OCA drawing 1.1

 P10 EX2 A Personal Project Part 1

Create a personal project in the studio developing your work. Use your Personal Project Proposal and tutor feedback to inform this body of work. This is your opportunity to make a drawing, or series of drawings, you are really excited by.

“And then everything drops away.  You release the ego and things start to happen.  In a state of surrender I sit and all the phrases, influences, ideas, notes, guidelines, limitations, swirl in an endless loop.  It’s not a fountain head moment, it’s a tornado.

Like oil rising to the surface, the strongest inspirations finally rise to be visible.  They were once whispering quietly, amongst all the other contenders, but as time goes on the physical relationship with the work develops.  I am working towards something unknown and anything not relevant is forced aside”.  (Extract from my notes)

In P10, Part 1. I had explored the layers of a painting by breaking it down into foreground and background using pouring paint and floating sculptures. My intention for this piece in Part 2 is to construct the painting through drawing, a topic I chose to explore in my Critical Review. 
This time my aim was to invoke the atmosphere of my chosen subject (Fig.1, Voice Final Piece) a drawing I made in P8 EX4, that was inspired by a friend’s trip to Antartica.

I have struggled with the duality of representation and interpretation.  Not really knowing whether I should separate the 2, or if there’s a negotiation in practice that uses both elements.
Some of the conflict is in how the finished work is going to be approached, by myself and the viewer.  Ultimately I have to let go of a sense of duty and expectation.  And allow the subject to pass through me.  I related to the quote in Fortnum’s essay, from Mieke Bay, Looking In: The Art Of Viewing.
“Perception, however, is a psychosomatic process, strongly dependant, for example, on the position of the perceiving body in relation to the perceived object…….The degree of familiarity with what one sees also influences one’s perception…….Perception, in fact, depends on so many factors that it is pointless to strive for objectivity”.

PROCESS

I used fluid pouring paint as a base to create an ‘environment’. And then I intuitively drew in the elements of ice, shaped by tonal blues and turquoise. The intensity of the jagged icebergs, hostile and unforgiving, bound by the dark blue black waters. The aim was to create a state of flux. Uncertainty. I needed this project to be a catalyst out of my comfort zone, to explore new dialogues using paint.

CONCLUSION

This work, (and I feel all my work) is not about repeating an experience, I do not want to create an expected scene.  By engaging with my resources, and negotiating between intention and realisation, the subject and experience moves through me. I use that technique to interpret an authentic ‘drawn’ language.  That is ever evolving from painting to painting. drawing to drawing.

List of Images

Cover Image Flockhart, K. (2025) Eleventh Hour. [Pouring paint on canvas and acrylic, photo edited with Hipstamatic] In possession of: The author: Volleges.

Fig.1 Flockhart, K. (2025) Voice Final Piece. [Mixed media] In possession of: The author: Volleges.

Fig.2 Flockhart, K. (2025) Eleventh Hour. [Pouring paint on canvas and acrylic] In possession of: The author: Volleges.