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. 

Gathering Images 3 - Exhibition and Final Pieces

I don't consider my work to be very visual in the terms that they are solely on what you see as my pieces usually incorporated a mixture of audio, works, performance or interaction with them that can't be portrayed well in a image alone. For some of these images I have the audio to accompany these imagery and others I think it is necessary to provide a brief description of how the piece is meant to be viewed or interacted with. 

Below are a range of exhibited and final pieces, not all of which would go into my website, but from the images I have so far it is most likely most of the ones on my site will be from this collection.

There is three project I would consider a good representations of my work and that would be 3, 4, 5, 6 and 8, all of which were at a point I knew my practice and worked in text. Also in image 5 I like that I have someone interacting with the piece, it also shows change of location and this would be one that have audio alongside it. The other images would contain a brief description, also have been featured and talked about in my interview with Nest which will also be present on my website, in doing so will reflect well. I need to remember its more about quality of work than quantity. 

Artist Statement Research 3 - Adam Brown

I found the most valuable artist statements or about pages to look at is what past students have done. By looking at them I feel I am at a more comfortable level in knowing what to writing about my practice at this point in my life, as it is still early. Compared to looking at artists that are so far ahead in their careers which is also good to look at, but I feel its the next level past this and you can't skip ahead. Your statement needs to reflex you work and you personally, you can't write about the future as it hasn't happened. You talk about the point you are at, which doesn't seem like a lot but with a clever and passionate set of words you can make a good statement/about page at any stage/level in your work as an artist.

I decided to look at Adam Brown's statement about his work, being one of the suggested websites that came from Leeds College of Art, Fine Art course. Also because he has made his website very connected to his practice.

"Words on my practiseWith my work I like to try and discuss the space between what is considered 'work' and what isnt. What I produce is often concerned with the relationship between art, craft and design and its connection to the modern era. It strives to connect aspects of conceptual art and skilled hand craft techniques to connect concerns between the value of ideas and the value of production.Continuing concepts The ideas driving my work have culminated in the production of fine woodwork, concerned with hand carving skills rapidly disappearing in the age of mechanical production techniques to two-dimensional outcomes with an emphasis on the process of draftsmanship. The proccess of enagaging with heavily time consuming methods of prodution is often as important as the completed object"

This statement is in first person, very personal and reflects the way he works. I have highlighted bits I feel describe his practice as a whole very well. Its a nice size paragraph with engaging, intelligent yet understandable text. He establishes a common theme in his work, describes the connection between his ideas and making, summing up his work well. It tells an audience who he is, what he does and how he does it. It makes a very good about section in a whole.

Wordpress Session 4 - Contact page and viewers

I decided a contacts page was needed for my site, however rather than add my email address to this and risk getting lots of spam I decided to use a contacts me book, it avoids most spam and also looks more professional. I also avoided adding links to my twitter and instagram as I couldn't figure out a neat way of presenting it on the website without it looking out of place. Also as mentioned before I have used the same user name throughout and even in my soundcloud account so finding me on social networking will be easy. 

Last thing to consider was, what with people mainly using the internet on their phones now, how my website works on phones. I had to make sure my images were at 72dpi which is the right size for best quality and quickest loading time on the web. When I looked at my website on my phone I found it worked even better on the iphone then it did on my computer, layout and speed wise. 

Artist Website Research 5 - Yoko Ono

I choose to look at Yoko Ono's webpage, it's mainly for her music however there is some good points and some bad ones that I could learn from especially in the terms of how she uses soundcloud for her audio and social media to help her gather information from people.

The first thing I noticed with this site is that it is extremely busy, there is a lot of heading and subheadings which organizes some of it however the pages especially the home page stretch on for quite a while making it look messy and hard to find what you are looking for. Here the social media links are not only on her home page, but nearly every page you click on which takes up a lot of room and seems too much. 

One thing I do like is that one of the headings is a drop down menu link to all of her social media, twitter, soundcloud, myspace, youtube and so on. Her work is present on a wide range of social media platforms and she uses these as ways of promotion but also ways to gather images and pieces for her work or videos. 

With an aim to make a film from a collection of smiles from around the world, this has been successfully promoted and gathered by a hashtag on twitter and instagram making it easy for people to get involved, #smilesfilm. She links in these ongoing projects well in the website that states her aims and how people can get involved. This could be something to consider for my twitter and collection overheard conversations or in future projects in gathering information. I have already explored and researched this in my own work and twitter is a very good tool for this. 

Also being a musician, a soundcloud link is very important. I was going to put my sound clips into my website, but when I get more recordings and expand on the audio setting up a proper soundcloud page to present my work would be ideal, and then to attach this to the webpage under a subheading for my audio would help me organize my media cross over. 

The only problem with the site is that it has way too much on it, at time I don't even know what it is I am looking for because there is so much going on. But as a musician/artist with a very successful career and a lot of show for it, organizing a website must be very difficult. 

Naming My Website

At the current time of starting I was running the website under the same of Paisley Boyd Art as this was also my social networking name, which I felt was important to keep consistent in order to link them all together.

The reason for the choice of the name in the first place was to state who I was Paisley Boyd and what I did Artist. However when joined together Paisleyboydart can be miss read as Paisley Boy Dart in some ways confusing the matter. Also I felt it didn't flow well and wasn't very professional.

With Paisleyboyd.wordpress.com having been taken and paisleyboydart.wordpress.com not flowing so well I explored the possibility of changing this.

The name needs to be unique and different in order to make a mark or stand in the mass of the internet and avoid getting confused with another Paisley Boyd, which on researching I have found there is a few that are constant bloggers on popular and fan culture so I need to step away from this as an image.

Suggestive names can be and also to include maybe my middle name Jay, as there are a few Paisley Boyd as established but none of which with the exact full name.

paisleyboyd.wordpress.com - Webpage name taken already, also may get mistaken for other Paisley Boyd's

paisleyjayboyd.wordpress.com - I find this a little too lengthy for a webpage url however it's a possibility

paisleyjboyd.wordpress.com - This one I like, the J in the middle is seen obviously as an initial for my middle name, it breaks up this connect and separates me from others of the same name, also this name is available for other social network sites such as Twitter and Instagram that I use to network. Also for the future this url isn't taken and could be used.

paisleyboydartist.wordpress.com - Writing artist at the end breaks it up a little better than just art however I feel I want to avoid labeling myself as just artist as my practice and work is quite open and can also tie into writing in parts. I want to present this website as my work in a professional manner, but avoid adding too many labels.

paisleyjayboydart.wordpress.com - Too long and poses many problems like same above.

paisleyjboydart.wordpress.com - Miss read and above issues stated.

paisleyjayboydartist.wordpress.com - Same again.

paisleyjboydartist.wordpress.com - Lastly same again.

Overall I felt PaisleyJBoyd worked the best, it translates well over to other social networks I use as well as providing a professional look as a name. The website needs to be clear on what it is about and who I am but I feel the visuals and writing should portray this. Also if it comes to buying a domain name paisleyboyd.com and paisleyjboyd.com is currently not taken so that's an idea for the future.

Gathering Images 2 - Collaboration Project

I have been considering if I should add the collaboration project I did in the first year, the project and work produced was of a high standard and reflected on creating some strong work. However I felt I didn't document it well and even though it was a good project, poor images will effect how this is portrayed.

Some of these images such as the book are usable and of a high quality, however I didn't have much involvement in the making of the book and the part I did such as the sound and short video have been lost due to not backing up my files properly. Also they weren't of a high enough quality to be part of the website either. 

Gathering Images 1 - Foundation Level Projects

Looking through my past work to consider what images could be used. Here is a range of images that represented my work at the time of foundation level, including sketchbook work. I have to decide if I want to use sketchbook workings as well or just keep it to final pieces. At this time my sketchbook working were very visual and interesting. As my practice has changed so has the way I use my sketchbook, it have become much more uniformed and more detail and more concentration is put into the text and words than drawings.

The point I was at here was more of a range of exploring my abilities and testing what my practice is, most of these ways of working like the sketches are used for my set design and film work. And the last piece reflects my first uses of words and literature forming and being incorporated into my work. It wasn't until the end of my foundation that I fully embraced the use of text and chance in my work in which was the start of a new direction and path I still follow. In a summary these photos are relevant for me to keep to see where I came from and also are useful for other projects I am apart of, but in connection with my practice as an artist now these aren't relevant and wouldn't be suitable to use in my website. 

Layout Consideration 1 - Articles and Interviews

Upon looking at other Artists websites, I have noticed a common theme of adding a page with Articles/Interviews in them. I found this is a nice touch to the website and maybe just important as a exhibitions list because this shows not only is someone else interested in your work, but also that they have an opinion of your work. You are giving the viewers the opportunity to read another opinion and now just what the artist has put on their page. Articles in the style of interviews are also a good way of adding a personal yet professional touch to your webpage. A bit like seeing an interview with an actor or director you admire, you have seen their work but the interview on top adds this personal touch and further understanding.

I have featured in  a few publications online and in magazines, as well as creating artwork and writing for various pieces. In considering the above I decided my most recent interview with Nest Magazine would be the best starting point for making an archive of articles and interviews as it is professional looking, about my work and also is something that has be published to the public. In the website itself I will create a pdf file or separate page to link the text of the interview. Bellow is a image of the layout in the magazine itself, however for the future to keep these consistent I decided to type these up as text only, as seen in Kenneth Goldsmith's and David Shrigley's webpages and archives.

This can also be found on the Nest Magazine ISSUU - NEST III

Artist Statement Research 2 - Jenny Holzer

I chose Jenny Holzer as an artist to research for her practice as an artist who uses text similar to the themes in my own practice and it is important to see how types of artists have successfully portrayed their practice in their websites.

Her about page reads as followed:

"For more than thirty years, Jenny Holzer has presented her astringent ideas, arguments, and sorrows in public places and international exhibitions, including 7 World Trade Center, the Reichstag, the Venice Biennale, the Guggenheim Museums in New York and Bilbao, and the Whitney Museum of American Art. Her medium, whether formulated as a T-shirt, as a plaque, or as an LED sign, is writing, and the public dimension is integral to the delivery of her work. Starting in the 1970s with the New York City posters, and up to her recent light projections on landscape and architecture, her practice has rivaled ignorance and violence with humor, kindness, and moral courage. Holzer received the Leone d'Oro at the Venice Biennale in 1990 and the Crystal Award from the World Economic Forum in 1996. She holds honorary degrees from Ohio University, Williams College, the Rhode Island School of Design, The New School, and Smith College. She received the Barnard Medal of Distinction in 2011. Holzer lives and works in New York."

I have found that Artists either have a very in depth about page or none at all. It should avoid explaining current work and concentrate on explaining common themes within the artists work, bring up any key projects or events that are connected with the artist and also be in third person. It's like a summary, it should explain the bigger picture of the artist, their work and their life and not concentrate solely on one particular thing. It also shouldn't go on too much, being straight to be point in order to keep the interest of the audience and be informative at the same time. Holzer's is a balance of her work, the medium used, where she is based and where she has studied. All built up to give you this idea about the artist. 

Artist Statement Research 1 - Olivia Berggren and Mike Winnard

As the artist statement or about page is a key marking criteria in this brief, but also because it can make or break a website depending on the quality and how it portrays you, I decided to separate my website research into a separate exploration into Artists Statements.

First up I looked at the suggested Previous students webpages, choosing Olivia Berggren and Mike Winnard's webpages. 

Olivia's Statement is short but straight to the point, it establishes her practice and interests in a professional and third person manner summed up in under 100 words. She uses this short paragraph to then be reflected against the rest of the website which is mainly visual imagery. In doing so she contrasts the point in her work loosely and allows the audience to get that when they view her work. 

Mike on the other hand doesn't have an about section as such he summarizes who he is as "I make pictures and I live in Leeds.' However the layout of his website is different than Olivia's rather than the site being mainly visual with this short paragraph, Mike has reflected about what he is doing in each project along side the imagery to create a narrative in his work. Making the about page not as necessary compared to images without explanation. 

Artist Website Research 4 - Jenny Holzer

In looking into Jenny Holzers work the first thing I notice is consistency in presentation and showing the connecting themes in her work. It is a simple white page with black writing and a series of images. Being simple means that it allows the work to stand out, unlike Shrigley who used the site as an extension to his work, Holzer has used the website as a place to present her work, just the same as exhibiting it in a white gallery space. 

It works well as text can become overpowered but colour and busyness, Holzer's work are big statements even as thumb nails in this part of the site. She presents this process and series allowing the audience to click on ones they wish to see which then brings up more images of that series or location. 

Her about page is formal, third person and it all have a very professional feel to it. And a simple yet straight to the point contact page. 

Overall I feel this is a very good website, its very easy to navigate and a clear style. However I feel it may need some more information maybe explaining certain series of works or maybe an archive of interviews and articles to give more information about the work. Simple and one colour scheme is better.