P o r t f o l i oDaphne Van Dam

2013/2014

SUMMARYWork Projects

1. Three Faces about Distortion

Expression Expension Compression

2. Zoetrope

3. Clay Scenes

Nightmare Beauty Transformation Fallen Earth Relax Scape I Had A Dream Self-image Listen Wave Snakes Wedding Culture Invasion Human Recycling

4. Head with Fimo clay

5. Other Works: Some Paintings, Drawings, Sketches, Rotogravures

6. DVD or LINK with the Zoetrope video, the Color/Light project and the Sound project

INTRODUCTION

In the next pages you will see work pieces I have made throughout my three years in Art School and two works from my last year in high school. I was accepted to the art section in my former school.

I was brought to learn a wide range of different art media by my Art School.

My most used material and medium is clay. I discovered that I liked making three dimensional work such as sculpting and other structures. At first, I began making only heads and faces of clay and then I got the idea of making miniature scenes. I always try to discover and work with other materials and techniques to enlarge my knowledge.

I am fascinated by the human heads, the uniqueness of each facial line. The changes they go through and the distortions that exist in the world. Till which extent the face can distort.

I also always enjoy the drawing part and the preparatory work.Sadly I can not send you the real drawings and pictures but only photos of them because I still need them for my final exam. I have got a lot more preparatory work and sketches that I can not show you. But I hope you will be able to make youself a picture of it all and to see my progressions.

When I look at this work I can almost hear the scream that should come out of his mouth but it is strangely with-held too. His expression seems like frozen in the act. It almost leaves me feeling frustrated.The expression is now at its most extreme but can not go down anymore because of the frozen moment, it is like a memory.

The size is a little bigger than the real size of a head and is connected to a support that makes it stand on his own.When I show this work, and the other works made of clay, I present it on a white pedestal at a height that enables people to see it from above, front and from all around.

I painted it in black because I associate the colour with the expression. I’ve done that with the two other heads as well. I just use the colour that feels the best to me.

The Scream is my first work with clay, it is since this piece that I began to develop more of this kind of ideas. I like to work with this material.To manipulate it in my hands, to be able to make it take any form I wish and if I make a mistake I can change it easily.

Back then I wanted to make a face that expressed such an extreme feeling of rage that his face nearly com-pletely distords till it is not realistic anymore.

This one is more about the distortion of the face than expres-sion. This can be made if you put it in or against really hard wind, for example if you put your head under a hand dryer or out of the window of a car and open your mouth.The cheeks are pushed backwards and they swell when they are filled with air. The eyes are forced to close because they become watery.I found it most interesting to do the inside of the mouth. To create depth with it and do all the little details like the teeth, tongue, the inside of the throat.

This one is heavier then the first one. The inside of the first one is made of papier-mâché. This work is entirely made of clay. I constantly try to experience different approaches to see what the inconvenients and convenients of each way are. The third head I even tried to use a chicken wire and envloped it with papier maché. When it dries I apply the clay around it.

It’s a bit bigger and I added the hair because I wanted to try it out. I don’t usually sculpt hair because it’s difficult to make. One day I would like to use real or plastic hair to implant it in a silicone head.

I made the construction of the zoetrope with everyting I could find.

I used the mecanism of a bike, a wheel, a double chain, and a pedal to make it spin. The mouvement of turning the wheel with the pedal and looking through the holes at the moving sculptures also reminds us of the forgotten circular motion people had by turn-ing the handwheel on a Cinematographe. At the time of the primitive filming.

There is a roof on the zoetrope that can be taken off and a light fixed on it. It shines directly on the sculpture in front of our eye.I filmed it and projected it on a wall with the sound of the mecanism when it turns. I did it to show an other link to the old ways of projecting with a projector.

I copied it on the DVD, but in this case I will have to send you a link via e-mail, for further inspection.

I made this zoetrope earlier this year. I got the idea of making a zoetrope when I saw one in the british film museum when I was in London in april last year.

I wanted to associate my work with clay and the film making process. So instead of us-ing images I used three dimensional works. The dimension of each little clay head is 13x8,5cm. This time I used some tools to shape the clay.

There are 27 of them with little differences between each to make the movement as fluid as possible and the first and last must be the same. The images have to be made in a circle so that it is seen as a closed loop.

I call it a primitive, home made special ef-fect. The effect that is produced is the face openning his mouth and little by little covers his own face with it. Then out of the depth of his mouth comes the same face out again.

Four examples of the twenty-seven little clay heads:

Plans / Sketches

These miniature scenes are representations of mental images that come to me at any time. I also use what I see in my dreams. I draw them directly and make them without asking myself what they mean.While I’m working on them I analyse them and I begin to see the significa-tions in these images. In some way I make use of my subconscience.I’m always surprised about the meanings in these little scenes. I show them to different people and they nearly all see the same message.Normally when you see these images in your mind you don’t think more about them and forget them quite easily.

My clay is not backed so the material is fragile. I make use of that fragileness.The opinions you have, the ideas and such things always change.The clay cracks like the idea cracks when believes are proven wrong.

Sculpting whole scenes is not the same as only faces. It’s always fun to try to make different patterns and details in the material. The way you work a brick wall and a floor with tiles is completely different for exemple. It’s like a painter using different brushes and techniques to make the brushstrokes pat-terns. These patterns create a certain energy on the surface of the clay.

Since my zoetrope work there is a stong association with cinema. These scenes are like “mise-en-scenes” in theatre, television or in movies.

Nightmare17x15cm

This mental image come to me after a particular horrible nightmare. It felt like a violation of the mind and soul.

Beauty transformation18x13cm

It is an ironic representation of esthetic surgery. As I already said in the introduc-tion I did a lot of research work about different distortions of the face so also about extrem cases of plastic surgery and botox that went wrong or wasn’t what I considered beauty.

Fallen earth19x17

A poetic and fantastic approach. I imagined the earth crush or run aground like a boat on another earth.

Relax17x11cm

Bath scene. I liked to photograph the scenes in close-ups. It looks like we are in the scene and that without the other photos we could not tell that it is in miniature size.

Scape18x11cm

The difference between Cityscape and Landscape.It creats a separation between a natural environemment and an un-naturel one. Forest and city. And in between is a desert. Maybe here a cohabitation is not possible between the two and the human space drives nature to retreat more and more.

I Had A Dream11x9cm

I dreamt about making this one. So I did. It represents Hitler with the title, this time in the past present, of the most known speech of Mar-tin Luther King. These two men where excellent orators with goals as opposite as can be.

Self-image14x12cm

You can see someone in front of a mirror. It is about the diffences between how you see yourself and how you really are, how others see you. So differ-ent perceptions of youself. This scene also reminds us at how people with bulimia see themselves.

Listen11x10cm

A character with headphones on which are connected to a plant. I wanted to make this one a while ago but I wanted to do it with silicone and make it hyperrealistic like the works of Ron Mueck. But because I do not have the skills to do so, I put the idea aside.

Wave13x11cm

I often dream about tsunamis and big waves. I am not in a boat but often stand at the beach or I am swimming in the see when they come. It is one of the many biggest human fears.

Snakes27x20

When I was a child and even now I dream that I have to walk on a ground full of snakes and scorpions. I am not afraid of them but I find it disgusting walking on them. There are some dreams that come more often to me but I do not know what they mean.

Wedding21x20cm

Two nearly identical pragnant women who are about to get married. The mental image came to me because of the actual polemic in France about gay marriage.

Culture Invasion20x13cm

It is about the invasion of the “coca-cola” culture in France. An Eiffel tower coca-cola can that shakes hands with a Liberty statue can. It was not my intention to go into political works and I am not even that inter-ested in politics but even so, it still came to my mind.

Human recycling28x15

This is an image of an “human recycler”, as I call it, which refers to an excessive consumer society. Here you don’t know if he is eating are rejecting food. The idea comes from a sketch I made. You will see it further in my portfolio.

I have got more of these scenes that I did not put in this portfolio.

Head with Fimo clay7cm

This is my most recent work and my first try at using Fimo clay. I tried to make the face as realistic as I could master. I learned myself some technics from a book but mostly from the internet.

Other Works: Some Paintings, Drawings, Sketches, Rotogravure

Rotogravure is a type of intaglio printing process, which involves engrav-ing the image onto an image carrier. This rotogravure is made on copper sulphate plate. It is a whole procedure from the drawing in the copper till the printing. This image represents a crazy soldier I imagined.

This is Dracula played by Gary Oldman.

I was so impressed by this movie that I wanted to make a rotogravure about it.

A gravure on wood inspired by la métamorphose by Franz Kafka.

This is a bit different than engraving in copper because here you have to carve into the wood and contrary to copper, you know that what you carve will stay white. So with wood, if you want a simple black line you will have to carve all around and leave a line of wood.That is why I prefere copper because it is more defined.

A Painting about obesity caused by fast food eating or fatty foods.

Here I used aerosol paint spray. I first sprayed the background. Then I made a stencil from a photo I took from myself and sprayed on it. I’ve seen a lot of different street arts and watched some videos on how they did it.

An example of all the steps I made to accomplish my final work

This is a much older work, I made this in high school but I like all the little details in it. The given theme was to do something about masks. My choice was to make it about venice festival masks.

Here I drew my own imaginary, fantasy city with Ink. Also made during high school.

Close-ups to some details of the city

This is a bust of an old man. It made me think of Honoré Daumier. He made a large series of carica-ture figures.

Ink Pen Drawings

I like drawing with many lines and forms.

Three sketches I made from Goya paintings I have seen in a museum in Madrid.

I had some classes of silicone moulding. The objective was to create an exact dublication of an object. I wanted to choose something simple to begin with but even a lighter is not that simple to mould. The lighter to the right is the real one. The one to the left is made of caoutchouc and the others are of resin.

DVD / LINK

The first one is the video of the zoetrope.

The second one is about some work we had to do about light and colours. It was a long process of working on the computer with programmes as Photoshop and Movie Maker.

The last one is about sound, it wasn’t the first time I worked with sound. Our assignement was to make our own sound so that it would match with a video of our choice.I used Audacity to manipulate and make a sound I thought would go well with the atmosphere and rhythm of the clip. I chose the beginning of Peacock with Cillian Murphy that realy captivated me.In the beginning you don’t understand much, only that everything is organised and that the time is important. Then at the end of the clip, you begin to comprehend.