About

I am a current student at University of East London, studying Graphic Design and Printmaking. Art has been my passion ever since I discovered a pencil. I can’t place myself to a specific genre but if I absolutely had to it would be somewhere in between Graphic Design and Illustration. As a young artist I am still trying to define my style of work, so far I would describe it as accurate and delicate. I like to take great care of each piece and make sure it is produced to high quality or else it is not worth exposing to the world, I am definitely a perfectionist when it comes to my own work. Living in digital age it is hard to ignore all the amazing software, however I believe that handmade pieces are so much more valuable and precious compared to digital. It takes great determination to producing a handmade piece, making unintentional mistakes part of the work often leads to uniqueness, such work cannot be re produced which makes it very admirable. I guess I try to re bell against all the brand new techniques on purpose, because I like spending time on solving problems that could be corrected in no time on computer software. I get my inspiration from quite literally everywhere

Saturday

Mysterious Al

This is a solo exhibition by Mysterious Al at the Stolen Space gallery, the exhibition space is not very big but its perfect for this style of work as the gallery is well known for hosting underground style illustrators and graphic designers. all works are thoughtfully laid out around the space, flat pieces were hung on the walls and there were two installations, a colourfully pained broken down garden shed and a small prayed space with crosses made out of wooden branches, candles, spray paint cans and an open bible with cut out pages with a marker pen placed inside. The whole exhibition is vibrant and humorous, which creates a great atmosphere to be in as a viewer. I thought the bible piece was quite successful, as it was an artists way of presenting his strong believes in graphic art by creating almost a shrine for his tools. Wood masks also really stood out for me, because of the way they were composed, layers of wooden pieces painted and carefully placed on top of each other to create a three dimensional effect. I would really like to take this technique into practice and make something similar to these masks in the future. 
Mysterious Al  Masks 2011

Mysterious Al  Pisstake 2011

Posted by Julia Baranova at 1:26 PM  

British Art Show 7

This week I went to see a British Art Show exhibition which was based at the Southbank Centre. I think this is a perfect venue to host an exhibition filled with contemporary British art work, as the Southbank Centre has been used for Art's purposes since 1951 and to this day it looks like a modern piece of architecture.
Most art work's displayed around the exhibition spaces were very difficult to grasp, I felt confused and misguided for most of the time. Perhaps I am just not as open minded as I thought...However there were a few pieces that caught my attention, a video screening by Christian Marclay The Clocks and Luke Fowler Grammar for Listening (part 1). I was quite surprised of myself, as I don't usually find video pieces that interesting, but these ones were more like film.

Christian Marclay The Clocks: The screening was based in a dark room, where a 24 hour video was projected on to a big white wall like a small cinema. As the work is 24 hours long at first I was not sure what was going on on the screen, but after a few minutes I have started to realise that the video is created out of short clips from various film fragments which indicate a certain time. Basically what ever time it is right now, that will be the time in this video.
Watching this piece was incredibly interesting, I sat there for some time while hundreds of different narratives were flickering before my eyes. I think that's what makes it so interesting and timeless, because your mind wants to know what will happen in the next minute so you want to watch more and more. It seems that Marclay is trying to communicate the importance of time and how it can fly by without us noticing, while constantly being reminded about it.
From reading reviews and watching a BBC news report on Christian Marclay's The Clocks, this piece has left a very positive impression on critics and the public itself, everyone is recommending to take a peak at this brilliant work of art! Personally I couldn't agree more, seeing a small part of this film has left me mesmerised, I wanted to sit in that very uncomfortable chair for the whole of 24 hours.
Still from Christian Marclay’s The Clock, 2010
Luke Fowler A Grammar for Listening (Part 1): Again the video was screened in a dark room with an even smaller screen, the film footage was shot with a 16mm camera which gave it lovely rounded edges and a vintage crackle look. The viewer is supposed to observe the video and listen to a separate sound file, which automatically encourages to question the communication between listening and looking. Personally I was overwhelmed with the calm and unnoticeable everyday noises that were complimenting the peaceful imagery on the screen, mostly because they were turned up to a very high volume which I was not used to. Sitting in the room became very uncomfortable due to the build up of the sounds, which was very strange because usually I barely notice them in my every day life. On the other hand the film was beautifully composed and I particularly enjoyed that part of the work.
Still from Luke Fowler's A Grammar for Listening, 2009

Posted by Julia Baranova at 12:25 PM  

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