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NCEA Level 3 - Visual Arts 2013

Examples of Candidate Work – 91458 Printmaking

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Excellence

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Excellence

This candidate shows evidence that:

•This submission deals with the candidate’s experience of illness, in particular Whooping Cough. It captures the sensations of illness; monotony, the restriction of breath. The macro and micro environment of illness (bacteria versus whole body).

•The candidate works with a range of printmaking media and multimedia techniques such as, monotype, prontoplate, etching, screenprinting, marbling, photographic transfer and an appropriate use of photocopying. Printing onto surfaces such as x-rays, pill packets, pills, growing bacteria to incorporate into the prints, printing onto an actual lung. Stitching is a reference to mending, a lack of heath, being sewn back together

•The combination of photographic and hand drawn conventions, such as the synthesis of the gestural intaglio mark with photographic imagery to communicate control versus lack of control with the cough.

•The use of nudity is appropriate as a reference to fragility and the raw nature of illness – reference to medical diagram.

•The colour palette is clinical, purposeful and symbolic in areas, the colour of lungs, hospitals, medical diagrams, surgical equipment etc.

•Sequences of works read as smaller series but feed into each other as a larger body of work.

•A variety of approaches to drawing is evident which is experimental and wide-ranging. These provide a range of options from the outset and throughout. The candidate has documented their sculptural interventions as the foundation for new work.

•The final work refines several earlier options, exploring the concept of the X-ray, the interior world of body and dissections; it is not a full stop but sets up other possibilities

•Artist models include Damien Hirst, Ralph Hotere, Terry Winters, Jim Dine, Medical journals, Rauschenberg, Ghada Amer (Sewing), Marina Abromovic, Kathe Kollowitz.

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Excellence

This candidate shows evidence that:

•A clear proposition is established from the outset – looking at abuse, fragility and isolation. The candidate uses the symbolism of the wings/landscape/puppetry/skulls to describe a lack of control and the relinquishment of innocence.

•There is a fluency and synthesis of formal printmaking conventions and ideas which are underpinned by well understood links between contemporary and tradition printmaking practice – Goya, Jason Grieg, Rembrandt, Barry Cleavin, Otto Dix, Kathe Kollowitz.

•There is a mature reference to literature and film in order to further explore the suggested loss of childhood and a mythic landscape in order to develop a unique submission.

•It is clear the candidate has used their own photographs, documenting orchestrated performances or situations in order to make work which is an authentic reflection of their visual voice. The candidate is very present in the work, operating as a director rather than just thinking in terms of 2d works on paper.

•There is a conscious decision to use a monochromatic colour palette which enhances the considered theatrical nature of the work. An intangible quality permeates the submission, a psychological, harrowing, disturbing exploration. The narrative or concepts do not undermine the pictorial understanding and exploration.

•Ideas are explored in multiple ways, with subtle shifts between each body of work. Decisions are well understood and the work is a natural progression. There is a range and depth of ideas evident – being invisible, escaping, nightmares. For example the top of panel 2 establishes several possibilities. Panel 3 technically refines and prioritizes options set up earlier.

•It is evident that the Internal Standards are embedded in the evolution of the folio.

•A range of printmaking techniques is used, often in combination. For example reductive and additive monoprint, rolled slab, draw through monos, collograph, intaglio, photographic transfer.

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Merit

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Merit

This candidate shows evidence that:

•This submission deals with a clear and accessible proposition of “my life and my social group’ and builds from this a refined series of works. From the beginning the candidate recognises their graphic strength and how it reflects the motifs of popular culture reflective of their generation.

•There is a successful integration and exploration of print processes using a combination of methods and media. The sources of imagery are personal and distinctive, giving us an insight into the student’s personality and humour.

•The candidate is not afraid to build the visual momentum of their picture making. The work combines a clean graphic starting point into an expressive, energetic and distinctive handling of colour and mark making which allows for a unique investigation.

•This submission reflects an active engagement with printmaking. Attention to surface and colour is key to the coherence of the work. Techniques selected are appropriate and purposeful to the consideration of the candidate’s ideas (for example linear mono and pronto plate).

•There is a sound understanding of the relationships between the ideas being communicated in each sequence of work. Previous pictorial explorations are revisited and reconsidered in order to inform new sequences.

•Editing refines and formalises work while building upon the initial proposition such as the use of the informal grid, fragmentation and overlays.

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Merit

This candidate shows evidence that:

•A range of starting points is established on panel one to introduce motifs and characters that are distinctive in their use of print processes and aesthetic (for example the treatment of colour; colour is taken from the game and the green of the circuit board).

•Particular print processes are selected in order to communicate a symbolic handling of subject such as woodcut which is used throughout to symbolise a supposed reality while airbrush forms reflect a virtual mind-crafted world.

•The relationship between the digital image and the handmade (for example collograph) is handled with purpose.

•The selected surfaces support the reading of messages within the work such as grid paper and tessellated imagery.

•Panel two begins to explore the deconstruction of motifs in order to enhance a narrative which deals with the disintegration and digitalisation of self.

•An ongoing range of related propositions which deal with the relationships between supposed reality and virtual reality are developed through the handling of space, fractured images, white linear and digital forms, and the juxtaposing of techniques.

•There is a limited analysis between each phase and on panel 3 we see how technique fails to build conceptually and in its facility. On-going thinking is evident throughout but is let down by a collapse in technique at the end.

•The limited technical and conceptual extensions result in interchangeability throughout the submission.

•There is a reliance on a solid but limited idea and selection of imagery.

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Achieved

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Achieved

This candidate shows evidence that:

•The candidate establishes a consistent understanding of layering and composition throughout the folio using different formats and arrangements including the use of devices such as symmetry, juxtaposition, pattern, grid, and mirror images.

•A range of techniques are deployed that include woodcut, collagraph, mono print, gel media transfer prints cut outs and stencils combined with text, hand drawn and photographic images.

•The selection of colour is not only appropriate in a cultural context but also compositionally and pictorially. There is evidence that the colour palette has been mixed to help form coherent links between works.

•The handling of text and fonts is used in different contexts as part of the composition rather than to just convey a message.

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Achieved

This candidate shows evidence that:

•The submission is systematic and the ideas are regenerated by the third panel to show an integration of the print conventions selected. There is a balance between the use of black and white and colour that is applied selectively to identify key areas.

•Techniques used include dry point, collage, mono print, marbling with black ink and colour. Wiping back and plate tone are used as effective devices to explore tone and form. Colour is added adequately to revisit earlier ideas. Collage is used successfully in related series in order to extend the narrative.

•The two large works on the third panel holds the folio at Achieved as they consolidate the ideas and reformat them but do not refine them. There would need to be further sequences of work on panel 3 in order to explore and analyse links between the different series or sequences.

•Artist references include Graeme Sydney and Escher.

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