FMP evaluation:

This FMP lasted 16 weeks and concludes the 2nd year of my Fine Arts Foundation Degree. To begin my project I started off with some photography of walks and hikes that I did while on holiday. The theme of this project was about recovery, this was a personal theme as last year I had come down very suddenly with an illness and have spend months recovering from it. I wanted this project to explore the themes of sickness, recovery, how these thing change and affect your every day life and the resilience and perseverance needed to get better. 

Through a series of images I was able to document walks, hikes and meals that I would not have been able to do or eat a month before and I found this process empowering and liberating. Once I had the foundations I was able to start developing my project. I started with cyanotypes as this is a fairly quick and easy process and used multiple of my landscape photographs to create the images. I experimented with a variety of different materials including pill packets and packages. I believe that the experimentation with different types of paper and materials when creating these cyanotypes has been really important to the process and allowed me to figure out what works, what doesn't, and perfecting techniques to make undesirable material such as nylon, that doesn't hold cyanotype solution very well, to work correctly. 

 I then experimented with collage, I wanted to try out some different processes and techniques as a way to develop my project further. I used my previous photography as inspiration for the collage to make sure that there was still a clear connection and theme throughout all of the works. I used a multitude of found paper from previous projects that been painted and drawn on using oil pastels, charcoal and acrylic paint.  I created three collages and I believe that all were successful.

Moving forward from my collages I decided to use photoshop to create digital collages. This was a challenge for me as photoshop has always been something that I have found more difficult to use. During this development and process I was able to learn and improve on a new skill set. I had to watch a variety of YouTube tutorials to help me understand how to use different tools and allow me to work through any issues that I faced. During this process I made some mistakes that I had to work through such as using the wrong sized template and using screen shots instead of raw images. I really enjoyed this process and was able to create something new that I had never done before. 

In terms of time management and planning, I think that this is something I could improve on. Due to issues and delays faced with previous projects my timeline was set beck a couple of weeks and I didn't get to spend as long as I would have liked creating work. That being said, I do believe that I was able to manage the time that had well and dedicated about three hours a day to complete two or three blog posts and about four hours a day to create my physical work. I was able to create a decent body and work and analyse and annotate this work critically. 

In terms of materials and processes I believe that I used a variety of materials and I have explored old and new processes and I think that all of my explorations have been successful. I really enjoyed using photoshop and I believe that I have greatly improved my ability and efficiency at using this software. I have also improved my skills when editing and adjusting my photographs using software such as adobe camera RAW. I have really enjoyed using new software and I believe that this has greatly helped me improve as an artists. 

Another spect of this project that has helped me with development is research, including artist research. doing research and artist research about different processes and materials has helped me to be knowledgeable and efficient when creating work. A particular artist that I have taken inspiration from is Richard Long and I believe that looking into and researching his work, techniques and processes allowed me to better understand my own work. 

I believe that this has been a successful final project and I think that I have shown clear development and experimentation within my work. I believe that I have learned and improved upon new and old skill sets and shown development and improvement as an artist. I am happy and proud with the final result for this project and I believe that I will continue to grow as an artist as I move forward. 

I believe that the process of deciding how to display my work and putting it up for the show was fairly easy. To decide how to display my images I played the prints flat on the table and moved them around into a variety of compositions. Initially, I though about displaying them overlapping each other to create a huge piece reminiscent of David Hockneys 'Joiners' but quickly decided against it as it seemed messy, unorganised and the images seemed to get lost in each other. I then decided to put my photographs into sleek, black frames and set them out in a neat and tidy formation with the larger A1 pieces on top of each other and the smaller A2 pieces on the board to the side, and I think that this really allows each piece to shine and stand out 

The process of installing these pieces was quick and simple. For the larger frames I needed to attach 3 mirror plates, two on the top and one on the bottom to distribute the weight properly. Not the A2 fames I only needed to attach one on the top and one on the bottom. Using the drill was an easy process, I just needed to have a steady hand ad made sure not to drill too far so that the screws didn't show on the other side of the frame. When attaching my pieces to the board I used a spirit level to make sure that they were level and uniform with each other and drilled in some longer screws to hold my work up properly. Overall, I am happy and proud with how my end of year show has turned out. I believe that my work is meaningful, impactful and showcases a narrative.