[LAUIL603] Studio Brief 2: Timeline of Events

Here is an overview of events to take in consideration for the publication:

4th September 2018 - Change in vision. Like looking through coffee granules sifting in water. Like looking through TV static by the end of the night.

5-6th September 2018 - Further deterioration in vision. Large floaters like black strings across lens, flashing lights, a black curtain pulling across my lens. I needed medical attention. I originally suspected I was exhausted from being a carer to my mum, a stroke survivor, and tending to her needs and two animals, as well as doing all of the house work as well as planning to come back to university and putting those steps in place and packing my things, as well as getting ready to go to a concert and organising everything for that and packing.

6th September - I could no longer ignore what was happening or wish for them to magically get better. I needed help. I don't live near any kind of hospital as I'm on the edge of Salford. I don't have anyone who can drive me anywhere anymore with my mum suffering her severe stroke. She severely disabled and we had to get rid of our car. Waiting for a bus was miserable, but Tami and I went to the Trafford Center where there is a Boots with an opticians. IT's all I could think of doing that was relatively close. 

7th September - Travelling to London for Ghost's Royal Albert Hall show. The black curtain was pulling across my vision so severely and I could barely see a thing. It was a huge struggle checking into the hotel and I didn't even attempt to unpack. That night, I was blind and everything was black.

8th September 2018 - Ghost show (my favourite band) at the Royal Albert Hall in London with meet and greet. The black curtain had completely drawn over my vision meaning that my retina had completely detached and peeled away at this point. I had to stay as safe as possible and ensure I wasn't knocked in any way. Everyone was kind and considerate from the band, crew, and audience. After the show had ended I knew that trains would have stopped running and I'd need to somehow problem-solve what to do next. Someone suggested the Magic Bus service to me. No seats were left and I had to wait for a bus for one available seat next to the driver. I'd travelled alone in the night, with Tami, from London to Manchester and tried to make myself as comfortable as possible. The driver was considerate to my situation and let me know every major city that we passed through. My phone had died upon arriving into Manchester so the next issue was trying to get help in ordering a taxi to the hospital.

9th September 2018 - 7am emergency surgery at Manchester Royal Eye Hospital to reattach my retina.

10th September 2018 - Discharged from Manchester Royal Eye Hospital and sent home with eye drops to help the healing process and the pressure in my eyes. I struggled to use them on my own. My mum is a severe stroke survivor, with little mobility or coordination - especially in her hands, so struggled to help me too.

11th September 2018 - My operated eye was so incredibly swollen, painful and an angry red. It had a tight feeling about it. It didn't feel right to be feeling this way so I ordered a taxi back to the hospital. After going to the eye A&E department, the pressure in my eye was too high and would need operating on. Ideally I would not be awake for this surgery but the nurse received miscommunication about then my surgery was and so I was confused too and gave me something to eat. My eye needed operating on though, so I went under local anaesthetic while I was awake and had needles poked into my eyes. It was like white hot pokers in my eye while the pressure escaped out. It was the worst pain I've ever felty and wouldn't wish it on anybody.

After my second emergency surgery, I stayed in hospital for a number of weeks to help posture my retina correctly and to administer my eye drops at the correct times of the day as I couldn't see to do it as a newly blind person. When my positioning period was satisfactory and over, I could then go home, pack as best as I could and move to student accommodation to start my second year of university. Ideally I wouldn't have been doing this at all given the circumstances but the accommodation were not forgiving of my medical circumstances as I was locked into a contract. I had also the student loans to think about and university and felt a huge amount of pressure to go, and make up for the year I had already taken out to look after my mum.

7th December 2018 - I transferred to St. James in Leeds to have check-ups on my eyes, and it was discovered that the retina was detaching in my other eye while they looked in. Retinal detachment is seen as a medical emergency, even though I was already blind in that eye it still needs attaching. An emergency surgery was booked for the next availability. 

10th December 2018 - Third emergency surgery. The retina had detached differently in my right eye so a silicone buckle had to be inserted into my retina to keep everything in place. At first it wanted to reject and made everything very difficult for me.

5th February 2019 - Fourth and final emergency surgery. A membrane had grown over my left eye which was still preventing me from seeing. Stitches were placed in my eye, instead of the inky gas bubble I'd come to know from my previous 3 surgeries. I really struggled with these stitches and two became very stubborn to dissolve as they became deeply embedded into my eye. 

After being discharged, I didn't feel very well. I got very cold and lost track of time. Guide Dogs had rang me on the phone to make sure I was okay and to see if Tami could come home after my surgery but I was distant and fallen asleep on them. Concerned, they rang my GP. He came to visit and evaluated me. He rang for an ambulance and I was put onto a frailty ward. 

16th February 2019: I had suffered a post-operative infection and had my bloods regularly monitored. 11 days later, I finally go home and heal. I was still suffering with the stitches in my eyes which would send shooting pains down my eyes and face like lava.

March 2019 - April 2019 - Stitches in my eyes were very stubborn but after some prompting with eye drops from my surgeon to speed up the process, were finally dissolved. I had missed the majority of the academic year and needed to reapply. 

Potential content for the zine:

What is a retina? What does it do?

The retina is a layer of cells that line the back wall inside the eye. It senses light and sends signals to the bran to that you can see.

What is retinal detachment?

Retinal detachment is where the retina peels away from its underlying layer of support tissue. It is a surgical emergency and without immediate treatment can lead to vision loss and blindness.

Next Steps:

• Collecting my photographs from my camera roll and compiling into a digital photo album.

•Collecting my instagram posts and statuses of the time. 

• Continuing the physical output/briefs and enjoying the experimentation process.

[LAUIL603] Studio Brief 2: Tutorial with Pat and Reflection

 Notes from Tutorial:

• I discussed the lack of disabled and blind artists in the creative industries and how it was difficult for me to navigate and uncover any blind artists to properly research the work of for this project.

• One such artist, John Bramblitt, came up in my search a number of times and brought up a number of flags for me. He can tell what a colour is by "feeling the paint" - one such news outlet reports. This is misleading and creates all sorts of problems for the blind community. We are not a commodity with this kind of superpower and cannot tell the colour of paints by their thickness. Either this was misquoted or John is fabricating his abilities. This is not what blindness is. While there is a heightened sense of awareness to touch sensitivity, as a means of navigating the world, we don't become a superhero like this and it is dangerous to harbour this kind of thinking. Many blind people also have a small degree of sight, whether that is light perception, colour perception, shadows. Only a tiny percentage see nothing at all.

• Blindness is rarely an issue with the eyes. Something else is happening whether it is the optic nerve or the brain. In my case, it isn't my retinal detachment that caused me to go blind but the complications surrounding it - constant high ocular pressure resulting in early glaucoma, fluid at the back of the eye, and scar tissue.

• How do blind people see colour? There are phone apps and tech devices (Google glasses, Orcam) that can detect colour and say it aloud. We ask people we trust if we are unsure of something and there are apps such as Be My Eyes where we are paired to sighted volunteers in real time. I have used it a number of times for helps with various things such as labels. Thickness of paint is misleading but John has been the first blind painter in many galleries in New York. He paints perfect representations of animals which says nothing about his experiences of blindness. He has some sight to be able to capture these shapes accurately. It's frustrating.

• Do I want my publication to educate the sighted audience reading the contents in the way I have educated Pat? Do I want to reflect on my own experiences and tell that story through text and image? COP work provides a good starting point and foundation of where the publication can go.

• Pat suggests thinking of how to implement and experiment with text. Text could turn to Braille towards the end, disappearing completely to make the audience think and engage about what that could mean for them.

Reflection and Next Steps:

I'm quite nervous at this stage to get started. I have a clear idea of what I would like to do, and that there is a gap in the field of disability for blind artists in order to do it, and on a wider scale in terms of disabled artists, but I feel a pressure to represent myself - and others - accurately and authentically. I think it is important to make a note of that. 

In my COP work, identified in the Project Proposal Slides that were presented during this tutorial, I used very low-cost materials, such as oil pastels and charcoal on paper, to work through the trauma of going blind whilst also trying to represent what I can see. Everything was done in one take and very quickly. I am keen for my final major project to be a continuation of my COP work but I would also like to push myself so I am not stuck in the same ways of creating this year. This is my final year and so I want to utilise the facilities to he best of my abilities despite the lockdown. My New Years Resolution is to paint on canvas.

There is an esteem and a class barrier that surrounds canvas painting so there is another confidence issue I need to work past.

I need to keep myself on track with producing at least two paintings per week during this brief, so that I have a wide portfolio to select from when it comes to creating the publication.

I'm feeling rather down at present. I'm feeling the Festive blues, and I'm still without my Guide Dog and finding it very difficult to engage with the course and with anything at all. Depression has a way of disconnecting you from absolutely everything and you do it without realising. I ignore emails and all messages that are sent to me and cut myself off so I can grieve and try to heal, but ultimately it creates more problems. Tami was due to come home on January 5th but the new lockdown has meant that we cannot retrain until the lockdown is lifted just to be safe. But when will that be? I find little enjoyment in anything except painting so will try to use that to my advantage as much as I possibly can. 

[LAUIL603] Studio Brief 2: First Canvas Paintings and Reflection

 

The first brief I wanted to set myself was to paint onto canvas for the very first time and to continue this throughout the module so that I have a range of paintings to choose from for my final publication. 

Coming from the Access to HE course, and experiencing a range of disciplines in one place, I had witnessed someone create their own canvas in the 3D/wood workshop and paint it for their final exhibition. I thought no more of it as that didn't align with my practice at the time - someone who wanted to create children's books and had a specific way of achieving that with digital illustration. 

Now that I have reached a way of working that involves abstract expressionism, in a way to heal myself from the trauma I've been through - to create mindfully and in an accessible way - the canvas has become an intriguing option, albeit a scary one!

There is this invisible barrier around the canvas and around oils that has surrounded these materials for many, many years because of gender and class. Oils on canvas are seen as the fundamentals of Fine Art, with associations of high class and high society, the "ivory tower", and are therefor almost untouchable. It was also very much a man's tools where women weren't allowed to go. There are invisible pressures and barriers that I had to mentally work past in order to reach this point and feel like I could paint onto a canvas. While I am not using oils at this stage, partly for monetary reasons, I would like to build up to that one day. For now I am using acrylic paints though have invested in a good quality Liquitex set. I started with a cheap set of readymade canvases from Amazon - flat-backed, without a frame, and easy to be delivered in the pandemic, extremely affordable to my budget as a student and someone from a working class background, and to help me overcome any hangups about painting onto a canvas. If it doesn't work out then I haven't lost out too much and can return to working on textured paper.

I have attempted to convey two elements of blindness onto canvas - high ocular pressure in the first canvas painting and flashing lights before retinal detachment in the second canvas. It was a very strange, yet tactile, experience. Something about it was very physical, very involved... As with anything, this will take some getting used to and more practice to become second-nature and more comfortable.

What could be better? I definitely over-blended in my first canvas painting and some of the strokes and information were lost in the process. I harboured a lot of self-doubt and second guessed every move when I should just let it flow, which is understandable for a very first canvas painting, so ended up with something very naive and juvenile. In the second canvas painting, I didn't gesso the initial surface to see what would happen. I wanted to try using a palette knife for the first time - hitting lots of goals here! This resulted in a very textural painting with very rough and harsh visual language and mark-making. Ultimately, it was incredibly hard to work with as the acrylic paint didn't travel far across the canvas without grounding it first. This will be something to note in the future. Gesso is important!

[LAUIL603] Studio Brief 2: Project Proposal Slides

[LAUIL603] Studio Brief 2: Project Proposal

My final major project aims to capture my lived experience (from September 2018 onwards) of double retinal detachment as accurately, honestly, and authentically as possible. Through a multidisciplinary approach I aim to make sense of what happened, during a highly traumatic time, to my vision and try to project what I am able to see now. I will take the viewer on a journey through my blind lens.

It is engaging and impactful as, from my research, very little else exists like this in the world that is easily accessible. While disabled artists exist, and to a much lesser extent, blind artists, this kind of work is not readily available to sighted people - let alone that is from the hand of a blind maker. It holds incredible value, personal significance, and aura.

It is relevant to my practice as a blind artist as the double retinal detachment and events surrounding it affected my ability to finish my studies at the time and continue to illustrate in the first instance. It affected every aspect of my life and I needed to rebuild myself and problem solve how I do everything - including making art.

This project will incorporate a series of abstract expressionist paintings to portray my blindness, a direction I have found myself headed in this past year. The new specialist skills I wish to employ for this project include painting onto canvas. I wish to push myself away from painting, albeit naively, on paper and card stock and onto something with more esteem and value that can be exhibited. This will afford me specialist and profession skills upon and beyond graduation.

The strategy I wish to employ for this project are as follows - to adhere to three briefs in an open studio format to allow for experimentation and exploration of the blind lens:

• Brief 1: To paint at least TWO abstract expressionist paintings per week, conveying my blind lens, for the digital publication.

• Brief 2: To produce a series of experimental monoprints, incorporating Braille print.

• Brief 3: To produce a series of experimental monoprints, conveying a blind lens.

• Content: This will be authorial, educational content of lived events. It aims to be innovative and ambitious. 

• Context: Publishing and design. It is relevant at a time when disability is still overlooked and is not at the forefront of representation, when it should be in this day and age.

• Processes: Lens, abstract expressionist painting on canvas, poetry. It is challenging and skilful and aims to push me beyond the foundation I built in the Context of Practice module. 

I am looking to the abstract expressionist field of contemporary practice, drawing inspiration from Jackson Pollock's drip paintings, and other such painters such as Joan Mitchell and Willem de Kooning, to inform the visual language and surface texture of my canvases to give the impression of floaters and decaying sight before detachment.

A potential output will be a digital publication or Zine housing my monoprint experiments, canvas paintings, poetry, photographs, and reflections as a blind person. I want to keep outcomes open at this stage as I have locked myself into a set of definitive outcomes in the past and found it difficult to commit to demanding deliverables. I want to keep it broad to allow for experimentation and surprise. I work best with breathing space where I can enjoy the process of making, and experience the opportunity that painting onto a canvas can afford me - freedom. I will reflect on my progress regularly and monitor next steps in the project.

[LAUIL603] Studio Brief 1: Final Reflection

My choice of briefs were well-selected and appropriate to my abilities as an abstract expressionist artist who wants to retain and apply this way of working as much as possible, while also pushing out of my comfort zone through image-making, shape, dimensions, limited colour palette, and moving image.

Electives 2 was truest to my way of working in a very open studio format using a range of methods to problem solve the brief and respond to an appropriate piece of music. What does Salford represent? What are the fundamentals? How can I convey that through texture and colour? With the university facilities closed due to the pandemic and with the November lockdown, I had to work out how to screen print and monoprint at home in a very DIY and homemade way. It deeply embedded and imbued those values of graft that the working class people of Salford, and the wider North, hold dear: giving a greater meaning and connection to the work I was creating.

I found that the greatest surprise was Electives 3, the animated GIF brief. I struggled at first to come up with an idea for a signifier/visual identity/branding/logo and I continued to push it and reduce the shapes and forms. It became very naive and simple, hard to recognise in some instances, but was also a very overdone idea in the rock and metal community. To "throw the horns" is the crux of everything in mental music, created by Ronnie James Dio who is a dear and iconic figure to us, and I tried to do something with it but found that I couldn't quite solve that problem in an image-based way. Taking a different approach through responding to music, staying authentic to how I now make work, offered a much more successful outcome. Identifying and contextualising a font and colour palette gave greater success to this brief.

My ability to problem-solve the briefs in good time, with consideration for limited colour palette, the specifications, and what I find value in - my heritage of Salford, married through my love of music, worked to my advantage. I tried to put music at the heart of all three of the briefs by either responding to music (electives 2 and 3) and including music motifs (electives 1 with the Salford Lads Club - an iconic building in relation to the Smiths - and Joy Division's album cover Unknown Pleasures.)

What could have been different or better? I have realised that I find it incredibly difficult to work to a brief as I don't work in an illustrative mindset anymore. This is no longer my way of working as I no longer identify as an illustrator. I consider myself an artist, or painter, and I work in a very open-mode way. There are still parameters in place in terms of canvas dimensions, the colours I'm using, the song I'm listening to - but anything goes. It's difficult to make this kind of work on a computer. The work I make now is very open and abstract and anything can happen in that one take. The vulnerability and authenticity excites me, rather than planning in a sketchbook as before.

With the animated GIF, I struggled with a successful logo that wasn't a generic fist throwing the horns. I couldn't quite solve that visual problem as it didn't interest me or align with my practice. There was the possibility of being more elaborate and adventurous in the branding through animation but I made it work for my level of vision and my way of working in abstract ways responding to music and the songs on the playlist. The same with Joy Division's Unknown Pleasures for the final stamp in Electives 1. I don't work in an image-based or visual way, I prefer to make abstract work and work through feelings so lost interest in solving the problem. 

[LAUIL603] Studio Brief 1: Electives 3 - GIF for DJ

 

Reflection:

What worked well? This brief challenged me a lot and it's often valuable to be pushed out of one's own comfort zone to learn new skills and not settle into a place of complacency. This brief surprised me in what I was able to achieve. I struggled at first to deliver a logo or concept. I wanted to do something with "throwing the horns," which is at the heart of everything rock and metal - but trying different approaching, reducing the shapes, and so on, made it become unreadable. It's also an, admittedly, unoriginal idea that has been overdone in the industry. My greatest success was listening to the playlist and responding to each song individually with charcoal - capturing the sounds through movements which I could then use as individual frames, almost telling a story and narrating the show. 

What could be better? If I had the time, I could have explored the font more and even created my own. I enjoyed making my own font last year in the Dracula brief as I traced around my hands and nails to created claw-like shapes. It was both accessible with my level of vision and successful in being legible. What could I have achieved with more time in this brief? I settled with using a royalty-free version of Iron Maiden's font - one of the most recognisable band logos in the world. It is important to note that this is from dafont.com and is for personal use only, not to be used on any sort of commercial products which should be fine for a small podcast.

[LAUIL603] Studio Brief 1: Electives 2 - Heritage Space

 

Reflection:

What worked well? I continued with the starting point from the previous electives brief, creating stamps in response to my heritage, and the identified successful colour palette of green, orange and brown that easily tells the story of Salford's architecture. Another aspect that worked well was the exploration of visual language through texture and how I could interpret rough surfaces, bricks and smoke using brushes and found materials. My ability to push the idea further and problem solve, in response to the pandemic and university's facilities being closed, was also a positive factor. I created my own ways to screen print and mono print at home - reinforcing the values and ethos of the people of Salford - hardworking, dedicated and grafting.

 I much preferred this brief as opposed to the stamp brief. This suits my way of working, in an abstract expressionist and open-most fashion, much more than working to particular specifications. I'm not really an illustrator anymore and prefer to paint and create textures that can be interpreted. 

What could be improved? The university facilities are currently closed due to the lockdown. Testable processes, such as screen printing with proper inks and monopriting with a press, could improve the responses and the visual language within taking them to different, more valuable, places.

[LAUIL603] Studio Brief 1: Electives 1 - Heritage Stamps

 

Reflection:

For the first electives, I chose to answer the stamps brief. I'm incredibly proud of my heritage of being from a working class background and from a city such as Salford that is rich in music history, art, and graft of the people. 

What went well? Working with a limited and striking colour palette of 3 colours (orange, green and brown - with white) worked incredibly well, and simple shapes of the first two stamps provide easy signifiers of Salford through architecture of the Salford Lads Club and Matchstick Men and Dogs What didn't work? The final stamp was very difficult for me to problem solve of the Unknown Pleasures album cover from Joy Division. I tested two approaches to line - in a scribbly effect and in a thicker, more uniform way, and I'm not sure how successful either are. The album cover is so easily recognisable that to alter the precision of the lines in any way starts to unpick the visual language of what it is and what it says. It no longer becomes easily identifiable as the Joy Division cover and therefor associated with Salford.

In the session with Ben I had started working to another brief, in responding to Dirty Old Town by the Dubliners, and can answer that brief separately in Electives 2.