Aboriginal Art, Ellen Gallagher, Neville Gabbie, Paul Noble and John Lancaster

Aboriginal art

Aboriginal sand art

Aboriginal art is a offering to to the gods and a show of respect, they are often painted or created in the sand so the gods can see and appreciate the work. The main form of the work is concentric circles and patterns focusing around these to signify power and authority. There is a great religious connection between the art and sacrifice to the gods. There is a lot of rituals involved and the art is also used to mark territory in between tribes. The colours are quite muted and warm because the colours are made out of natural things that the tribes could find, there was quite a limited pallet. The works show the history of the aborigines they tell a story like any good piece of work. 

The work is often about the myth of aboriginal dreamtime, this type of art is made by both a man and a woman as a pair to keep the sacredness of the work in balance. The main features of the work are representations of fire, air and water. The circles show a transition of energy between the past present and future, as I said before it tells a story of the aboriginal culture. I looked at the work because of the visual connection between my work and the aboriginal, but not I have researched it I understand the meaning behind it and the work couldn't be anymore different. However I think what I have taken from this is that the shapes that I am using need to become more instinctive and free, almost like they flow and not as structured.

http://www.aboriginalarts.co.uk/art.htm

Ellen Gallagher 

an example of a section of her work

Gallagher is an artist that has become very popular in the the last twenty years, as an artist she creates sculpture, photography, painting and drawing. She brings together images from myths, history and present crisis to create her work. Her recent exhibition at the Tate revealed that there was many recurring themes within her work race being one of them. She creates her work as an ongoing response to things that are happening in her life and as a constant documentation that things are changing for the better.

Her work is made up of many different images usually as a collage, these are the particular artworks that i am interested in. All the images when placed together are really interesting, but also the fact that the create a larger image or a complex pattern in the way they are placed is also really interesting. Her influences are said to be amongst Agnes Martin, and she has excited across ther world. I personally find that some of her work is quite creepy a lot of the figure have had there eyes cut out this makes them look like they have know soul, I think this is how Gallagher might have felt at the time in her early work. 

There is a awful lot of work that go into her pieces there can be up to 60 processes in each piece, which suggests that the actual process is quite painful, but also that the art is more about the process than the actual work. This is something in common with mine, I am really focusing on the process rather that the work at the moment and I think that this something I would like to refine.

https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artists/ellen-gallagher-9553

Neville Gabbie 

A still from his video for the Jeerwood prize

I wanted to look at this artist because of one particular work I saw at the Jerwood Drawing prize I saw this year. It was his video of his chalk drawing, I would it really interesting because like my work it is more about the process and I think that I want to try videoing my work as I make it to create some sort of performance. The video itself is quite ironic in the fact that he is wearing a black suit that is obviously going to get dirty form the chalk and it is suggested that he does this to show that this is his job and he is in fact very serious about it.

This particular piece is one in a series that he is creating while in a residency at Bristol university, he is experimenting with the properties of chalk, ice and oil in relevance to climate change. At the university he is working with scientists to explore the effects that climate change is having on the world, his experiments include cutting, pouring and drawing with these three materials. 

http://www.nevillegabie.com/about-neville-gabie/

Paul noble

The Nobspital Drawing

Paul Noble is an artist that's work is mainly instillation based and tends to be on a very large scale. Noble focuses of bleak issuer such as unemployment, but his work is visually very appealing and interesting, it's is I fact really fun and playful. He focuses on the issues that gate and annoy him as I have said before with unemployment, he makes works about a aimless existence and a social hopelessness, it's almost as if the artist himself feels inadequate. Noble writes stories with his work he is a firm believer that a place doesn't have a story we bring the story to the place, something that I find very true. We attach memories to places almost as if we are scared to forget them. 

I wanted to really look at his drawings because he makes these huge drawings made up of a tiny little marks, that could be a small squiggle even a number, but because of the scale of the drawing you can't even tell. I think that these drawings are incredible, they take him almost a year to finish. The marks that they are made up of are all obsessive small marks and they seem to blend into each other this is something that I would like to take from his work and reflect into mine.

http://www.tate.org.uk/art/artists/paul-noble-2767

John Lancaster

Wave motion 57 X 76cm 2005

John Lancaster is a lecturer at De Montfort, and a lot of his works are abstract and he tends to stick on the themes of structures and interiors in his early work, but he has recently gone on a conquest to explore colour and the influence that that has one your work, he pushes the boundaries with colour combinations and like my own work uses small repetitive marks to create shape and pattern within his work. 

He strongly believes that colour is a catalyst and by picking the right colour combinations you can make and break the work, it can create something "wonderful and surprising". His work is all about colour that is his main inspiration and this is what he makes his work about. I really like his work in particular his wave motion paintings.   

http://www.jlancaster.co.uk/main.htm