AO1: Develop ideas through investigation informed by contextual and other sources demonstrating analytical and cultural understanding.
CONTENTS:
Have you shown links and connections with art/ photography, artists/ photographers and different cultures, craft workers and designers? ..................................................................................... 2 Have you achieved what you set out to achieve? ........................... 4 Make use of contemporary artists/ photographers, western and non-western, known movements in art, music, video, films, ICT, artefact's. ...................................................................................... 5 Starting point could be a theme, object, issue or brief. .................. 7
Have you shown links and connections with art/ photography, artists/ photographers and different cultures, craft workers and designers? • Whatever your project and/ or item of coursework is, you should try and include a clear and strong reference to the work of other artists/ photographers. This can be achieved in a number of ways, for example, think about the subject or context of your work. What your work is about or of, can be used to help you research and find work done by other artists/ photographers, which follows or uses a similar theme. ◦ If your work is an observational piece for example, of an object or group of objects, then try finding similar work of objects. This would usually be called 'Still-Life'. So searching for 'Still-Life' artists/ photographers would be a good start. ◦ Also try to use a variety of resources to help your search. The internet for example, although it will provide you with a comprehensive search, try using an image search engine to find examples that use 'Still-Life' within the subject/work. After finding some examples note the name of these artists/ photographers, and then explore further by using specific knowledge bases, a more general search could be performed by using wikipedia or even better, try using an Art specific website like www.artcyclopedia.com. • Another way that you can go about making sure that you include links and connections to the work of other artists/ photographers, is to begin your project or item of coursework by finding inspiration within work that you find. In a sense, start with an artist/ photographer and/ or their work, rather than your own subject matter or context, and through your exploration and discovery of artists and their work, let your findings help your own work to develop. ◦ For example, suppose that you were given a project brief to make a response to portraiture but don't know where or how to begin. Instead of trying to develop your own response or work from the beginning, seek out examples of art/ photographs and work, and then use what you find to help develop your own work. This could be the 'style of art/ photograph' that you have found which inspires you, or it could be materials that an artist/ photographer has used, which you decide to use
for your own work, maybe you like the subject of the portraits which an artist/ photographer has used? To help you find artwork and inspiration from the beginning, try visiting a gallery, if you can't visit a gallery in person, go to one of the many online gallery's and explore work online. Some examples of these would be: ▪ www.tate.org.uk - This website gives you access to four of the UK's most popular galleries, being Tate Liverpool, Tate St Ives, Tate Britain and Tate Modern. ▪ www.saatchi-gallery.co.uk - This gallery is home to many modern and contemporary art and artists. If you are looking for something modern and fresh then the Saatchi gallery is well worth a visit, online and/ or in person. ▪ www.moma.org - Another modern gallery is the MOMA (Museum of Modern Art). This famous gallery in New York is well worth a visit, and with the use of the internet visiting this gallery to find inspiration for your own work couldn't be easier. ▪ www.npg.org.uk - The National Portrait Gallery is the perfect place to visit if your coursework project or work is based on portraiture. There are many excellent examples of traditional and contemporary portraits on display for you to explore. ▪ www.louvre.fr - The Louvre Museum in Paris is another excellent place to visit, here you can see many famous works art such as the Mona Lisa (Leonardo Da Vinci) • Perhaps one of the clearest ways to ensure that you have found strong/ clear connections with the work of other artists is to present your research. This method is useful if a link to a chosen artist/ photographer is not directly clear within your work. Presenting your research is not about writing or typing up a bunch of facts, although by including some facts in your work is good evidence of demonstrating that you have done some work in this area, ideally your work should include opinion and thoughts. Opinions of your own and if possible from others, this should be based on what you think about the work of your chosen art or artists/ photographers. Explain 'why' you believe that your chosen art or artist 'fits in' with your own work. If the art/ photograph or artist is the inspiration behind your own work, explain 'why and how' you were inspired. • You should also include examples of analysing your artists work. Consider explaining methods, and structure about the work, is there a reason behind the work? If so explain what you think this reason is. Can you explain what materials were used by the artist/ photographer to create the work? And how big, or small is the artwork, and, is there a reason for the artist/ photographer using the size or scale that they did? • Do try to include some pictures/ examples of work created by your chosen artist/ photographer in your presentation or sketchbook/ journal. • Also, as much as you can, try to include a list of your sources. This could be a simple list of books, websites that you have read/ used and/ or galleries that you may have visited.
Have you achieved what you set out to achieve? • The answer to this question will not usually be apparent until near the end of your finished work or project. Throughout your work and projects you should be making clear notes that explains your work as it develops. Think of this as annotation, or as a journal or diary. These notes are very important for providing good evidence of developing your ideas and work, and can also be used to reflect on your work to determine if indeed you achieved what you set out to achieve. • So to gain marks for this assessment objective, make sure that you make constant notes about your work, your ideas and your development process. • If your final outcome ends up being unlike, or different from your development work, this is when questions about weather or not your work achieved what you intended will be asked.
Make use of contemporary artists/ photographers, western and non-western, known movements in art, music, video, films, ICT, artefact's. • Contemporary artists are modern/ current artists that are usually producing new work at the current time. A good source of contemporary artists/ photographers would be the 'Turner Prize', which is an annual event for new and current artists to showcase their work and hopefully win an award for their contributions. You can find examples and more information about the Turner Prize at: www.tate.org.uk/britain/turnerprize/ This would be an ideal place to find examples of British (Western) modern artists, which you can then include within your work. For some examples of non-western artists try visiting this website: www.asianartnow.com • Known movements in art are points in history when a group of artists typically worked in the same or similar style or theme. Some of the more famous art movements are: ◦ The Renaissance - Which reigned from the 1400s in Italy until the mid 16th century. ◦ Baroque - Which began in the 1600's and lasted until 18th century. ◦ Rococo - In the 1700's ◦ Romanticism - In the 1800's ◦ Realism - Which began in the mid 1800's ◦ Impressionism - Also started in the late 1800's ◦ Expressionism - Which began at the turn of the 20th century ◦ Cubism - In the early part of the 20th Century ◦ Surrealism - Which began in the 1920's ◦ Art Deco - From the late 1920s to the 1930s ◦ Abstract Expressionism - During the 1940's and 50's ◦ Pop Art - In the 1950's and 60's ◦ Photorealisim - During the 1960's and 70's ◦ Post Modernism - 1980s to the present day • Knowledge of these popular artistic movements in time is very useful to enhance your marks for Assessment Objective 1. You should at least learn which art movement your chosen artist worked in and mention this period of art, along with a brief understanding in your sketchbook and/ or presentation. There are many time-lines available online to help you learn about the different art movements, one of which is: http://www.visual-arts-cork.com/history-of-arttimeline.htm
• The use of ICT can be a very quick and effective way to add more depth and evidence for assessment objective 1. For example, you could use image editing software like adobe photoshop, or Gimp (which is free) to change and manipulate an image. This could be something as simple as changing the tones and colour effects, or something more extreme like applying filters and effects to warp and bend images. By printing these out and working from them in your own work, you can create some wonderful results. Within each project that you create during the course you should try to include at least one example of developing your work using ICT as a tool.
Starting point could be a theme, object, issue or brief. • For all of your coursework and/ or projects your work should follow a set theme. Usually this theme will be set for you, and your challenge is to show that you can create a series of outcomes that follow the set theme. Where ever possible your work should clearly show the connection and relevance of the theme that your project is based on. However, occasionally within a project you will also have an opportunity to make a personal response. A personal response to a project or theme is your chance to produce an item of coursework with development work, using your own ideas, inspiration and direction. This is an excellent opportunity for you to experiment and develop your own style or preferred context. • A good way to illustrate how your work is in-keeping with a given or chosen theme is to use a mind-map or spider-gram. These are excellent methods that will help you get started on a project or item of coursework, and something that you can return to and develop further as your project or coursework item develops. • Sometimes an object or artefact may be the source of inspiration for a project or item of work. If this is the case then try to begin your work by working directly from the artefact or object. Treat it like 'Still-Life' exercise, where by you sit in front of the object and produce a set a drawings/ photographs and studies based on what you see and how you see it. Later you could then develop your work further by adding more objects, selecting alternative viewpoints to work from, experiment with scale, and try out a range of different materials and methods. Taking photographs of the objects and artefact's is also an very good way to develop your sketchbook work. As well as producing drawings and studies of your object, take a couple of photographs which demonstrate and capture the same view points that you used. Stick these into your sketchbook and add some comments that explains how you worked from the object. Also, consider taking photographs of your object that use alternative view points that you can work from at a later point in your project.