TRIANGLE PROJECT: TRIPTYCH

Triptych paper published on TRACEY

2008-10-17T06:09:00.003Z

The full and illustrated paper titled Δ: A Collaborative Practice-based Research Project: Reflecting on Drawing Practice as Knowledge is now available on TRACEY

Triptych Paper

2007-11-20T09:52:00.001Z

Triptych
[*illustration: indicates where an image will be inserted from the blog]

Triptych is a collaborative research group originated by Kingston University, Loughborough University and the Dublin Institute of Technology (DIT) in 2005.

Triptych’s strategic intention is to improve the recognition, use and understanding of drawing pedagogy, whilst investigating the use and application of drawing in professional practice.

Practice and theory will be explored to contribute to knowledge of the act of drawing. This includes investigation of diverse and contemporary aspects of the fine arts, design, built environment, pedagogy and theory on drawing.

Triptych is built upon the research interests and expertise of its members. This can be evidenced not only through individual practice based research but also in projects such as TRACEY (Loughborough), Drawing – The Process (Kingston, to be followed by Drawing - The Purpose) and The DrawingLab (DIT).

‘Δ’: A Collaborative Practice-based Research Project:
Reflecting on Drawing Practice as Knowledge
Leo Duff, Brian Fay, Siún Hanrahan, Phil Sawdon, Andrew Selby: October 2007

Triptych, as a research group, is built upon the interests and expertise of its members and the diversity that exists at each institution is multiplied by bringing three drawing-centred research groups together. After an initial meeting in January 2006 (IMMA) of most of the researchers involved in Triptych, ‘Δ’ was selected as a common focus that might lay the ground for the emergence of shared interests. Each member of Triptych was to respond to this mark in a way that made sense in the context of her/his practice, and to record this on a project blog (http://triangleprojecttriptych.blogspot.com). There are twenty-two project contributions/research conversations, on the blog, made by a total of twenty-three individuals.

Jake Abrams, Alastair Adams, Bernadette Burns, Simon Downs, Leo Duff, Sarah Dyer, Brian Fay, Cathy Gale, Joe Hanly, Siún Hanrahan, Mark Harris, Deborah Harty/Phil Sawdon, Anna Macleod, Adriana Ionascu, John Mayock, Liz Minichiello, Mario Minichiello, Nick Rodgers, Andrew Selby, John Short, Kerry Walton, Yijia Wang

I
Reviewing the blog, the ‘Δ’ mark, prompted in the first instance by the tripartite constitution of the research group, seemed an apt metaphor to anchor a reflection upon the initial stages of this unusual research collaboration. At a general level, taken as a directional metaphor – an arrowhead pointing in different directions – it captures a sense of the diversity of practices and interests brought to the project through its members. Not only do the members come from a range of different art and design disciplines (illustration, textiles, typography, graphic design, fine arts, and critical theory) but the nature of their interests within a given discipline and consequent approaches to drawing are also different. Within their collaborative contribution to the project, Sawdon and Harty explore something of the challenges posed by this diversity in visiting and revisiting ‘you, me and us’, the question being what ‘us’ might mean. *Illustration

Further, if that directional metaphor is reread as an expansive spatial metaphor, attention is drawn to the ubiquity of drawing that makes it, as a ground for collaboration, somewhat arbitrary. The coming together of this research group is unusual in its open-endedness; it was an experiment to see if three groups of researchers, each based within a particular institution, could, in fact, collaborate in some meaningful way as well as to find potential strands for individuals from each institution to link and contribute within smaller pockets. The collaboration emerged because key people within each of the institutions’ drawing research groups happened to know each other, happened to believe that they might have a similar approach to collaborative ventures, and so decided to see whether some sort of collaboration could be devised, sustained and deliver meaningful research outcomes. The real test – meaningful research outcomes – has yet to come but the project has been remarkable thus far in having been productively sustained. Following several smaller meetings, the formal launch of the Triptych research group took the form of a symposium and international public seminar, Drawing Perspectives, at the Irish Museum of Modern Art in January 2006. The agreement to work from the ‘Δ’ mark so that convergences of interest might emerge was agreed, captured through the project blog, and followed up at a second formal meeting of the research group in Loughborough in November 2006. At this point a number of common research themes were identified: artists’ notebooks, observation, process, language and meaning, and narrative.

Whether or not these research themes will generate meaningful outcomes and /or continuing developments will become apparent at a one week practice-based symposium to be held at West Cork Arts Centre, Ireland in November 2007. In the meantime, it is interesting to look at the material generated thus far and captured on the project blog.

II
Convergence

Jeremy Deller (Turner Prize 2004), in the introduction to his work exhibited at Tate Britain, and in particular in relation to the wall drawing The History of the World *Illustration, draws attention to a quotation it contains from Lenin, that “everything is connected to everything else”, and comments that it “could almost be the title of this work because it’s how my brain works in a lot of ways how I try to connect things up, and its how I work as an artist”. Perhaps unsurprisingly, continuities or convergences do emerge in terms of interests, processes and outcomes – yet another ‘Δ’. Indeed, Deborah Harty and Phil Sawdon created actual ‘thought process’ diagrams specifically on the subject as part of their reflection on drawing practice as knowledge; they equated the triangle to ‘you, me and us’ and examine the ways that these three states connect and disconnect. While, Hanly *Illustration talks of the triangle in terms of the rational, the intuitive and the instinctive, and also talks of the third element (side) of the triangle being what happens when two opposites begin to work together/against each other (e.g. black v white = grey).

Convergent interests
One shared interest that emerges from the blog centres on the typographic mark, and juxtaposes the work of Deborah Harty and Phil Sawdon, Cathy Gale, Clare Bell, Simon Downs, and Siún Hanrahan. The nature of each individual’s interest in the typographic mark and their approaches to it vary significantly: there is the play of text, image and concept in the collaborative dialogue of Harty and Sawdon; Gale’s exploration of multiplicities of meaning through a playful approach to the humble ‘graphic device/symbol/icon’, so that a connection is forged between a fascination with ‘X’ and ‘Δ’ through ‘Y’*Illustration; Bell’s interest is as a professional designer and typographic historian and theoretician with a strong interest in the materiality and semiotic significance of typographic forms*Illustration; Downs’s approach is also that of a designer, embracing the challenged posed by a triangle as the foundation for an alphabet*Illustration; the point of connection to the typographic mark for Hanrahan emerges from an interest in the materiality of text, as a resistance to a cultural tendency to see through the text to ‘the meaning’, rather than attending to all the means (including the typographic) by which a text composes meaning*Illustration.

Another shared interest is ‘conversation’, which pulls together the work of Deborah Harty and Phil Sawdon, Siún Hanrahan, Joe Hanly, and Cathy Gale. In the work of Harty and Sawdon the interest is self-evident as the work emerges from and incorporates a conversation *Illustration – about the nature of collaboration, what it is to make a mark, what it is to do research – as well as capturing something of the overlaps, interruptions and silences of conversation in the composition of the work; Hanrahan’ s work is about conversation – conversation serves as a metaphor for the nature of meaning, for its formation in the exchange and contest between people – and emerges from an engagement with texts rather than people, a shortfall to be addressed through Triptych; Hanly’s work traces random triangulationships in a public square outside his studio, a light hearted projection that nonetheless captures something of the complexity of our social constructs*Illustration; for Gale, “meeting and exchanging in (a) space through the language of drawing” is at the heart of her exploration of ‘X’ (where two paths cross, perhaps without meeting, and speech may be prevented) and ‘Y’ (the point at which three paths meet), multiplicity and trialectic.

‘Audience interaction’ is another interest shared by a number of the Triptych members, such as Liz Minichiello, Andrew Selby, and Adriana Ionascu. Minichiello’s work explores the gap (and interaction across that gap) between text and image and between picture storybook and reader*Illustration; Selby sets out, in his research, to explore narrative and the subversion of narrative in the relationship between triptych paintings and viewers/audience; Ionascu too embraces ‘triptych’ as a concept to explore the act of seeing as performative, and as a vehicle to explore the dynamics of viewer-image-maker*Illustration.

An interest in buildings and the changes they undergo is shared by Leo Duff and Anna MacLeod. In reflecting upon her work, Duff describes the “constant demolition and rebuilding and the waxing and waning of the use of buildings in many parts of Ireland”, and indeed throughout the world, as a key theme*Illustration; Macleod’s layered drawings and photographs explore changes in the vernacular architectural landscape and in social interaction in Ireland’s pubs in response to the smoking ban brought in several years ago*Illustration.

Convergent processes
An approach to drawing that explicitly involves a layering process is an important facet of the work of Brian Fay and Leo Duff. In Fay’s work – which focuses upon notions of time, particularly duration, and (literally) traces a relationship between contemporary drawing practice and the work of the Masters – an explicit engagement with layering, multiple images and transparency values is evident in response to ‘Δ’. Fay explores issues around transparency and the use of multiple images increasing use of these in the Triangle project*Illustration. Like Duff his subject matter is to do with existing objects that are affected by the passage of time and the interference of both human and natural acts, thus investigating through the exposure of existing layers and re-interpreting them through a process that builds them up again in the creation of new works. Where Fay uses layers which build immediately on top of one another, referring directly to the reality of the original art work studied, Duff layers conflicting materials, scale and meaning in her subject; the construction and deconstruction of the built environment, “the mix of scale and perspectives, the conflicting amalgamation of drawing and painting materials” that it allows is central to the process of her work and her exploration of our relation to our environment.

The work of John Mayock, Nick Rodgers and Kerry Walton is developed through a process that seeks to harness the capabilities of a particular computer programme, particularly its iterative processes. In the work of Mayock this is part of an ongoing exploration of the active relationship between artistic and scientific processes, and a play with the limits and potential of a specific programme, Photoshop, within a creative drawing process*Illustration; for Rodgers his work begins with an intuitive response (in this case to ‘Δ’), and has developed as an exploration of randomness and resistance to the emergence of an image within the mark making process using a range of programmes such as CAD and Photoshop*Illustration; themes such as “repetition, sequence, tonal gradation, shading and layering, and repetitive use of line and simple geometric forms” lie at the heart of Walton’s work in which the triangle symbol is used to create a range of net-like effects*Illustration.

The notebook is central to the work of John Short, Sarah Dyer and Leo Duff. Observational drawings and sketches, documenting bathers at a famous swimming-site in Dublin, are at the heart of Short’s practice, and are combined to create complex, amusing and whimsically anecdotal watercolours of a particular local community*Illustration. For Dyer, “playing in her sketchbook is key” – in it stories are born, images take shape and characters are created, to be worked up and out into story books*Illustration. In Duff’s work, drawings made in notebooks over years – such as aerial views made during air flights – are the starting point for drawings, and the vehicles for a layering process within her work. For Short and Duff their use of the notebook extends to a shared approach to putting those sketchbooks to work, recording materials as well as logging research information and both combine source images from their notebooks to create a composite whole. A new development in the work of all three through the Triangle project has been has been a move into thinking three dimensionally with drawing, either by the intentional use of folding concertina notebooks by Duff and Dyer to explore connectivity between images , or as a stepping stone to creating three dimensional maquettes formed by cut-out drawn shapes by Short. The other evident link in the notebooks is the sense of purpose, the lack of indulgent musings or tinkering, all three working with determination.

Duff, Dyer and Short are also using the notebook as a vehicle for developmental work, it provides a systematic method for working on one theme or subject. Short on location, Dyer to avoid preconceptions and to seek new places in scale, motion and message when creating a narrative, and Duff for progression of work both in the studio and on location, moving between pocket size/large scale books while researching a theme.

An explicit exploration and reviewing of art historical sources is an approach shared by Brian Fay and Andy Selby. For Fay this involves mapping the traces of time on the cracked surfaces and x-rayed layers of historical paintings, recording its effects on both the materials and supports, and invoking the time of the painting’s creation, the time since the painting was completed and the time of the drawing’s creation; triptych paintings by van Eyck, Daddi, and Giotto are the vehicle for Selby’s exploration of narrative structure, not so much for the wealth of their stories and teachings but for the form through which these stories were illustrated for their audiences.

Convergent outcomes
Unsurprisingly, a number of the outcomes converge around more or less explicit derivations of ‘Δ’:
A curious tangle of triangles emerges from the work of Nick Rodgers, Kerry Walton, Joe Hanly, Jake Abrams, John Mayock, and (to some extent) Yijia Wang*Illustration. (Although most of Wang’s drawings are an oasis of calm, reflecting on notions of stability and instability prompted by ‘Δ’.);
A tripling within the image takes place in the work of Brian Fay, Mario Minichiello*Illustration and John Short;
The triptych format, and its semiotic consequences, is explicitly engaged in the work of Andy Selby and Alastair C. Adams*Illustration.

And yet … (Divergence is undefeated)
Even with these happy convergences, ‘Δ’ is a prickly form, legible as resistance. Within the points of convergence explored above, the differences are often as significant as the similarities. Where the interests converge, the approaches to making work and the works subject matter tend to differ. Where there is something shared in terms of process, the outcome can be significantly quite different. And where the outcomes are comparable, the approach to making the work and, indeed, its purpose, can be very different. The work resists easy equations.

There is clear and present differentiation between a symbol △ and an icon △. Participants in the Triptych research project so far have not as universally questioned or acknowledged this subtle, but important difference, as avidly as they might, allowing for greater repositioning here. Scott McCloud (Understanding Comics, 1993) makes the point in a number of his essays, ostensibly about the grammar and vocabulary of the comic form, but useful to borrow and superimpose here, that graphic forms once simplified away from photographic experiences, can be central to our understanding of deeper and more complex meanings.
This ability to communicate ideas or notions, beyond the chronologically sequential or seemingly logical path, can be said to enable a greater range of interpretations, emotions, experiences to become and remain present in our understanding of what is presented to us. By extension, some of this information is not immediate or primary in function; there are instances of secondary, tertiary or even partial function inherent within both the process of work, as well as the body of output thus far. Slater and Usoh (1994 cited in Understanding Virtual Reality in 2003, 176), explore the notion of interface properties and the suspension of disbelief by referencing that cartoon convention allows for greater theories to be presented to an audience once the veneer of ‘the real’ is stripped away.

In Pierce’s triadic relationship , a sign may create one or more interpretant in one mind. The interpretant depends not only on the representamen, but also on the context in which it is used and on the culture of the user (Mollerup, 1997, 78).
Interpretation does no necessarily imply a language being present, but does identify a series of codes, conditions and, at face value, conventions here that others have questioned, supported where and whenever appropriate, down to those who have ambiguously circum-navigated these notions. Streams of process and narrative would be well placed to challenge these conventions further by identifying individuals, pairings or groups who are inadvertently, or otherwise, using these parameters to frame their contributions.
Participants interpretive use of △ as a symbol or icon might imply that a strand of this appears might follow a quantative research methodology as its core. This indeed could be of significance if we are measuring data with a view to how those artists became involved with the idea of exploring a practice-based outcome centred around △. However, there is more scope to analyse, leading up to and possibly from the Triptych West Cork event, further streams in this argument centred around interpretation and whether this signifies greater meaning or more scope for ambiguity. By placing the creator in the role of the reader, at an earlier stage as part of the developmental concept strands, research surrounding the research question of ‘how has your project evolved in this way?’ become more pertinent to participants and emphasis ids further taken away (not exclusively) from “the outcome”.
III
‘Δ’ metaphor

Turning again to the Triptych project as a whole, the ‘Δ’ metaphor may serve a final purpose in inviting reflection upon the potential of an apparently arbitrary collaboration:
Apex 1: If drawing is so diverse and ubiquitous that it is inherently arbitrary as a sole basis for collaboration (the first apex of a triangle), and
Apex 2: if the will to identify convergences (in the thematic strands that emerged in Loughborough and in this review of the blog material) is a gesture to counteract that arbitrariness, to create the coherence that typically underpins collaboration, then what train of thought might Apex 3 suggest?

A ‘directional’ possibility suggests that the train of thought would concern the outcomes, but these are early days yet. At this stage what we have is a process, and the possibility of reflecting on that. To date the process has been a curious mixture of ‘enthusiasm and commitment’ and ‘confusion and ambivalence’ – reflecting the premises given as Apex 1 and 2 above. The former is reflected in participants’ willingness to put time and effort into meeting up and developing the project along with a reticence to post work on the blog. This is reflected in an overall lack of new work specifically focussed on the agreed theme posted on the blog (with a few notable exceptions). At present the will to identify and exploit convergences is uppermost – both in response to the experience of confusion and ambivalence, and as an important gesture toward achieving a valuable research outcome from this initiative.

In inviting the use of ‘∆’ as an emergent and seemingly serendipitous metaphor for this paper’s reflection on ‘∆’ we should be mindful that as a ‘thing’, i.e. some ‘thing’ conceived as representing something else (in this instance a paper (text) incorporating the material/stuff (images and texts) submitted by the contributors (to date), that we allow ourselves to be aware of the potential for textual play and further creative theoretical association. A ‘something’ might/can be a further unspecified ‘text’, a written version of something; ‘something’ unspecified as constructively and strategically indeterminate, vague and indefinite, where any ‘visual’ ambiguity testifies to the intimacy of writing and drawing as marking gestures.

The apex is/can be the highest point however that is not what we think we are intending. The literal visual association between ‘∆’ and a mountain, amongst other things, allows us to speculate as to whether we are running/climbing/drawing (up) the mountain to the/an apex or perhaps the further notion of Sisyphus condemned is a mythological association too far given the current fashion for tracing drawing theory through Pliny to the present day. The rock always fell/falls back. Richard Wollheim asks us to think of Criticism as retrieval (Art and its Objects, Second Edition Essay IV p 185) where ‘criticism’ is the process for coming to understand a particular work of art and he sets ‘where evidence is lacking’ as a limit for that retrieval process, so Triptych should be OK as we have plenty of evidence. What we don’t seem to yet acknowledge through the contributions is a shared and or convergent notion of critical reflection. Is that desirable and or helpful?

The notion of the apex as a point of culmination and potential hierarchy would seem to further compound the difficulty and question the Triptych process as somehow aspiring to a summit, a ‘point’ of arrival and or conclusion. Indeed, one could argue that it pauses or even breaks the line that draws ‘∆’ as a continuous line of self-reflection and reflexivity. The authors of this paper suggest that Triptych’s drawn line (‘∆’) as a graphic sign is (to paraphrase David Rosand, Drawn Acts, Studies in Graphic Expression and Representation pg 2) both self-referential and representational. If we aspire to maintain its (‘∆’) identity even as our line alludes to something beyond itself, the object of representation, then this semiotic ambivalence invites the interpretation that is requisite for its functioning: the active participation of the viewer in constructing meaning.

We can speculate as to the apex as the pointed end of an object such as the apex of a leaf, the leaf in this instance as the sheet of paper that makes up a book but probably not a blog, however that might be a speculation too far. We agree (we have no choice) that to be pointed is to be critical, meaningful and incisive but with regard to an ‘end’ we can argue that the object is ‘∆’ and that to be critical is embedded within the space and place of ‘∆’ as theory is in theory, the mind is stimulated by the practice of the hand, and that an ‘end’ should not be the immediate goal… Perhaps the text of the object (‘∆’) acknowledges Jonathan Swift’s Big and Little-Endians arguing over the right way to crack an egg, and that a text can and should be interpreted in different ways, which perhaps argues against an end as an immediate priority.

The apex is sometimes the vertex. The vertex is sometimes the apex. In anatomy a vertex is the highest point of a body part, especially the top of the head. Off the top of our head is it more helpful to think about the point where sides of angle meet, the point where two sides of a plane figure or an angle intersect, the point where three or more planes of a solid figure intersect, the point at which the axis pierces the surface, the point of a triangle or pyramid opposite to and farthest away from its base? The metaphorical complexities implicit within this shift from apex to vertex may serve us more appropriately.

This is further supported if we look at vertex in astronomy as a point on the celestial sphere towards which, or from which, a group of stars appears to move. It is the point toward which the stars in a moving cluster appear to travel, or from which the meteors in a shower seem to radiate. We don’t think we are claiming to be stars or celestial, not today anyway. The convergent and ‘directional’ possibility of some apparent movement(s) through the Triptych process to date may be a façade, however we suggest it is more likely to be an outward show (does this imply ‘exhibition’?) that is emergent and developing towards a convergence.

The use of ‘∆’ as a theme presented the benefit of choice within a flexible set of ‘restrictions’ that each contributor could manipulate for the benefit of their explorations. Three situations - in which to work, through which to approach work and through which to analyse work (the ‘you, me and us’) still afforded all a continually mobile space. The blog has witnessed the emergence of definite discrimination by participants on methods and theories and this applies not only to those working actively as team players, but also to those working on their own and benefiting from involvement and being a part of the community. For example, Leo Duff, Rebecca Davies and Brian Fay recently took part in a two week drawing residency at Stonehenge Riverside Project along with three other artists, a collaboration which benefited from the communication brought about by Triptych and the opportunity to share personal view points at IMMA.

We end this reflection with the thought of convergence as a union, a meeting point(s) drawn, geographical and spatial (IMMA, Dublin ‘06, Loughborough University ‘06, Sherkin Island ’07).

Exchange

2007-01-19T17:36:00.000Z

... the invitation to converse as something given ...
... an exchange has been effected ...
... a tracing placed in the process blog ...
... the gift to converse is open ...

Sarah Dyer - See no, Hear no, Speak no...

2006-11-03T15:20:00.000Z

‘Playing’ in the sketch book is key; I make a point of never having a plan. Sometimes the story comes first, sometimes the images, or sometimes a character is created / developed through the use of the sketch book. Story-boarding also takes place within my sketchbooks, and again helps me investigate alternative possibilities including introducing control in the pace and design of the book and story.

I wanted to continue to develop my sketchbook characters and use the triptych project as an excuse to explore it in a narrative form rather than seeing the project as something I wouldn't normally approach, something alien to my normal way of working. See no, Speak no, Hear no Evil is my result.

ANDREW SELBY: LUSAD; TRIPTYCH

2006-11-03T13:09:00.000Z

Triptych

Δ Research Proposal – Andrew Selby
Loughborough University

The introductory meeting of the Triptych research group, a collection of artists from Loughborough University, Kingston University and Dublin Institute of Technology in January 2006, represented an opportunity to formalise discussions surrounding the creation and context of collaborative research centred around drawing. In particular, the approach of DIT’s group to take a piece of work from a sister event 3x Abstraction, being held at the Triptych meeting venue, the Irish Museum of Modern Art (IMMA), produced some targeted outcomes which framed the research interests of those individuals in a significant way.

The Δ research project allows me an opportunity in the coming months to explore an area that, within my own design work, I have neglected for some time. The subject in question is narrative, something that I frequently write about within the context of illustration, and with certain illustration monographs in particular, yet much of my own recent work would be better described as conceptual rather than being situated within the genre of narrative.

The nature of this research project allows for certain key research questions to be posed and research can be undertaken relating to both historical and contemporary contexts, which forms important parallels with my related research projects.

Research Questions

In this project, my interpretation for Δ is simply a triptych. The umbrella title of this collaborative research project, Triptych, clearly and obviously could be said to provide many rich examples of narrative paintings from a religious context. This forms the basis of my research intentions. Historically, triptych paintings lay claim to have a predominantly religious content and in this project I intend to choose one example and recreate it. My outcome will be a trio of narrative illustrations.

In declaring my ambitions for this work, I would want to stress from the outset that it is not my intention to produce an updated version of the selected origin of my study, but instead to answer a number of key research questions that I wish to pursue.

In this project, I wish to examine:

• Do triptych paintings have a coherent narrative structure that is inclusive of culture and socio economical groupings?

• In the genre of triptych paintings, is there a recognisable narrative direction?

• Could a narrative structure be subverted by it’s creator?

• Could a narrative visual dialogue within a triptych painting be understood by an audience?

• Is the vehicle of the triptych image(s) pertinent to today’s social and cultural values?

Context

Whilst not being overtly religious, I do subscribe to the idea that life can have spiritual significance. At the same time and at the opposite end of the spectrum, I am bitterly opposed to the idea of religious fundamentalism, oppression and extremism. In this project, the true focus of my interest is not in the undoubted extraordinary stories and teachings of the religious scriptures, but moreover, the form that these stories were illustrated to their audiences, congregations and gatherings. This interest stems aesthetically from an appreciation of Russian miniature iconography paintings from 13 – 15th centuries, the work of painters like van Eyck and Giotto, the great Renaissance paintings, architecture and stained glass of the foremost European cathedrals, chapels, monasteries and churches that I have had the privilege to see on trips. I am open to the notion that my research and my outcomes may be interpreted by individuals in different ways and that whilst some might view the body of work as flippant and irrelevant, some instead might question it’s significance, reasoning and findings in more detail.

My initial research questioned why triptychs are triptychs at all. Are they merely related to birth, life and death or even life, death and afterlife? Were they just three sided because they needed to conceal something? Or promote something?

Are they viewed from left to right? If so, why? Is this our natural systemic reaction borne out of our reading pattern as westerners? Surely this has no relevance to congregations of the 14th Century who were widely under educated or illiterate and needed painting to educate, inform and, on occasion, preach. Are there components within triptych paintings that immediately engage the viewer? Do these have a cognitive effect and create a sense of connection, or joining, to other sections of the painting?

Is scale important or was this dictated by the physical site of the paintings? Should factors like this have a bearing on my own work. Does this in turn dictate my working method and outcome? Perhaps I want the outcome to be projected rather than simply printed? Does this mean it will have a different cognitive impact and effect on my audience?

Methodology

As stated previously, my first task in this project is to choose a subject for my study. This will involve researching triptych paintings between the period 13th – 16th centuries and refining my search to those where narrative content related to pictorial imagery has been discussed, debated and published in sufficient detail by historians.

From this original search I will take one example and use this as the basis of my Δ research project. At the present time I am considering a number of possibilities:

• Eyck, J. van, The Ghent Alterpiece, 1432, oil on panel, Cathedral of St. Bavo, Ghent, Belgium
• Daddi, B., Virgin and Child Enthroned with Saints, 1338, oil on panel, Brno Museum, Czech Republic
• Giotto, B. di., The Stefaneschi Triptych, 1330, oil on panel, Pinacoteca, Vatican

The chosen example will be subjected to a number of tests related to the research questions that I have posed. I will examine the chosen painting and associated texts to explore whether triptych paintings have a coherent narrative structure that is inclusive of culture and socio economical groupings. In this process I may have to gain first hand information from an audience engaged with this work. From this audience I would wish to question whether, in the genre of triptych paintings, is there a recognisable narrative direction and if, therefore, a narrative structure could be subverted by it’s creator (myself)?

From this point, I would attempt to create my outcome so that this could form the study for my second set of tests to determine answers to the aforementioned research questions. The audience (possibly Triptych on 9th and 10th November) would be asked whether they could identify a narrative visual dialogue within my outcome and whether the (meaning) be understood by an audience? The audience would also be asked whether the vehicle of the triptych image(s) is/are pertinent to today’s social and cultural values?

Conclusion

My conclusion to the Δ research project will culminate in a ‘drawn’ version of a triptych image using a method of delivery that is appropriate for it’s audience, at a scale that is supported by answers to my research questions. There will also be a piece of accompanying written text to contextualise the piece, but not attempting to explain or rationalise it.

Andrew Selby: LUSAD: Responses to six questions

1. Has working on this subject/theme altered your drawing process in any way?

No, although it has influenced the manner and reasoning about how and why I collect research material. Some of the subjects I have chosen are difficult to get reference for at the detail I would normally expect or require, even if the outcome is simplified.

2. Has the idea of a possible collaborative outcome altered your thinking/ working methods in any way?

Yes. I was inspired by the whole DIT approach in Dublin and particularly about Brian Fay’s approach to unlocking and reconstituting work. This process is natural for an illustrator but it is interesting to see another approach from a different field.

3. How has the experience of your practice reviewed and viewed by your peers in Triptych influenced your work?

Initially I stated that I wanted an audience response to the work I had created and that I might be able to use them in part of the process. I still want to do that but at this stage I am still attempting to decipher the material for myself and the process is longer than I had originally expected. In that sense alone, this is an unusual project for me as I am normally up burning the midnight oil to get work completed before a deadline.

4. Have you discussed this piece of work/ process with anyone else in Triptych whilst carrying out the work?

Briefly with Brian Fay at Kingston in the summer. I have discussed it with members of other research groups relating to animation and storytelling, but not so far with the broad church of Triptych.

5. Has anything you saw at the Triptych IMMA symposium influenced your thinking or process in any way?

I found the approach of artists who had contextualised their work into a research based forum the most interesting and helpful to my own work. As I mentioned, Brian Fay was instrumental but I also appreciated where Jordan McKenzie was coming from too.

6. What collaborative outcome would you suggest as being appropriate for this research group?

If we have reached that stage by the November meeting at Loughborough, I think I would be trying to push the merits of an interactive web site. I think Brian’s idea about the blog was good, I think it has been a process of learning about the benefits and hang ups about this form of exhibiting, but I personally believe there is something to be gained from making these submissions available via pod casting, web or other download platforms.

Andrew Selby  2006

ADRIANA IONASCU Triptych Response

2006-11-02T22:56:00.000Z

ADRIANA IONASCU

The Triptych concept enabled me to analyse the viewer vis-à-vis image content and to consider the act of seeing as performative1. In support of this analysis I have set the theoretical frame on Bal’s assertion that meaning is developed in the acts that take part around the work; Bal2 (2000) argues that the meaning of a work does not lie in the work by itself but rather ‘happens’ in the specific performances that take place in the work’s field: “(..) rather than a property that a work has, meaning is an event; it is an action carried out by and in relation to what the work takes as you”.
Meaning production is crucial for understanding viewer-image interaction, as inter-actions and inter-relations are sustained by the interpretative act of the viewer. In this sense, any image is active in establishing reference relations, and these can be seen as actively partaking in interaction3. In analysing a picture’s way of addressing the spectator, Michael Fried4 (1980) distinguishes a ‘theatrical’’ mode – in which the picture directly addresses the viewer, as though fully cognisant of being displayed to the audience; and an ‘absorptive’ mode – where the picture adopts the fiction that none of the depicted figures were aware of being on display, so that the viewer seems not to be addressed at all, but enters the scene as an invisible, undetected observer. In other words, in the first model the picture ‘is looking’ at the audience - the viewer is addressed; whilst in the second case, the roles are exchanged - the audience is looking at the picture. It seems that from a two-dimensional interaction, the rapport of viewing becomes three-dimensional because it incorporates the viewer who ‘gazes’ into the image: a theatrical exchange. It follows that perception is in the space between the image and what the viewer perceives as the end product of the image. In this sense, every viewer plays a role in the space of the image by creating his own scenario. The audience becomes therefore an integrated element at all stages of viewing and so the meaning of an image makes sense not only in itself – as a inter-relation between its elements, but it acquires a fluctuating meaning vis-à-vis of my embodied presence.
By focusing on the seer, I conclude that an image is represented by its reflection onto us in a sort of tangible way; seeing becomes part of being in the perimeter of the image. As Merleau-Ponty (1986) says, “When seeing, I do not hold an object at the terminus of my gaze, rather I am delivered to a field of the sensible (..)”. In Ontology of the Flesh, Merleau-Ponty5 (ibid.) regards seeing as an act of interrogation, an intimate relationship, like the touching of the cloth on the body: a notion of reversibility. As in any narrative where the reader takes part in the story (‘abandoning the flesh of the body for that of language’), the body becomes the receiver, the prototype for the logical relations between things. In this reflection on the touching-touched, Merleau-Ponty shows that my hand, my eye, my voice is both touching, seeing and speaking, and at the same time tangible, visible and audible; and so that seeing is in turn being seen.

The illustration intends to show a series of visual interferences vis-à-vis a drawing. It aims to demonstrate that viewing is a three-dimensional enactment and as such, it incorporates the viewer into the image: in this sense, when I look, I become part of that of which I look at. By adopting this way of seeing, the viewer is not ‘looking at’ an image but – to paraphrase Mieke Bal (2000) ‘looking in’ the image (being inside the image instead of being outside it). I define this process as a participatory, active way of seeing. In this sense, when I look, I become part of that of which I look at, and, as such, the geometry of the image includes the space of the viewer.

Triptych Answers

1. Has working on this subject/theme altered your drawing process in any way?

Working has been in my case an analysis of the process of drawing in relation to the viewer. In reflecting on how the end-product of my drawing is perceived, I realized that my place is taken by the viewer and he or she will be in turn incorporated in a series of ‘acts’ of looking and interpretation.

2. Has the idea of a possible collaborative outcome altered your thinking/working methods in any way?

Yes, as collaboration is a creative process – and in being creative it has to find and/or adapt its own ways of thinking and working.

3. How has the experience of your practice being reviewed and viewed by your peers in Triptych influenced the work?

It has influenced mostly the process of reflection on the practice of drawing itself, on its multiple interpretations and theories; and the awareness of possibly being part of a continuous development of a language that is unanimously understood.

4. Have you discussed this piece of work/process with anyone else in Triptych while carrying out the work?

In being more a reflective, written text, I have only discussed notions on perception vis-à-vis reading Maurice Merleau-Ponty with a few colleagues.

5. Has anything you saw at the Triptych IMMA symposium influenced your thinking or process in any way?

It has made me aware on the whole that no drawing is finished with the achievement of an end-product: that the end-product of any drawing is the response anyone has to it.

6. What collaborative outcome would you suggest as being appropriate for this research group?

It is difficult to envisage a tangible outcome at this stage, but a ‘hands on’, impromptu approach (as in “Tomato” workshops) as a collaborative process would probably generate visible results.

Rendezvous at 'Y'

2006-11-01T12:44:00.000Z

Drawing has been and continues to be an evolutionary means of conveying information (and dis-information) through its "extreme economy of means" (William Wegman). The graphic device/symbol/icon humbly performs a vital role in the workplace both nationally and internationally: a coded system of communication evidencing the hand yet associated with (digital) industry. The multiplicities of meaning in a multitude of contexts places the letter/sign of 'X' in an interesting position as both defined, contained, and clear (in context) and yet also ambiguous and intriguing. The subtle differences in rendering or realisation may place the reader in a life or death situation: if 'X' were a person his (or her) existential angst would prevent any 'speech' or actuality of expression for fear of the consequences.
'X' is where two paths cross (without meeting, at the same time?): 'Y' is the point at which three paths meet.
Euclid: "things that coincide with one another are equal to one another"
The Triptych or 'Rendezvous at Y' rather than a containing shape is a sign of trialectic: a geometric X, Y and Z axes meeting and exchanging in (a) space through the language of drawing.

V Three Jake Abrams

2006-10-30T19:54:00.000Z

Drawing- Negative- Print
White- black- Orange
You- Me- It
The triangle, the triangle of triangles has got me thinking, got me playing got me here.
I'm in Oslo, not there not home. I'm still drawing them. It'a a road straight converging to the horizon, it's also a cap for the dunce.

'V'Three

2006-10-30T19:34:00.000Z

Joe Hanly (DIT) Tiangle Project

2006-10-23T18:02:00.000Z

A Triangulational Aesthetic

This project has, surprisingly enough, afforded me a welcome opportunity to talk about triangles, something, until now, I would never have been caught dead doing, in spite of the fact that I’ve always had a special place in my art fort a triangle or two. For me the triangle has helped as a kind of thinking device for working my way through or around problems. As I saw it, a problem often consisted of two competing components finding themselves together in a contested space getting no further than a frustrated and often static impasse alleviated only when an appropriate third component is identified and introduced into the mix. It would become a “ménage a trois” in which each component would act as a catalyst for the other two to reveal themselves in a full and active dynamic. This triangular relationship has served as a device for realising work and for identifying the nature of its discourse. It has informed my teaching practice and proved a valuable aid to the setting of course projects. It has also functioned as a type of mental drawing for use not only to negotiate my own work but also to negotiate real life situations out in the big world. In fact, if really pushed, the “ménage a trois’ can be projected onto any situation one cares to think about. Now I keep finding triangles in spaces I didn’t even know had angles.
When starting out on this Triangle Project for want of something better to do I decided to take the word itself and play about with it in order to see what it might throw out. Among the words I came up with were triangulationship, striangulation, entrianglement etc but the word, which returned something more engaging, when googled, was “Triangulation”. Although used in statistical analyses and in navigation, more interestingly for me this word revealed “Delauny’s Triangulation” a system, invented in 1943 by a Russian mathematician Boris Delauney, for taking complex geometric objects and breaking them down into their simplest possible geometric object which is the triangle. This is now apparently one of the main techniques used to create 3D computer graphics. Although not appearing, as yet directly, applicable to anything here the resulting drawings of this process seems to offer a flexible structure ideal for a visual approximation of what I consider to be mental drawing.
While trying to ponder life’s enigmas over the years there were a number of writers that interested me, whose work required some serious mental drawing in order to get a handle on it. Amongst these there were a few obvious suspects such as Derrida, Barthes and Chomsky. Triangles of varying complexities were required in order to come to terms with such works as Roland Barthes’s “Mythologies” with its references to the Signified, Signifier and Sign as it multiplied into multilayered triangular readings of cultural situations and historic events and Jaques Derrida’s endless deferral of meaning back through other meanings and traces of meanings in “Margins of Philosophy” and his deconstruction of western cannons of truth established throughout a logo-centric tradition of binary oppositions. Also in the not so triangular Naom Chomsky’s “Universal Grammar”, in which he suggests that there is a universally innate and complex grammatical scaffolding that grows in the mind/brains of children, autonomous of environmental conditions but in tune with their biological development, in order to handle the vocabulary that they are acquiring no matter where in the world they come from. Finally, late to this group, comes Edward Soja, social geographer and a true man of the triangle, of whom I have become come aware more recently, who in his book “Thirdspace” has enlisted Henri Lefebvre, of, one time, situationist fame, in taking Hegel’s dialectic and reconstituting it into a spatial trialectic. To this intensive bout of mental drawing comes Delauney’s Triangulation, which provide an intricate visual system that, for me, seems to fit it all like a glove. (image 1)

”Delauny’s Triangulation” interactive site, worth checking out:
< http://www.cs.cornell.edu/Info/People/chew/Delaunay.html >

One of those triangles, that I keep finding everywhere, I have found in a space, more commonly frequented by psychologists, political and historical analysts and perhaps even social geographers but it is a space that is not totally unknown to the odd self-opinionated artist either. The triangle is situated within a three-way relationship of traits basic to the nature of an individual’s personality. It is a “Holy Trinity” of the psyche that consists of (a) A rational component (b) An intuitive component and (c) An Instinctive component. In this triangular relationship, a, b and c make up the triangle and the personality is positioned within it, like a pointer in a triangular colour palette of some graphics software, benefiting proportionately from each of (a) the rational, (b) the intuitive and (c) the instinctive. This is certainly not the most complete or accurate picture of what happens but its not too far off either and it is sufficient for my purposes here. I find that that basic triangular arrangement of traits has a very interesting outcome when it is taken from the micro situation of the individual psyche and is projected onto the macro situation of the collective psyche. There you can have such threesomes as Politics, Commerce and Culture or things Material, Imaginary and Spiritual. You can also have such wonderful mixes as Totalitarianism, Democracy and Anarchy or Classical, Traditional and Contemporary; Realism, Idealism, Fantasy etc. My point here is that since these positions really actually only reflect human constructs or interpretations of society’s complex relationships, each of the components in a group is likely to bear a loose resemblance to a general personality type which would have been fundamental to its conception. In other words each position within a group would gravitate towards a particular type of personality and visa versa although always retaining something of the other types in the group too. Things begin to hot up when one component in a group becomes dominant over the others or more commonly when two components become so actively engaged in a struggle between each other that they are distracted from or forget about the possibility of a third component leaving it out in the cold to continue developing unobserved all on its own. This tends to happen in the logo centric world, described by Derrida, where every position is perceived as being in some natural binary opposition to another, like good and bad or black and white, where there are only grey areas that exist in between. However, in a trialectic world, although not quite that of Soja’s rather netherworldly “thirdspace”, every position might be in a tri-polar relationship like that of red, yellow and blue in the colour wheel (sorry triangle) with the space between being any one of a multiple of contrasting or complementary colours and shades.
One task might now be to find two apparently polar oppositions, which are locked in combat with each other, completely oblivious to the existence of a third component bubbling away in the background. (A classic example could be Left wing versus Right wing). Then assign to those components their appropriate personality traits within the triangle. When that is done try to identify a third component that will fit an alternative personality trait within that same mix. (So! In the case of the classic example above, what could the third component be? All suggestions welcome or any other banter at all. Be adventurous!).
Where does that now leave us? Nowhere really except that we end up with lots of lovely triangles strewn all over the place and the next time that an old reliable pendulum stops swinging in a predictable motion back and forth between two polar oppositions but swings erratically and unpredictably all over the place it is time to throw a spanner into the works. I think I feel a few squares coming on now.

With more modest intent, the triangular relationships in my work, produced for this project, “Entrianglement” (image 2.) are established between diverse elements, in the photograph of Rathgar/Rathmines junction, such as between an elbow, road markings and a cloud and in ”Triangleyes” (image 3) the relationship is between the eyes of those walking through Temple Bar Square. In this piece the relationship is not triangular but it produces lots of incidental triangles which open up further possibilities.

Nick Rodgers

2006-10-20T12:12:00.000Z

The triptych project arrived at an interesting time. I have been considering my practice and research for some time. I have been looking at various strands of my work and trying to consider if they are what I really want to do , or things that I think I should be doing.
So a project that encouraged me to consider my approach to drawing forced me to question , further, my practice,
I would say that most of my textile work has had an intuitive approach in terms of mark making and my use of colour. I respond to what I see, hear, think by working directly on textiles with dyes and inks.
At the same time I can identify that I am interested in the processes that I use to create work. I love printing, I love layering colour, I love experimenting with what I can do to fabric , I love trying to work out systems for economical printing, I love lots of things but I don’t always do them.
Why? sometimes fear.
What if it all goes wrong? What will people think?
The Triptych project has allowed me to develop ideas without the need to be prolific in my output. It has allowed me the time to think about ideas , discuss those ideas with peers and it has influenced some aspects of my teaching practice.

STARTING POINTS
the project started with a response to the triptych symbol. I considered this to be a basic triangle. the question was to consider my visual response to that shape or to consider the idea of my response having 3 facets.
I have previously been interested in producing images of stripes that are random but are generated in CAD. The stripes would be horizontal but would alter in width and colour.
having had conversations with Dr Hilary Carlisle of Edinburgh College of Art, I knew that this would be difficult. Her PHD dealt with random patternmaking in a textiles context. One of the main issues with the random generation of a recurring image is that it can become incredibly large or small. Therefore you have to build in upper and lower limits in the programming .i.e. the shape can be no smaller than x and no larger than y but within that limit it can be any size. You then have the issue of creating random generation of colours.
The first response was to start drawing triangles, or to be more accurate, approximations of triangles as none of the lines were straight. the shapes were connected to form larger shapes that were fairly random
These shapes could not be random as I was obviously making judgements about : the size of paper, where to start drawing, what direction to develop the image and most importantly when to stop.
What I was interested in was making the process more, if not completely, random.
The drawings that were created in the sketchbook started to resemble wire mapped drawings of semi recognisable organic forms. When anyone looked at the image there first comment was that it looked like a thing!.
when I started to create the next drawing this response was in my head so I started to see the images as some sort of creature. This was not what I wanted to achieve. I think these thoughts were influencing the decisions I was making when adding the next triangular element to the composition. Therefore there was, as is to be expected , a response to external influences and to my own instinctive sense of trying to read an image into the marks I was creating.
At this stage there was no indication if the drawings were a means to an end. There was no product or design solution in mind. The result could be 2d or 3D . What I was interested in was considering a new drawing process for me, but at the back of my mind there was the thought of creating some leatherwork that used my drawings as the pattern for some form of embossing.
The next set of conversations I had were with Claude Gerald, a friend with experience of using lasers and of creating some basic computer programming. We discussed the drawings I was creating and the fact that that I wanted to create drawings that had a greater random element. Most of the development of this project has been insular, that is to say I have deliberately not looked for reference to this approach to drawing. I felt I needed the time to consider the idea before looking at how others may have explored the concept. However, recently I have been drawn to the sports pages of national newspapers and have found that there is an interesting use of random process in the production of drawings. The Guardian has been producing graphics that show the level of passing, direction of passing etc in particular World Cup matches.
At the same time I started to discuss my work with Kerry Walton, lecturer at LUSAD,
We were both interested in the use of the Triptych symbol as a starting point for our drawings . We both have similar interests but take quite different approaches to our drawing. The discussions were helpful as much as a form of encouragement as well as a mechanism for reflection and critical appraisal.
The discussions with Claude led me to shift my ideas slightly. Instead of using CAD at the end to produce work that was developed from my drawings , I would now consider using cad to create the drawings. Using Photoshop or any of the graphic packages would keep me working at the same level and would only be a digital version of what I was creating in the sketchbook. To make the drawing have a greater level of randomness there would have to be a some programming created.
I created some experimental drawings using Photoshop . These drawings are an extension of what I was doing in the sketchbook. Instead of one layer that had created the illusion of 3D I was now starting to work in multiple layers. Taking the image, copying and adding a new layer where I might shift, slightly, the angle of the drawing. On top of this I was drawing a new layer.

What I realised was that I definitely wanted to create drawings that have a large random element in their production. What Claude and I discussed was how we could do this from scratch. The starting point was to draw a series of connected triangles on a grid. The grid would have an x and Y axis placed on it so that measurements could be taken. When the shape was drawn the three points of each triangle were recorded ( point 1=x, Y . point 2 = x, Y etc) each triangle was given a number and each line in the triangle was given a number .therefore each triangle in the shape could be recorded as a sequence of numbers and this sequence could be translated to computer programming that would then be able to visualise the shape that was drawn.
So the first triangle(T1) in illustration 9 can be represented as :
T1 = L1(P1-P2) + L2(P1-P3) = L3(P2-P3)
And this can be read as
T1 = 3/3-3/7 +3/3-7/3 + 3/7-7/3
With the first digit representing the X axis and the second digit representing the Y axis.
This basic system is then translated into the corrects sequence and inputted into the CAD programme “ visual Basic”
CHICKEN OR EGG?
Why translate what is already there to just reproduce it on a screen?
The idea was to figure out how to represent the triangular shapes in a nonvisual way. From this point one could programme the computer to create random drawings by indicating maximums and minimums for the x and Y values. One could also start to create the images in 3D by adding a Z axis .
What I have realised is that I still want to create ‘the drawings myself. I want ownership of them. I don’t want the mechanical machine creating the image I want it to translate the image.
Now that I have figured out, in a very basic way how to represent the shapes I have drawn (using numbers) the next stage will be for me to select numbers that will create the drawings.
I see this as a relevant method , for me , of creating the drawings in a more random way. I cant help linking it with music. If you gave me a sheet of musical notation paper and some basic symbols I could mark them on the lines but I would have no idea what they would sound like if played on an instrument. However if I made the marks in a variety of ways and heard them translated I would possibly be able to start understanding sequences of notes and be able to figure out how my marks were being translated. The same could be said for the method I am considering for creating my drawings. So how do I avoid this?
One method would be to create the series of numbers and not translate them until I had created a group of the “number drawings” therefore I would have no visual reference to respond to. Another method nay be to create one drawing that is a continuous number sequence. The advantages of both of these methods are that there may be mistakes; some of the triangles may not match up, the lines may be repeated.
This will also allow me time to reflect on how I want to represent the drawings, if I am using them as a means to an end ,if I want to use this method to create drawings using different basic shapes (squares , rectangles etc) or if I could respond to places and situations with “number drawings”. i.e. landscapes as a series of numbers.
the next stage is to start work on one sequence of numbers , aiming to produce a drawing that has a large number of triangles. The decisions will be whether the numbers or the translation, in the form of a print , will be the drawing and whether the drawing is the final outcome of my project.

Nick Rodgers
Lecturer in textiles
LUSAD

Mark Harris

2006-10-19T21:21:00.000Z

Two found images of ocean volcanic eruptions of the coast of Iceland
Silkscreen print "Les Volcans de Monde Occidental"
Untitled Jul06 Drawing and Acrylic on Lambda Print

Kerry Walton

2006-10-16T10:39:00.000Z

The images above represent the development of the Triptych project through a series of drawings which have explored the repeated use of the triangle symbol to create a range of net-like effects, using a range of drawing media. The most recent drawings have used layering techniques to build a more complex and 3 dimensional quality.

Background

For a number of year as a Textile designer I have been making prototype and sample pieces to be sold through agents or at Textile trade fairs. These designs have been variously directly translated by the manufacturer into production pieces or alternatively used as inspiration for the development of new ranges.
Drawing has always been part of the design process, a means to an end, and not the outcome. The outcomes have been the Textiles pieces, and a methodology has emerged involving the collection of imagery, and recording and analysing through drawing and photography. This visual research is then developed through a variety of processes, towards a textiles conclusion.These are often not literal interpretations of the research but develop a sense of the subject.
I have an interest in the structure and construction of the Texiles and the pieces tend not to be image based. My background in weaving has meant working within the restrictions of a process which is largely based on straight lines working in parallel with one another. There has always been a quality of drawing running through the pieces and thread is often used to create linear marks- a single thread creates a line, fibres create tonal effects. I frequently use restricted colour palettes – very often the inherent colour of the materials in their un-dyed state is sufficient: linen, cotton, silk, man made fibres, polythene and paper, concentrating on line, tone, effects of light and 3D surface qualities.
The Textile work has recently developed away from traditional boundaries of Textiles – Weave, Print and Embroidery and encompasses new processes such as heat bonding, laser cutting and multi-media approaches. These new processes have allowed me to develop the work without the constraints of a formal process – weaving – and to approach the work as drawing with Textile media – thread, fabric, stitch.
Re-occurring themes have been repetition, sequence, tonal gradation, shading and layering, and repetitive use of line and simple geometric forms. This is reflected and developed in the Triptych work where ideas have been allowed to develop through drawing without the urgency of processing quite quickly to a design stage.

Triptych
The Triptych project has given me the opportunity to develop some of the themes apparent in my textile work and explore these through drawing.
I have been able to explore a more meaningful approach, without necessarily having to address function.
The project provides an opportunity, drawing provides a freedom un-restrained by commercial constraints and design considerations: is it on trend? is it what the buyers want? can it be commercially produced?
Sampling also rarely provides an opportunity to address issues of scale, but drawing will allow exploration of the ideas in a range of scale and media.
The next phase of the project will involve working in the same way I have been but making use of textile media.

The outcome will be a drawing response, using Textile media.

Recent drawings have begun to explore the potential for layers of similar imagery, and it is my intention to further these experiments through the use of fabric and stitch, transparency of some of the materials will allow for playing with space and light.

I am currently scanning the drawings and using Illustrator to generate files to operate laser cutting equipment to cut and mark the net effects onto a variety of textile grounds, and paper. Layers of laser cut fabric, paper and possibly other materials of different tone, density and transparency will be layered and stretched, stitched and printed to create a textile drawing which will be a piece in it’s own right, and not a fragment of a whole, nor intended for a specified Fashion or Interiors context.

Has working on this subject/theme altered your drawing process in any way?

The focus has been on the drawing and it's development, and drawing as an outcome rather than as part of a design process.

Has the idea of a possible collaborative outcome altered your thinking/working methods in any way?

The nature of collaboration has not really altered my approach, but I have used the opportunity to think more about the development of the work and less about a defined outcome.

How has the experience of your practice being reviewed and viewed by your peers in Triptych influenced the work?

That has not influenced the practice, however, I have made a conscious effort to organise the work in a kind of chronological sequence so that the development of the work can be followed without the need for accompanying text.

Have you discussed this piece of work/process with anyone else in Triptych while carrying out the work?

I have discussued the work on one occasion with Nick Rodgers, but so far it has been important for me to build up a body of drawing, and to gain confidence in this new approach before inviting discussion.

Has anything you saw at the Triptych IMMA symposium influenced your thinking or process in any way?

I did not attend the symposium.

What collaborative outcome would you suggest as being appropriate for this

research group?

I suggest that an exhibtion of the drawings and development work would best demonstrate the diversity of the project, and approaches through a variety of media and disciplines.

Simon's ∆ Submission

2006-10-11T12:59:00.000Z

Dear Triptych Colleagues.
Anyone wishing to access my typographically inclined submission should click here. The submission is in the form of an Acrobat .pdf file which contains both the work and it's accompanying rationale.

John Short DIT

2006-10-09T15:31:00.000Z

I have been working on a large series of bathers based on a local sea water pool at the Forty Foot Bathing Place in Sandycove, County Dublin over the last few years and exhibited the drawings and watercolours in a solo exhibition in a Dublin gallery last November. The works were all generated from quick direct observational sketchbook drawings. I aim to capture little fleeting moments. I then transfer these images later in the studio and build up complex scenes
of figures involved in lots of activity.
I have worked in some paintings with 30-40 little figures and alternatively worked on drawings with just a couple, chatting, dressing ,drying and so on and have begun transfering these glimpses into 3D drawings (I say this rather than sculptures) The triptytch structure I have created ties in with the triptych idea as a solid hinged piece of decorated furniture. A pierced hinged screen from one simple piece of card incorporating the idea of using 3 figures (rather than 2) I feel is more of what my intentions are in creating a sense of a social activity. I will use these macquettes to experiment on a larger scale and in sheet metal for my next exhibition next year.

Liz Minichiello

2006-10-09T10:42:00.000Z

through this project I have explored the gap between text and image, and I have looked at reader interaction to picture storybooks. The process is not linear. Expectation created by the page element relationships demands and thus stimulates higher cognitive awareness.
One of things I have found useful in working with other artists is to look at how we convey message and meaning and to think again about how I use text and image.

Leo Duff (KU) Stone Upon Broken Stone

2006-10-05T14:12:00.000Z

Stone Upon Broken Stone

Stone Upon Broken Stone was a phrase I saw high up on a long side wall of the vast Guinness brewery in Dublin in 1981. The words stayed with me as a type of memorial for that area of Dublin - St James Gate and The Liberties - and all of the ways of life they represented over many centuries. From early man through Viking invasions, the poverty associated with living outside the edge of the old city walls (known as the Liberties) and the phenomenon which is Guinness itself and its world wide distribution making the name St James Gate known across and in even the remotest parts of the globe. The constant demolition and rebuilding and the waxing and waning of the use of buildings in many parts of Ireland are a long term theme in my work. Stone Upon Broken Stone sums this up perfectly, and as my travels increased, became the expression which described the way I have been looking at mans use and reuse of stone and other building materials in Southern and Northern Ireland, the Boarders in Scotland, Croatia, Montenegro, Taiwan, The Peoples Republic of China, Mumbai and New Delhi in India, Byblos and Beirut in Lebanon, and Seoul in South Korea. Stone Upon Broken Stone also takes on a political edge when seen in the light of the changes which have occurred in the places people live and how they have relocated under the influence of change. Change for the better or change for the worse is not my theme however, it is the way change has affected the ways of building and rebuilding the ordinary places we inhabit.

As a whole, Stone Upon Broken Stone looks at the application of materials in buildings which are part of our normal lives, rather than grandiose or monumental architecture. The use, re-use and application of natural and recycled stone in its natural environment, the movement of materials from one place to another for use in building, the way in which buildings echo and respond to their native environment, construction and deconstruction and the placement and replacement of individual stones in our man made surroundings all provide sources of reference for the drawings. Recently, and mainly as part of the research fellowship which took place at Taipei Artist Village concrete has inevitably been added to my exploration of the unpresumptuous world of domestic building, as seen in The Precipitous Edge, my recent exhibition in Taiwan.

Over many visits to Seoul in the past ten years the changing cityscape and its relationship to the mountains around the tower blocks of apartments across the city have constantly both fascinated and confused me. The double perspective frequently created by the painted exteriors of these buildings, the relationship of the colours used, which has always seemed to me a uniquely Korean palette, and the multiples and juxtaposition of the geometric shapes mirrors the small mountains which the different districts of Seoul have been built amongst.

The positioning of single and grouped rocks and stones taken from the mountains and placed around buildings – from small restaurants to enormous banks, is a source of constant fascination to me. These led to my observing that almost every surface in Seoul is covered with some form of stone based material. For example the underpass at the Kyobo building is covered in pale though dramatically patterned marble, the grounds of the palace are covered with a fine pink grit, and pavements are made with rough cement briquettes in an array of subtle colours which like the apartment blocks seem to reflect the colours of the mountains through which they are interwoven. Investigation into religious and social history, along with seeing stones used in family burial places on the small hills outside the city and recent sessions drawing in the stone shops all added to the intrigue. But the most influential issue in my gathering of information to feed my vision for drawings representing Stone Upon Broken Stone in Seoul was the Chung Gye Chung River Project.

The reopening of this small river from under now demolished concreted roads, the removal of fly-overs and the peeling off of these layers of several years of fast lane development began to give Seoul a shape in my eyes. The map took on a real life and started to make sense. The opening of the river, although curtailed within concrete river banks, coincided with my research into oriental ink painting and thinking about the importance of flowing water in the philosophy embedded in this tradition. Thus the ‘’new’’ river is included in the drawings made for this exhibition, playing an important part in the composition and the start and end of the journeys through the city I am representing. When journeying in a city where you cannot read any information (Hangul being unknown to me) the course of a river and the position of individual rocks or rocky mountains act as tools for navigation and in themselves become the touchstones of your mental map. Thus Chung Gye Chung, the rocks and stones set auspiciously around the city, the repetitively hallucinatory apartment blocks, the covered surfaces beneath your feet and the colours of the mountains watching over all this reflected in the materials used in this entire natural and man made construction make up the elements of Seoul used in Stone Upon Broken Stone.

Process has played an all important role in the making of this series of work. The way of working developed from an ongoing series of aerial views made observationally during air flights over several years and used as the starting point for many of the works in Stone Upon Broken Stone. The scale and the confusion between large and small which can be witnessed in the sketchbooks of the original aerial drawings of rocky landscapes as seen from 35,000 feet forms the concept for the play on comparisons of scale and of symbolism used in oriental ink painting in these drawings. The study of oriental ink painting and the breaking of rules as an attempt to understand them have played a large part in the process of this research. Thus the use of a ruler, the mixing of scale and of perspectives, conflicting amalgamation of drawing and painting materials and the deliberate layering of objects and view points. The subject matter of the drawings become interchangeable, as does the relationship of the separate stones to the overall rural or urban land or cityscapes which make up Stone Upon Broken Stone.

Where does this fit within Triptych and Triangle – a relationship of interdependency. One step in the process not being able to work without another, like a triangle. I have not been able to produce work specifically for this, as I had planned, but have been thinking about the themes of the triangle, (and Triptych) , since we decided on this subject, and found that a helpful and supportive addition to the way I work.

Mario Minichiello

2006-10-05T08:25:00.000Z

Drawing always was and still is our first language of communication as we grow. Culturally drawing still provides a means of expressing the values and nature of a people. The first humans made images to document their history and as a means to retell their experiences and to fulfil a deep set need to describe and connect to the world around them. As a consequence of making an image most of us inadvertently reveal a personal imprint of ourselves. My work for this project has allowed be to explore the kind of process I naturally use to make descriptive marks in ways that are substantially different from other artists, a kind of finger print of hand and mind. The project has also been a chance to work with other makers and that is a rare thing for many artists. The subject/theme of this project has altered your drawing process in that i have had to consider the process I use.
I would like to find ways of being more collaborative and further develop links to my peers, I have enjoyed the input they have had on the work so far. This has included the many view points seen at IMMA symposium which is something we sould revisit. I would like to see a series of collaborative outcome from this group including a book or site that explored the differences in approaches - this is something other makers of art always ask about.

Yijia Wang (DIT) Triptych Project

2006-10-04T14:31:00.001Z

The first group of pictures is about the °ÆJia Gu°Ø words. This is a special word from old traditional Chinese words. Most word°Øs shapes were from the means by themselves. People get communicated visually to describe what they observed. My responses to ßQ were °Æspace°Ø. In Chinese calligraphy, space was one of the very important ingredients. Sometimes people attended blank rather than the words selves. So I used the words that add some transmutation in order to display the special place.

The second group of pictures is about the °Æchair°Ø. One of the old chairs existed in vast seas of wax-covered paper without souls. They quietly lie on the paper to convey calm and contemplative. Another of my responses to ßQ was °Æjust a ghost of instability in the stability°Ø. As far as we know, triangle is the most stability figure. But anything didn°Øt exist absolute stability. I want to find a ghost of instability and to strengthen it. So I used the rosewood chair from the Ming dynasty. These the most firm chair when lost one leg gives people another feelings.

yijia wang

drawing as a language of communication

2006-10-04T12:58:00.000Z

I am interesting in researching the essential role of drawing as our first language of communication . I explore this through practice of drawing and making work. I see drawing as a very powerful process in art and design. Culturally drawing still provides a means of expressing the values and nature of a people. The first humans made images to document their history and as a means to retell their experiences and to fulfil a deep set need to describe and connect to the world around them. As a consequence of making an image most of us inadvertently reveal a personal imprint of ourselves. My own research shows that from the very beginning of their course, every student draws/makes descriptive marks in ways that are substantially different from that of their peers. My own observations and research builds on that conducted by Dr Sperry, Dr B Edwards at CAL TEC and Vilayanur S Ramachandran Fellow of All Souls, Oxford. Findings confirm that the act of making a drawing engages the mind in ways that reveal different and complex aspects of consciousness, social function, identity and expression. Picasso said: "Art is the lie that reveals the truth". Yet drawing has never been fully understood and the subject is not seen as particularly important. This project shows how drawing can be developed not just as a tool of self-expression, for a number of artists from different backgrounds. the work here is quite different but the drawing still remains an important carrier for mass communication. And for me I think it offers a is a strong counter to the globalising influence of impersonal corporate mass media.

Alastair C. Adams Triptych Response

2006-10-04T08:28:00.000Z

Research for me is essentially based around issues surrounding the production of painted portraits, how they can convey issues relating to character, what they say about the person who paints them and how the process can cause those involved to identify with the experiences and emotions that construct their identity. Further to the initial launch of Triptych and discussions held in conjunction with Dublin Institute of Technology and Kingston University at the Irish Museum of Modern Art in Dublin, I was presented with an opportunity to identify with areas within my own emerging research profile and produce outcomes. Being in my first year of probation in a research based position at Loughborough University, I am currently involved in developing a practice based research agenda and responses to the Triptych impetus are, for me, an opportunity to explore the production of painted outcomes lead by a research context. Although DTI’s starting point within the Triptych framework was to respond to existing imagery I have decided to take the opportunity to identify and explore themes within my own work that can be placed within a painted, three panel based format.

When dealing with issues regarding engagement, contact, power, threat and isolation in solo portraiture images are inclined, by their very nature, to become singular, stand alone pieces. Responses to the direct level of engagement that these paintings offer and require are instinctive and “primeval”. Viewers have a gut feeling that, unless already versed, is hard to verbally communicate. This may be because they are addressing an inherently visual situation however without the benefit of contrasting imagery there is no opportunity to triangulate and develop a detailed viewpoint and understanding. Is it possible then that by viewing paintings in sequence the observer is allowed an insight into the potential manipulation of character, or at least shown several sides to the same personality. Within portraiture this manipulation by the artist is a powerful tool and can imbue the subject with desired, or un-desired qualities. These qualities can then convey to a viewer character, manner, attitude and identity, which inevitably lead to reflection upon the subject as an individual. In all the purpose of the production of a portrait, rather than being the physical reproduction of a likeness becomes a process that causes the viewer to identify with issues relating to the subjects past, present and future. If this is so then by turning the viewpoint around and giving partial ownership of the production to the subject, does the ongoing cathartic process re-define the required content and perceived purpose of portraits? In this way a portrait could be said to become the by-product of the process and a re justification of the content versus depiction would have to be negotiated.

With this viewpoint in mind how can this be linked to three representations of the human head? A tripych, or series of three images, could be seen as the minimum number of images required to convey the widest range of emotions. For instance, by using one as a control or normal we have two remaining opportunities to convey a positive and a negative. In it’s most traditional format the two outer panels of a triptych fold in to the centre panel, the two outer panels relating to, and being justified by, the centre panel. In this way a three outcome statement could explore non verbal communication and concequent meaning by emphasising viewpoint, mood and expression between two extremes.

The drawback of a traditional triptych format in this sense however is that it relies on the outer panels reflecting upon, and relating to, one main panel. To increase breadth it might be better to relate to three images, forming a cycle, where each has equal importance. Working from a cyclical point of view now introduces sequentially based connotations which, in turn, suggest natural rhythms and the passing of time, such as morning, noon and night. One of the greatest strengths of portraiture over conventional photography is that it allows a response to be generated over a period of time, capturing the essence of an individual by filtering relevant and irrelevant information. Would it be possible then to produce a sequence of three related portraits that identify with differing aspects of an individual’s personality, contrasted with themes associated with engagement, atmosphere and viewpoint? Can one exist without the other? Is this “filtering through time” an essential ingredient in producing incisive, quality portraiture or is it possible to use a model and imbue attributes that do not relate to them?

The production of a series of paintings such as this offers the opportunity to identify and explore issues relevant to my current practice based research framework.

Triptych: ‘∆’: Reflecting on Drawing Practice as Knowledge

1. Has working on this subject/theme altered your drawing process in any way?

It has allowed me the opportunity to consider and explore the interaction of multiples further. Producing an out come as the result of developing a text around a theoretical point of view rather than a visual point of view
Is also new to me

2. Has the idea of a possible collaborative outcome altered your thinking/working methods in any way?

I believe the possibility of a collaborative outcome with another generates images with a greater clarity of intent and direction. Further collaborations could stimulate yet greater outcomes.

3. How has the experience of your practice being reviewed and viewed by your peers in Triptych influenced the work?

This has not happened yet.

4. Have you discussed this piece of work/process with anyone else in Triptych while carrying out the work?

No.

5. Has anything you saw at the Triptych IMMA symposium influenced your thinking or process in any way?

The diversity of outcomes at the Triptych IMMA event has made me stronger and more determined to pursue work that identifies further with personal strengths and themes evident in my work.

6. What collaborative outcome would you suggest as being appropriate for this research group?

Exhibition and publication.

Brian Fay (DIT) 5 Drawings for Triptych project

2006-10-02T15:45:00.000Z

Siún Hanrahan, Triptych Project

2006-10-02T12:03:00.000Z

Tri-Angle
One of my responses to ∆ was ‘tri-angle’ – three angles or points of view. It offers a sense of the limits of dia-logue… The polarity of two risks the illusion that the full range of possibility is somehow captured in the space between them. Three marks the impossibility of this; it suggests différance.

A Tale of Bread, 2005

This piece explores the idea of conversation (rather than dialogue) and unfolded from the idea that: Bread is connectedness and communion and Conversation is connectedness and communion. Conversation is central to meaning as meaning emerges in the encounter with others. It is in and through conversation that identity is constructed.

A Tale of Bread takes the form of a book in three parts – Milling, Baking and Eating. Each part is built around a key moment in the tale of bread, from the processes by which it is made to the process by which it is consumed, and explores the intercourse of self and other in the emergence of meaning.

Some tales are told across all three parts and some belong to one part only. What is sought is a playful kneading of ideas, a kneading enacted within and between chapters.

Triúr: Elias, Benhabib and Burgess, a work in progress

The idea of three points of view (tri-angle) suggested a rather arbitrary beginning: the three books I have read most recently. Each of which is connected in a loose way with one question, 'how do I account for what is shared in meaning making?'

Book I, Elias, offers some sense of the perspective offered by Elias, in his book The Society of Individuals, overlaid upon images drawn from previous work lifted into attention by Elias's metaphors.

Book II, Benhabib, will be like Book I in that its form will be determined in response to Benhabib's book The Situated Self.

Book III, Burgess (as for Benhabib).

Siun Hanrahan (DIT) - the 6 questions

2006-09-30T11:10:00.000Z

1. Has working on this subject/theme altered your drawing process in any way?

My art-practice has, at time, involved drawing and I had hoped to use this opportunity to work on a non-textual part of a long-running work-in-progress, Babel. This may yet happen. Meantime, the changes involved an opportunistic narrowing of sources and an explicit re-viewing of past work.

2. Has the experience of a possible collaborative outcome altered your thinking/working methods in any way?

Not yet, but the possibility is exciting. 'Conversation' is at the heart of my art-thinking but my art process is a solitary one, a conversation with books rather than people. Collaboration promises new perspective on my thinking and process, and a loosening of same through engaging with the thinking and processes of others.

3. How has the experience of your practice being reviewed and viewed by your peers in Triptych influenced the work?

So far it has been strangely encouraging. To my surprise, a humble effort thus far revealed points of connection to the thinking and processes of others. Building on this in Loughborough is an exciting prospect.

4. Have you discussed this piece of work/process with anyone else in Triptych while carrying out the work?

No... I would like this answer to change.

5. Has anything you saw at the Triptych IMMA symposium influenced your thinking or process in any way?

A conversation with Triptych colleagues may do. Can making a virtue out of hte constraints of circumstance (few stretches of tie in which to work in a sustained way) be made to work for me?

6. What collaborative outcome would you suggest as being appropriate for this reserach group?

A range of themes, activities and outputs built upon small-scale shared interests. A larger scale context for and perspective upon these productive points of connection should be easy to achieve. Beginning with a large scale project incorporating our diverse interests seems less promising in terms of focus and quality of outcome.

TRIANGLE PROJECT: TRIPTYCH

2006-09-29T16:06:00.000Z

TRIANGLE PROJECT: TRIPTYCH

Bernadette Burns (DIT) Triptych Project

2006-09-29T10:30:00.000Z

Text to accompany Bernadette Burns work

A Limitless Wandering of Thought

And he dreamed, and behold a ladder set up on the earth, and the top of it reached to heaven…

Standing midst the landscapes of ‘Jacob’s Ladder’, the overall impression they convey is calm and contemplative. Broad, apparently simple planes are juxtaposed to render foreground and a distant horizon. Writing, traced in paint, hovers within and above the layered landscapes. Many feature water and a distant island. Some look across a warm stretch of sand or yellowed grass, others look toward or through an open door.

The work of imaginative construction required by the simple landscape schema in works such as Colour Field draws you in; an expanse of bright yellow sand sweeps toward a narrow strip of sea with a hazily distant island beneath a darkening sky. A strong brown stripe running along the right edge of the painting, punctuated by red writing, seems likely to be a fence post in the immediate foreground, perhaps marking an entrance to the beach. The simple beauty of the scene is inviting. And yet my advance into the picture is refused. The simplicity of this imagined landscape is only momentary. The brown post of the foreground runs ambiguously to the sea, disrupting the fragile coherence of the scene. The shifting yellow plane of sand refuses to recede, becoming instead an upright plane with five blue lines scraped on it or through it. I am returned to the surface of the painting, an expanse of colour disrupted only by the texture of the paint.

The scripts, whose rhythm so often reflects that of the painting on which it sits – like ripples on the water of Crossing Over or the scratched grass of Travelling Light – promise to lead to the heart of the work. Narratives are inscribed, perhaps fragmentary and ambiguous, but central to many of the paintings. And yet the promise of these words is withheld; they cannot be deciphered.

Exact meaning and an exact topography are thus beyond reach, and a sustained imaginative engagement is invited instead. In works such as Upon the Water and Open Door II, a strong motif within Burns work - the doorway - suggests a kind of presence that is evident throughout ‘Jacob’s Ladder’. The doorway brings two spaces together, a beyond is brought close. This juxtaposition of physical spaces marks a particular kind of presence within the landscape, a presence to the immediate surroundings and an awareness that also wanders beyond its boundaries, whether remembering or imagining.

With the introduction of the ladder motif, this figuring of an active connection between discrete planes of thinking and being, or modes or presence within the landscape, is retraced. The ladder is not about escape or escapism. In paintings such as Between Here and There the immersion in landscape is too particular, emphatic and solid, and the ladder does not lead to another place. Instead, the ladder disrupts the landscape schema to actively figure a second possibility within that space, dreaming. An open horizon of possibility encountered within a particular place.

More whimsically, this space for dreaming within the landscape, anchored in the structures of a particular place but not simply of that place, is marked by disruptions such as the floating turquoise square of Crossing Over. Suspended midst blue water and an ochre shore, this ambiguous space is written into the surrounding waters and yet is a world of its own.

The particular places of these paintings are Sherkin Island off the coast of West Cork, Tipperary and Crete. The sandy shores and surprisingly high skies of Sherkin have long been a refuge and source of inspiration for Burns. An abandoned reservoir near her home in Tipperary is a growing presence in her work and recent trips to Crete are directly reflected in a number of small paintings and indirectly in the ladder motif emerging in the work. (The Jacob’s Ladder of the exhibition title and the paintings was inspired by Greek icons.)

Water – and its invitation to imagine freely - is common to all three places. Where they differ is in season and mood. Sherkin and Crete are rendered through the high skies and distant horizon of summer. The reservoir is a winter space. In Flow the skeleton of a tree is shrouded in a dark green that seems to remember dense foliage, or the rich humus underfoot of long-since fallen leaves. A sense of the horizon drawn near is given by the distinct band of light and dark lines running across the top of the painting. In the uncertain light, a rush of watery blue casts a spray of unravelling script. This is the misty blurring of winter, of drops that sit heavily on and fall wetly from twigs and sodden surfaces. And the space for imagining and remembering is differently configured. Here it is the seeping of one space into the next – the misty uncertainty of the boundary between distinct spaces and planes – that enables the limitless wandering of thought.

The paintings of ‘Jacob’s Ladder’ are specific – they capture a time and a place. And they are wilfully ambiguous, inscribing something of the remembering and imagining that may irrupt in or infuse a particular time and a place. What the paintings reveal and invite is dream-laden reflection in a landscape.

Siun Hanrahan

John Mayock DIT: Triptych Drawing Project

2006-09-29T08:35:00.000Z

Anna Macleod Transparent Drawing for project

2006-09-28T14:03:00.000Z

Anna Macleod: DIT: Response to 6 questions from Triptych.

1. Has working on this subject / theme altered your drawing process in any way?

I am coming to this project TRIPTYCH relatively late but the theme has helped consolidate some of the aspects of a drawing project already in progress: a reflection on the evolving architectural constructions in public houses in Ireland in response to the smoking ban, this social legislation for health and safety in the work place has changed the vernacular architectural landscape and altered the nature of social interaction in the pub.

2. Has the idea of a possible collaborative outcome altered your thinking / working methods in any way?

Not yet but I am interested in this project specifically because of the potential for collaborative opportunities.

3. How has the experience of your practice reviewed and viewed by your peers in Triptych influenced your work?

Ones work is constantly viewed and reviewed, it goes with the territory of
being an arts practitioner. The exciting aspect of Triptych is that it offers a platform for discourse on the practice of drawing with the opportunity for interdisciplinary and collaborative engagements.

4. Have you discussed this piece of work / process with anyone else in triptych while carrying out the work?

Not yet but I am looking forward to some dialogue about our postings.

5. Has anything you saw at the triptych IMMA symposium influenced your thinking or process in any way?

Unfortunately I was out of the country at the time and missed the symposium.

6. What collaborative outcome would you suggest as being appropriate for this research group?

A website / blog seems a logical outcome for a number of reasons, as suggested by Brian Fay it could be an educational tool and post graduate forum as well as providing possibilities for future collaborations with regular updates & information on evolving practices. It is important that whatever forum we use reaches a greater critical audience and will potentially lead to a broader pool for further collaborative opportunities.

6 Responses from Simon Downs.

2006-09-04T15:57:00.000Z

1. Has working on this subject/theme altered your drawing process in any way?

In all honesty the ‘∆’ theme fitted into an existing research agenda I had been pursuing: that of technology disrupting existing design practice and culture. Although not trained as a typographer, typography is one of the most obvious places to play with these disruptive technological artifacts. As an area of culture it has been continually made and re-made through the action of technological disruption, while still retaining its creative origins in the act of drawing. The conceptual seed is realized through the act of drawing and finally disseminated through technology ‘x’, ‘y’ or ‘z’. The drawn form remains, and dominates, the broadcast technology is subordinate.
As such the very ambiguous vacuity of the ‘∆’ pandered to my interests.

2. Has the idea of a possible collaborative outcome altered your thinking/working methods in any way?

The prospect of so many peers ‘reading’ my work is quite terrifying. But all I can do is work and write honestly in the hope that someone will find something that sparks his or her curiosity.
My industrial practice has been founded on working collaboratively on scales from teams of thirty [large multimedia studios] down to two [me and a client]. In truth I’m not sure I can think of ‘work’ as a solitary activity.

3. How has the experience of your practice being reviewed and viewed by your peers in Triptych influenced the work?

Fear, panic and mind-numbing paralysis: peers are intrinsically more frightening than clients. A disappointed client merely goes away, peers stay and gift you with their thoughts. This awareness of ongoing scrutiny has engendered a degree of scholarly care in my practice that would normally be reserved for my written research.

4. Have you discussed this piece of work/process with anyone else in Triptych while carrying out the work?

I’m shamed to say I habitually use several of my colleagues as well-informed sounding boards. They are very tolerant.

5. Has anything you saw at the Triptych IMMA symposium influenced your thinking or process in any way?

As one of the Tracey Editors I am continually amazed at what people consider ‘Drawing’ and continually heartened by the uses they put it to. The IMMA symposium reinforced this view. Viva Drawing!

6. What collaborative outcome would you suggest as being appropriate for this research group?

I’m not sure that a single collaborative outcome is the point. Like humanity itself, we are best, strongest and most beautiful in our diversity. The power of the Triptych Project lies in this multiplicity: in a myriad of voices all calling out the word ‘Drawing’.
While I accept this is the sort of thinking that does not easily win research grants, it gains strength precisely because the outcome is unbounded and unpredictable.
Let us be mutual, but united.

Deborah Harty & Phil Sawdon

2006-07-23T15:58:00.000Z

Triptych: ‘∆’: Reflecting on Drawing Practice as Knowledge

You can view the complete Triptych Project for Deborah Harty & Phil Sawdon by clicking on the 'LUSAD' link in the sidebar.

You are requested to provide no more than 50 word answers to the following:

DH: Deborah Harty

PS: Phil Sawdon

Has working on this subject/theme altered your drawing process in any way?
PS: I make art(ef)(f?)a(e?)cts as a process of symbiotic and mutually dependent relationships so questions, answers and effects are creatively altered and tautological.
DH: My process of making is an individual undertaking determined by reflection on personal experiences and experimentation withmaterials. The collaboration has not altered the creative process but the stimulus for the work has changed and the consideration of another, namely yourself!, has had to be taken into consideration.
PS: Consideration is completely apposite. Thoughtful concern and esteem are imbedded within its meaning and I think are very appropriate to successful collaboration.

Has the idea of a possible collaborative outcome altered your thinking/working methods in any way?
PS: I am altered by 'another' in a collaboration that is aware of a collaborative outcome, i.e. a collaboration squared as part of a three way collaboration feels like surreal mathematics.
DH: Absolutely!.....Hmmm.....although during the process of making how much do you consider the collaboration it is to become when you are dealing with and responding to, the collaboration it is?
PS: In my case not at all other than I collaborate to in order to be a collaborator and have only a marginal interest in the next phase during this phase. My interest is in immediate response with no real eye to the next phase.

How has the experience of your practice being reviewed and viewed by your peers in Triptych influenced the work?
PS: I am not aware that I am aware of others other than my collaborator.
DH: I would agree, I was aware the 'outcome' would form part of a collaboration beyond that of the collaborative making at the start of the project, but immersion in the process of making focused the intent on the work progressing not the viewing and reviewing of outcomes.

Have you discussed this piece of work/process with anyone else in Triptych while carrying out the work?
DH: Only my collaborator!
PS: ditto, ibid

Has anything you saw at the Triptych IMMA symposium influenced your thinking or process in any way?
DH: Not from the symposium as far as I am aware but the experience of working with another, when used to such a personal pursuit, has offered the opportunity to challenge what has become a very personalised method of working and thinking.
PS: I agree. The symposium was concerned with overcoming first date nerves and what has followed has been a consequence of the project developed from the symposium so I suppose it could be argued that that is an influence.

What collaborative outcome would you suggest as being appropriate for this research group?
DH: It will probably depend on the project outcomes of the research group members. Will be interesting to have the opportunity to 'view' others responses.
PS: A further collaboration!

Brian Fay (DIT): answer to 6 questions from Project

2006-07-20T15:09:00.000Z

Brian Fay – Response to 6 questions from Project

1. Has working on this subject/theme altered your drawing process in any way?
Formally it has led to an increased use of layering, multiple images and transparency values. In terms of thinking around ideas in drawing it has led to a clearer defining of stages of time in the drawings as per illustration which is informed by an image used to explain Husserls theory of time flow.

2. Has the idea of a possible collaborative outcome altered your thinking/working methods in any way?
Not specifically in relation to this project. I have recently worked on an extended drawing collaboration with a composer and found it to be a most productive way of working and would like to think of the drawings as having possibilities and applications outside of their own context.

3. How has the experience of your practice being reviewed and viewed by your peers in Triptych influenced the work?
I suppose one is constantly aware of ones work being viewed and reviewed. However in this context the sense of critique is perhaps less “adversarial” as it is an informed and focused arena for placing your practice.

4. Have you discussed this piece of work/process with anyone else in Triptych while carrying out the work?
Not yet as I am somewhat uncertain as to how it is actually working. We have held meetings within DrawingLab where presentations have been made and feedback given, but only in this context to date.

5. Has anything you saw at the Triptych IMMA symposium influenced your thinking or process in any way?
Not specifically or perhaps I should say not yet. I was particularly taken by the variety of approaches to drawing

6. What collaborative outcome would you suggest as being appropriate for this research group?
Public exhibition (touring), catalogue and accompanying website/blog for feedback during duration of show. This could act as an undergraduate teaching tool and postgraduate forum. An agreed format/s could be decided on for practical purposes of transport etc.
Also shared guest lecturing, which I would have liked to get started this semester but proved impossible.

2006-07-20T14:59:00.000Z

Triptych