ARTPEDAGOGY
  • THRESHOLD CONCEPTS
    • ABOUT THE THRESHOLD CONCEPTS
    • THRESHOLD CONCEPT #1
    • THRESHOLD CONCEPT #2
    • THRESHOLD CONCEPT #3
    • THRESHOLD CONCEPT #4
    • THRESHOLD CONCEPT #5
    • THRESHOLD CONCEPT #6
    • THRESHOLD CONCEPT #7
    • THRESHOLD CONCEPT #8
    • THRESHOLD CONCEPT #9
    • THRESHOLD CONCEPTS: A CRITICAL POINT
  • KS3 PROGRAMME
    • THRESHOLD CONCEPTS: KS3 PROGRAMME
    • TC1: MAKING MARKS - ON SURFACES, IN SPACE
    • TC2: EXPRESSIVE APPROACHES
    • TC4: EXPLORING (& ABUSING) ART HISTORIES
    • TC5: PLAYFUL, PURPOSEFUL, ABSURD
    • TC7: A SENSE OF PLACE
    • TC8:VALUE & BALANCE; REPRESENTATION & ABSTRACTION
  • COUCH TO ARTIST
    • COUCH TO ARTIST: A 9-STEP PROGRAMME
    • COUCH TO ARTIST: TASK 1 MARKS; WORDS
    • COUCH TO ARTIST: TASK 2 VIBRATIONS; SENSATIONS
    • COUCH TO ARTIST: TASK 3 TAKING SHAPE
    • COUCH TO ARTIST: TASK 4 PUBLIC INTERVENTIONS
    • COUCH TO ARTIST: TASK 5 PLAY, TIME
    • COUCH TO ARTIST: TASK 6 HEAD, HANDS, HEART
    • COUCH TO ARTIST: TASK 7 ART, WORDS; MEANINGS, CONTEXTS
    • COUCH TO ARTIST: TASK 8 VALUES & MEASURES
  • RESOURCES
    • #abstractadvent
    • PRIMARY RESOURCES >
      • INTRODUCTION
      • PRIMARY: DADA WORKSHOP
      • Superheroes! (And patterned pants)
      • Robots!
      • Ancient Greece: figures and forms
      • Eek! A wolf ate my sketchbook
      • Ancient Egypt: What a Relief!
      • Shapes and (hi)stories
      • Figures & Factories
    • Why study Art?
    • LESSON RESOURCES >
      • THE GRID - METHOD AND MISCHIEF
      • Noughts & Crosses - playing with art (hi)stories
      • THE ART OF INSTRUCTION
      • PREHISTORY NOW
      • Self-Portraits (Pt.1) About Face
      • Self-Portraits (Pt.2) More than just a pretty face
    • ARTICLES >
      • ABOUT ABSTRACTION: HENRY WARD
    • Preparing for the Personal Study
  • SHOP
  • ABOUT
  • THRESHOLD CONCEPTS
    • ABOUT THE THRESHOLD CONCEPTS
    • THRESHOLD CONCEPT #1
    • THRESHOLD CONCEPT #2
    • THRESHOLD CONCEPT #3
    • THRESHOLD CONCEPT #4
    • THRESHOLD CONCEPT #5
    • THRESHOLD CONCEPT #6
    • THRESHOLD CONCEPT #7
    • THRESHOLD CONCEPT #8
    • THRESHOLD CONCEPT #9
    • THRESHOLD CONCEPTS: A CRITICAL POINT
  • KS3 PROGRAMME
    • THRESHOLD CONCEPTS: KS3 PROGRAMME
    • TC1: MAKING MARKS - ON SURFACES, IN SPACE
    • TC2: EXPRESSIVE APPROACHES
    • TC4: EXPLORING (& ABUSING) ART HISTORIES
    • TC5: PLAYFUL, PURPOSEFUL, ABSURD
    • TC7: A SENSE OF PLACE
    • TC8:VALUE & BALANCE; REPRESENTATION & ABSTRACTION
  • COUCH TO ARTIST
    • COUCH TO ARTIST: A 9-STEP PROGRAMME
    • COUCH TO ARTIST: TASK 1 MARKS; WORDS
    • COUCH TO ARTIST: TASK 2 VIBRATIONS; SENSATIONS
    • COUCH TO ARTIST: TASK 3 TAKING SHAPE
    • COUCH TO ARTIST: TASK 4 PUBLIC INTERVENTIONS
    • COUCH TO ARTIST: TASK 5 PLAY, TIME
    • COUCH TO ARTIST: TASK 6 HEAD, HANDS, HEART
    • COUCH TO ARTIST: TASK 7 ART, WORDS; MEANINGS, CONTEXTS
    • COUCH TO ARTIST: TASK 8 VALUES & MEASURES
  • RESOURCES
    • #abstractadvent
    • PRIMARY RESOURCES >
      • INTRODUCTION
      • PRIMARY: DADA WORKSHOP
      • Superheroes! (And patterned pants)
      • Robots!
      • Ancient Greece: figures and forms
      • Eek! A wolf ate my sketchbook
      • Ancient Egypt: What a Relief!
      • Shapes and (hi)stories
      • Figures & Factories
    • Why study Art?
    • LESSON RESOURCES >
      • THE GRID - METHOD AND MISCHIEF
      • Noughts & Crosses - playing with art (hi)stories
      • THE ART OF INSTRUCTION
      • PREHISTORY NOW
      • Self-Portraits (Pt.1) About Face
      • Self-Portraits (Pt.2) More than just a pretty face
    • ARTICLES >
      • ABOUT ABSTRACTION: HENRY WARD
    • Preparing for the Personal Study
  • SHOP
  • ABOUT
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​FROM COUCH TO ARTIST

TASK 1:
MARKS; WORDS


Task 1 connects with Threshold Concept 1.  It is an opportunity to consider: the type of marks you like to make, the art you want to produce now and in the near future, and the words that might help you to understand and articulate this in more depth.
​
​ ​You will complete:
1. a range of reflective notes and sketches as you read, question and research. (suggested time: approx 1-2 hours). 
2. a text-inspired/influenced response (approx 2-4 hours).
​
Picture

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In these unstable and uncertain times, we need to look to the things that unite us – the things that show us the world in all of its variations - and for that, we need artists Audrey Azoulay


​TASK 1

Respond creatively to the following question. Incorporate relevant words, texts or quotes into or alongside your response:
​
  • What type of marks should you - as an artist - make at this time in history, and why? 

REMEMBER: 
  • The question is deliberately challenging and open-ended. That's good for your creative development and should provoke a more original response.
  • Be brave, experimental and opinionated - and if you haven't got an opinion yet, or if the question doesn't make much sense at the moment: read on carefully. 
  •  Your response should be creative - personal, practical and experimental - not a stereotypical 'first-page' style brainstorm. It might contain some of the text/words that you generate or encounter as you continue reading. 
  • Your response might also reveal or hint at something related to recent experiences, be this personal, local or global.
  • You might be led by: the materials you most enjoy working with;​ techniques and 'styles' that you wish; other artworks that inspire you.
    ​
Potential practical starting points:
  • Hand-written notes scrawled in chalk on a wall or pavement (and this - the results and act/performance of making - photographed or filmed as evidence).
  • Keywords recorded/designed/scattered in a mini hand-made sketchbook alongside/over/within related images and doodles.
  • A drawing, painting or sculpture that responds to, or incorporates, relevant words, or is accompanied with creative captioning or explanations.
  • An audio or video recording or animation. This might be a conversation with yourself or someone else (real or imagined), or a video montage within which you dub or layer your own text or spoken responses. The words you choose might complement the images, or contrast in an unexpected way.
  • A combination of the above, or an experimental response of your own choosing.

TASK 1 ADDITIONAL PROMPTS & RESOURCES


​So, what type of marks do artists make?
Threshold Concept 1 reminds us that artists can make many different types of marks, and for many different reasons. We might describe types of marks through their:
  • Visual qualities - for example: a flowing line, a brightly coloured shape, a textured brush stroke...
  • Mediums or techniques - for example: a pencil sketch, a sculpted form, a recorded performance... 
  • Genres or subject matter - for example: a portrait, a landscape, a still-life... 
  • 'Movements' or shared philosophies  - for example: Impressionism, Cubism, Expressionism... 

Why do artists make marks?
The reasons why artists might be moved to creative action are numerous, often highly personal (but not always), and subject to change with experience and time. Artists might produce art in response to experiences and emotions; as a means of engaging with the world; as a form of learning, communicating, questioning or challenging ideas and conventions. Artists also produce work for others, for income and profit, for decoration and design...

Consider the following combinations of images below and how they have been ordered under the headings 'Traditional', 'Modern' and 'Contemporary'. ​
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About' Traditional'. 'Traditional' art might be considered artwork where specific skills, techniques and/or styles are established within a culture and have been taught and passed on. For example, 'representational', 'figurative' or 'realistic' works such as drawings, paintings or sculptures might often be described as 'traditional'. But it's worth keeping in mind that contemporary artists also play with our expectations of these, and traditions are subject to change. 'Traditional' art might also be taken as craft-based, designed or decorative.  Some artworks considered traditional might also be described as abstracted (generally considered a 'Modern' term) or be comparable to contemporary forms, such as installations or performances. 
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About 'Modern'.'Modern' art might be considered as a challenge to 'traditional' approaches. In art history terms, the 'Modernist' period tends to refer to the period of time from late 19th Century to mid 20th Century. This was a period of great change, a time where many artists challenged traditional techniques and ways of perceiving and recording. Movements such as Impressionism, Post-impressionism, Cubism, Futurism, Expressionism and Abstract Expressionism (along with many others) might be described as 'Modern'. But many artists today continue to explore ways of looking and recording (as did some artists prior to 19th Century). It might be argued that some of these now-established Modernist approaches have or will, with time, become considered 'traditional'.
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'Contemporary' art is a complex soup. The 1950s saw a wider emergence of  ways of making art that might be considered more self-aware or self-referencing, ironic, playful, troublesome, less-obviously skilled even. Pop Art (for example), provides many examples of this. There was also an increase in the appropriation of existing objects as art - albeit a practice established much earlier by artists, most famously Marcel Duchamp. Art also moved increasingly out of traditional gallery and studio spaces. 'Happenings', events, collaborations and 'performances' emerged to challenge - play with, even - the notions of 'traditional' and 'modern'. In timeline terms, this shift might be described as 'Post-Modern', but of course many of these ideas and actions had been explored previously within different contexts. (Art movements such as Dada and Surrealism, for example, had embraced performance, absurdity and assemblage; ancient tribes, such as The Dogon of Mali created fantastic costumes for collaborative performances, ceremonies and rituals).

CONTEXTUAL QUESTIONS

  • Which of the three categories, above - Traditional, Modern, Contemporary - appeal most to you and why? (How do other forms of art and design - applied arts in particular e.g. architecture, illustration, cartoons and graphic novels, fashion, animation - sit within or beyond these distinctions? 
  • Which styles/approaches/techniques seem most fitting to respond to your recent experiences - of COVID-19, lockdown, or other events of global or personal significance?
  • All of the artworks above have been produced by BAME artists (Black, Asian, and minority ethnic). Re-considering how art (hi)stories are shared is an important step towards fairer representation, fuelled by recent BLM protests (Black Lives Matter). How might the type of marks that artists make raise issues, challenge conventions and provoke change or speak truth to power?​​

TASK 1 SUMMARY

  • You should have completed a range of notes in response to the information above. This might also include wider research and experimental sketches.
  • The notes, words, quotes and insights you have gathered should now inform your own creative response to this question: What type of marks should an artist make at this time in history, and why?
  • Your response might be deliberately 'traditional, 'modern' or 'contemporary' in style or concept.
  • Your response might also address a specific issue, personal or global, from this moment of time.
  • Your response should be personal and intuitive and not constrained by fear of failure, the thoughts of others or concerns of perfectionism.

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