Tuesday, January 24, 2012

Matt Youngblood's Proposal



My aim is to both re-express and explore further the abstract expressionist works of myself in the past, which are of the form of painting and printmaking, as well as those works of an artist whom I recently began to admire, Jasper Johns. I seek only to generate ideas conceptually from Jasper Johns, though, as a source of inspiration. I will do this in my preferred style, printmaking (as this is my focus here at Meadows), but, also, may choose to utilize drawing and painting to assist in whichever way that may so happen. I hope to fledge out a more in-depth understanding or appreciation of my own work and that of Jasper Johns in the process. I have also been influenced by other associate artists during my art education that has lead me to this desire to make work of this sort, but I think that making this type of art comes out of a very real personal desire and will of my own. I will only be mildly motivated by works of others, relying mostly on my own experience. I mention Jasper Johns mainly because I readily identify with his work, more so than other artists I’ve seen, but it is not so much that I aspire to do work like his. I began this line of work a short while ago when given freedom to explore myself as an artist as a part of a class, and have further refined these tendencies through my focus as an artist, which is printmaking, for now at least. So, this is all very new to me. I would also describe my work as impulsive and the reasoning behind it to not be ideally conveyed through the use of words. The art really speaks for itself, and what ideas it represents can be elusive to me, as the artist, and probably far more so to the audience, but nonetheless, here I believe my work to hold meaning to others, but what that might be I cannot rightly say. It has the capacity to be profound, I might add. I think my work here could be described innocent in nature in that it is free from conscious thought and more in line with the emotional and subconscious underpinnings of the human condition. If there is any conscious thought that I impart on my work, it is not done intentionally. Sure, the exact actions that create the effects within the piece involve my own human psychological traits, but these exist at a much deeper space in my own psyche that does not operate on the same level as conscious thought processes do, thus, I cannot adequately explain my actions in words.

4 comments:

  1. I think it woudl be good for you to see the film "Painters painting" which interviews Ab X artists as well as Johns and other Americans focussed on new forms of painting in the wake of Ab X

    http://www.amazon.com/Painters-Painting/dp/B0031RCPES

    As we mentioned in class, what would be most valuable to learn from these artists is various ways to generate studio methodologies. How to make a mark, shape or gesture on a plate and then do something else in relationship to it, something else and something else, etc. vary the color, the speed of the marks, the texture, the number of plates, the value range and see what happens. Then once you have a whole bunch of things, we can look at them and then evaluate a course of action.

    also look to experimental forms of printmaking like those that Garner Tullis or Dieu Donne have been involved in

    http://www.dieudonne.org/

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  2. Bryan Hunt’s prints (see works titled "Sedona Precipice" and "Island") is an example of an artist that incorporates the un-staged, strong, and forceful line with the softness of pale colors. He hand paints into the prints again, alternating between a dry and super saturated brush. Crownpoint.com is usueful for printmakers.
    http://www.crownpoint.com/artists/hunt

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  3. As someone who has seen your work and process in class, it was interesting to see the transformation from black and white prints to color. I would recommend looking at abstract expressionist painters such as Joan Mitchell, Jane Frank, Susan Rothenberg, and Willem De Kooning as a source of inspiration and to further your knowledge of the abstract movement. I definitely agree to look at more experimental techniques of printmaking and would encourage you to take your textured plates further.

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  4. Thank you all for your responses. I plan on looking into it all. I am also looking at an artist named Georges Braque. I think he better describes what I am going for than Jasper Johns. Maybe even better is a fellow Meadows student by the name of Trevor Y* (something, can't remember) He has done some interesting things that have influenced me

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