At the time, I was not a fan of the way that she captured nature. She captured the ugly side of nature, which I did not wish to replicate.
Oddly enough, I seem to have done a full circle, as my final sculpture very much represents the darker, uglier side of nature. (albeit accidentally!)
Referring back to a previous blog post:
http://sculpturebysian.blogspot.co.uk/2017/02/researching-anj-smith-more-deeply-anj_27.html
Here, I looked at the way that Anj Smith looks at pollution. She mentions surf scum, and chemical smears in correlation with clouds and rainbows.
She speaks of them casually, as if there is only a thin line between them. I think that this relates to my sculpture, in a way. The beautiful plant grows from a horribly disfigured face, which could be the personification of pollution (perhaps an oil spill, because her face is shiny and black). There is no line to explain where the plant ends and the face begins, so there is no way to tell which part is beautiful and which part is not, because they come from one another.
Anj Smith's work is also very difficult to section, as each item/creature/thing weaves in and out of itself. The only thing that is always left untouched is the face.
Her work still doesn't necessarily appeal to me. But I do appreciate it in a new light, and enjoy it now especially because I can relate it so closely to my own work.
Another especially influential artist was Jess Riva Cooper.
I feel that in a way, my final pieces are strange combinations of Anj Smith, and Riva Cooper's styles primarily, with additional influences along the way.
Cooper:
- Porcelain white skin
- White features (no detail in eyes)
- Empty face
- Colourful flowers
- Nature overtaking the face
Smith:
- Metaphors of suffering
- "Ugly"
- Deformed
- Disturbed
- the "darker" side of nature
- pollution
I think that both of my sculptures relate to these points in their own ways. As they both have their aesthetically pleasing sides, alongside the not quite so "pretty" parts.
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