Tour de
France report
For our first project as second years this year, we have
been looking at Le Tour De France. I went to watch the tour in Sheffield as the
riders came through Yorkshire so I got my primary research from that. I took
some photos and videos of the scenery and I even visited the Civic gallery as
their theme was the history of Le Tour De France. I took some photos from there
and for my secondary research I used information and pictures from the
internet, mainly from the official Yorkshire website and the BBC.
Nothing particularly inspired me at the Civic, however I thought
it was quite interesting how they displayed bikes from the early 20th
century and all the information they had about them. In my opinion I thought
the Civic Gallery was a little boring but that’s just because I am not a big
fan of The Tour De France.
I looked at a number of different Artists but the main 3
that stood out to me the most were;
Moy Mackay, she is a needle felting Artist who looks at landscaped and Nature. She inspired my final piece as I took forward her style and the way she perceives the country side in her work. I think her work is beautiful and unique. The second Artist is Alister Colley, who was the official Artist for Le Tour De France. His work is different from any I have seen before. He works in a cartoon style but distorts his work and makes it look like its bending. I recreated one of his pieces of the British Countryside and even used his cartoon like style in my work. The third and final Artist is a man called Rob Corradetti, he created a company called Killer Acid and he specialises in screen printing which has been a big part in this project for me. I find his work inspiring with all the bright colours he uses and how crazy and different it is.
Moy Mackay, she is a needle felting Artist who looks at landscaped and Nature. She inspired my final piece as I took forward her style and the way she perceives the country side in her work. I think her work is beautiful and unique. The second Artist is Alister Colley, who was the official Artist for Le Tour De France. His work is different from any I have seen before. He works in a cartoon style but distorts his work and makes it look like its bending. I recreated one of his pieces of the British Countryside and even used his cartoon like style in my work. The third and final Artist is a man called Rob Corradetti, he created a company called Killer Acid and he specialises in screen printing which has been a big part in this project for me. I find his work inspiring with all the bright colours he uses and how crazy and different it is.
In this project I have, screen printed, needle felted, knitted,
experimented with gouache and brusho inks and done some felt making. My favourite
was needle felting, I have never used this technique before but I really
enjoyed it, I found it quite therapeutic. However my least favourite was definitely
knitting, I found it really difficult to master and I didn’t find it enjoyable.
I experimented with felt making and made some little felt
balls, and blended two different coloured felts to make the finishing piece of
felt thicker and multi-coloured. I then experimented further with it and needle
felted on top of it.
My chosen Artist- Moy Mackay inspired my final piece with
the landscape. Because I am looking at Le Tour De France and Yorkshire, I thought
it fit in well with the project as Yorkshire is mainly countryside which Moy
looks at and also because I enjoyed needle felting I thought I would use her
work to inspire my final piece.
I think I could have managed my time a little better as I have
had to work at a really fast pace to make sure I get all my work done to the
deadline and I have also been taking my work home and finishing it. I think I managed
my time well when producing my mood boards and Artist research sheets as I managed
to get them done in the first 2 weeks. I still have some work I need to improve
but I am confident my work will be ready to hand in on the first Monday back.
I was really proud of my painting I did, inspired by Alister
Colley’s work because it turned out just how I had pictured in my head and I put
a lot of time and effort into it. However, what did not go so well was my
knitting. I found it really difficult to grasp the technique and also my prints
did not go as well as I had hoped. I didn’t make some of the lines thick enough
on my design so they didn’t show up as well as I would have liked. If I was to
change anything I would make all my mood boards/development sheets neater and with
a lighter background because the paint was too dark and I feel like I could
perfect them more.
Throughout this project I think I have used my blog effectively
as I have updated it with felting and work I’ve done for Le Tour De France but there
is still more work to be uploaded. I did not use my sketchbook as effectively
as I could have. I used it to keep looking back at work and taking ideas from
it but I need to add more work to it still.
Overall I am satisfied with this project. I have enjoyed experimenting
with new techniques and looking at multiple things e.g. (countryside, bikes,
people, nationalities, history of Le Tour De France) rather than just looking
at one thing.
