Research

To begin with I was planning on creating a moving illustration animation, and so I spent a lot of time trying to find examples of stories/fairytales told through drawings and moving paintings and animations. I didn't end up continuing with this idea but I've added some of the research I did at the start to the year for that part of the project.


''Meeting the Pied Piper in Brasov, a paper prologue" from anne-marie creamer on Vimeo.

My research at the beginning was quite thin, and I was struggling to find work that combined all of my ideas, so I looked at a wide variety of different artists that combined different elements of what I wanted to do. I really liked this animated classical paintings video, as it was pretty much exactly what I wanted to do with my drawings, but in a story form.



This animation I thought was really sinister and empowering, for this design of Red Riding Hood was the character who takes control of the situation and saves herself. It was when I was just trying to find any versions of these fairytales that subverted the norm, and portrayed their characters in a way that was contrary to what we expect them to be.

RED from RED on Vimeo.

I also thought the animation technique was really well done, and the use of silhouettes and colour schemes was cleverly used through the piece. There were moments where it almost looked like and action comic, which I liked the use of, especially in the action sequences.

I was going to use the parallax effect to animate my drawings, and so spent time watching tutorials on learning how to use different animating techniques.






I found some quite adult and more complex interpretations of the original fairytales and they're quite horrific at times. I enjoyed looking into other interpretations of the fairytales I am using, Alice in Wonderland, Red Riding Hood and The Little Mermaid. I read through lots of different poems I found online, and looked at Angela Carters 'The Bloody Chamber' as another source of reference. I have also spent a lot of time just reading through the original tales, as they are also very rich ground for inspiration.

The poems are very gruesome, which is something I was initially interested in exploring, this sort of unnerving, creepy and grotesque side to the fairytales. I thought maybe I could have them recorded being read aloud and edit them into a sound piece to be played. I did after a while move away from this idea of the sinister fairytale.

Little Red-Cap

At childhood’s end, the houses petered out
into playing fields, the factory, allotments
kept, like mistresses, by kneeling married men, 
the silent railway line, the hermit’s caravan, 
till you came at last to the edge of the woods. 
It was there that I first clapped eyes on the wolf. 

He stood in a clearing, reading his verse out loud 
in his wolfy drawl, a paperback in his hairy paw, 
red wine staining his bearded jaw. What big ears
he had! What big eyes he had! What teeth!
In the interval, I made quite sure he spotted me, 
sweet sixteen, never been, babe, waif, and bought me a drink, 

my first. You might ask why. Here’s why. Poetry.
The wolf, I knew, would lead me deep into the woods,
away from home, to a dark tangled thorny place
lit by the eyes of owls. I crawled in his wake,
my stockings ripped to shreds, scraps of red from my blazer
snagged on twig and branch, murder clues. I lost both shoes

but got there, wolf’s lair, better beware. Lesson one that night, 
breath of the wolf in my ear, was the love poem.
I clung till dawn to his thrashing fur, for
what little girl doesn’t dearly love a wolf?1
Then I slid from between his heavy matted paws
and went in search of a living bird – white dove –

which flew, straight, from my hands to his hope mouth.
One bite, dead. How nice, breakfast in bed, he said,
licking his chops. As soon as he slept, I crept to the back
of the lair, where a whole wall was crimson, gold, aglow with books.
Words, words were truly alive on the tongue, in the head,
warm, beating, frantic, winged; music and blood.

But then I was young – and it took ten years 
in the woods to tell that a mushroom
stoppers the mouth of a buried corpse, that birds
are the uttered thought of trees, that a greying wolf
howls the same old song at the moon, year in, year out,
season after season, same rhyme, same reason. I took an axe

to a willow to see how it wept. I took an axe to a salmon
to see how it leapt. I took an axe to the wolf
as he slept, one chop, scrotum to throat, and saw 
the glistening, virgin white of my grandmother’s bones.
I filled his old belly with stones. I stitched him up.
Out of the forest I come with my flowers, singing, all alone. 

Carol Ann Duffy 1999

The Little Mermaid

by Anne Widdowson

The Little Mermaid began to chop
Her shimmering tail in two,
And squirmed beneath the axe’s head.
Blood spread across the clammy flesh,
Wet tissue sprayed about her chest,
As she maimed the sticky limb.

The cleft drooled, alien matter,
Not only to us; the girl was sickened
By the mutant fin, felt hatred
For her mongrel blood.
But time for alterations and tweaks,
To correct this monstrous flaw.

She grasped the fragile nerves and snapped;
Scales scattered where the water lapped
Her stinking slab of meat.
Scraps of sinew licked her wrists,
Slimy, hot beneath her frenzied touch,
Her shaking, grisly hands.

The child admired her work, unfazed
By the carnage, the carcass, the sight,
Hefting the chunks like a cripple might.
The pieces oozed and bulged,
Her figure, in her eyes, much improved
Compared to that dreadful tail.

With a sigh of respite and release,
She regarded the newly botched legs
And smiled. Fillets replaced the fin she had,
Hardly equipped to walk on land.
What a pity she’d never stand
On her two new stumps.

PAULA REGO

I have been really interested in Rego's work for a while now. The way she captures her audience is really clever and she positions her characters in the frame in such a way as to make them seem imposing or as victims.
She inspires me both in her painting style which is stunning, and in the way she uses fairytales as influence in her work and reimagines their meaning or the way the story unfolds.

This piece by her for example, is called 'Snow White playing with her Fathers trophies' and depicts Snow White sitting in the forefront of the painting with a stags head on her lap, with her legs placed in a traditionally masculine pose. The stepmother gazes on in anger and jealousy in the background. The stags head represents the failed attempt of the Evil Queen of murdering Snow White and being fooled by the heart of a stag instead of a human one. For me, the painting also gives reference to Red Riding Hood due to the over whelming use of red in the painting and the stag giving reference back to the forest, as well as the green on the curtain behind her.
The fact that Snow White has her feet placed on a cushion implies the youngness of the girl, as in the original story she was supposed to be around 14 years old. In addition to this there is a strong contrast with the white of her dress hinting at purity and innocence, offset by the severed stags head and the red surrounding her.
Her gaze is also quite important in the piece as you can clearly see her turning away from the natural direction of where the rest of her body is facing and gazing over her shoulder with a strong challenge in her eyes. She has also very deliberately been faced away from the stepmother in the background, as if she is not worth her time, and as a statement of defiance.

Snow White playing with her Fathers trophies

Rego's painting 'War' is one of my favourite pieces. The artist stated it was inspired by a photo in a newspaper from the early stages of the Iraq war. There is heavy symbolism in the piece, not the least of it being the two main characters have heads replaced with rabbit heads. Reasoning behind this may be that rabbits are an animal associated with running away, they are the prey not the predator and they are also painted white a symbol of innocence. 

A meaning that I'm not sure Rego did on purpose or not, or if it's me reading too much into the piece after reading too many fairytales but I feel a strong association with Alice in Wonderland for this painting. The main part is of course, the white rabbits in the centre of the work. Also the main character wearing a blue dress, as the character does in the story implies in my mind a connection. 

The colours are also quite bold, blues, oranges, reds and yellows quite prominent through the painting. There are several characters also scattered around the work and it's very busy; there is a lot going on and always something new to see.

Rego has going to be key as inspiration throughout my painting process, and in helping me achieve what I am trying to capture at the core of my paintings. She has been a key source of influence over the past few months, and when I feel I have drifted of track with where my paintings are going, I can use her work to anchor the core of my paintings. My piece isn't meant to be an exact copy of her work, and in fact it comes across quite different at times. Despite this, the essence of what Rego portrays in her paintings is what I was trying to capture in mine. Everything for the symbolism, to the rich colours, is something I thought would be interesting to emulate, and have been referring back to her work throughout the process of creating mine, and is something I have been baring in mind.

Of course, how my paintings are posed is very different to the arrangements within Rego's paintings, as mine have a more renaissance feel to them and hers are much more busy and dynamic which I love, and there is a lot more going on. This was something I thought I might cut down on, as my work is also involving projection and I felt it would be too busy if I had these complicated scenes unfolding. From the start I wanted to have big simple portraits, just using elements of different artists to inspire me, and Rego was one of my primary sources for that. Her work is stunning.

KIKI SMITH

Artist Kiki Smith has explored a lot of different dynamics involving stories, specifically in regarding Red Riding Hood. Smith has had a long time interest in wolves and the natural world. Its intriguing that in her work she represents the wolf and woman as equals instead of the natural prey and predator.
I think this equal status is really important in the work, as it shows a shift in power. Rather than the traditionally stronger and more aggressive character, the wolf, being in control and attacking the woman, they are shown in a mutual caring embrace.

What is quite refreshing about this piece is that it shows a different side to the usual violent nature of the story of Red Riding Hood, showing an unnerving companionship between them, as the wolf lies totally docile at the woman's side. I love the contrasting way Smith has created these pieces of work with this new dynamic between human and beast, totally at ease in each others company. 

The piece below shows not adults, but children in mutual peace with the forest creatures. I like the way Smith has done one child with a deer, the deer being the usual prey of humans but both totally at ease in each others presence, and the other child (the one wearing the red cloak) is side by side with the wolf. Both pairs are natural enemies, at opposite ends of the food chain and yet are sitting in total comfort with each other.

I also think her style is really beautiful in the way she creates these illustrations, and the toned down colours she uses. I think the way in which she's drawn the wolves captures their essence really well. The delicate style of drawing shows this muted respect between the individuals, and in each drawing there are two subjects, one traditional 'prey,' and one traditional 'predator.' As in the image above, Smith has shown these usual dynamics subverted, and the pair in each drawing is relaxed in each others company, nonchalant. This is perhaps, the ideal that we strive for; equality, so to speak. In my mind, in the fairytale, the wolf represents the male energy and Red Riding Hood represents the female. To see them side by side undermines the traditional male superiority complex and balances the scales. It is useful in some ways to see the tales represented like this, but there is also an interesting point of view to look at it from the opposite perspective, where the roles are reversed and the female energy is the dominant, and the male the submissive. Smith explored this in her work further down below, in a sculptural piece.

This piece is different in that instead of the wolf and the girl living side by side, the woman is stepping out of the belly of the beast. It's a much more intimidating piece of work, the woman standing in a challenging stance, striding forward from the wolf and facing away from the fallen creature. She is in a position of power as she moves forward, appearing to have ripped her way out of the wolf's stomach to freedom, and emerged victorious.

SALLY GOLDING

Sally Golding is an audio visual artist who combines film projection, light and sound in her work. She was a really useful source of inspiration for me when planning my projection and sound parts of my film. What I am going to produce will be quite different in theme and delivery, but the essence of what I am doing is the same.

I found the video below, and loved the way she used the projection. This piece actually is quite similar to what I am imagining doing for my projection part. I am not going to be doing performance art, but in the place of the person I will have my paintings and I want to line up the projection so it lies relatively accurately on top of the paintings, like she has done with the rib cage lying over her own chest. I love the way it exactly lines up, the face with her face and the chest as well. The whole figure lines up with her and gives this really uncanny effect. I think the way Golding has used both the shadows and light in the piece is really clever, as the shadow could have just been an ignored part of the work, but she incorporated it really well into the performance. The piece is really interesting and I think will be really useful in helping me produce my own work.

I think the piece below by Golding is clever, but also makes me feel kind of nauseous and uncomfortable with the intense flashing lights which is something I am considering using in my own work. I am going to film any photoshoots I do, and any subsequent footage from that will have flashes in it from the shoot. I may decide to use some of those flashes in my work to create a sense of being on edge. I think it's a bit intense in Golding's work however, although I think that is what she intended. I find that Golding also uses sound really well. In the piece below I feel she was trying to achieve a certain overwhelming and over-simulating effect and she has succeeded. The sound is very intense, and that combined with the lights will have a very immersive and sensory overwhelming effect. For my own sound piece, I don't want it to be overwhelming in the same way but I do really like the idea of it being a bit immersive, and I think sound would have a really important part in making that happen. Light and image are great at drawing the viewer in, but I think the sound really is what absorbs people fully, and I want my piece to be able to immerse people with the combination of light and sound, as Golding has done here.

ROSE WYLIE

Rose Wylie is another artist I looked into. Her style is very different to mine, but there is something about her work that captured me and so I wanted to explore further. I visited her exhibition at the Serpentine Gallery in London, 'Quack Quack' and really enjoyed it. I loved her incorporation of such a large variety of themes, from herself eating a chocolate biscuit, to iconic scenes from films such as Kill Bill and famous figures like Queen Elizabeth II. I found her use of colour very impressive, I found the bright colours against the stark background very striking and made the image really stand out.

I especially enjoyed looking close up to her work. I liked stepping back to look at the whole piece as well, but being able to get up close and look at all the amazing textures and smears of paint she had thrown onto the canvas was really inspiring. The shear amounts of solid paint that raised from the surface of the painting gave it such an energy, and really brought the work to life.

I also found her use of collage impressive, as it is a medium I used to enjoy a lot and I find it can add so much character and dimension to a piece of work, and while her work already has these attributes I found it enhancing the complexities of the work tenfold. There was a great piece she made of elephants, using just red paint on white, and there was just so much paint used it was so interesting to be try and decipher the different layers of canvas, paint and texture, it was amazing. 

I found the large scale of her paintings particularly motivating, as scale was something I was spending a lot of time thinking about. Ideally for my own paintings I wanted to do something on a large scale if possible as I have always worked better when doing large scale work. 

I really liked the humour in her work, and I especially loved the painting she did that was of both Elizabeth II and Elizabeth Taylor. I thought it was really clever and her incorporation of the eyes and ears in the background, showing the way both of these women were under the spotlight of the media in different ways. I thought the fact that for this exhibition Wylie had drawn inspiration from so many different places was a great idea. There were pieces of work in this exhibition that she had created years ago, and some that was brand new. The shear volume and diversity of the work on display alone was enough to be impressive, but the depth and simplicity of each piece of work was amazing to see, and the development of her style and themes was fascinating to try and analyse.

Sound Editing

 Some progress screenshots for my sound editing!

Painting Process

I began all of my paintings by sketching out the rough proportions on my canvas, taking steps back to make sure everything was the right size. I needed to do this so I had some sort of guide to follow when I began painting.

I began by mixing up lots of skin tones. I really enjoy painting flesh as there are so many different tones, in these pieces I used lots of pinks, yellows and even purples on the canvas, giving depth and tone to the paintings. I was very loose and expressive to begin with, just trying to get a feel for the shape and shadows of the figures, and just kept layering more paint on.

Once I had the basic shape of the skin areas, I began to add colour shapes for the rough outlines of the clothing and where it would be. I was using palette knives the whole time, as it is I find them a very versatile way of painting as they can be used equally for free big movements, and also, if you're working large scale, they can be used for more detailed elements as well.

It was important to me to get across the depth of the subjects, and not to make them just feel flat and lifeless. I wanted them to have character. To achieve this, I just kept on layering and layering up the paint so that it brought out more textures and complexities within the paintings.

I knew I was going to need a background of some kind, and I found that a dark grey stood out the best. Black I felt would be too flat, and there wouldn't be any opportunity to add tone to anything. I made conscious choices for both the primer and the background that it wouldn't meet the edges of the paintings, to add to the overall unfinished feeling of the paintings.

I began to add black paint to areas of depth, to bring out the raised areas and give more dimension to the piece. I knew also, that the eyes would be important parts and so spent a lot of time trying to get them right, and get across the emotion I was trying to give out with each piece; pride, superiority and playfulness.

Presentation 3.0

As always, I struggle to get started with projects so I began with taking baby steps, and just started doing some practice paintings to start producing some work. The style I work in is quite loose and rough which I tried to emulate in these but struggled with sometimes as the page size was only A3. I wanted to practice making flesh tones, so I tried doing some portraits and close ups of faces. To get me going I also did some rough sketches, to get a feel for face shapes and different angles. These tests aren't linked to fairytales, they're just a way to develop my skills and I used my friends and random photos to practice drawing/painting from.

I began using very rough paint strokes and messy colour mixing, and tried not to think about what I was painting as I have found when I think too much about things I focus on one part of the painting too much. I do think I should have spent a bit more time on this one.

This painting I spent a lot more time on, and blended the paint a bit more. I did, however end up focusing too much on certain aspects and rather than using loose free movements I ended up getting a bit particular. I liked working on the collarbones and the shadows and highlights on the neck, and struggled more with the face, as I have always had a tough time with side profiles.

I then tried out a few close ups of features I struggle with normally such as lips and eyes.

I then started planning my photoshoot, as I knew that I was going to need reference photos to paint from. I wanted to incorporate props into the paintings to add layers of symbolism, so that people could infer from that what the paintings were about, and find these meanings from within the piece. I referred back to Paula Rego to draw from, and also looked at some Renaissance art to take inspiration from the use of symbolism in the work. I looked through some images taken in various studio lighting so that me and Billie could talk about the kind of lighting used, and the sort of thing I wanted in my reference images.
I also went to an exhibition up in London to look at the work of artist Rose Wylie. Her work is very different to mine in some ways, but the freedom and playfulness in which she creates her work I really admired, and that rough, free quality is something I want to combine in my own work.

Props - For the shoot I spent a lot of time planning out various ideas for props I could use. As each painting is going to be based on Alice in Wonderland, Red Riding Hood and The Little Mermaid, I wanted to do three themed segments of the photoshoot. For the Alice segment of the shoot I brought in a lot of blue tops, a pocket watch, small potion bottles, an alice-band and playing cards. These were all things I strongly associated with Alice, and wanted to play around with. For Red Riding Hood, I bought in deep red and forest green jumpers that I used, and managed to find an old fur collar thing in a charity shop that I used as wolves skin. The Little Mermaid I struggled with, I had a load of small shells that I used, and wore a turquoise top and had damp hair but I wished there were more props to play around with and I struggled a bit with that.

I spend a lot of time thinking about who to get as a model for the shoot, and after speaking with Kathleen about why it is I have such an interest in fairytales, and not knowing the answer I thought it might be interesting (though also very out of my comfort zone) to use myself as the model, and try to explore these characters I am creating.

I spoke to Billie about taking the photographs as I know she has photography experience and we work together well. She has a lot of photography knowledge which is fortunate for me because I have practically none, and she was able to help guide me through what I would need for the shoot and how to get everything set up.

As there were many things I was unhappy with in the first shoot, I decided to do a reshoot of the images. I quite liked how the first Red Riding Hood photos came out, I think the colours and richness of the images, and lighting Billie set up worked really well but unfortunately we forgot to shoot in raw for those ones, so I'm going to replicate some of those hopefully. I don't think the shirt I'm wearing for Alice works as well as I thought it did, so I've got some other outfit choices in mind for the next shoot - booked for later this week - and the same for The Little Mermaid. I really felt the mermaid ones didn't work very well and I want to use some more props, larger shells and stuff.

I am also planning on maybe getting some video footage to play around with later on when I'm creating my projections.

I ordered a huge canvas that I was planning on using for testers/painting, and really like the idea of painting on unstretched canvas, as to me, it feels very tactile and free to work with. However due to the size of the canvas I am not sure it will be practical as when transporting the painting it will need to be folded or rolled which will result in the paint cracking, so I am going to either have to go back to my original idea of using MDF or instead just used stretched canvas. I really need to start painting but I have a little time, as I still need my reference photos.

I will then need to start playing around with projection ideas which are all still a bit loose, and need to settle on many details regarding installation... my installing ideas have not progressed very far yet, I think I will need to see the finished paintings (which I'm aiming to finish before the end of March) to fully realise how they will be best presented. I am also planning on taking out a projector to do some tests with once the paintings are finished.

I have also been working on TJ's project by illustrating his storybook for the film. TJ sent me a list of the writing that will be on each page, and a rough idea of what he wanted and allowed me to have creative freedom over the drawings themselves. The story focuses on a boy living in a house in the forest and wanting to go up to the stars all his life. With each drawing I have left room for the writing underneath, as the pages are going to be joined together to look like the boy and his mother have made the book together.

I worked on Billies shoot as a runner, which was a great experience and helped out anyway I could. I was mostly clappering and keeping the time and doing any stuff she needed at the time.