colours. 

What does red make you think, yellow? blueish green?

Every individual colour makes you think of something, an emotions a meaning

Below i try to further prove that point 

Do these seem right to you? Thats the point. 

A few drawings:

Lined drawings

I also experimented with technology and media.

What i did in this series of work was use technology to text someone a question. I would then receive a response. 

This question was "Would you ever kill someone?"

"What would you do if there was no internet tomorrow? How would you react?"

"

"What gets you out of bed in the morning?" 

"What is missing from your life?"

"What was the worst thing that happened in your life?"

Before this foundation course i was painting, this year i tried to stay away from painting. I wanted to explore all other aspects of art therefore i barely painted. 

As i progressed, i ended up doing something i found really fulfilling. It was installation. 

My main medium was masking tape, coloured making tape. and my number was 4. In a sense i was trying to create a painting on the site i was in using coloured masking tape. 

Abstract, Painting, Installation site specific. 

This was my first test piece. 

I believe this piece was with red insulation tape.

It is a very precise process, everything has to be measured and spot on. 

Cutting the masking tape needs to be done with a sharp knife for a crisp edge. 

What i like about this is that it creates space in space. The wall is a big empty space, but in that space is a whole other dimension of space. 

This is what i was going for. 

More installations: 

More:

  

One more: 

This i photoshopped, I wanted you to understand what i was aiming for, space inside space. 

and for my Finale piece i used the exhibiting space for our final year show and worked in the site provided to us. 

First to inspect the site, see what I'm working with/on.

Checking to see if the masking tape sticks nicely, incase i need to sand down the walls..

Doing some repair work. 

Getting started 

Working onto the window too, part of the site 

Crisp edges 

Precise measurements 

And here it is, this was new for me, one of my very first times doing an installation piece, took me out of my comfort zone which was great. Here goes the end of my Foundation Diploma at Central Saint Martins, London, UK.