//Unit 13: Thanatophobia//.
Discovery:
I started my unit 13 by working through ‘context tasks’; completing a wide range of primary and secondary research to gather ideas. The most beneficial research was my primary research of visiting Liverpool Museum and reading the Junji Ito books, as these directly informed my project and enabled me to select my project theme. I have continued this research throughout my project, using secondary research sources for contextual artist research, and primary research for photographs to work from, supporting my work and project, particularly with problem solving and practical skills. I decided to study Thanatophobia in the end, as this theme was particularly interesting to me as an individual, and I felt I would have potential for constant research (symbolism, effects/causes of the phobia, peoples experiences, etc.), and since deciding to study this theme of Thanatophobia, I’ve learnt much more; both regarding the phobia, and how to tackle a theme like this more sensitively.
Defining:
Throughout my project, I have made many key creative decisions to push my work forward, often as a direct result of problem solving and reflection. I can narrow this down to three main decisions that I feel had the most impact. The first was deciding to develop practical work further and evaluate each of these individually, so that I could easily identify what worked well and could be pushed further, or what was less successful, which is apparent in my annotations and reflections constantly. This pushed my practical work to be as successful as possible. My next key decision was that my photograms work was my most successful work; I put my personal preferences in the use of fine liner aside, and focused on the effects and how successful the photograms work was, so that my final piece would be as successful as possible. Finally, the last main decision that shaped my project was my entire problem solving throughout my final piece process; deciding to produce my images using Photoshop rather than using photograms due to reliability and time being the biggest. This was also one of the ways that I adapted to an unforeseen technical problem; the acetates weren’t very successful, there was the chance that photogram prints could be unsuccessful or inconsistent, and producing each individual image took much longer than anticipated. I quickly identified these problems and decided on a solution. Tutorials and reflection are the two main factors that enabled me to identify problems and decide on solutions within the limited timeframe.
Problem solving:
I completed a range of research in order to gain a theoretical understanding of Thanatophobia, though the main ones that directly influenced my project were articles that outlined the effects of Thanatophobia (rough book 1), and looking at peoples personal experiences of the phobia (rough book 3). These helped me to remember what it is that I am trying to show, and comparing this research to the practical work that I produced enabled me to see how well I was achieving this goal. This research also informed and influenced the meaning of my work, as I was originally just trying to show these emotions, whereas looking at real life experiences of this helped me to add a more personal touch to these pieces. There were themes that were raised that I didn’t revisit or fully look into, the main one being about overcoming this phobia of death by looking at the causes. I briefly looked into these themes in rough research and referenced them in annotation, but I never actually followed through with it as a theme, mainly because of time, as I only looked into this quite late in the project, and I didn’t feel that I had long enough to look into it properly as a change in direction.
Planning and production:
My planning and production skills are to a very high standard. I planned each week at the start of each week, using tutorials and looking at available spaces to decide how best I could use my time. I also outlined intentions for the week in these action plans, in order to fully understand what I needed to achieve that week. I balanced work out between college time and at home; due to lack of internet access and certain materials at home, I would blog, use computers and complete some practical work in college. Then at home, I would annotate and complete practical work that did not need specialist materials or equipment, e.g., fine liner. At the start of my project, I was slightly over-ambitious in what could be achieved in the period, as I originally had another contextual in my original project plan. I do feel, though, that more work could have been produced out of the artists that I did study.
Practical skills:
Throughout my unit 13 project, I have used a wide range of materials and methods that I felt could show my theme and meet my intentions well. I aimed to use contextual artist research that would be relevant to my project by the themes or imagery that they explore, e.g., Junji Ito or Michelle Harvey. However, this wasn’t always possible with more particular methods, e.g., photograms or scanography. I feel that the most influential methods that I used were my cyanotypes and photograms. My photograms met my intentions most successfully and were used in/as inspiration for my final piece, and my cyanotypes were developed similarly to my final images using layers and blending modes, so I was able to see how successful this effect was and experiment with this method before even considering it for my final piece. My work with photography and scanography was much less successful; the initial shoots and developments weren’t very successful, and it took a long time to create developments that finally were successful. I am very knowledgeable about each of the processes that I used in this project as I completed contextual artist research and sometimes method research before carrying out a technique. However, I could’ve looked into the technical side of photography more, as this better understanding could’ve improved the quality of that initial work.
Evaluation and reflection:
I have reflected on and evaluated my work in a variety of ways, to ensure that these reflections are the highest standard and have covered all necessary points. I completed written weekly reflections and weekly reflections on my Tumblr blog, and completed larger evaluations at critical points in the unit. I also reflected on my work using my annotations, as immediate responses to the work I had produced and how successful it was, and what could’ve been improved or what I could do next. Later in the unit, after a group tutorial targeting reflection and evaluation, I decided to go back and add annotation at the end of each set of practical work, to act as a summary. These summaries looked at how well my original intentions have been met and why, and stated how likely I would be to use the method for a final piece. These summary annotations are very successful as they ensure that my reflection and evaluation skills are shown to the highest standard within this unit. This unit has definitely given me ideas for my future; I would like to revisit my initial idea of LGBT+ themes in future, as well as explore more styles of illustration, to aim to get my illustration skills to a higher standard and see my full potential as an illustrator. I’ll also research photography more in depth if I ever revisit this medium, in order to make this work more successful. I’ve also gained skills in research, and how to put my work in context, which I could use in further education.
Presentation:
For my final piece, I wanted to simulate the effects of Thanatophobia, focusing on anxiety, feeling trapped and feeling overwhelmed. I created a few designs that I felt could show this in different ways, but I feel that the one I decided on was most successful. The result was a sort of cubicle you would walk into, with a wall coated in intricate images, to create an overwhelming and uncomfortable feeling, which I feel was very successful. I also exhibited this within a dark space, and the viewer would walk in with a flashlight, to create this feeling of walking into the unknown and not knowing what was coming next. I feel that this is a very successful final piece, as it communicates my ideas and meets my intentions very well, whilst being engaging and unique. I feel that the piece was also put together very professionally, e.g., putting work onto foam board, using Velcro instead of tape to mount my images, repainting my board and plinth etc., that give the piece a finished, professional quality, which I feel makes the piece more successful.
