Part B: Visiting an exhibition

The gallery I will be visiting for the Part B of my Arts Award is going to be Pete McKee's gallery "Month Of Sundays" because I am interested in Pete's work liking art with a humorous aspect rather than serious work with a complex meaning. I’ll also be interview Pete himself so this will help me understand his work better.

I especially like his work because he puts a piece of writing with it to explain it which all adds to the humour, but I think it wouldn't be as funny to people who don't live in Sheffield or the north because the art work is like an inside joke and related very much to being working class and has echoes of old industry like steel working and mining....well that’s how I see it.

The gallery was great. It was set up just like a house and it felt so homely and comfortable .There was a kitchen and a living room full of his art work and this spread over two floors. We were greeted by a brolly bucket which was much needed as it was chucking it down outside and the staff and Pete were really nice and welcoming.

I took pictures of the work I liked (which was practically everything!) and I also took pictures of the tags that went with them. The prices seemed to be really high for prints (anything from £300-£2000) but it was really good art so I don't blame him. On the street when you can see it you are immediately drawn to it. A beautiful pastel turquoise with a McKee dog above the sign saying "A month of Sundays", it subliminally gives you an idea of what Pete's work is about. Check my interview out to hear with Peter had to tell me about his brilliant work:

Day Five

I came in late today because I went to the doctors whom gave me a prescription for a mass of pills to take.....I'll forget about them. I had a chat to Sammy C (Mr. Cawthorne) about working here I was like "errrrrrrm" I didn't really know what to say, but on the bright side ITS FRIIIIDDDAAAYYYY! the only day of the week when I can act like a complete nutter and get away with it (: I'm interviewing Pete McKee next Thursday and also going to his gallery "A Month Of Sundays" as part of my arts award. In the morning all I basically did was update my "The arts award" piece of my blog.

At lunch I went out and took a few (literally) pictures of people flopping over for my art project and then edited them on Photoshop.

After that we spent ages looking at facebook groups for Josh's part D which was to get some facebook titles and take pictures of the text next to where it would fit in around town (:

Day Four :D

Sooooooo...

Today I was a little late...not because I overslept..but because I couldn't find a key for my house, my mum kindly stole my key away from me so i was rushing all over my house trying to find one, so I resulted in using the front door which hasn't been opened in about ten years so that was fun trying to open that.

And yesterday after work when me, Bethany and Tom (my boyfriend who looks hilarious in a suit I may add) were walking to the bus stop, we got harassed by some guy trying to persuade us to do kung fu, so I gave him a Chinese burn and a drop kick...


.....not really.....



Film editing is a real winner of passing the time, literally. It takes ages to upload a video I drunk my own weight in tea! so we watched video's of LED sheep, a flying lawnmower and a death metal rooster.

What I’ve done today is edit a video, write some questions to use in an interview, eat a cupcake, feel sick after eating the cupcake and sort out which gallery I’m visiting and reviewing and what I’m doing for my arts award.

Day Three (:

Okay so there are some photo's that are nice of me anyway that we did in the studio (: I got into town really early this morning so I got a caramel macchiato (...I think that how you spell it) from starbucks (: so now I'm more awake then yesterday too which is a bonus ;) I’m not usually early for anything so I’m finding being early really weird.
Oh and luckily there were no talks today yayyy :) so my brain is relaxed so ideas can flow into my head easier so that I can organise better and now I have a better idea about what I’m doing.

Firstly today Vicky talked through Photoshop with us and now that I have really got to grips with it I LOVE it so I think I’ll get a macbook and Photoshop for myself at home... if I beg...

So I edited some photos that we shot yesterday so they don't look too bad anymore, my hair still looks horrible from last weekend though :/ but my eyes are bigger than I thought, I like photography on a plain white background because I think that it has a really good effect when you only concentrate on the detain of one thing

Vicky went through the "taking part in the arts" ideas and I came up with some good ideas. She also gave us ideas about artists that we could interview and personally I LOVE Pete McKee's work, it makes me laugh and I basically like ANYTHING that will make me laugh, I also like Maurizo Cattelan's work too because most of that makes me laugh :) So today I’m mainly trying to think "outside the box" and come up with a REALLY good idea, I have a few good notes so I'm torn.

I like the idea of doing some stop motion or a slideshow and Photoshop because that something new that I have never worked with before and I think that I could do some good stuff with it :)

Part A: My challenge

For my challenge I have learned and experimented with Photoshop making serious and subtle changes to photos and merging them together for my final project. I also wanted to create a final slide show learnignt o bput my images together using panning and music in a piece of software called Photo Magico.

In this two weeks I have managed to learn most of the tools and how to use them such as the filters, contrast, selections, layers, colour correction, sharpening and blurring, cloning tool and how to merge layers. I have had the focus of my final Part D project images which has really helped me improve and apply my skills.

I’ve also improved my general photography skills taking into account the "rule of thirds" in composition and this is reflected in my final project too.

I’m pleased with how my new skills are reflected in my finial project work. Both the set of images I edited and the slideshow I created. I feel confident I’ve learnt some solid new skills for the future.

Day Two :)

i'm tired and cold :(

im happy to listen to people's stories don't get me wrong but I’ve had about 3 hours of it today! I want to do stuff cause when I do stuff I’m being creative but at the moment I’m doing nothing :/

When we went to the exhibit downstairs and we entered a room with just a little video thing the first thing that came to my mind was "oh my gosh" my back hurt and being stood up bored for 15 minutes isn't good. I like photography...actually no, I LOVE IT, but I don't like Photoshop as I have no idea how to go about using it. Vicky says I’ll get to grips with it. We’ll see.

We met a producer guy called Rob Sparanza from SYFN (South Yorkshire Filmmakers Network) who produces short film's which are often scary and action packed. The one he showed me WILL give me nightmares as I hate scary films and in the middle of it, it made me want to cry it was so scary; I was scared watching "Shaun of the dead". I’m that bad at watching them.

WE also met artist Richard Bolam who did an abstract video of the big wheel in Sheffield and he might make it into a video for the 2013 Sheffield city of culture in the future.

We did some filming and some photography (which I looked horrible on!) I had previously dyed my hair so it's a horrid colour because I usually dye it lighter for my holidays. The filming was good because I've done some filming previously with my granddad and I was hoping to see my boyfriend wearing a suit at the train station so me and Bethany could laugh at him but unfortunately we didn't :( oh well we got some great shots of water and pigeons ;)

Day One :)

Woke up in my drowsy surreal state at 7.30 in the morning and casually glanced at my blackberry to have received a text from my boyfriend "Waiting outside the bus stop in the pouring rain on the way to the train station to get to chesterfield, where are you?" hahaha, I smiled at the thought that I only needed 2 hours to get to my work experience and that I could have a lay in :)

After dealing with wet feet and taking ages to find an umbrella; I was on the bus filled to the brim with old people and shady looking characters (great start to the day), I decided to pick up a metro so I fitted into this "work" lifestyle. Ahhh 15 minutes early I thought to myself BLOODY BRILLIANT! the traffic wasn't as bad as I first anticipated :/ so I went to get a nice cup of tea (:

Once I was in the building with people whom I have never met in my life! we were all sat in silence not making eye contact when Bethany called me ....."I’m lost!". Typical, the only person I know on my work experience is lost; so I gave directions and she arrived 20 minutes later :)

Walking up a mass' of steps later; 'Oooh macbooks! Ain’t this place posh!' my brain said to me as I walked into a big white room at the top floor of Site gallery. After meeting Vicky we all received lots of paper, folders, and best of all NAME TAGS! we then went through the boring task of learning about health and safety; we then took a little tour around the gallery :) I then interviewed Lucy and got to know her better :)

At lunch I went to starbucks with Bethany and Harriet :)....that about it for lunch... Oh we met Hannah too who is also doing work exp in town.

We then met artist Lesley Guy who talked about different artists (Berini,John Stezikar, Susan Hilliar, Michael Borremans, To Maraz,Chris Ofilli, David Altejd, Mark Manders and her own work) I learnt about contemporary art and how it is basically art which is going on now (modern) and reflects on many different things by taking an everyday object or way of life and twisting it such as Altemejd who used a childlike aspect of someone's imagination and used cheap materials, and Borremans who used art to express how people use their hands in a magical way. I also learnt that many pieces of art are based on religion such as Bernene's piece of sculpture which was commissioned by the pope and Stezikar's art also has a religious affect by combining a Jesus story from the bible mixed with an aspect of the 21st century.

After receiving a mass amount of information and a headache we edited our interviews and I was surprised how many times I said "uuuuurrrrmmmmm" so I cut them all out :) so now I sound like a celebrity on Alan Carr Chatty Man who knows they're life story off by heart :)