05.10.20 - Self Portrait on Painted Cushion

Drawing on the painted cushion with pencil felt quite scratchy and uncomfortable but wasn’t too dissimilar to canvas so it turned out to be a good surface to work on because it gives texture and allows different levels of tone to be created. I think the drawing resembles me in quite a naturalistic way, but it’s not completely accurate so I would spend longer getting the facial proportions right next time and go darker with the shadows to create more three dimensionality. 




The next stage was manipulating the portrait with string. I tried squashing the cushion and tying it very tightly to hold it in this crushed position which creates folds and completely warps the face, like a digital edit but with much more physicality.





I think this reflects how we have a distorted sense of identity, in that we perceive ourselves differently to how everyone else sees us. We have only ever seen ourselves through reflections and images - we are inside looking out, and I think the idea of being trapped inside of ourselves is represented by the string tied across the face which gives a sense of imprisonment. The energy of the folds and curves appears to be contained by the string and pushing to be free of its linear restraints.



I placed the cushion in the photocopier and squashed it down to create these black and white scans which I really like. The highlights and shadows are emphasised as the scanner picks up the foremost areas of the cushion while the creases become very dark with a great sense of depth. After the first scan I changed the settings to make a darker version which has a bolder effect. I think this way of capturing an image of my work was more successful than photographing with my phone camera because the light and dark contrast has a much stronger impact 




I experimented with adding detail using white pen over the dark areas and black marker over the light area to give the features more definition and I think this captures the binary of positive and negative,  although I think it would look better with more decisive, bold lines



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