Collage to Painting: Richard Dadd and Yinka Shonibare

'And if it is true that the image still has the function of speaking, of transmitting something consubstantial with language, we must recognize that it already no longer says the same thing; and that by its own plastic values painting engages in an experiment that will take it farther and farther from language, whatever the superficial identity of the theme.' Madness and Civilization: A History of Insanity in the Age of Reason, Michael Foucault, 1961, pg 15.

Within this entry I am interested in exploring what happens during the process of painting and how this contributes to the artist's delivery of the underlying content in their work via the analysis of the paintings of Yinka Shonibare and Richard Dadd. Initially it may be worth considering why use the medium of paint? A visit to the Reality exhibition at the Sainsbury’s Centre in Norwich a show of contemporary British painters reveals that painting is still very much alive as a contemporary medium. The show focuses on artists whose work is underpinned by an interaction with the real world as opposed to conceptual concerns. However it begs the question why and how is this preferable to using a photograph, collage or alternative 2-dimensional representations? How does painting alter, extend and elaborate the processes that these other mediums offer?

Two contrasting artists whose work I have been exploring and loosely tie in with some of the ideas around which my own practice is centred are Yinka Shonibare (1962- ) and Richard Dadd (1817-1886). In Maxa 2003, Shonibare substitutes canvas for small regimented circles of African batik fabric decorated on the front and side. The troubled history of the fabric, which was introduced to Africa by British manufacturers via Dutch colonizers in the nineteenth century contrasts effectively with the visual pleasure of the patterns created. The work becomes a metaphor for excess and exploitation. The use of everyday cloth to create high art acts as a way of questioning the relationship between commercial decadence and third-world exploitation.

‘But actually, the fabrics are not really authentically African the way people think. They prove to have a crossbred cultural background quite of their own. And it’s the fallacy of that signification that I like. It’s the way I view culture- it’s an artificial construct.’  Art News online, interview by Pernilla Holmes, October 2002

Yinka Shonibare, Maxa 2003, Circles of partially painted fabric on a deep blue wall.

Richard Dadd’s work centres on landscape and nature and draws upon subject matter often evoked from his memory. Many of his paintings utilize surrealist imagery and alternative worlds and include dream figures, fairy creatures and demons. Whilst travelling in Egypt in 1842, Dadd underwent a dramatic personality change becoming violent and delusional. On his return in 1843, he was diagnosed to be mentally unstable before killing his father. Subsequently he was committed to a psychiatric hospital where he continued to paint.

‘On my return from travel I was roused to a consideration of the subjects which I had previously never dreamt of, or thought about, connected with self… I know not whence they came, although I could not question their propriety, nor could I separate myself from what appeared my fate…’ Biography of Richard Dadd, Patricia Allderidge, 2006

Richard Dadd, The Fairy Feller’s Master-Stroke, 1855-1864, Oil on Canvas.

It is worth noting the fashion with which both Dadd and Shonibare have utilized their materials in order to accentuate the underlying meaning within their work. Both are dealing loosely with ideas around otherness. 

'Otherness is a fundamental category of human thought.  Thus it is that no group ever sets itself up as the One without at once setting up the Other over and against itself.'

Women, the Family, and Freedom: 1880-1950, Simon De Beauvoir, 1949, pg 423

Shonibare’s work is brightly coloured, sumptuous and decorative drawing in the viewer’s gaze. It is only upon further investigation that one realizes the back-story and associations of the fabric that has been used. The corner less circles Shonibare uses to frame his compositions are much less formal than a conventional rectangular format. By utilizing both the front and sides of the objects however they come to represent a visual metaphor for what is at the centre or at the margin thus establishing an informal hierarchy and relating back to his original concerns around race and class.  

Yinka Shonibare, Line Painting 2003, emulsion and acrylic on Dutch Wax printed cotton & painted wall.

Dadd’s otherness is a product of his separation from society due to his mental breakdown, incarceration and classification as a madman and subsequent perception of existing outside of the realms of civilized society. His paintings are highly stylized and filled with microscopic details, intricate decoration, rich colours and formal compositions featuring figures occupying a variety of landscapes. It is only on closer inspection that it is possible to make out who these figures are and what activities they are engaged in to realize that these are no ordinary pastoral scenes. The figures are a curious mixture of pantomime Kings, Queens, pirates and fairies mixed up with people who could have stepped off a mid-Victorian street. Many of the characters have distorted heads and further observation reveals other miniature figures that magically appear within the compositions. Perspective appears to be practically non-existent and the result is both simultaneously beautiful and disturbing. 

Richard Dadd, Contradiction; Oberon & Titania, 1854-1858, Oil on Canvas.

Both artists operating in different centuries have utilized paint in an opposing yet highly effective fashion to vastly differing ends. Dadd’s paintings achieve something that would be impossible via any other medium. Not only has he created painstakingly detailed and intricate compositions, his paintings render in detail the product of the inner workings of his feverish imagination. The act of painting enables Dadd to articulate his feelings and give a form to this inner turmoil. This is not something that could be achieved as effectively via a collage or a photograph. The attention to detail, perfection and visual aesthetic beauty and strangeness of his compositions combine to draw in the viewers gaze so that they are able to contemplate and examine the complexities of the work without necessarily understanding it or having to pass a value judgment on it. If this serves as an effective tool to capture and draw in the curiosity of the viewer then it is possible that this may prompt a further dialogue within the viewers mind as to what the artists intentions were in creating the work and enabling a more complex analysis.

Shonibare makes use of pattern and texture in a non-representational fashion as a way of conveying his message. His bright, showy colours are highly seductive and appealing. His pieces unlike Dadd’s however are not representations that have been taken from the real world and are created using patterns and abstracted forms arranged in such a fashion as to create a formal sense of unity via the harmony of the painted surface. However once drawn in it is only after realizing that the relationship of the cloth to the painted surface has such a strong bearing on the composition that the viewer begins to realize that there is more going on than just a superficial and decorative rendering of paint. Once the viewer realizes the importance of the origin of the cloth it changes the relationship between the artwork and the spectator in a similar fashion to the background story around Dadd’s mental breakdown and subsequent incarceration. In both of the artists’ work the painted surface acts as a way of capturing and enthralling the spectators gaze, however it is only after scratching through the surface of this polished and veneered facade that it is possible to realize the true message, commentary and artists intention lurking below.

Analysis of tondo collages based around Sheringham Park and Old Catton Park

Within this blog entry I wish to analyse the components which make up my more recent works in order to test whether they are effective in achieving my aims. Since visiting Sheringham Park and gathering images as part of my research I also took a trip to Old Catton Park in Norwich also conceived and landscaped by Humphry Repton. The new collages which I have created are loosely based around both of these parks, making use of photographs taken during my respective visits.

Fragments, Mixed Media Collage (based on photos taken at Sheringham Park), 57 x 57cm.

Why use the tondo?


I have found that the tondo has been an effective tool within my recent work as a framing device for the compositions. My most recent works, utilize Sheringham Park and Old Catton Park as my subjects with the circular composition taking on a number of functions.

Round and spherical things in nature are considered to be perfect, complete and stable. Within the context of these works the circle simultaneously unifies and works in opposition to the composition, which consists of disjointed/disparate planes and discordant/unharmonious colours.

A round or spherical composition is an effective way to depict another world. In this instance the other world is that of C19th Victorian England encompassing values, which are no longer applicable to contemporary society including a regimented, divided class system and ideas around power, dominance and colonization. The circle helps to accentuate the otherness of the compositions, making them appear although they are being observed through a portal, or window, which captures a particular moment in history.

Study from Old Catton Park, Mixed Media Collage, 37 x 37cm.

A round or ‘concentric’ system places an emphasis on matter/force of some kind being concentrated around a center, such as planets circling the sun, children round their mother or the fruit of a peach around its pit. By using a circular frame to surround the subject rather than a conventional rectangle or square format it places extra weight on the composition as a self-contained unit around which we the observer must navigate. 

Nick Cave's (1959-) piece 'constellation' is a sequined and beaded work, inspired by a memory from his childhood of looking up to the stars with his brothers on a summer night. He recalls exclaiming:

'It's right there look, it's the place of innocence where something so mundane can be so transformative.' www.denverartmuseum.org/article/staff-blogs/tondos-installation-images

Cave created his tondo pieces in order to create the impression of independent worlds, dispensing with issues relating to judgement:

'The work hides gender, race and class, you're forced to come to the work without judgement. That's the bottom line. We live in a world that wants to categorize and put things in a particular place.'
www.palmbeachdailynews.com/news/entertainment/arts-theater/nick-cave-whose-works-are-at-norton-museum-uses-ar/nMB63/

Tondo, Nick Cave (2012) Mixed Media

Constellation, Nick Cave, 2006, Mixed Media

 

Why use images that have been collaged and coloured red?

Fragments I, Mixed Media Collage (based on photos taken at Old Catton Park), 57 x 57cm.

Using collage within my work involves taking reproduced images from the real world and manipulating and combining them in order to create art forms. Not only is this able to be carried out relatively quickly and efficiently, it also allows for the imagery to be combined with painting, drawing and other visual forms as well as providing the potential for manipulation of the printed subject matter via burning, cutting, tearing and layering.

In creating these pieces I was dealing with issues relating to memory, place and walking as well as the underlying processes around which memories are formed. Sebald’s account of walking and observing the landscape leads to large sink holes opening up in his sub-conscious mind triggered by the landscape, which he just steps into evoking his own graphic description of human suffering, loss and trauma. The act of creating a collage alludes to the process of a layering of memory constructed via the passing of time, whilst simultaneously allowing for the potential of slippage into a sub conscious realm via the juxtaposition of imagery.

'There are things in that paper which nobody knows but me, or ever will. Behind that outside pattern the dim shapes get clearer every day. It is always the same shape, only very numerous. And it is like a woman stooping down and creeping about behind that pattern. I don’t like it a bit. I wonder—I begin to think—I wish John would take me away from here!' The Yellow Wallpaper and selected writings, Charlotte Perkins Gilman, 2009, pg 13

I was partly inspired by the short story the yellow wallpaper written by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, 1892 telling the narrators story of being confined within a bedroom in order to recover from her nervous depression. On account of her confinement she begins to descend into psychosis, becoming obsessed with the colour and pattern of the wallpaper. In the end she starts to believe there are women creeping around in the wallpaper and that she is one of them. By tearing, burning and juxtaposing different imagery within my collages I hoped to create a visual impression of disorientation on account of the different shapes and images which appear within the collage.

I have manipulated the surfaces of the pieces by placing together imagery, photographed by myself of Sheringham Park and Old Catton Park. Both parks were designed by the English landscape architect Humphry Repton and were designed with ideals strongly relating to the picturesque and its association to the beautiful and the sublime. Within my compositions I have presented this as fractured and discombobulated, so that it is hard to decipher in a literal fashion, whilst balancing precariously on a background of red in the case of the tondo inspired by Sheringham Park and Grey in relation to the tondo inspired by Old Catton Park. I sought to invoke a sense of brooding, melancholy and the feeling that the sub-conscious mind is operating below the veneer of the landscaped exterior. The backdrop of the compositions contrast effectively with the greens that make up the foreground symbolizing nature and relating to the picturesque.

What are the pieces about and do they actually deal with these things?

Study from Sheringham Park, Mixed Media Collage, 37 x 37cm.

My original intention for making these pieces of work and the original three pieces tied in with ideas relating to walking, memory and place with a strong influence derived from W G Sebald’s Rings of Saturn and the idea of the landscape acting as a trigger for other often darker subconscious memories and associations. 

'I suppose it is submerged realities that give to dreams their curious air of hyper-reality. But perhaps there is something else as well, something nebulous, gauze-like, through which everything one sees in a dream seems, paradoxically, much clearer. A pond becomes a lake, a breeze becomes a storm, a handful of dust is a desert, a grain of sulphur in the blood is a volcanic inferno. What manner of theater is it, in which we are at once playwright, actor, stage manager, scene painter and audience? W G Sebald, Rings of Saturn, 1999, pg 79-80

Although related this differs from the pieces I made which dealt with ideas relating to invasive species. Whereas the invasive species collaged tondos served to illustrate the changing values and meanings of objects within the landscape as well as acting as a direct metaphor for Victorian colonization, I hoped that the collages inspired by Sheringham Park were related more to the idea of place memory.

In creating these pieces they raise a number of questions: what do large parks and estates like this tell us about the values and ideals of society around the time they were created and how do these translate into the values and meanings recognised in contemporary society? What are the darker and less desirable elements lurking beneath the decorative surface of the estates and landscaped gardens of the aristocracy?

I see these pieces functioning as a sketch or a test for more substantial finished pieces, constructed on a much larger scale with the possibility of introducing more painterly areas alongside the paper collage. By working on a larger scale it would open up the possibility of making the pieces more immersive with the creation of more discernible tension between the foreground and background.

A Sense of Place, Memory and Walking

Leading on from my research and work that centered on invasive species within the landscape I became interested in researching ideas relating to walking, memory and place.

'The walk creates a speculative experience of the world, between the stable and ephemeral, continually undoing and remaking relationships between fixed elements. The more you see the less you hold. To walk is to lack place. It represents an indefinite process of being absent from your goal of searching.' Nature and Nation: Vaster than Empires, Julian Walker, 2003 

Sketchbook images, mixed media, collage, crayon and ink on paper, each image 14.5 x 21cm

The Rings of Saturn, W.G.Sebald (1995) is an account of Sebald's walk through the Suffolk landscape acting as a trigger for the unfolding of historic events. Sebald attempts to tell the reader about the walk but ends up describing the catastrophe of western culture. The landscapes which at first appear innocent are in fact loaded with elements from their past which spill out of the pages of Sebald's book.

'But the fact is that writing is the only way in which I am able to cope with the memories which overwhelm me so frequently and so unexpectedly.... Memories lie slumbering within us for months and years, quietly proliferating, until they are woken by some trifle and in some strange way blind us to life.... And yet what would we be without memory? We would not be capable of ordering even the simplest thoughts, our existence would be a never ending chain of meaningless moments.... My sense of estrangement is becoming more and more dreadful' The Rings of Saturn, W.G.Sebald, 1995, pg 255.

Sketchbook Images, mixed media, collage, crayon and ink on paper, each image 14.5 x 21

Another aspect of my research relates to the fashion with which place and memory are often inextricably intertwined. The places which feature within memories are often filtered through the onlookers affective glance, becoming irrevocably associated with the emotions that the onlooker was feeling at that particular moment. The resultant memory may represent a synthesizing of the two forms combining to form an inseparable hybrid of cognitive and visual factors.

'Space defines landscape. Space combined with memory defines place.' The Lure of the Local, senses of place in a multicentered society, Lucy R. Lippard, 1997

Invasion, 
Paper Collage, 2014

Herocleum Mantegazziamum, 
Paper Collage, 2014

Fallopia Japonica, 
Paper Collage, 2014

Impatiens Glandulifera, 
Paper Collage, 2014

My invasive species collages were based on a subversion of C19th ideas surrounding the sublime and the changing values and meanings of objects within the landscape from a historical to contemporary perspective. In the case of many of the invasive species they were originally introduced into England during the C19th by the Victorians for their decorative and ornamental qualities before subsequently escaping and spread into the wild becoming a pest, nuisance and environmental hazard, thus their meaning and values.

Continuing with this train of thought  I took a three hour walk around Sheringham Park in North Norfolk. Sheringham park was designed by the C19th landscape gardener Humphry Repton (1752-1818) . The English landscape movement of which Repton was a major figure had an irreversible impact on the British Interpretation of Nature, with its inability to separate its idealised vision of Nature from any notion of real wilderness. It was deeply intertwined with British perceptions of peaceful, civilized refinement.  

'The perfection of landscape gardening consists in the four following requisites. First, it must display the natural beauties and hide the defects of every situation. Secondly, it should give the appearance of extent and freedom by carefully disguising or hiding the boundary. Thirdly, it must studiously conceal every interference of art. However expensive by which the natural scenery is improved; making the whole appear the production of nature only; and fourthly, all objects of mere convenience or comfort, if incapable of being made ornamental, or of becoming proper parts of the general scenery, must be removed or concealed' The Landscape Gardening and Landscape Architecture of the Late Humphrey Repton, 1840, pg 84-85.
 

 Studies from Sheringham Park, Mixed Media Collage, approximately 40 x 40cm

My intention for these pieces was to create a series of fragmented collages, based on photographs taken whilst walking around Sheringham Park. I hope that the collages would function as a way of encapsulating themes relating to walking, place, memory and some of the ideas emerging from Sebald's The Rings of Saturn involving the idea of place as a trigger for memory.

Final Thoughts on Self Negotiate Unit

In writing my learning agreement for this unit I was interested in notions of the displaced English Landscape and the fashion in which forces operating within it may somehow detract from notions of the sublime or traditional values that we place upon our experience of the landscape.

I considered this in three ways, firstly via films, I looked at three films in which the central oddball characters blunder around within the English landscape featuring as a backdrop to their meanderings. Rather than any sense of contemplation and union they manage to obliterate any sense of the emotional or spiritual sublime via their erratic behaviour.

Secondly I considered an area of Outstanding Natural Beauty Beach Head on the South Coast Beachy Head recognized for its picturesque and beautiful nature. The ciffs themselves however mask a dark statistic which is that they are used as a popular suicide spot making it the third highest suicide spot in the world.

Finally I considered the effects of invasive species introduced in the C20th as ornamental and decorative species by the Victorians which have subsequently escaped and spread throughout the length and breadth of the country causing immeasurable damage and destruction to the indigenous population of species living nearby.

Very soon into this unit I realised that of these three topics the invasive species was the one that I was more interested in pursuing and as a result the other two areas fell  to the wayside. Although I did not actively pursue the case studies that I mentioned within my learning agreement these topics did crop up within my research and as part of my working practice.

The film I made of the contractor clearing a site of special scientific interest of Himalayan Balsam tied in with idea of the English Landscape as a backdrop to other potentially sinister activities occurring within it. The hybrid collages that I created from found imagery of National Parks and areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty juxtaposed with imagery of invasive species were also inspired by the fact that darker forces may be present within these beautifully, manicured and managed landscapes.

I feel that the experimentation that I have carried out within this unit has been particularly beneficial to my practice and much of the research and work that I have produced will carry forward into my final year. The themes and ideas that I am interested in elaborating on include ideas around National Parks which exist as an extension of how we perceive the Natural unadulterated landscape should look like. In reality these spaces are carefully managed and manicured in order to conform to this stereotype. The same may be true of public green places which have been constructed around ideas of C18th English landscaping. The Botanical Garden ties in with ideas of the collection and entrapment of foreign species existing as an extension to ideas around colonization, collecting and exploitation of other places.

I would be keen to expand on the forays I have made into film as I feel that this has the real potential to produce some exciting and varied results whilst the results achieved via the use of collage in my practice  has made for some really interesting and effective work that I feel could be expanded upon as I go forward with the possibility of transferring some of these over into painting.

New work: Invasion and Eradication Day

Invasion, 53cm x 53cm, Paper Collage

Eradication Day, 53cm x 53cm, Paper Collage.

In preparation for my hand in I have produced two final paper collages which were inspired by my earlier experiments. The first Invasion, features a swirling vortex of invasive species contained within a circular tondo composition. The second, Eradication Day, was inspired by trip to the Wensum Valley to observe the clearing of Himalayan Balsam also constructed as a circular composition around a central point.

 Of the two I feel Invasion is the more successful. With this collage I combined coloured alongside black and white imagery which I placed around a central point to create the impression of a circular movement. This format differs from the earlier paper collages that I had been experimenting with which were constructed on a horizontal and vertical axis. I felt that the circular movement contributed to the impression of displacement and a layering of time and memory exacerbated by the juxtaposition of coloured and black and white imagery and the use of multiple invasive species alongside one another. I also felt that the circular movement gave the image more of an organic feel whilst hinting at an underlying drama, tension and fragmentation.

Although retaining the same format as Invasion I decided to further break up the composition of Eradication Day by including a series of different sized stars across the surface of the piece and surrounding border alongside fragments of text from newspaper articles written about the damaging effects of Himalayan Balsam. Although effective in parts I feel that the juxtaposition of the stars overlaying the backdrop of the contractor clearing the Balsam was not totally effective, as they draw the viewers eye away from the landscape creating an unnecessary distraction.

 My thinking behind using them was that stars are often used as a symbol for celebration or high achievement and would work in direct contrast to the title of the piece Eradication Day and the subject matter: multiple images of a contractor attempting to eradicate the Himalayan Balsam from the landscape. I felt that this paradoxical contrast would  imbue the piece with a degree of irony. I feel that the more ambiguous and organic nature of invasion is more effective however creating a more visually arresting image, which contains within it an underlying tension which operates in more of a subtle way than within Eradication Day.

William Morris, Invasive Species and ideolised landscapes

Following on from my previous blog entry I have been playing around with and creating additional experimental work using invasive species as a subject matter. An area I feel that has been particularly interesting and has come out of my practice to date has been the conflict and fallout between the attitudes, ideas and knowledge around invasive species when they were first introduced due to their ornamental and decorative qualities and their subsequent fall from grace to being regarded as an extremely costly pest, nuisance and hazard to the environment. I began to think about additional ways in which it would be possible to try and combine these two sets of ideals. 

To start I researched prominent Victorian  artists and designers who helped to define the 19th Century. William Morris (24 March 1834 – 3 October 1896) is recognised as one of the most significant cultural figures of Victorian Britain. Associated with the English Arts and Crafts Movement, he was a major contributor to the revival of traditional textile arts and methods of production in Britain. 

William Morris, Sunflower Wallpaper

William Morris, Oak leaf Wallpaper

'In choosing natural forms be rather shy of certain very obvious decorative ones, eg bindweed, passion-flower and the poorer forms of ivy, used without the natural copiousness. I should call these trouble savers and warn you of them....we have had them used so cheaply this long while we are sick of them ' William Morris 'Making the best of it'

Morris used nature as his prominent inspiration. His sources were plants themselves, observed in his gardens or on country walks, and also images of plants in 16th-century woodcuts, illuminated manuscripts, tapestries and other textiles incorporating floral imagery. His designs were not to be literal transcriptions of natural forms but subtle stylized evocations. Of the nearly 600 designs which are attributed to him there are very few which do not feature flowers, leaves, trees or plants.

William Morris, B + W thistle wallpaper

William Morris, Borage Ceiling Paper

Using Morris's floral designs as a starting point I wondered what the result would be by attempting to combine them with some of the dystopic qualities contained within the invasive species collages I had been creating and experimenting with earlier in this unit. 

I decided that it would be interesting to retain the circular format of the collages and began by placing some of the patterns from the Morris designs on top of sections of the collages by using Adobe Photoshop and effectively lifting the colours, textures and patterns from the collage in order to create a new composition. I have posted some of the results below:

 

 

I think that the results from these four pieces are mixed. Although they have retained the decorative elements which are inherent within the William Morris designs I am not sure whether they contain within them the dystopic qualities that I was hoping to achieve by using the subject matter from invasive species collages. It is possible to make out some of the elements from the compositions however much of the subject matter appears lost and instead it reads as just colour and pattern. 

A further idea that I have experimented with for my recent practice relates to the landscape. Having previously created paintings of places using found images which I collaged together in order to create new landscapes, I began to experiment with images of idealized landscapes that I juxtaposed with images of invasive species. Continuing with the theme of the English landscape I began by considering idealized landscapes within the United Kingdom.  In order to come up with some imagery I began by using a google search in order to generate some results. The website global grasshopper includes a link to the top ten most beautiful places to visit in the UK: http://www.globalgrasshopper.com/destinations/uk/10-of-the-most-beautiful-places-to-visit-in-the-uk/  although subjective in their nature as to what actually constitutes the most beautiful landscapes in Great Britain I felt that this could be a good place to start. The following four landscapes were the ones that I chose to use as a starting point for my experimentation:

Llanberis Pass, North Wales

Glen Nevis, Scotland

The Jurassic Coast, East Devon to Dorset

Cambridge, Cambridgeshire

Below are the four images after I have cut up the landscapes and added in the imagery of the invasive species, in order to further break up the surface of the collage. I was much more pleased with the results achieved via this process and felt that they had much more of a dystopic feel to them. The most effective in my mind being the one taken using the Jurassic Coast as a subject and Llanberis Pass North Wales.  Some of the ink nozzles on my printer had become partially blocked meaning that the colours of the print out from the invasive species collages had begun to distort and change which helped to add to heightened sense of discordance and unease, while the fragmented juxtaposed sections of the composition complete with the images of the people added to the scene and created an even greater sense of tension and uneasiness.

The Jurassic Coast, East Devon to Dorset plus invasive species collage.

Cambridge, Cambridgeshire plus invasive species collage.

Glen Nevis Scotland plus invasive species collage.

Llanberis Pass, North Wales plus invasive species collage.

New Collages and Reflections on Research and Practice so far

I think it is worth noting that green issues have not been a leading force in my research into non-native species, although these are pertinent in light of current events relating to the environment. I have conducted my research to date in a scientific and rational fashion, leading to some interesting and thought provoking results but don’t wish for it to become an overbearing feature and for the work to lose its spontaneity or to become overly methodical and planned.

In a previous blog I discussed how I had started to experiment with collage creating two giant Hogweed collages from found images, one by hand and the other using Adobe Photoshop. I felt the handmade one to be more effective due to its handcrafted, less seamless and more chaotic juxtaposition. I chose a circular rather than rectangle or square composition to frame the work and to strike a balance with the content, which was chaotic, busy and full of contrasting elements.

Giant Hogweed Collage, created using found images, with paper and glue.

I decided to stick with this circular format, as I felt it was particularly effective. I created an additional collage using found images of Himalayan Balsam and another using found images of Japanese knotweed. In both although retaining the circular format I attempted to experiment and break up the composition. In the Balsam Collage I used images of clumps of Balsam for the bottom left area while I interspersed close up images of Balsam flowers with felt tip pen to create the top right of the composition which I felt created more of a hallucinatory and fragmented sense. I included figures in both the Hogweed and Knotweed collages but decided not to include any figures in the Balsam collage.

Himalayan Balsam Collage, created using found images with paper and glue.

Within the Japanese Knotweed collage I experimented with the composition by using felt tip pen as well as burning the paper in order to change the appearance of the collage by breaking up and fragmenting the surface further. I felt that the burned areas added another dimension to the piece as they changed the feel of the whole surface by creating more of a used and destructive feel.

Japanese Knotweed Collage, created using found images with paper and glue.

Detail from Japanese Knotweed Collage, showing areas that have been burnt.

I created one additional collage using images of Muntjac Deer. I initially started by again using a circular composition as a starting point however as I made progress I decided it would be interesting to see what happened if I placed the imagery outside of the circular composition. I also experimented with the effect of using deer that were dead, and images of the deer that were having sex to see if this added or detracted from the end result. The effect of the deer breaking out of the bottom of the composition not only breaks up the seemingly perfect circle but creates an impression of ejection, escape or expulsion.

Muntjac Deer Collage, created using found images, paper and glue.

One of the issues that I have found particularly pertinent surrounding my research into invasive species is the apparent conflict between 19^th century knowledge and attitudes versus contemporary knowledge and the manner in which it has changed. 

Many of the species were initially introduced into the UK as ornamental in order to enhance one's back garden before they escaped and evolved into something which was a pest, nuisance and incredibly costly; inhabiting disregarded places, borderlands and peripheries. It implies a fracturing of knowledge and highlights the change in attitudes between then and now. When I made my trip to the Wensum Valley in order to observe the area being cleared of Himalayan Balsam I had the opportunity to capture some footage of the process, which involved a contractor using a strimmer in order to clear the area. 

I considered various ways in which it would be possible to capture and contrast this change in attitude and fracturing of knowledge and decided it would be interesting to juxtapose some footage of the Himalayan Balsam being cleared with a soundtrack which consisted of music from the Victorian era when the species was first introduced. After some research I discovered that a popular leading English Victorian pianist and composer Sydney Smith had been born in the same year that the Balsam was first introduced into the country in 1839. I created a video of the Balsam being cleared and used one of his popular piano scores the Fairy Queen as a soundtrack.