Level 2 Painting - Week 5

For my folios this year, I have decided that my broad idea is to focus on the idea of light and dark. To build on that large concept, I will particularly be focusing on the theme of love and hate.
I have been researching a few different art genres and I one that really suits my ideas is impressionism. Post impressionism has many aspects which I would like to incorporate into my artwork, such as texture, vibrant colour and also giving an alternative view of an image. I feel as though post-impressionism is a way of sharing a different perspective of a scene which is your own - its how you see it and manipulated to how you want to share it with everyone else. This art genre originated from the impressionism, however, post-impressionists moved away from the normal and went past the limits of what impressionism is supposed to be. By passing the limits, I mean breaking through from traditional subject matter, introducing brighter and more vibrant colours, and more ambitious expression. A post-impressionism artist who I feel displays the concept of personal perspective is Vincent van Gogh. Van Gogh's work really captures my attention and that is something I want in my artwork. I want people to be interested in it. The texture he uses in his art fascinates me in how it clear objects can be seen, but they are also not too clear. The texture allows distortion in objects, encouraging an audience to figure the objects for themselves. A simple example of this is from one of his most well known pieces The Starry Night. In the oil painting, texture is used to make stars look bigger and brighter compared to how we normally see them, yet we still see them as stars. They don't look normal, but they are definitely recognisable.

My perspective of the world at this point in time is that there is a lot of hate. Hate rules the world in my eyes. The hate ranges from jealousy between two people, to war between two countries. Sometimes, the hateful feeling is just there without a real reason. It seems so easy to hate compared to being able to love. My point is, is that if it is so easy to dislike one another, why is it that we find it so difficult to like one another.
My idea is to show the current society the world is experiencing - on both small and large scales - and it progressing into what I want to see. I want to see is things like people being happy for each other, not jealousy, more positivity shared around, and rather than countries fighting against each other over nothing reasonable, why can't they just work together to help everyone to live out the lives they deserve.
The world as I see it now isn't the greatest place and I have no idea why so many people are abusing the greatest privilege of all - living. A few world leaders are some of the greatest people at picking out every little thing which they think is wrong, and finding a destructive way of getting rid of it. Things like 'I don't trust those people, bomb them' or 'That country is closer than I'd like, let's build a wall' are thoughts which come to mind when certain important people are mentioned. I understand the possible trust issues in between countries and people, but I feel as though that people have forgotten that there are kind hearts in this world. Stereotyping is something which I feel occurs so often - towards ethnicities, genders, and even just the colour of your skin - that I feel it encourages those stereotypical things to be seen more. Some people are different to their culture. Some woman still find it difficult to feel strength with men just bringing them down with their greater strength - not physical strength, but societal strength. But then on the other hand, males have feelings too, and it is stereotypical to say that men don't have such strong feelings towards some situations, but do people really think that boys are born without a sad bone in their body? It is a very large circle of how society works in my eyes. I purely just think it is unfair to prevent the innocent from living.
As a part of my work to help portray my whole idea, I want to use a single flower on a hill, all alone. In the beginning, the flower will look as though they are dead, and as the folio progresses, the flower will come back to life and there will be more flowers alongside it - kind or like a group of people coming together. The reason behind this is because I feel that by being kinder to each other, it could mean that we are being kinder to Earth itself. Also, to tie in the use in 'light and dark', I think it is only right to give use more dull, dark colours to represent the dull, dark world at this point in time. As I continue to develop the world in how i want to see it, I will begin to incorporate a more vibrant colour palette.
Therefore, the idea I want to use is positivity and the affect it could have on the world.