Katie Widdowson - Artist

Fine Art Student at Sheffield Hallam University

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Final Degree Show Plans for S1 and AGC

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Theorising Sound Imagery In Psychology. Auditory Perception and Sound As An Event.

Within psychology the study of sound falls under the term 'auditory perception' where the research focus is centred upon the presumed relationships between sound and associative cognitive processes of recognition and interpretation. While the benefits of such an approach can be identified in certain areas, such as nero-psychology, it can be argued that there remains something of a theoretical outlook which moves the vacuum in our understanding of the relationships between hearing sound and the images that it conjures up by our experiences.

Can psychology develop a theoretical outlook which moves beyond the 'stimulus driven' orientation of the traditional approach, an orientation of which helps highlight the role of imagery in our everyday perception of sound(s) as an event?

Reflecting on the relationship between sound and imagery provokes the observation that ours is a visually dominant world/ representational culture. There is no reason to believe however that sound perception is any less complicated than visual perception and discursive representations of perceptual experience remain philosophically pragmatic. Although we understand scientific descriptions of auditory perception, phenomenally we don't 'hear' acoustic signals or sound waves, we hear events: the sound of people and things moving, changing, beginning and ending, forever interdependant with the dynamics of the present movement. We 'hear' the sound of silence.

From an evolutionary perspective sound has at least two distinct qualitative dimensions, one nurturing, supportive and indicative of comfort, care and safety, the other dissonant, disruptive and likely to provoke anxiety. Nurturing sounds might include blood flow (from our time in the womb), rhythm, intentional prominence and all those associated with the presence of others involved in our care. In adult life the beneficial effect of mediative or calming mood music is promoted as an aid to reducing stress and suffers of insomina know the value of listening to music in order to lull themselves to sleep.

The inherent rhythm to the sound of speech can have a calming effect on us when we are anxious. It makes auditory sense that we are highly sensitive to those sounds that are indicate the presence of potential predators. Some sounds appear to be intrinsically appealing and pleasurable, otherwise discomforting and annoying. I what sense however, do we imagine the cause of the sound or sound event?

When awoken in the night by a scratching noise, we might quickly decide that we are listening to the sound of a mouse or rat under the floorboards. It is upon hearing the noise that we then imagine that the sound is the kind a rodent might make when scratching around for food. Our knowledge of such sounds has come from a cultural repertoire of all those available imaginable sounds. In reality we don't have to of seen the rat making such a sound, a great deal of our knowledge comes from the available cultural discourses about sounds and their causes. We might even say there is no such thing as silence, except and imaginary silence, a pure, abstract absence of sound. Arguably we can not jump out of our discriptive representational knowledge of sound into a 'soundless void.'

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'The Sublime 2013'

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'We may therefore conclude that imagination is not an empirical power added to consciousness as it is the whole of consciousness as it realizes freedom.'

J P Satre 

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Evaluation of final piece 'Three Dangling Mice 2013'

Overall, I was really pleased with how this piece turned out. I thought the mixture of movement from the fog machine and the strobe light was really interesting, against the dead frozen mice. Having the fog creep in from the bottom was really spooky and the strobe light made the fog even more effective. I think the sound also matches the imagery really well. The fog looks really convincing and creates an amazing creepy effect to the film.

The idea behind this piece was taken from the nursery rhyme 'Three Blind Mice' and the mice characters from the fairy tale Cinderella. The imagery and the story is supposed to suggest that the mice don't get their happily ever afters. It portrays the idea that perhaps the evil step mother is setting up a trap for the mice and electrocuting them all, thus meaning they wont be able to help Cinderella and she wont be able to go to the ball. Furthermore, it suggests that evil sometimes prevails good in the real world.

I love this idea that fairy tales are recognizable within my work but directing it more at an adult audience. A lot of my work this year contains adult like themes. Its interesting to think that children listen to the fairy tales and read them growing up. Then when you hit the age of being an adult, you realize , fairy tales aren't real and life isn't really like that and that the world can sometimes be a scary place. The thing that captures most people's attention first is the fact the mice are real ! (But were already dead).

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Sound Analysis - Three Dangling Mice 2013

I wanted to have another play with creating another sound piece like the last one, 'The Wolf-Man and The Dark Forest 2013'. Again, I created the sound using garage band and used free sound effects from the internet and garage band and edited them together so I could get the sounds I exactly wanted to use. Even though I liked the photographs of the Mice by themselves, I knew I wanted to create more of a visually interactive piece.

Since the video footage of the mice is quite eerie and sinister, I wanted to create a sound piece that would help tell the story I wanted. It also represents this idea of me working with the real and the unreal throughout the year. Using real mice and unreal sounds so to speak. I love the juxster position of the different media to create this unusual video.

The piece opens up with the sound of thunder and lightening crackling, sounds of moving machines and electricity. The sound of buzzing electricity kicks in with the sound of the mice squeaking  suggesting that the mice are being electrocuted. Machinery starts beeping and the little children start cheering because the mice are been electrocuted. More electricity can be heard, as well as machinery cogs and beeping, portraying that the machine is been to overloaded. Alarm sirens start and the machine conks out at the end. The kids cheering is to be ironic and quite humorous as children love the 'Three Blind Mice' nursery rhyme, even though its visually quite disturbing when their tales get cut off.

Furthermore, this sound piece was about bringing my work to life and making it seem more real than it is. I love playing around with different senses and I enjoy making people think about the different connections and links from fairy tales to my work. I love using different aspects and techniques, such as a fog machine and strobe light to create interesting effects. The sounds seem to really make the piece. its really unusual to create pieces of work where the sound and music tell the story. Without the sound effects both of my pieces wouldn't make as much sense.

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Kieran Draper - Artist Research 2013

"Sometimes I'll be working on a piece, and i'll think no this is bullshit. So I will literally rub bull excrement on the piece as a metaphor."

When I started thinking about my piece for 'Three Dangling Mice' what immediately stuck out in my mind was the opening credits for 'Dinner For Smucks'. The minutiae gives way to several astonishing tableau vivants of miniatures - a bespectacled mouse and his red headed mousette - engaging in the sweetest of romantic cliches, demonstrating an artistry so fine its leans on borderline obsession. I found these figures created by Kieran Draper really clever and beautiful. I love the idea the mice are anthropomorphic and really give a sense of the cartoon and fairy tale which I also wanted to work with.

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Three Dangling Mice 2013

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Sound piece for my latest film 'Three Dangling Mice' 2013 made on Garage Band

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'Three Blind Mice' 2013 

Video, fog and strobe light.

Image stills taken from my latest video piece.

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Three Blind Mice Nursery Rhyme

The origin of the words to 'Three Blind Mice' rhyme are based in English History. The farmer's wife, refers to the daughter of King Henry V|||, Mary |. Mary was a staunch catholic and her violent persecution of protestants led to the nick name 'Bloody Mary'. The reference to the farmer's wife in Three Blind Mice refers to the massive estates which she and her husband King Philip of Spain, possessed.

The Three Blind Mice were three nobleman who adhered to protestant faith who were convicted for plotting against the queen. She did not have them dismembered and blinded as inferred in the rhyme, but she did have them burnt at the stake.

Three Blind Mice, three blind mice,

See how they run, see how they run,

They all ran after the farmer's wife,

Who cut off their tales with a carving knife,

Did you ever see such a thing in your life, 

As three blind mice.

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Reflection

I feel like I'm at that stage in my practice this year where I can develop a good body of work from the themes and ideas of which I'm currently exploring. I want to keep the sense of unease and the unsettling element from my previous piece 'The Wolf Man and The Dark Forrest'. I want to create a video piece based on the nursery rhyme 'Three Blind Mice.' I will use a fog machine and experiment with a strobe light again to explore the notion of building worry and anxiety  I want to continue working with children's tales and fairy tales as I love taking the well known stories form fairy tales and making them not to happily ever afters.

I want people to be able to see the links within my practice, but I don't want it to be immediately obvious. I want to create a sense of the uncanny. I love evolving the fairy tale stories and using this to create a piece of Art and thus, creating a new narrative, or alternative to the original folklore's. I love working with fairy tales now as an adult and exposing the truth behind them, banishing the fantasy of innocent childhood and bringing forth reality of the modern day world. 

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Visit Original Link

Sound piece for my installation - The Wolf Man and The Dark Forrest 2013

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Helen Chadwick - Artist Research

Chadwick's Art is often described as visceral. It's meaty and talks about what is is to be human and our contradictions and apposing forces; males vs females; fleshy fleeting individuality; spirituality and universal existance. 

Chadwick died unexpectedly in 1966, but her works still seem vibrant. Flower arrangements in the wreaths of pleasure look like genitals and bodily fluids. Cacao, the plopping poo-like pool of malton chocolate smells so much it makes your stomach gurgle.Her photos and sculptures are arresting and decorative but also thought provoking. Photocopies of her twisted naked body in oval court like under golden sphere, as though shes in her own zodiac. The bronze 'piss flower' fills shapes made where she and her boyfriend urinated in the snow.

Heralding the likes of Sarah Lucas and Damien Hirst in subject and disregard for traditional work is a mark of how things have changed. We don't flinch now, for example at the image of cervical cells. However, Chadwick's beautiful absurd and affecting Art remains as relevant in today's world as when she made it.

English sculptor, photographer and installation artist, Chadwick studied at Brighton Polytechnic and Chelsea School of Art, London. She lived and worked in London and lectured at the Royal College of Art, Chelsea school of Art the London institute. Chadwick's innovative and provocative use of a rich variety of materials such as, flesh, flowers, chocolate and fur, was hugely influential on a younger generation of Artists. Her strongly associatiative and visceral images were intended to question gender representation and the nature of desire. The theme was continued in 'model institution' (1981) is an architectural  sculpture and was intended to reflect on high unemployment and economic frustrations of the time.

Throughout the `1980's and early 1990's her work became richer and more direct in impact. A fountain thick of chocolate carried associations both of excessive physical desire and pleasure and at the same time being nauseating .

Desire and repulsion also converge in 'Piss Flower', in which casts  were made of cavities that were produced by urinating in the snow. Evoking the infantile and the use of chance by the dadaists, as well as the provocative and the political work of contemporary artists such as Andres Serrano and Robert Mapplethorpe, piss flowers represents the transgressive behavior as equally beautiful and disturbing as well as disgusting, Chadwick was shortlisted for the turner prize in 1987.

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Artist Research

Ann Bevan studied fine art and sculpture at Edinburgh College of Art. She grew up in Orkney, close to the sea and surrounded by Orkney tombs. Both the sea and ancient history of her home town influence her works. She is fascinated by water, energy, places and the physical nature of materials.

The shining silver shape of the moon pool on the forest floor looks quite out of place. It stands out because of its colour reflection and its materials as it contrasts with the forest floor natural tones and textures. The artist has tried to achieve a cold silvery appearance in the work which ripples on the surface. As the title suggests, the sculpture sparkles like a water pool reflected by the moon. The idea of a moonlight  pool in the middle of the woods brings to mind ideas about ancient myths , magic and folklore associated with the woods.

The artwork has been developed in response to its chosen site. The artist knows that the pool will respond to and change with nature and particularly the natural light as it changes through the day, which may even be pitch black or moonlight.

Ann also likes to question the tole of public sculpture within such a context. She thinks about how people will respond to her work in the space. It's as thought it tells its own ancient folklore and people can become part of the story by walking over the work . The artist has also considered the site of the work and its proximity to the sea and the nearby off shore oil industry. From the forest floor you can regularly see and hear helicopters fly overhead on their way to the oil riggs.

Another interesting association is that 'Moon Pool' is the name used to describe the space in an oil platform, where divers are aloud in the sea. Ann believes that casting-taking molds etc, helps her to analyse and understand things. Bevan claims that taking a cast is like taking a print, it is a shadow of the original object and loved been faced with the challenge of casting water.

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The only limit is one you set yourself...

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Angela Carter - The Bloody Chamber

As part of my research this year, I have being reading Angela Carter's 'Bloody Chamber'. Her short stories are variants of the well known fairy tales, but are much darker, sexual, twisted versions, similar to that of the Brothers Grimm's Tales. I took inspiration from Angela Carter's reworking of Little Red Riding Hood, 'The Company Of Wolves' for my latest piece of work 'The Wolf man and The Dark Forrest 2013.

The Bloody Chamber is based on the legend of Bluebeard. This tale is often wrongly described as a group of fairy tales given a feminist twist. These are new stories, not re-telling. This version of Bluebeard where a new bride unlocks the forbidden room in her husband's castle to find the murdered corpses of his former wives. Its a moral symbolizing that female curiosity leads to retribution, The Bloody Chamber could well be seen as the womb. The source of all life, and death.

In Carter's 20th Century version of Bluebeard, the menace is located not in the the perils of childbirth, but in the darker side of heterosexuality, in sadomasochism and the idea of fatal passion.

The nameless heroine tells the story many years after the events happened. She narrates in the presence tense, going back to the age of 17, when she was married of to a Marquis. She is a poor pianist, who is attracted to the considerably older Marquis because of his wealth. The Marquis has already being married 3 times and his last wife disappeared under mysterious circumstances. Despite her unease at the Marquis impenetrable personality, the heroine is excited to move into his extravagant seaside castle.

The Marquis gives her a painting of Saint Celia at the organ as well as a wide ruby choker as wedding gifts. The marquis takes the Heroine's virginity in a room filled with mirrors and then is called out of town suddenly on business. He leaves the heroine with keys to every lock in the castle, but forbids her to enter the one room that he says is his oasis and his hell.

In his absence, the heroine befriends a blind piano tutor named jean Yves. She orders the servants around like a spoilt child and is so overwhelmed by her luxury surroundings she calls her mother to complain. Later, while exploring, the heroine drops the keys on the floor. The first she happens to see and pick up is the key to the forbidden room, and overwhelmed by curiosity, she sets out to the remote corner of the castle where the lock to the room lies.

In the dark chamber, the heroine finds the corpses of the Marquis's three former wives, whom he murdered. He killed his last wife so recently , her body is still bleeding onto the floor. Shocked, she drops the keys in the blood. She locks the door behind her, the blood stain on the key will not disappear. The Marquis returns home and demands to see the key. Noticing the bloodstained key he says he will behead the heroine. He sends all the servants home, except for Jean-Yves who accompanies the heroine to the court yard to the chopping block.

Before he can kill the heroine, her mother bursts into the courtyard on horseback and kills the Marquis with a bullet to the head. She knew instinctively that her daughter was in grave danger. At the stories end, some years later we find the heroine and the piano player happily married and living on the edge of Paris. They have given away all the Marquis fortune and turned the castle into a school for the blind. They made a respectable living by tuning pianos and giving piano lessons. The heroine ends the story by saying she is glad Jeans Yves cannot see the indelible mark on her forehead because it spares her no shame.

The Bloody Chamber is like a multifaceted glittering diamond reflecting and refracting a variety of portraits of desire and sexuality, heterosexual female sexuality, which for the time, 1979 are told from a heterosexual female view point.

Similarly to Alice by Jan Svankmajer's, I found 'The Bloody Chamber' to be a deeply disturbing story of a teenage girl how marries for wealth and almost pays for the consequences. I'm also astounded at how dark this version actually is and how the idea of fatal passion can lead to fatal consequences.