Reflection

Reflecting upon the Unit-X Whitworth brief, I believe that I now have a larger understanding of my own practice. My strengths lie within nature, capturing beauty in neglected and un-noticed places - the texture is expressed through my specialist area of embroidery. However I enjoy capturing colours and using digital aid to create carefully compositioned drawings that can be printed onto fabrics enabling me to work the textures back in on top - this allows for a more contemporary and simple, yet detailed outcome, which fits well into the design of the Whitworth and the target audience of families with children. 

Initial Photographs of tree bark in the Whitworth Park, inspired by "Outside, Inside" theme.

During the Unit-X brief I have pushed myself out of my comfort zone, allowing me to strengthen my practice work. I did this by producing drawings digitally, that could be transferred into digital prints (which I have never tried before), this was all documented in a sketchbook, produced digitally through Adobe Illustrator (However after workshops I decided to create my boards for the exhibition in InDesign, another new skill!). 

As well as opening my mind to learning new digital skills, this project also taught me the learning processes of different courses. For example, after the peer review I found that 3D Design students, design a product and then sample towards it, whereas Textiles students tend to sample then pick a product and refine a collection of final samples aimed towards that.

This allowed me to think ahead, in the future for commissions it would be easier to work in a more similar way to 3D Design students, to keep track of production costs.

 From my initial research inspired by the "outside, inside" theme, to my drawings, developing samples aimed towards a product allowed me to make more of a connection to the Whitworth gallery. I wanted to carefully connect my work to the gallery and its history - therefore, I decided to make everything with 100% cotton, due to the gallery becoming an institute at the same time as the Manchester Cottonopolis era. The threads I used were all cotton, and the embroidery techniques that I used all had underlying connotations of the Whiworth. By using chain stitch I wanted to represent how the Whitworth is central to many communities in the area around, and by using the satin stitch on the Bernina, it was an adaptation of the screw thread. 

Visualising set-up for Exhibition: Range of Samples

My tutorials helped me to produce a wide variety of samples, and final samples for my designs. Initially I couldn't decide whether my combined samples of drawings and photographs were more successful than just my drawings with the embroidery layered over, and after long discussions I decided to use a range of both. I also pixelated the layered prints on Photoshop to gather the best of both worlds, these were also re-printed and again embroidered over.

Final Exhibition.

Future Developments of the project would include packaging design and how it would be displayed in the gift shop. 

Packaging and label ideas.

Investigations

Drawings that I produced influenced by Ashley Goldberg weren't successful and reflective enough of the Whitworth and what I aspired to achieve. Therefore I decided to scan these images into Photoshop and colour match my colour palettes to the compositional drawings. However, these drawings weren't vibrant enough so I decided to develop on technique - changing the medium used to draw with. 

David Hockeny was the main influence for this. I allowed myself to research into the ever changing medium within his work. Starting off using acrylic, oil paints and gouache, and developing into the modern day using an 'app' on his iphone called "Brushes". Hockey uses the app to paint landscape art using colours that he notices directly (even though this might not be the exact colour), he paints as he first visions it, and this was a massive help to me as it enabled me to start to visualise different colours in the initial photographs and create developed drawings using more vibrant colours - this reflected my Whitworth target audience more effectively.
These drawings were taken from the "outside, inside" theme, capturing the outside colours of my (tree) photographs, with the inside patterns. 

 

After producing these drawings I decided after seeing students work from 3D and their miquette's in the peer review, that it was time for me to understand my product more by concentrating on the construction of it. In particular how easy it is to make (for production purposes).

The bird (keyring) will be digitally printed, and the outline will be satin stitched using the domestic Bernina. This is to ensure that every bird is the same until the construction process where it will be hand sewn by the consumer to allow each bird to be unique, making it more personal.

Sampling started with digitally printing various drawings onto 100% white cotton.

The first set of samples that I produced were embroidered onto using the Cornelly, as I found that the continuous movement of the machine and thread would allow me to draw the spiral patterns on the inside of a tree. The chain stitch the Cornelly machine produces vaguely represents that the Whitworth gallery links the various communities around the area together. 

After producing these samples I found it hard to visualise them as a 3D product, so I made a window frame of the exact template measurements to focus on the important parts of the samples.

I decided to produce further prints after sampling various techniques onto my inital developed drawings, as the embroidery wasn't effective enough.
I haven’t been completely happy with previous drawings and I came to the conclusion that when the photographs are layered with the drawings, they are very strong and distract from the main focus in samples. Therefore I have experimented with the opacity of my photographs, layering them with these developed drawings and stitching into them using various carefully considered techniques. I started changing the opacity of drawings and pixelating them on Photoshop allowed me to embroider easier as I could focus on techniques better. 

Research

I started this unit with a group visit to the Whitworth gallery, where the theme of bringing the "outside, inside" became an initial starting point for research. This theme became more apparent throughout the day, from the 'Welly Walk', to the Gift Shop talk, and the tour around the gallery, everything was about creating links between the outside and the inside. 

Initially I started by taking photographs of the Whitworth park, capturing surfaces, textures and colours. 

My research always starts with nature, as I believe in encapsulating and revealing beauty in unusual places that are un-noticed and often ignored. 

I also believe in keeping the clients requirements in mind, therefore making this product as personal to the gallery as possible is my main focus, reflecting upon the words "playful, intelligent and personal".

 

I refined my photographs to be left with three that all contained very different yet effective colour pallets.
The first artist that I research was Michael Chase, I enjoyed the blocks of vibrant colors in his work, juxtaposing against the intriguing textures of his digital photography. Therefore I started to digitally layer colours found in my photographs using the eyedropper tool with the photograph the colour was taken from. 

 These initial photographs as a starting point all escalated from the renovation of the new gallery, the juxtaposition between the old and the new allowed my research and drawings to contrast against each other. Looking outside into the park I found detail, but looking back into the park it was very clinical and basic.  
 From my colour developments I made yarn wrappings and colour blocks to help define materials and threads to use when ready for sampling. Samples will all be made with everything 100% cotton, influenced by the Manchester cottonopolis era occuring around the same time the Whitworth became an institute, which led to it becoming a textiles based gallery. 

Reflecting upon previous projects, my strengths lie within designing towards fashion and accessories, and after researching the Whitworth gift shops I found myself working towards the cheaper of the two shops with a "buy now, think later" attitude. Aiming my designs at the target audience of families with children. 
After artist research exploring Ashley Goldberg and Emily Rickard, I decided to make a range of products with unisex colour palettes. I created drawings based on composition, influenced by both artists, using colours from the images above. 

 The 'Post-it Review' session opened my mind as I hadn't yet started to sample designs or create visualisations, which created obstacles as peers didn't understand my concept or product ideas. 
Comments from this orientated around my successful colour palettes and effective digital prints. Developing upon comments from this I will start to digitally combine drawings and photographs, to be processed again into digital prints that can be embroidered onto.
I also made visualisations of my product design ideas - choosing the 'DIY Bird Keyring' to develop on, as it had the most reflective concept of the Whitworth and the brief.