Art & Technology in Lockdown
With limited options to going out, many of us have turned to technology. Whether it has been to…
follow a YouTube lesson to make a mask or live drawing class
use Zoom to work from home or meet up with family
find online recipes so that you can use ingredients in your kitchen
or maybe even follow virtual tours of galleries or museums
…we have all had to spend more time on our computers.
So now is a good time to find out what some of the BEAT artists have been doing on theirs during lockdown.
Artists Houria Niati, Victoria Williams and Bronwen Dace share their experiences.
Houria Niati
Houria Niati has been using digital art alongside the media of painting, poetry, performance and music. Her digital work documents her own multicultural history. She uses old family photographs like snippets of the past, hidden behind a veil of whimsical calligraphy in English, French and Arabic texts, based on her own poetry. She is driven by an interest in the way people adapt to their environment and become one with it.
“I don’t escape from my engagement as an artist to the challenges that the world is facing now; wars, global warming, immigration, refugees and the gap between poor and rich.”
Her series, ‘Haunted...Self Portrait with a Difference’, was specifically created for The Venice Biennial 2015. The works were printed by ‘giclée’ on canvas.
“I used my camcorder to take pictures of a composition that I made on the wall, adding more and more photos from my family background and from my own paintings, ultimately finishing with my self-portrait. I was going deeper and deeper into my history. When I feel it is finished, I will use my computer to edit and save it and then I send it to the giclée printer. In a sense it is a kind of ritual to allow me to create the series to re-question my identity.”
See more of Houria’s artwork at: www.hourianiati.com
‘The Agony & the Ecstasy’
Victoria Williams
Victoria Williams (Wilde and Sinclair) says “I used to make greeting cards by hand. However, this proved very time consuming, so I decided to buy a drawing tablet and teach myself the basics of digital art in order to design illustrated cards. I do not have a design or graphics background so learning about dots per inch, aspect ratios and so on took some doing - several years on and I am still learning! One of the things I like best about digital art is that I can create one illustration, and then have it printed on lots of different surfaces – paper, ceramic, fabric – as cards, prints, home décor and clothing. I also love that my drawing tablet allows me to choose from a range of tools and finishes. For example, if I am drawing a whimsical illustration then I use the drawing pencil tool as this gives a soft, childlike feel with a nostalgic quality whereas if I draw something with a Gothic feel, I plump for the oil paint tool as this gives deep, bold colours. I tend to draw wildlife - each of my little creatures has their own personality so I try to match the character to the tool.”
Find out more about Wilde & Sinclair at:: www.instagram.com/wildeandsinclair
Bronwen Dace
Bronwen Dace started learning Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator so she could pursue her interest in repeated patterns, but a few courses later she switched to making digital collages instead.
“Much of my work came out of a visit to the V&A where I fell in love with the shapes and decorations in the ceramics displays. My collages include imagery from my own paintings or prints together with photos I take of the things that excite me. Looking at the imagery, you could say there is a theme emerging – natural forms being confined within a vessel which is appropriate to our situation now.”
See Bronwen’s digital art and original paintings at: www.bronwen-dace-art.com
‘Collage of Kew Flowers with Birds’