College Week 6 – 1950s hedgerow

I’ve finished another module, and this time it’s graphics and illustration. We were set the brief to draw natural forms and then collage the observational drawings before selecting areas for simplification, stylisation and ultimately producing artwork based on the illustrations. My drawings were mainly based on hedgerow seed heads, as you’ll see. The theme was also 1950’s prints, such as those by Lucienne Day, hence some of the colour schemes and styles. Finally, we had to put our artwork onto various items to see how they worked in different sizes.

To get the images on the mugs, I used Letraset’s Safmat inkjet sticky back transparencies, and to get the image onto the candle, I printed onto tissue paper stuck to a paper carrier page and then melted it into the wax with a heat tool.

College Week 6 – a complete basket case

I’ve just finished work on my jewellery project! And I have a very big blister on my thumb to prove how much work I did on it too… The brief was to make a wire basket using natural form as our reference. The wire had to be designed around a repeating motif and for bonus marks we could attach pierced and hammered metal pieces. And here it is:

I think it has taken around 20 hours to make, with the binding of the inch and a bit square motifs taking about half of that. Each of the five metal sections took around 40 minutes to pierce using a jeweller’s saw, and the blister resulted from hand sanding them this morning. And it all started from my drawing of a hollyhock seed head in Week 1.

Persian Flower Knot – tangle pattern

Oh boy, this is a good one – as you can see, I more or less mastered it by the end of the instructions! The pattern is based on 10th century Persian motifs using the pomegranate plant as inspiration. The dots in step 1 are to aid you to keep the orientation of the flowers more or less at the right places later on. I found the trick was to try and follow the imaginary curves of the interlocking outlines as you draw the steps. Don’t despair, just practice!

Well that really is it, hope you’ve enjoyed the series 🙂

 

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Sassanian – tangle pattern

This pattern is from a Persian repoussé motif on a bronze ewer from the Sassanian period (224BC to 651AD). I think it also has fabulous art nouveau qualities and would fit well with Jugenstil and Wellenstil patterns.

Tomorrow – and you thought it was all over? Well, it turns out I had notes for 15 patterns, so dear tanglers, you have a bonus pattern: ‘Persian Flower Knot’. Make sure you have your glasses on, your tongue ready to stick out slightly and your headache pills ready as it’s a bit of a toughie!

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Persian Diamonds – tangle pattern

Another pattern adapted from 10th century Persian stucco borders. I think it would look great with the ‘lines’ coloured in as well (the inverse of the shaded sample). Careful shading would also make the outlines pop off the page… Hmmm, must have a go at all of those!

Tomorrow, 13 of 14: ‘Per-de-lys’.

 

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