The book..the object...the archive

(fig.i)

The latest contribution to my State Library of Victoria creative fellowship is a series of small hand-held bound books that feature the photographic etchings of unnamed figures from the photographic archive of the library. Titled 'foto metafisica' the intention has always been to create a series of book-objects that withhold the same intrigue and unknown' aboutness' as the images themselves. I guess essentially maintaining the same ambiguity yet retaining the sense of an object and an image from the past that once contained meaning and a sense of narrative. 

                                                                            (fig.ii)

                                           

                                                                      (fig.iii)

Material Opening:NERAMG

The joint exhibition of works by the Black Gully Print Group based at Armidale and myself opened on Friday night at the New England Regional Art Museum and Gallery. The Armidale arts community showed it's wonderful support with a fantabulous opening night event and an engaged audience returning for the artist's talks on the Saturday. Thankyou again to each of the exhibiting artists from the Black Gully Printmakers who shared their moving stories and images...so rewarding to have been part of the very first exhibition of Material Thinking: The Poetics of Process.

Material Thinking:Glen Skien and The Black Gully Printmakers

Image: Beth O'Loughlin: montage and monotype 2019

Opening at the New England Regional Art Museum: Armidale 

Friday 8th February: 6pm.

Material Thinking:The Poetics of Process

Featuring the works of Glen Skien and The Black Gully Printmakers

Artists talks 11.30am Saturday 9th February 

Exhibition dates: February 8-April 28th

Ritual of The Garment: Armidale and The Black Gully Printmakers

Monotype and photographic transfer...R.

Returning from a two day workshop at the Armidale Regional Gallery working with the Black Gully Printmakers group. In a workshop that literally used the material surfaces of a range of garments, each participant was asked to bring a garment or fragment of material as a means of exploring notions of ritual through print and collage. Extending upon the use of the photographic image as a form of disturbance, each participant used the most basic monotype methods to create a variety of rich and engaging works.

Thankyou to all who participated. The time and care taken by each participant in not only the making but also in reflecting upon the nuanced associations between material and medium, often so easily passed over within the process of making, made the experience truly satisfying. The outcomes of the workshop will be exhibited at the Armidale Regional Gallery together with my own works in February.  

                                                        Works in progress... B.

                                              Works in progress...(detail) B.

Material Thinking in Mittagong

Returning from 5days of the first of the Poetics of Process workshops. Studio outcomes were a mix of print editions, hand bound artists' books and experimental works.

The class was a nice balance of beginners, intermediate and experienced prinmakers. The brief was for participants to respond through either a single or combination of processes I demonstrated, to create a series of visual narratives. 

They were encouraged to avoid the familar formula of a progressive natrative.  Instead intuitively responding to the personal affinity  they felt for a particular process or equally an awareness of not connecting with certian things. 

Inevitably the book form requires an element of design but essentially each of the book forms created evoked the possibility of open and multiple readings. Material 

So thankyou again to each participant for their trust and capacity to forego the familiar desire to always be in control of that deeply subtle relationship that exists between the making, the form and the very thoughts of the material itself.

Material Thinking: The Poetics of Process

Material Thinking: The Poetics of Process is a series of workshops I have designed for visual art students with the onus on creating meaningful artworks through a poetic interpretation of the relationship between making/process and the use of materials. The following outline provides an overview of concepts and approaches. I am available to present these workshops throughout Queensland together with Material Thinking: Poetics of Process lectures, artists' talks and professional practice workshops.  

MATERIAL THINKING: The Poetics of Process

A series of studio-based workshops that explore the poetics of making.

Presented by visual artist Dr. Glen Skien (DVA,MVA)

 

The Poetic Concept

Material Thinking: The Poetics of Process provides the opportunity for visual art students to engage in a series of creative workshops underpinned by a form of ‘material thinking’. Through a series of studio-based strategies that allow for unexpected poetic associations, material thinking provides a platform for the development of students conceptual thinking. The emphasis of any process driven methodology is a belief that the ‘making’ informs the conceptual, in contrast to the concept perpetually informing the process of making.

The motivation of each workshop is for students to embrace a contemporary application of collage-based disciplines that enables them to analyse and interpret their initial exploration of materials and process to help define their conceptual concerns.

The models that support each of the workshops are structured towards printmaking, collage and drawing-based practices such as the monotype, montage, photographic transfer technique, the artists’ book, and the box assemblage. The interdisciplinary nature of each workshop allows for a mix of 2D and 3D interpretations. The outcomes of each lesson provide students with the opportunity to create meaningful responses through a better understanding of the relationship between materials and process.  

The strategies that guide each of the material-thinking workshops are as follows:  

·         Creating unexpected juxtapositions to form unfamiliar visual relationships.

·         The merging of self-narrative (personal stories) as a way of questioning cultural and historical narrative structures.

·         Imaginative play. Students are urged to embrace the concept of

‘intuitive knowing’.  

·         Exploring the nature of the fragment. Students explore the capacity of ‘the fragment’ to inform narratives relating to identity and notions of place.  

·         The deliberate shattering of progressive narrative structures.

·         Leaving conceptual gaps that create spaces of doubt. The notion that not every element or response needs to be bound to a semiotic intention.

·         Embracing and deliberately extending perceived contradictions.

·         A rigor of observation and appreciation of the meanings and contexts often embedded in both materials and processes.

·         Engagement with poetic and metaphoric thinking/making.

Phenomenology Based Descriptions

A significant element to the series of material-thinking based workshops is the integration of a written component whereby students are encouraged to document their reflections on processes and use of materials. Essentially these descriptions present a form of deconstruction and personal decoding of student’s outcomes. In its most fundamental definition phenomenologically based descriptions provide a strategy for documenting both objective and intuitively grounded responses that offer a platform for identifying and articulating the essential meanings embedded within their studio responses. The basis for inclusion of phenomenology-based descriptions relates to providing students with a personal strategy for facilitating independent analysis and evaluation of their studio outcomes. The documentation of studio responses also provides a method for students to identify the context of their works in relationship to professional artists and contemporary arts practice.

For a more detailed outline of each workshop please contact me:

Glen Skien

email: silentparrot1@bigpond.com

mob:0427 850 782