Conflicts

I wanted to explore the theme of decision making and relationships with people. Some people are afraid of expressing their own opinions in fear of rejection. This sometimes causes many conflicts and people end up being in the middle of a situation, not knowing who and who not to agree with. I wanted to express this frustration through my art. I photographed myself and my dolls separately. I then expanded them to human size in Photoshop and placed them on either side of me. The dolls are symbolic of the people who try to influence you. My facial expression is neutral and slightly troubled, to emphasize the idea. Except from the message I am trying to convey, I also wanted to explore my recurring theme of real in relation to the unreal, and  flesh vs. plastic.

Clay Sculpture

For my work placement, I worked with the Cypriot artist Christopher Christou. This inspired me to get back into sculpture. I would like to go back and collaborate with the artist sometime in the future and further discuss my ideas with him. I wanted to challenge myself by creating a sculpture by looking at my face in the mirror simultaneously (using my face as reference). The result didn't come out quite as I had wanted and so decided to leave the sculpture unfinished. The only part I liked was the mouth and the face in profile. Therefore, I tried experimenting with photography. I wanted to explore the relationship between the real and non-real. I tried hiding parts of the face with my hands. I also asked my mum and dad to contribute.

    Here are some of the experimental photographs:

BJD Photoshoot

For this photoshoot, I attempted to turn myself into a ball-jointed doll. I have had an obsession with these dolls for a long time and I currently own two of them. I wanted to reflect this obsession onto myself, the same way I did with the Androgyny Photoshoot. I was assisted by Stefania Papayianni who helped me with the make-up and photographs. I looked at various images of ball-jointed dolls as reference, in particular modern asian ball-jointed dolls. I was also inspired by the artists Hans Bellmer, Cindy Sherman and Hellen Van Meene, including some images I found on Google. I drew on the joints manually using black and brown eyeshadow to avoid harshness. I wanted to give the joints a subtle look. It was a challenging and tricky procedure as it was difficult to get all of the joints to look the same. I tried posing in ways that are not typical of the way a human poses. I really enjoyed this photoshoot because it gave me the chance to express what I love using myself as a canvas. Here are some photos I selected from the photoshoot:

Portrait of Adam

During the Easter holidays, I went back to Cyprus to spend time with my family and did my work placement. I got the chance to take some photographs of my brother. I liked one of the photographs so I decided to attempt to turn it into a painting. At first, I was planning to paint only some parts of the face, leaving the rest unfinished to let the viewer's imagination complete the image. However, I ended up blurring half of his face, putting emphasis on the eye. The left half could suggest clarity, the right half could suggest mystery and confusion. There is a part of him that knows what he wants but the other is that he is unsure of himself and is still searching to find his path in life. I am not sure if I will paint some other parts of the painting or leave it unfinished, but for now this is its current appearance.

    --->Painting Details

Androgyny Portrait

I decided to create an oil painting inspired by one of the photographs from my ''Androgyny Photoshoot''.

My aim was to create something more realistic and life-like compared to my previous paintings, which have a more fantasy feel to them. I tried to pay more attention to colour, giving the skin a more flesh-like look. I also tried to focus on the gaze, making it almost intimidating, wanting the subject to confront the viewer directly and affect them in some way. Is it male? Is it female? I believe that I have improved since my last painting as I have become more conscious of colour harmony and detail. I would like to experiment more with different styles of painting and ways of presenting my work.

    ---> Painting details

Androgyny Experiments

Based on the photos taken in my ''Androgyny Photoshoot'', I tried doing some experiments. The first and second are purely watercolour studies. I attempted to paint them more realistically, and give them a more photographic quality. They are also small in scale (A5), to make them more intimate. The viewer would have to walk up close to them to observe and appreciate the detail. After the watercolour studies, I tried to be more experimental and decided to make some collages. In the first series of collages I used watercolours, package paper and ink. I printed the images and tore them into pieces, placing them over the package paper, later writing the words 'Male' and 'Female' to question the image. Is this person male or female? Another reason for tearing up the images is to show confusion, ambiguity and incompleteness. Most are torn in half, with this I want to show that androgynous people have two sides, a male and female side. This is to describe the definition of androgyny (in that androgynous people have both masculine and feminine characteristics), but also to say that there is no such thing as being male or female. We all have our own identity and personality, we are unique individuals that should be judged according to our personality, not our gender.

--> Watercolour study based on collage above

Further experimenting with collage, I tried using grease proof paper, package paper, tape and charcoal. I cut out pieces of the photograph, filling the missing parts with charcoal. I also wrote the words 'Male' and 'Female', in addition to some questions and information about androgyny. Some things I had written I erased and wrote over again, to make it unclear to the viewer what is actually written and to emphasize the idea of ambiguity and confusion.

Here are some simpler collages that I'm planning to use as reference to create some watercolour/oil paint studies taking out some parts of the collage, focusing on detail.