Contextual Influences Essay

Throughout my final major project I have been researching many different types of natural phenomenon’s, such as, the Antelope Canyon. These were formed when the flash flooding eroded the Navajo Sandstone, as well as other processes, like rainwater. During monsoon season it would run into the narrow passageways, which overtime eroded them, making the canyons deeper, as well as smoothing the hard edges, which formed the “flowing” edges. I also looked at striped icebergs. The stripes are caused by microscopic cracking due to thermal stresses; letting air in to the ice, turning it white (the “normal” colour of a glacier is blue, this is because of the way that ice transmits light, by scattering atoms, molecules and impurities), the stripes occur when the now white icebergs crack again, letting the blue reappear on the surface.

Antelope Canyon                                                                                          Striped Iceberg      


 Even after researching all different types of phenomenon’s, I still find that I am mostly drawn to phenomenon’s that are associated with light and occur in the sky, such as Auroras, Fire Rainbows, Sun Halos and Supernovas. My favourite of all the phenomenons that I have researched are the Aurora Borealis, otherwise known as the northern lights, these are caused by electrically charged particles in space hitting the Earth’s atmosphere. When the particles collide with nitrogen and oxygen particles they emit excess energy as light. The colour of light produced depends on the particles that collide and how high they collide above the Earth, for example, the common yellow-green lights are caused by oxygen molecules colliding about 60 miles above the Earth. There is something about it being in the atmosphere and so untouchable that makes it so fascinating, we can see them, can even understand the explanations of why they occur, but we can never be part of it, we can’t visit it and touch it like we can the grand canyon or even a striped iceberg. This is what mostly attracts me to them, and why I want to focus on these types of phenomenon’s, I can’t be part of it so I want to materialise it in a collection of garments. I did this by experimenting with print.


Wang Pieyi
Fall/Winter 2013/14 Collection
First Bleach Sample
Many designers have inspired my development of ideas, such as Wang Peiyi, who created his debut catwalk collection on the Aurora Borealis. The collection consisted mostly of evening gowns, most of which were embellished with a variety of coloured Swarovski crystals. What I like most about this collection is that he hasn’t used the obvious colours associated with the Auroras Borealis, the greens and yellows that occur most commonly. Instead the gowns are mostly black with dashes of colours showing the rarity of the phenomenon’s, as well as using colours that occur only in the rarest incidences.  Also because the colours are created with crystals when the light catches them they will shimmer, also creating the illusion of the northern lights. This collection has been one of my biggest influences, as the designer has used one of my favourite phenomenon’s for inspiration, and although I have chosen to not use embellishment as part of my project it has shown me a different way in which the northern lights can be represented within a garment. To try and create the illusion of the Northern Lights for myself, I have been experimenting with bleach. Originally I planned on using bleach to create patterns on coloured fabric, however that could be difficult, as it wouldn’t necessarily be associated with the Northern Lights. The method I have been experimenting with uses a silkscreen, which has your chosen colours painted on to it using Brusho dyes, then areas of colours are taken away using bleach, and then layering up more colours and bleach. However I feel that if I’m going to continue with this method it will need a lot of refining, to achieve the effect I want, in the sample shown, I feel that everything is much too blurred, although it is visually interesting, the lines are not clear enough, so they can’t represent the waves of the Aurora Borealis. During my research I looked at a number of blogs for tutorials and information about discharging with bleach. One of the posts I looked at had examples of how different methods of applying the bleach change the outcome, my favourite of these examples was the one that was applied with a sponge, it gave it a delicate look, with the illusion of many layers, that slightly resemble clouds. Another talked about fabrics that are good to use when removing dye directly from the fabric; natural fabrics are best as synthetic fabrics usually have a form of colour protection. I also found an interesting tutorial that combined the bleaching process and potato dextrin. Although I didn't fully understand the process, the result was really interesting.

Richard Weston
Elestial Quartz silk scarf
 Another designer I have found very inspiring is Richard Weston. He creates amazing silk pieces, most commonly scarves, using images of minerals and other natural objects. This fascination started “when he bought an ammonite that cost more than his scanner”, although his first attempts did not work out, he persisted, now using a much more expensive scanner to capture the beauty of his natural objects. The process can be lengthy, as many scans must be done to achieve the perfect image, before any extra blemishes are removed. These images are then digitally printed onto silk. I think what most draws me to his work is that some of the pieces resemble some of the first images I looked at, which were taken from a book called “The Natural World Close Up”.  I have done a couple of samples using digital printing; I used t-shirt transfer paper to print out images of my some of my work, such as, my mono prints, a bleach sample and a light trail photograph. I used the heat press to provide enough heat to transfer the images, and they came out extremely clearly and look great on fabric. However this method is not practical for creating garments with; this is because that the t-shirt transfer paper makes the fabric somewhat thicker, making it less easy to manipulate and more difficult to work with, especially if I wanted to create a flowing garment, the printed fabric would be much too thick and that isn’t an effect that I desire. Also t-shirt transfer paper is limited in terms of it’s size, most sheets are only made A4 size, so if I was going to cover an entire garment it would be unrealistic to do this transfer paper. I would also need a large amount of fabric to create my garments, so create a design would be difficult as I don’t want an obvious pattern, as natural phenomenon’s aren’t predictable and have no obvious pattern, so I would not want an clear pattern within my textile design. Another option would be to create a design and have it sent off to a company who would print in professionally, which could be done on a range of different fabrics, which would solve the problem of not being able to manipulate the fabric, however this would make any pattern even more obvious. So although I like the effect of my digital print samples, it is not a method I will be continuing with.

After looking at many different artists, my biggest inspiration is definitely Wang Peiyi's collection combined with the wonderful tutorials I have found for bleaching garments. I will continue to use Peiyi's collection for inspiration in terms of design/structure, colours and our shared theme.


word count: 1251



Bibliography:

  • Challoner J, John Farndon, Kerrod R, Walshaw (2000), Planet Earth How the World Works shown in 1000 Photographs. London: Southwater
  • Graham I (1999). All About Space Amazing Cosmic Facts. Bath: Southwater
17:13http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zkvVgvaKJgA&feature=player_embedded [7th March 2013]



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