Leanne Hedley project repot

The wall coverings project has been a chance for me to experiment with techniques I have always been interested in. When we first received the project I was quite keen to work with the nature side of wall paper, I didn’t however want to do florals, so I did some research and thought about corals and rocks that you may find, it was when I looked further into it that I discovered I was interested the idea of mould and the pattern it leaves behind, I came across this when looking in books related to microscopic images, I like working in different scaled to how people normally view things.
The visit to the Whitworth Gallery in Manchester was so inspiring and showed me how the history of wallpapers is so important.
The archive in the gallery was equally useful to the exhibition; they held a collection of different styles of wall coverings, some of the piece in heir cam from the 18th century. It showed a lot of traditional and very old papers t hat as a gallery had been given or found.
1 One that stood out to me was this (pic 1), this didn’t have a name attached but the staff said it is an old piece. I was attracted to texture of the piece, it was very much like the idea I want to pursue, although you cant see it was made with lots of holes in it and the peeling away of the material works to give the look of rot.

Another paper that I was drawn to was a leather embossed piece, it was amazingly still intact although obviously very fragile. The Japanese leather papers were not imported into England and America until after the 1800’s, Moroccan Arabs earlier took them to Spain, this was before wallpaper wall invented. This suggest just how old the papers must have been and how good the workman ship was to be able to have them so intact.
The exhibition ‘putting on the glitz’ was amazing for me, been interested in quite literally ‘Glitz’, the pieces were ranged from older more traditional pieces that had been well preserved, to some contemporary pieces that you can buy in shops today for the modern home. The biggest inspiration and most interesting piece I have seen in a long time was this. (pic2) I was stunned by this piece; it was appealing to me, as I like the idea of having what is thought to me something not beautiful that actually is very attractive. The metallic sheen made this look very luxurious and the colours used gave it a lot of power; it was like a petrol spill with a textile designers input.
2
It inspired my to believe in my idea more and showed me the possibilities and potential of my design and ideas.
The piece at the Whitworth is something I will always remember and im really glad I went and saw the exhibition as it was defiantly a starting point for my designing.
With my direction been nature and my theme been mould I started with researching fungus and taking photographs. I visited Tropical World to take some photographs and look at mould on a bigger scale, growing on the water areas and rocks also the fish tanks, with my first idea been rocks and corals I planned to visit there anyway it was very useful to get some good photographs that I used for my drawings, they helped me o understand the pattern.
I thought marbling would be a good way to get some background papers but unfortunately these were unsuccessful for me, I also played about with layering and collaging to make some textured papers. I like working with a mixed media so I knew I wanted to use a print and then work back in to it. I also really like the effect of the laser cutter so I was hoping to use that too.
I decided to make a screen using the design I did in a drawing. I played about with scaled and experimented with different colours. Also I looked into how I could incorporate some metallic finishes into m work as this was something I had like in the work id seen, I bought some metalic and silver binders and also some foils that could be heat transferred on to my work. The prints were really exciting and I had some really successful sessions in the print room.

I then started working with the laser cutting using a similar design, this gave my prints a really good finishing touch they made them appear more delicate. I was really happy with the results of the processes mixed together and knew which I had in mind to use for my finals.
Whilst going through these workshops I was introduced to a different technique ‘gesso’, this was something I wouldn’t normally go for as the effect is quite subtle, however I experimenting with making some gesso boards and I found adding prints and foils worked in the same way as it did on paper so I made some of these to display with my work. I would use this technique again for something more floral I think. When I had made the boards I thought about panelling with my different pieces how that could look on the wall, I think the gesso boards would make really good panels however mixed with my prints they didn’t quite work together.