Screen Printing - Practice
This week I have been practising my screen printing techniques. Over the previous year I have made screen prints from a collagraph and an ink drawing, both of which were successful. However, the technician had prepared the screen with the stencil from which I worked. I now want to be able to do this process myself. I decided to experiment with a photograph of the Cement Works at South Ferriby which will form part of my Research area. I went to the Graphics Department and got some assistance in highlighting the contrasts by using Photoshop. A clear black and white image produces a better stencil. I, and a colleague, were then shown how to go through the full process and afterwards we made notes. This will enable me to be more self-sufficient in the future. We then proceeded to print our images on our own. Although the outcome was not perfect at the first attempt I felt that I had learned a lot about the process.Research - Andy Warhol (1928-1987)
I have
chosen Andy Warhol as one of the postmodern artists to investigate further. As well as his use of screen printing, I
feel that his work can give me insights as to how to use colour to create
impact. I like to work in series, and silkscreens provide the
opportunity to do this and to experiment with and create different effects,
including how colours inter-relate. I
also feel that his use of icons, whether they be film stars or well-known commercial
products, resonate with my work. Icons can be anything you
want them to be. I can treat a person, an object or a scene in ways similar to
Warhol to add power and impact to a work.
Working as a commercial artist appealed to Warhol, “The process of doing work
in commercial art was machine-like, but the attitude had feeling to it” (Warhol
quoted in Anfam et al,.1985, p. 512). I like the way that Warhol took his
subject matter from the category of mass communication, which made his own art
“less exclusive, less unique and more accessible” (Anfam et al,1985, p.512).
This does not mean to say that this is the same type of motif which I would
want to emulate, as I would want to create something different from my own
areas of interest and personal to me. However, his approach is something which
appeals to me – the strong line, readily identifiable subjects, colour and repetition.As an example, I am analysing Warhol’s Diptych, Marilyn, from 1962, which is acrylic and silkscreen on canvas. I saw a number of his works at the American Dream, Pop to the Present Exhibition last year at the British Museum. Taking inspiration from the world around them – billboard advertising, global politics, Hollywood and household objects – American artists over the past six decades created highly original prints to rival their paintings and sculptures. Printmaking brought their work to a much wider and more diverse audience.
Analysis - Content
Marilyn
Monroe died in 1962, allegedly from an overdose. In the following months,
Warhol made more than twenty silkscreen paintings of her, all based on the same
publicity photograph from the 1953 film Niagara. The image provides an example
of two themes which fascinated Warhol, that of death and the cult of celebrity.
The repeating of the image, replicates the fact that she was always in the
media spotlight. The contrast of vivid colour on the left, with black and white
on the right-hand side, which blurs and fades, may suggest Monroe’s mortality.
Andy Warhol,
Marilyn Diptych, 1962, acrylic and silkscreen on canvas
Form and Process
Materials
and viewpoint: The work would have been screen printed and hand painted with
acrylic paint before being stretched. We are looking up at many images, all the
same basic black print, but each image is individual in colour application and
indiscriminate in the way that the paint is forced through the screen with a
squeegee. The bottom is left bare, helping to give an unplanned air. The
process fits in with Warhol’s ideas of creating art like a machine and using
commercial techniques.
Composition:
Repetition of the brightly coloured left-hand side exudes glamour. The
monochrome, messy, fading right-hand side balances the left symmetrically, but
gives off a totally different atmosphere. The repetition emphasises the
difference and creates power and impact. The composition was very unusual for
this era.
Colour: Six
separate vibrant colours have been applied – pink for the face, yellow for the
hair, turquoise for the eye-shadow and collar, red for the lips, white for the
teeth and orange for the background. The colours abut, but sometimes they
overlap – this is inherent in the process as it is in many ways unpredictable.
The colour makes Marilyn’s face shine out from the image, and coupled with the
slight variations, makes for absorbing study and impact. In contrast the
monochrome side is drab, messy and with the ink poorly applied – overloaded in
some areas which almost obliterates some of the images, and poorly charged in
the last column where the image fades away. This inconsistency adds to the
uniqueness of the piece and makes it more accessible and less élitist.
Process: The
silkscreen process creates a black image from a “ready-made” photograph. Then a
stencil is made onto which the individual areas of acrylic paint are applied to
a mesh screen. This is placed over the
black print and the paint applied by pressing on a squeegee and pulling down a
number of times for each separate colour application over the basic black
print. The application of the coloured paint can be varied, and the way that
the pulling down of the squeegee works creates discrepancies in each individual
image. The monochrome version would be done in a similar way, but some of the
images are so poor, that the effects must have been purposeful to create
effect. Some images are nearly completely obliterated by the overload of paint,
while in other areas the paint is so thin that weave of the fabric shows
through.
Context: The
work typifies the “Pop Art” culture of the time, at which Warhol was at the
centre. With his background in the commercial field he was ideally placed to
exploit ideas of commercialism through his choice of subject matter and take up
their ways of working on a mass production scale. This enabled his works to
appeal to the population as a whole as they could readily identify with baked
beans etc. and made art more accessible.
Energy: The images themselves are static, but
they are created in an energetic way. The process, as described above, by being
un-prescriptive, creates its own energy and anomalies. There is movement from
left to right, from colour to monochrome. There is energy in the application of
colour across the whole and within each individual image. The swiping of the
paint is apparent, loose and uncontrolled. Space is left at the bottom, to
allow the whole to breathe. It has a slightly unfinished air. On a wall it has
much power and impact. The atmosphere and colour on the left provides a brazen
setting for a film icon known for her beauty and feminine allure. Yet the right-hand
side is pitiful in its execution and drab in its colour. The image fades away
and the artist has not bothered to rectify the obvious technical shortcomings.
This mirror’s Monroe’s tragic life – brightly shining star to the public, but
haunted in private and destined for a tragic and untimely end.
Culture: Warhol introduced a new era of
“portraiture” with this work. He took a very traditional genre – portraiture –
and stamped it with his own skills and personality. He introduced new
materials, and techniques to produce works of immediacy and power. He was
extremely influential in the Pop Art movement, and became an icon himself. His
subject matter from the category of mass communication – newspapers, comic
strips and advertisements – produced paintings which were creative and
original, but have been much copied since.
Relevance to my own practice: There are so many aspects to this
work that it is very clever on many levels. I am sure that I will be able to
work up some of Warhol’s techniques and ideas to enhance my own practice,
particularly, the use of series, colour, mood and impact.
References:
Andy Warhol, Marilyn Diptych, 1962
References:
Andy Warhol, Marilyn Diptych, 1962
No comments:
Post a Comment