I have been wondering if the mundane was too mundane, so this experimental work was important.  Looking for a way to illustrate the scale of these construction projects, I turned to printmaking, painting, collaging and layering images by reprinting images on printmaking paper to create another constructed reality.  The images below are test pieces really to allow me to gauge whether this is valuable going forward.

As a migrant, I am intrigued how invisible we are and wanted to produce a piece of work that would honor the marks made by migrant construction workers.  I don’t think that this piece is particularly engaging, or even interesting, but it did help me with the problems that I found related to scale and how these could ultimately be addressed.  I like the idea of layering and these prints were hand painted and drawn, adding architectural lines that mimic airport tarmac traffic markings.  These markings are some of the first and last things that we see when we travel.

While I was doing some independent research I found an article in the Guardian about various artists including Ai Wei Wei who had collaborated with prisoners to make artwork. This artwork included sewing, this is a technique that I have used in the past and this article has inspired me to revisit this way of working. Joanna Choumali also works with hand sewn photographs. These artists along with Jessica Rankin, who hand sews fabric with words and journeys interest me.

Bibliography

DEAN, Beth. 2020. ‘A Stitch during Time: Artists and Prisoners Sew Together – in Pictures’. The Guardian, 15 Feb [online]. Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/gallery/2020/feb/15/a-stitch-during-time-artists-and-prisoners-sew-together-in-pictures [accessed 16 Feb 2020].

COTTON, Charlotte. 2014. The Photograph as Contemporary Art. Third edition. New York, New York: Thames & Hudson.

‘Politicized Landscapes, Julie Mehretu’. 2020. Art21 [online]. Available at: https://art21.org/watch/extended-play/julie-mehretu-politicized-landscapes-short/ [accessed 7 Jan 2020].

‘Joana CHOUMALI – Accueil’. 2020. [online]. Available at: http://www.joanachoumali.com/  [accessed 2 Feb 2020].

CUBE, White. 2020. ‘White Cube – Channel’. [online]. Available at: https://whitecube.com/channel/channel/jessica_rankin_in_the_studio_2011 [accessed 2 Feb 2020].