Rationale

In terms of making an artist website, I felt it was something I planned to create in the future however never felt I was ready to do so just yet. I wanted to make sure I had a clear idea what it is I do as an artist and what my practice involves. In doing so I could then reflect how to portray my work and practice in and as part of a website. This brief made me think about this a lot earlier than I would have thought about it, what I do realise now is that it takes time to develop a good working website through trial and error, by seeing what works, so it’s best to start as soon as possible in order to achieve a good website by the time you’re ready. It can seem to progress as you progress in your practice in doing so it may better to reflect you as an artist and your practice.

In doing this research I have realised the connection between artists practice and presentation of their website. The best ones connect with and reflect their practice as an extension to their work. Jenny Holzer and David Shrigley have done this well, especially Shrigley who continues to be playful in the presentation of his website like he does with his work.

Taking this into consideration for my own website, I wanted to keep the design of my website simple with the white background and black text, and then add very selected imagery that reflects my overall aim and themes of my work. I split it down into three projects that reflect and explore this notion of collecting words and questioning the link between art and literature. Words are very important in my work, so the words used in my website have to be important as well. Adding the interview I felt bridged the link between artist and writer a little more and added something a bit different to the website. It also helped bridge the link between a professional formal page, and also a personal touch that showed the audience I am human on this faceless internet.

Another way of doing this would be to add social networking in with this site allowing people to see the contrast between a professional cv and your working sketchbook. I have yet to figure out how I do my blog and have tried and failed several times, but once that is up and running it’s another thing to consider adding. As for twitter and instagram I didn’t add them to this site as I felt it would look too messy, however I have used the same user name throughout making finding me easy. Also there is no separate account for a personal and artist twitter as I felt a balance of the two in one account seems a lot more personal and people connect better to it.

Overall for my website, I felt wordpress.com isn’t the best way to do this website and if I was to create a website again I would seek the help of someone who knows what they are doing. But what this has done is give me an idea of how I can present myself online and what design I may want for this future website. 

Photography Session 3 - Setting up at Home

From the last few Photography session I learnt the basics of setting up and lighting, also took photographs of the pieces I could, however due to the process of this current project I wasn't able to get all the pieces together before our last session.

I wasn't so worried as I felt these are still in working process and wouldn't necessarily make it on the website, however it would be good to have the images anyway. So using the techniques taught to me in these photography sessions I set up a make shift booth in my room. Lucky for me I have blackout blinds so light from outside wouldn't be a problem.

So for a back drop I used an A1 sheet of black card propped up on a table and curved so to avoid as much shadow as possible. I then had too identical lamps which is important to get the lighting balanced on each side. As the bulbs weren't brilliant and they weren't smooth I added a filter of tracing paper over them in order to take away the glare and produce a softer light.  

The camera and tripod was then just set up the same as they were in the photography studio, I just had to translate how to do the settings from Canon to Nikon. 

The results: 

The results aren't perfect but they show the pieces a lot better than if I was to photograph them without this set up or scan them in. My focus was a little out in parts and I feel to white balance was playing up on my camera. I found this difficult trying this on a camera i'm not familiar with. These wouldn't be going into my website due to the quality, but also these are still one going pieces and need more developing. As for the first image I felt this set up for this wouldn't work for the piece and one of it in a space it should be in would make more sense. 

 

About My Work

I decided to put a brief description of each piece because a photograph doesn't really whole piece and how I presented it. Where I have added audio I have made the description even shorter as the work is able to explain itself more.

Nonsense, makes sense is part of a series of 8 experimental poetry pieces where the public were invited to donate a sentence to the artist. These were then reformed in order to create a poetry series, that through chance and randomization removed itself from set writing boundaries in order to questions its relevance as a poem.

Here at Thwaites Mill is an audio installation documentary exploring the everyday life of the people who run and maintain the Mill.

Overheard conversations is an ongoing work exploring what we hear people say in public, from the everyday to the outrageous. Its intent is to investigate into depth how words out of context can completely change their meaning.

Layout Consideration 2 - Social networking

As established before my social networking names are the same as the one chosen for my domain name, as I feel it is important to link in this personal and professional link, showing people you are not a robot and aren't constricted to a set of rules. This doesn't mean I am going to be crazy and inappropriate when online, it just means that I use my twitter and instagram accounts to show people my creative process and how it reflects me personally. It is said the best artists blogs, twitters and instagrams are the personal ones as the internet can take away what it means to be human, you hide behind this technology. By being playful and personal allows people to connect with you, what you stand for and what your saying at a lot higher level than a uniformed this is the facts layout. This style also reflects in my writing, especially in my film reviews and blog of which I have seen can be successful way of working, especially for me as a person. 

However this being said an artist website needs to be like a CV, that little more uniformed and professional, but also with a personal touch that should reflect your practice. In comparing the way I behave on social networks will be a lot less restrained than the way I act and portray myself in my artist website. In this I decided to avoid linking my social networking in with my website for the above reason in the same way you wouldn't put a link to your facebook on your CV, but also another reason being it will look visually messy with adding too much. I have, as mentioned above used the same names throughout so that upon searching people are still able to find all of these link and decide upon themselves what it is they are looking for. 

Instagram - PaisleyJBoyd

Twitter - @PaisleyJBoyd

Film Blog - The Vertigo Effect

Adding Audio 2 - On the website

Adding the audio link from soundcloud to wordpress turned out to be extremely easy, the soundcloud site had a share and embed file option which also created a file especially for hosting on wordpress. So I just copy and paste the link into the edit page and its done. Also looks good and gits in with the image nicely.

Artist Statement 2

I decided to keep my statement as a short paragraph summary of my work and practice, presented in third person being as formal as possible. I feel people are more likely to read it and gain more information off of it, if it was short rather than long and in depth as they may never read it. 

"Paisley Boyd is a Leeds based artist/writer whose practice explores the themes of language and text; through observations of social interactions within society. By using audio and print she questions the differences and relationships between what is considered as art over literature. As a writer she explores how the written word has a place in art, as well as contributing to magazines and online publications on a variety of subjects."

I expanded on the statement used for my page on Hoard and felt presenting my self as a writer also ties into my practice. 

Adding Audio - Soundcloud

Audio is important for in my work and especially for the Thwaites Mill exhibition, So I wanted to present my audio along side the image of the chair and setup. Soundcloud was recommended to me, it was free, easy to set up and compatible with wordpress.

Setting up an account and uploading this piece took under 5 minutes, it was quick, easy and the playback is of a high quality and fast, even on my slow computer. Also it allows you to add a little image, which is nice to have the visuals and sound together even on my soundcloud account. 

My user name is the same as everything connected to this website in order to keep it consistent, so its PaisleyJBoyd. 

The next step is to add it to my website along side the images.