Denim History
Image Taken from Book; Delirious Denim By Zhang Huiguang and Luo lv
- They were invented by Jacob Davis and Levi Strauss in 1873 and a worn still but in a different context.
- Jeans are named after the city of Genoa in Italy, a place where cotton corduroy, called either jean or jeane, was manufactured.
- Levi Strauss came from Germany to New York in 1851 to join his older brother who had a dry goods store.
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Jeans marked culture of the last 140 years probably more than we think.
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They were first working clothes, then symbols of disobedience only to become fashion items.
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History of denim and jeans is long and colorful.Denim is highly durable, and that is why he was used by people that needed clothes that would last long.
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That is also why it was used by Levi Strauss and Jacob W. Davis for material for jeans pants.
- 1873, Rivets were added to the backs of jeans to make them more durable, when peoples hands are in and out of pockets it stops them from tearing apart.
Marques Almeida Collection A/W 2011
Boro Textiles
- Japanese Patchwork
A traditional patchwork style, boro grew out of necessity as opposed to aesthetics. Meaning “ragged” or “tattered,” the boro style was favored by nineteenth and early twentieth-century rural Japanese.
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Cotton was not common in Japan until well into the twentieth century, so when a kimono or sleeping futon cover started to run thin in a certain area, the family’s women patched it with a small piece of scrap fabric using sashiko stitching.
Over generations of families, these textiles would acquire more and more patches, almost to the point of the common observer being unable to recognize where the original fabric began.
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Covered in indigo scraps, what is beautiful to us was at one time shameful to these Japanese. As they recovered after the end of World War II, to some the boro textiles reminded the Japanese of their impoverished rural past.
https://www.heddels.com/2015/08/all-about-boro-story-japanese-patchwork/
Traditional Born Kimono - Image by Gerrie Congdon
research link
Digital Footprint
"1. Learn The Basics:
Your digital footprint is all the stuff you leave behind as you use the Internet. Comments on social media, Skype calls, app use and email records- it’s part of your online history and can potentially be seen by other people, or tracked in a database."
Richard Mcvetis
- McVetis uses a range of media, including drawing, installation, and textiles, to explore our perception of space and time.
- Using hand embroidery, he records time through multiples of dots, lines, and crosses.
- McVetis explores the way time and place are felt, experienced, and constructed.
- Ideas are often developed in response to, or created specifically to a moment, visualising and making this a tactile and tangible object.
Richard McVetis, 29 59, 2015
Mrinalini Mukherjee
Visit to Tate Modern -
- Mrinalini Mukherjee is an Indian Arist who transformed an everyday material, natural rope, into sculptural forms.
- Rejected conventional materials and techniques associated with studio practice – she began to work with hemp rope.
- Weaving and knotting she r=created complex shapes and folds that resembled flowers or the body.
El Anatsui – Tate Modern Visit
- He transforms simple, everyday materials into striking large-scale installations.
- Interested in African craft.
- His work raises questions about ethnic identity by combining traditional African techniques and imagery.
- In 1999, Anatsui found a bag of full of metal seals from African liquor bottles
- He crushes this material into circles or cuts into strips and then sews together with copper wire.
El Anatsui
Ink Splash II
Aluminum and copper
Images taken at the Tate Modern
Jelle Martens
Taken from the Book ‘Cutting Edges: Contemporary Edges By James Gallagher’
- Inspired by geometric shapes and the contrasting colours. I think I could incorporate the geometric collage style into my work, the contrasting bold colours and images really stood out to be from this book.
- Jelle Martens is a Belgian artist, graphic designer and photographer.
Nicola Starr
- Nicola graduated from London College of Communication, studied Illustration.
- I'm really inspired by her collage work, she uses recycled material and her use of minimalistic colour and recycled paper.
- This work really links to the current project 'Multiples' as its using the idea of sustainability as she uses recycled materials to create her work, and this is something I could possibly incorporate for example using receipts or paper instead of throwing them away.
Images taken from the book - Cutting Edges: Contemporary Edges By James Gallagher
Vanessa Beecroft
- Contemporary performance artist
- Involves staging of performances featuring models in various formations and dress
- Her approach to nudity has made her a controversial figure
Vanessa Beecroft, (2011)
Museum für Moderne Kunst, Frankfurt am Main
Damien Poulain
''Damien Poulain is an artist responding to various invitations, exploring design and architecture, Damien Poulain’s work develops in a transversality influenced by shintoist, tribal and heraldic symbols. In his practice, he uses material such as textile, spray paint, sculpture, and architectural volumes to develop a work targeting the meaning of community and the tools of its beliefs. His work invest and promote optimism in building communities and wishes through his projects to bring people together. At the same time, he intends to raise questions about contemporary popular culture’s practices, in collaborative approaches between the artist and local artisans and ressources.''
http://damienpoulain.com/about/
'Happy Face Project' - Damien Poulain
Both images above are of Damiens work 'Happy Face Project' where he spray paints on to shutters around the world creating interventions to create an interaction with its surroundings and people. Using his style of minimalist colours related to the place and geometric shapes.
Palm Angels Spring 2018 Menswear Fashion Show
Looking into existing garments that are inspired by traditional astronaut costume. In this piece I really like the metallic material used as its really simplistic and the clasps as they remind me of the belts but in a more modern way.
White Cube
Moving to Mars Exhibition - Design Museum
Full pressure suit for high altitudes
David Clark company in Worcester, 1962
Strizh fully pressurised spacesuit
NPP Zvezda, c.1980
Liquid Cooled high altitude garment
Human Engineering Department at the Royal Aircraft Establishment, Farnborough, 1977
- We used this exhibition as part of the 'Pairs' project, our project was based on technology, spacesuits also inspired by the Tim walker exhibition. We really liked the detail of these garments and used materials like tubes and metallic fabrics inspired by the Moving to Mars exhibition.
Anjelica Roselyn
- Inspired by colour and minimal use of line
- Mixed media
- Very 'free'
Elyse Blackshaw
Illustrator
Inspired by her use of colour, and simplicity of shape.
The Placenta
Looking at my interests deeper, I am also very interested in midwifery; If I wasn't so interested in the fashion industry I would love to be a midwife.
Moving forward from the idea of femininity and the womans body, I am going to look more into this especially parts of the internal organs that are associated with birth and new life.
http://theconversation.com/no-you-shouldnt-eat-your-placenta-heres-why-86405
- I will be focusing on these research images for textures using my denim, the shape of the placenta and also linking this with umbilacal cords.
Colour Meanings
I carried out my own colour research and asked my peers what certain colours mean to them.
@herplaceisin Instagram Account
"HER PLACE IS IN is an organization dedicated to social action through art. Focused on building community, celebrating diversity and empowering femininity, we are committed to sharing stories, advancing social education, and creating spaces for conversations that lead to real change."
I came across this account on Instagram, and because I'm really interested in femininity and diversity I thought it was a good start to research whilst looking at my inwards self.
Above, some of the Instagram posts, highlighting diversity within hair. I explored this further in my sketchbook by looking at textures within hair types.
Kings X History
Hassan Hajjaj
- A photographer, designer, and filmmaker.
- Heavily influence by the club, hip-hop, and reggae scenes of London as well as by his North African heritage, Hajjaj is a self-taught and thoroughly versatile artist whose work includes portraiture, installation, performance, fashion, and interior design, including furniture made from recycled utilitarian objects from North Africa.
Kesh Angels
"Hajjaj captures the unique street culture of young female bikers in Marrakesh. Meant to conflate Western perceptions of Arabic society, Hajjaj uses the language of fashion photography, to produce portraits of figures dressed in colorful North African garb. Set within frames of consumer products, including Coca-Cola and Louis Vuitton, the artist’s images recontextualize both fine art photography and popular culture. “My work started because I wanted to show another side of Moroccan culture, something more than that, and the imagery that they’d understand in the same way,” he has explained." - http://www.artnet.com/artists/hassan-hajjaj/
Lorenzo Vitturi
- Venice-born, UK-based photographer.
- Caused a sensation with his book of images inspired by Ridley Road market.
- Colour-saturated vegetable sculptures, capture vibrancy of East-London
- I really like how he is inspired, he takes an idea and then either uses the colour or patterns from it to create a sculpture or print.
Hairy orange, yellow balloons and rotten camote #2
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Plastic Blue #1 & 2
"In the post office one day I saw this very beautiful man with blue eyes, Mr Hunter from Jamaica, and he was wearing this hat he’d made using a bag from the market. His portrait was a starting point for the sculpture. It’s made entirely of blue things from the market – I collected lots of the same bags, some balloons, and fake diamonds from the kids' shop. I wanted to represent the soul of Ridley Road and recreate all the textures I found in this street. The sculpture, in this case, only lasted for 20 minutes’ -https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/gallery/2014/jul/13/lorenzo-vitturi-market-bought-in-pictures-east-londonMama Africa Vol 2 And Cloth 1
'The photo on the left is of the interior of a shop owned by a woman who is a fashion designer and makes lots of dresses for the African women on the market. I love the colours and the interior of her studio. I've never been to Africa, but with its bright colours and posters, her shop really looks like Africa to me – people who have been always say it's like being inside a Nigerian shop. Then I found this fabric [next to the photo] and scanned it. The images really talk to each other with their similar colours' - https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/gallery/2014/jul/13/lorenzo-vitturi-market-bought-in-pictures-east-london
Plastic Straw Ban
Plastic straws, cotton buds and drink stirrers to be banned in England
Plastic straws and drink stirrers, and cotton buds with plastic stems will be banned from sale and use in England from next April, the UK Government has confirmed.
https://www.edie.net/news/11/Plastic-straws--cotton-buds-and-drink-stirrers-to-be-banned-in-England/
- This is one of my materials I'm using for the Multiples Project. It links to the idea/theme of waste as this is something that had a general theme to my chosen materials, whilst they are still on sale in most corner shops, I thought I would use them in an innovative way, changing their purpose and they're 3D structure and so I melted the plastic using the heat press.
Serge Attukwei Clottey
- Known for work that examines the powerful agency of everyday objects.
- He utilises flattened Kuffuor gallon, jute sacks, discarded car tires and wood pieces to form abstract formations onto which he inscribes patterns and text.
"My Mother's Wardrobe", 2015
- “In just a few years, Clottey’s installation pieces made out of the ubiquitous jerry cans found all over Ghana have become an international movement, one intended as a commentary not only about water scarcity but, more widely, about consumption and migration in modern Africa. “
Tejuoso Olanrewaju
- Young Nigerian artist whose works refer directly to issues of environmental degradation.
- Uses wastes such as discarded sachet water bags, empty cans and packets of beverages and fast food wrappers for his sculptures and installations.
- In one of Olanrewaju’s work, he creatively configured wood, threads and discarded empty sachets of ‘pure water’, biscuit wraps, and empty bags of processed foods, polythene and foils in a manner that presents a spatial image of a forest.
- Processes of tying, folding, stitching and gumming
Sheila Hicks
- Known for her innovative and experimental weavings and sculptural textile art that incorporate distinctive colours.
- Uses naturl materials
- “weaving together threads, found objects, and materials such as petrified wood, raw silk, razor clam shells, and bits of copper.” https://www.artsy.net/article/artsy-editorial-84-sheila-hicks-making-defiant-honest-art
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Chimera, 2013
I am also really inspired by the colours Hicks uses in her work, they are bright and bold and colour is something love using in my work.
Katherine Peever - Textiles
- Really like the aesthetic of Katherines work, her use of embroidery and colour.
- During this project I will experiment with the visuals of her work as it really reminds me of using scrap materials and combining them to make something visually pleasing and have a new meaning behind the materials. -
Moffat Takadiwa
- Moffat Takadiwa lives and works in Harare, Zimbabwe in the neighbourhood of Mbare.
- Works with recycling and repurposing materials.
- Elevating found objects into sculptural forms that engage with issues of cultural identity, language, social practice, and the environment.
- His artworks are composed from the discarded remains of consumer waste, woven together in the language of traditional Zimbabwean textiles.
Moffat Takadiwa, Land of Coca-Cola and Colgate, 2019, found toothpaste tubes, toothbrushes and mixed plastic caps, 348 × 203 × 15 cm. Courtesy: the artist and Nicodim Gallery; photograph: Lee Tyler Thompson.
Moffat Takadiwa
Chapungu/Water Eagle Bird, 2019
found computer keys
Spencer Tunick
- American photographer best known for organizing large-scale nude shoots.
- massive crowds of nude people in complex performances.
- Describes his work as 'human installation'.
- His work is inspired by the divide between privacy and identity.
“For me, the nude body is like a raw material,” he has said. “Another artist might use oil or clay. I love the fact that, en masse, it can be turned into an infinite number of shapes or abstractions, while the setting I choose—rural, urban, indoors, or out—is like a canvas.” - http://www.artnet.com/artists/spencer-tunick/
Sea of Hull - July 2016
Mixing photography, performance, installation and nudity.
Tried to draw attention to the rising sea levels caused by the climate change – the bodies and humanity are flooding the streets.
Return of the Nude
- In total, 860 people took part, having been hand picked by Tunick from 12,000 applicants so as to achieve a cross-section of ethnicities, ages and sexual orientations.
- In some photos participants are in sheer red cloth and in another they are painted from head to toe in bright colours.
Damien Poulain - The Art of Sweets
The Art of Sweets - 2011
- Damien Poulain collaborated with a Dutch sweet company and used their confections to recreate tribal masks.
Tim Walker Exhibition V&A - WONDERFUL THINGS
For the Pairs project we also took inspiration from the Wonderful Things exhibition at the V&A as I was really inspired by the colours of India and the vibrant pink and blue colours. I was interested in incorporating this with the Moving to Mars exhibition inspired by technology.
Maison Martin Margiela, Couture Fall 2011
This garment really reminded me of the 'Moving to Mars' project as the buckles and attachable tassels on the garment really mirrored the spacesuits in the exhibition.
Issey Miyake Men 2013
Again inspired by the metallic materials used in this collection, and the combination of gold and silver. As I will be using these materials in my samples.