final headshots

war paint

wars notes

US Iraq baghdad imperialism 1798-1963
Decades of imperialism - "a policy of extending a country's power and influence through colonization, use of military force, or other means."
One of the most backward regions of the Turkish empire, poorly governed and underdeveloped
The empire lost its dominant position in the world when Europes capitalist revolution took over in the 1700s. The collapse of the Ottoman empire (during WW1) resulted in British, French and American efforts to control the Middle East.


vietnam napalm
The Vietnam war was the longest in american history, it resulted in nearly 60,000 american deaths and estimated 2 million vietnamese deaths, it still spoken about today weather it was a noble cause or not. Most people know the war for the severe napalm that was wide spread through the war and effected a lot of innocent people.

syria
the violence in Syria started in 2011 and is still ongoing. More than 4 million people have fled Syria to get away from the violence, over half of them being children.
How did it start?? It all started when 15 school children wrote 'anti-government graffiti on a wall' and were arrested and supposedly being repeatedly tortured. Obviously protests shot up, peacefully at first until the government didn't take kindly to the reactions and open fire on the protesters. This killed four innocent people and then later another was shot dead when they opened fired on the mourners of the victims. This lead to the country breaking into war.




FILM 'the man in the high castle' if germany had won the war...

Sketchbook

http://padlet.com/wilmotalix/tz9njwlizkv7/wish/96464108

WW2 stats

1939 - 1945

Although fighting reached across many parts of the world most of the countries had the same end goals, to stop the aggression of Axis Powers- Germany, Italy and Japan. The rise of Nazi Germany can actually be traced back to WW1, problems after the war really snow balled and led to the next war. 

This war was the deadliest in terms of death. Over 60 million people were killed. 

If you were to include disease and famine in the total count the figure could go up to 80 million. 

WW1 stats

1914-1918

Overview of WW1

Started in Europe but conflict travelled as far as the U.S. and Japan. The period leading into the war was a mass of diplomatic and political problems. It seemed to be chaotic right up until the very start of the war and the first following weeks but nevertheless it was war. It consequently led to WW2 and set the stage for a lot of other important events. 

Roughly 9 million soldiers died in battle

Roughly 13 million civilians died 

Epidemics of diseases were induced by the war adding another 20 million deaths 

Counting all casualties the loss of life worldwide surpassed 40 million. 

Vasily Vereshchagin

The Apotheosis of war - 1871 (oil on canvas) 

Another war artists during the late 19th century most people although might not remember the difficult name have seen this image before. He is a Russian artist and mostly known there. Most of his work shows during war or immediately before or after, what I like about this image is that the war is long over by now and this is what's left. I find it interesting that unlike most war images he's used a bright colour scheme and not stuck to the dark colours that are normally commonplace in a war image. 

Pyramids of skulls were actually left near destroyed towns by the conquerors of war and that's how Vereshchagin reinforced his idea of the image. I think everything about the photo screams not only about war but about destruction of life itself. 

Francisco Goya

The third of May 1808 by Francisco Goya 

This was painted when french forces invaded Spain in 1808 - the peninsular war. Francisco was considered one of the most important artists in Spain in the late 18th centuries. He suffered a severe illness which left him completely deaf and any work he produced after this period became very dark and pessimistic. I started to look at Goya's work because he is not only a painter but a printmaker as well and that fits perfectly with the subject I'm looking at (visual communication). He produced a series of prints "disasters of war" after the peninsular war that I think really show how deeply he was affected by it.  During the war he actually kept far away from involvement with the war. 

Brief

Who am I?

I'm hoping to create a visual communication response in regards to the cause and effect war has on a soldier. I chose this project due the recent events, with the bombing in France it caused a stir on the subject of terrorism and war. I thought it to be a very relevant piece to do and something that I think more people should be aware of. Art teaches and challenges our beliefs and encourages open ended thinking, I think by choosing such a hard spoken topic it can really ease the response and thought process.
I've always found subjects that are hard to talk about interesting, I think with being an artist that sometimes a challenging subject like war is just what you need. Now, with my project I'm not thinking I'll end all war but I'm hoping that it will spark a bit of thought on how it effects our soldiers. For example did you know that the suicide rate among veterans is 50% higher than for any nonmilitary civilians.

For the development of the project I want to develop a solid knowledge of ward, now I could either choose one war to fully go in depth into or I could look into a variety of different wars to look at similarities. With my subject being towards visual communication I'm wanting to experiment and produce a final piece of work with different mediums. Ill be looking to work with anything from painting and drawing to photography to typography and more. I will create a solid volume of work in my sketchbook leading up to my final piece developing and working my way through different materials to see what works best together. As well as looking at other wars I want to gather a collection of facts to do with soldiers during war as although my topic is war it's more precisely aimed at the soldiers themselves. 

For some resources what would be amazing would be to come across some veterans and ask them for there opinion but since that's hard to come by I'm hoping to rely heavily on the Internet and books. I did find a local (ish) war veteran turned artist and tried to contact him unsuccessfully. There's plenty of artists out there who tackle war as a subject and I'm hoping to look into there work for some information. 

mock fmp idea1 notes

look into bathrooms strange bathrooms
bathroom mistakes
mistakes throughout interior?
then could look into bathroom for disabled, people without hands, how you would go about fixing that dilemma 


stupid building designs, eg where stairs have to be around a tree or something being removed so a door is left and is useless now

visual communication

Visual communication is a broad discipline that encompasses a variety of different styles including; graphic design, drawing, typography, illustration and screen based drawing. As you can see from this it is mainly expressed with two dimensional images. Visual communication helps to build visual awareness and understanding of the world, which is why it fits perfectly with the theme I've chosen to do my project on. It is to convey information or ideas through visual messages, the power to inform through your work.

headshots

I chose to stick with soldiers for my work so I gathered some people in our building and started taking some pictures. I used a camo jacket and then edited the pictures on photoshop, turning some into black and white photos. I used Connor mainly as his photos turned out the strongest in my opinion. 

1933

'A war on the modern imagination' Degenerate Art

To be able to talk about the peril hitler caused I think you've got to first start with what caused him to do this. All the way back to the turn of the century. Hitler was an artist himself who was sent to war. He was of no particular importance during the war, just another soldier fighting a never ending battle but nevertheless he was a man with a mission after that. I think war can ruin anyone, especially trench war fare, surrounded by bodies for a year will do that to a person. But it effects someone so much more when they have a 'soft soul' and are much more sensitive than others (artists, musicians etc..) and thats what it did to Hitler. He said 'hatred ruined me' and I think that simple sentence perfectly describes exactly what the war did to him. That and his imprisonment, which I will come to later. After the war Hitler resolved to go into politics.

In the 1920's the nazis were a small group which held no fear towards the expressionists, few people cared about Hitler and his fanatic ideas. It wasn't until Germanys fragile democracy was in turmoil that the people started to take note of what Hitler was saying. Berlin flourished at the time and it was a centre for art and all things 'degenerate'. In 1924 Hitler was released from his imprisonment which he then blamed on jews, communists, degenerates, he labeled expressionists 'artists like the mentally ill'. Hitlers break was the great depression. He thought that there was a 'sickness in society' all caused by degenerates, that they were effecting the pure race and even the culture. 

Gradually as Hitler rose to power, where he attempted to 'cleanse' the nation of degenerates (artists, communists, jews, bolsheviks) to wipe them all out to become the purest race. Hitler made it so it was a science in the decision of who was a degenerate, there were symptoms and observations to be made. Basically what it came down to is if you didn't look a certain way you were a degenerate. 

In 1933 Hitler was appointed chancellor as the fragile German democracy was near death. Hitler was in power less than 5 months when the Berlin book burnings came about and the war on modern imagination really started. Even artists who stood by the nazis were turned against. All forms of modern art was slandered. Hitler resolved to create a new world with no place for the weak or sensitive minds. Many artists emigrated to save themselves, although some stayed. One man said 'I painted landscapes as that was tantamount to immigration'. Paintings were confiscated and people then painted in water colour because if they painted in oils you could smell it and they were afraid of the outcome had anyone known what they 'were'/were doing.

The Degenerate Art Show

The degenerate art show was created to purposely slander modern art. It was described as a horror show. It was claustrophobic, the lighting was terrible, there was graffiti ridiculing the art work. What was not long ago seen as amazing new innovative art, painted by amazing, famous artists was now mocked. Artists were now criminals or 'jews'.
The exhibition presented 650 different works of art from a variety of artists such as, Georg Grosz, Ernst Ludwig Kirchner, Emil Nolde and many others.
Ernst was a German expressionist painter and a printmaker. He was also a key founder of a group called The Bridge which led to the foundation of Expressionism in 20th century art! Sadly, after his endeavour in the first world war he suffered a breakdown and was discharged. Ernst's life spiralled from there as when Hitler came to power his work was branded 'degenerate' and over 600 of his works were sold or destroyed. In 1938 Ernst committed suicide.
Otto Dix was yet another classed as a degenerate artist that's lifestyle was taken when the Nazis came to power in Germany. Firstly Dix was sacked from his post as an art teacher, later his paintings like; The Trench and War Cripples were exhibited in the exhibition of degenerate art and later burned. Dix like a lot of other practising artists were forced into promising into only painting inoffensive landscapes. Dix still painted the occasional painting in his own style that the Nazi's criticised. In 1939 he was arrested on a charge of being involved in a plot against Hitler but was later released. 

Max Beckmann luck changed with the rise of the Nazis. There dislike of modern art quickly deteriorated his life. In 1933 the Nazi government called Beckmann a "cultural Bolshevik" and he was then dismissed from his teaching position (much like Otto Dix). His work was confiscated and also put on display in the Degenerate Art exhibition, this led Beckmann to relocating himself and his second wife to the Netherlands.
The day before the degenerate art show started Hitler delivered a speech declaring a "merciless war" of destruction against the last remaining elements of cultural disintegration. Hitler said "works of art which cannot be understood in themselves but need some pretentious instruction book to justify their existence will never again find their way to the German people."
There were so many artists effected by the Nazi's ruling and many either fled the country or killed themselves. One million people attended the show in its first six weeks. The art show toured for four years and caused the death of art in Germany.

House of German Art

Hitler created a new exhibition, 2000 years of German Culture, which revealed a archaic past that had not happened. It was all new and 'genuine' forms of art, art that Hitler approved of. It was a celebration of racially pure classism and purity, art that everyone can easily understand. The majority of art work displayed were nudes, both female and male figures. These figures would hold no expression, no character, no joy. Someone described it as almost pornographic as it wasn't about the art and the joy of a painting it was just simply to celebrate and view the human form. It's noted that any Nazi paintings of women were either nude or mothers. 

FMP and homelessness

Within the mock FMP project we've started out with the whole chindogu thoughts, which you may well already know. I feel like at the very start of the project I constrained myself and didn't give myself enough room for manoeuvring. So with this in my head I decided to scrap my previous boring ideas and tried to expand my ideas into other ideas.
The first thought was (after a lengthy discussion with Jon) was social concerns. Thinking of problems in the world and how we can solve that. For example, Homelessness and solving that problem.
"Defensive architecture" is the most cynical attempt to sweep away poverty and inequality. The anti homeless spikes prevent anyone from sitting or sleeping in the vicinity all for the sake of a company's corporate identity. Defensive architecture is revealing on a number of levels because it was not an accident or a thoughtless act it is through a thought process that the idea is formed. It's that sort of unkindness that is considered, designed, approved and then funded! All done with the explicit idea and motive to exclude a certain population. Rather than helping, were hiding poverty. This sort of thought process reveals how corporate hygiene has overridden human consideration, mainly in retail districts, because it is all linked to someone's corporate identity.
Anyway, sorry for the rant... Back to the ideas. So, social concerns and how we can solve or help with them, sort of like an empowerment project. Obviously in an idealistic world there wouldn't be homelessness (being that there is enough homes built to home homeless people you would think that we would have sorted this by now) you would think that government would of set something in motion to help but no. Anyway, some people have already tried to make changes and do their part for the homeless.
One of my favourites are things like these benches. I think it's because a lot of people are so against helping homeless people openly and don't like for homeless people to be visible and this is the complete opposite. Rather than putting railings up so you can't lay down this is an open invitation to use the bench to sleep. Which in the long run, who is it harming? And why should I be so surprised and impressed by such a simple gesture?

 

 

The paraSITE plastic/inflatable shelters. One of the most sensible things I've seen yet. Yes, it might not be glamorous and I would hope that you could sleep inside at night but if you can't, why not use something that is going to waste anyway? Using excess heat from a building to keep a homeless man warm in his sleeping bag. Beyond simple. Beyond smart.

Ai Weiwei

Ai WeiWei - art activist
Born August 28, 1957 is a Chinese contemporary artist and activist. He collaborated with Swiss architects for the 2008 Olympics. As a political activist he has been highly and openly critical with the Chinese government on democracy and human rights. He has investigated government corruption and cover-ups, in particular the Sichuan school corruption scandal with the collapse. He's done a lot of work that is controversial. Because of this he was actually imprisoned for 81 days by Chinese government. The situation was so severe they actually told him he would get 10 years minimum and he would 'never get out'. He was never beaten and fed well but he was under constant supervision, he created a piece of art work showing what it was like when he was in prison. It shows the constant supervision and no privacy he had during his time there. He reduced the scale for this sculpture drastically and I think he did that so as to make the whole sculpture seem more child like and like a game rather than real life.

The sunflower seeds made from porcelain, 'made in china' is my favourite work he's done. I think what you see is not what you see with this piece, the sculptural installation is made up of millions of sunflower seeds and although they look extremely realistic they are made out of porcelain. They were all hand crafted by hundreds of skilled artisans. The precious nature of the material makes a powerful statement on human condition. Making the seeds from porcelain speaks volumes, using such a precious material rather than using clay which is the equivalent to mud you can link that to the society. Ai Weiwei has long challenged this reverence and high financial values attached to the material. Although he does this his works still show the exact same high standards in their perfect finish. To me, the sunflowers are the population, so the seeds on the floor and being 'walked over' are much like the population in that society.

"From a very young age I started to sense that an individual has to set an example in society" Ai said. "Your own acts and behaviour tell the world who you are and at the same time what kind of society you think it should be". As material for his art, he draws on society and politics of contemporary China as well as cultural artefacts such as the ancient vases etc. The historical and cultural significance of the materials and techniques Ai Weiwei uses are an essential element of almost all of his sculptures.
"You can't force someone to feel the same way but you are responsible to speak your mind".

Mock FMP

When trying to incorporate Chindogu within interior design I started to look into the 'Tiny Houses' movement. I did this because I still wanted to look into interior design but link it with Chindogu and in Chindogu the idea is 'unuseless' so it works, but why would you go to that extreme? You could probably build a 'normal' sized house but to be different and a little interesting you build a tiny house instead.
The movement is gradually catching on in the UK where more and more people are looking to their gardens to create a bit more living space. It could just be for a teenager, a spare bedroom or a bit of extra space. These homes are custom built, fully insulated, luxury cabins are built like a house which will last a lifetime. There are many reasons one would like to have a tiny house as they can be fully mobile and easy to park, can be fitted with a shower, W/C and kitchen so it becomes fully liveable, elevated beds and a huge selling point is that in most cases you don't need planning permission.
This is just a standard within Tiny houses but it can be taken even further by warping the building so it isn't as 'normal' and standard or by looking into the interior and changing furniture to be unrealistic and strange.

The Tiny Houses movement was my favourite ideas, but it doesn't just stop there. You can look into a variety of ideas like the type of house for example; tiny houses, tree houses, caravans, garden sheds or even mud huts. Then from here you can look into the location, some locations are obvious but you could also look at underground homes, portable homes/car homes and even mini houses you can wear on your back (this idea goes into fashion perhaps a dress or coat equipped with everything you need). Another favourite idea was when I was looking into the recycling side of things and keeping it all environmentally friendly. So, you can look at bottles, pet bottles, hay bales, glass bottle windows and my personal favourite the palette project.
The palette project aspires to be aesthetically pleasing but also to a greater degree of function and practicality. It is highly environmentally consciousness along with spatial awareness and to enhance your surroundings.

Chindogu

Chindogu

"If at first an idea is not absurd then there is no hope for it" - Albert Eisntein 

There was a book published by a Japanese inventor, Kenji Kawakami called '101 Unuseless Japanese Inventions: The Art of Chindogu'. He says 'unuseless' not useless, why is it unuseless? This is because they do actually solve a problem however in practical terms they cannot positively be called useful. I think that with Chindogu no matter who attempts to use it will probably experience difficulties or even social embarrassment which is why these inventions might not be as popular. Which then defeats the purpose of any invention.

Some popular Chindogu inventions:

1. 'The Baby Mop'

2. Keeping your hair out of your face when eating noodles.  A common problem. 

3. 'The all day tissue dispenser'
 

4. Noodles too hot? Not a problem anymore. 

5. Tired on the commute to work? Don't worry about hurting your neck anymore. Sleep in peace with the plunger helmet.

6. No more makeup worries with this lipstick mask. 

There are a lot of other ideas some better than others but throughout them all they follow 3 key components:

1. It has to be possible to make (it has to actually exist)

2. It has to remain in the public domain

3. It must not be exclusively a vehicle for humour