Siobhan Drysdale Art
Visual Voices Exhibition Themed Work
Night Walk
-Oil Painting
For this artwork I tried to represent the physical side of the unknown, things that you cannot see. I chose the imagery of the night-time because it is one of the best examples of the physical unknown that we encounter everyday. I chose to put a lone figure walking in the middle to create a focal point, and chose a rain scene so I could paint reflections for interest. I was inspired by another artist, Victor Figol, who paints similar imagery to what I chose, and decided to use his impressionistic style with the large brushstrokes. The impressionistic style adds to the ambiguity and mystery of my artwork. However I decided to use darker colours than Figol to keep the theme of the unknown and mystery. I hope that my painting shows the viewer the beauty that I feel when it comes to the unknown and the night-time
Expressionless
-Pencil Drawing
In my drawing I was trying to represent the unknown aspects of people. You can never really experience the world like other people and understand what they are thinking or feeling, even if you know them well. I was inspired by artist Andy Beck for this artwork. Some of Beck's artworks are portaits of people with impassive faces looking at things that you the viewer cannot see. I think the impassive face and off frame gaze helps to represent not being able to understand how people are feeling internally on the outside. I decided to use the expressionless face and of frame gaze in my artwork, and drew a woman in pencil with those traits. I wanted to use realism so that is was more relatable to the feelings of actual people. I hope that my artwork turned out emotionless and impassive to the viewer, so that it helps present my theme of the unknown in people.
Oil on Black and White Photo, 2014.
Oil on Black and White Photo, 2014.
Oil on Black and White Photo, 2014. Click to see full image.
Oil on Black and White Photo, 2014.
History
-Painted Photography
For this artwork I was trying to represent the aspect of the unknown that is the past and the future. The past is mysterious and unknown because you can never fully understand what it is like to live in a time before you were born, while you can never fully predict what will happen in the future. I specifically focused on the past and history for this artwork. I was inspired by a Canadian artist Raphël Thibault who I met at an art fair in Toronto. He took photography and the painted on top of it to highlight certain aspects of the photo with colour. I took this approach for my artwork and chose 3 historical photos that I took. Then I printed them in black and white photography to represent the past since when I think of images of the past, I generally think of the black and white film and photos from photography’s origins. Then I hand-tinted the artwork using oil paints to represent trying to bring the history to life in your mind and imagining the past. I wanted to get the audience thinking about the past and imagining how it used to look through my art.