Michael Craig-Martin (Contemporary Art Practice)
Michael Craig-Martin is a British-Irish artist born in Dublin in 1941. Despite being born in Dublin, Craig-Martin spent most of his childhood in Washington D.C. and would study art in the US, the UK and even in France. In 1966 he would make the UK his permanent home. His contemporary work pushed the boundaries and in 1973 he would produce an installation that would challenge how art, and in particular, contemporary art was perceived. By the 1980's, Craig-Martin was a teacher where he inspired and culminated the Young British Artists (including Damien Hirst). In 2016 he was knighted.
Craig-Martin's work has been incredibly varied over the years, working in both sculpture and painting, though his work is rarely 'traditional'. Even his paintings tend to have some form of twist to them, such as using aluminium as a canvas. His style has evolved and changed as he has progressed, with his recent work taking a cleaner style with clean black lines and flat colours. These are the images that grabbed my interested the most, though I can't mention Michael Craig-Martin and not mention his most famous piece.
In 1973 Craig-Martin exhibited an installation of conceptual nature entitled An Oak Tree. The installation comprised of a glass of water, sitting atop a glass shelf. In addition, on the gallery wall was a series of questions, in which an interviewer tries to discern how a glass of water can be an oak tree. The piece was the most talked about art installation of the year, sparking arguments and discussions about the work and Craig-Martin himself, who claimed to have the ability to turn trees into glasses of water.
We have talked about this piece a lot in class. And I really do mean a lot. It's become something of a running joke. If we produce a piece of art we don't like, we joke about calling it 'An Oak Tree' and suddenly the work of art is transformed into sheer genius.
I do find the aesthetic oddly calming. But do I understand it? ...I think so. I've given this a lot of thought. I have an interruption of it, and I don't believe I'm clueless about it. But saying I fully understand it is perhaps still a bit of a stretch. I believe he's forcing us to challenge our perception of how we define our reality, and in turn making us question if we all perceive reality in the same way as one another. By changing the parameters of our perception, he's posing the possibility of warping our reality. I think. It makes sense in my head. Conceptual art is still a little confusing to me. I can say with complete honesty though that I am trying to understand it.
Full Life, created in 1985, is a painting. Oil paint painted onto an Aluminium sheet, supported by steel rods. The plate was cleaned with acid, then etched. The lines were painted white before being masked off, and the blue background being applied. The image depicts three keys on a keyring, a handgun and a safety pin (which I have difficulty making out). The items in the image are not to scale, appearing much larger than real life, but also out of context with each other.
The look of this painting is very pleasing to me. The colours are a personal favourite, and the style he has used in portraying these items is very much one I enjoy. I feel this is an image that you should really view in a gallery, as the flat image here does not convey the depth and texture of the painting. I believe this image to be a comment on life and how we treat it. Every day items that include a gun. I think it's a social comment, particularly considering Craig-Martin's American upbringing.
This image, left without a name was done in 2014, and is more indicative of his more recent works and style. Following on from Full Life, this image uses Aluminium as a base and is painted with (this time) acrylic. Painted in much the same way (etched, painted and masked), it shows some vivid flat colours, this way using black for lines. Although it's not really relevant in this particular image, most of his colour choices are bright and abstract. There's no shading in this image, or the other images he's created in this style. He's even recreated a Seurat painting in the same way.
I love simplicity as much as I like complexity. I like and enjoy these images on an visual level, but I can't honestly say I understand them. I don't understand the colour choice and why he'd used them. I find his choice of materials incredibly interesting, and I would be curious to see if I could do something similar. The imagery is definitely something I relate to, especially considering my more graphic and illustrative nature.
Michael Craig-Martin has clearly played a large role in the development of Conceptual Art, though in terms of Contemporary Art, I'm not sure I believe him to be that prudent. I understand he had a huge role in starting off a lot of the Young British Artists, but I would liked to have seen (or understood) more of these inspirations in his own work.
Craig-Martin's work has been incredibly varied over the years, working in both sculpture and painting, though his work is rarely 'traditional'. Even his paintings tend to have some form of twist to them, such as using aluminium as a canvas. His style has evolved and changed as he has progressed, with his recent work taking a cleaner style with clean black lines and flat colours. These are the images that grabbed my interested the most, though I can't mention Michael Craig-Martin and not mention his most famous piece.
In 1973 Craig-Martin exhibited an installation of conceptual nature entitled An Oak Tree. The installation comprised of a glass of water, sitting atop a glass shelf. In addition, on the gallery wall was a series of questions, in which an interviewer tries to discern how a glass of water can be an oak tree. The piece was the most talked about art installation of the year, sparking arguments and discussions about the work and Craig-Martin himself, who claimed to have the ability to turn trees into glasses of water.
We have talked about this piece a lot in class. And I really do mean a lot. It's become something of a running joke. If we produce a piece of art we don't like, we joke about calling it 'An Oak Tree' and suddenly the work of art is transformed into sheer genius.
I do find the aesthetic oddly calming. But do I understand it? ...I think so. I've given this a lot of thought. I have an interruption of it, and I don't believe I'm clueless about it. But saying I fully understand it is perhaps still a bit of a stretch. I believe he's forcing us to challenge our perception of how we define our reality, and in turn making us question if we all perceive reality in the same way as one another. By changing the parameters of our perception, he's posing the possibility of warping our reality. I think. It makes sense in my head. Conceptual art is still a little confusing to me. I can say with complete honesty though that I am trying to understand it.
Full Life, created in 1985, is a painting. Oil paint painted onto an Aluminium sheet, supported by steel rods. The plate was cleaned with acid, then etched. The lines were painted white before being masked off, and the blue background being applied. The image depicts three keys on a keyring, a handgun and a safety pin (which I have difficulty making out). The items in the image are not to scale, appearing much larger than real life, but also out of context with each other.
The look of this painting is very pleasing to me. The colours are a personal favourite, and the style he has used in portraying these items is very much one I enjoy. I feel this is an image that you should really view in a gallery, as the flat image here does not convey the depth and texture of the painting. I believe this image to be a comment on life and how we treat it. Every day items that include a gun. I think it's a social comment, particularly considering Craig-Martin's American upbringing.
This image, left without a name was done in 2014, and is more indicative of his more recent works and style. Following on from Full Life, this image uses Aluminium as a base and is painted with (this time) acrylic. Painted in much the same way (etched, painted and masked), it shows some vivid flat colours, this way using black for lines. Although it's not really relevant in this particular image, most of his colour choices are bright and abstract. There's no shading in this image, or the other images he's created in this style. He's even recreated a Seurat painting in the same way.
I love simplicity as much as I like complexity. I like and enjoy these images on an visual level, but I can't honestly say I understand them. I don't understand the colour choice and why he'd used them. I find his choice of materials incredibly interesting, and I would be curious to see if I could do something similar. The imagery is definitely something I relate to, especially considering my more graphic and illustrative nature.
Michael Craig-Martin has clearly played a large role in the development of Conceptual Art, though in terms of Contemporary Art, I'm not sure I believe him to be that prudent. I understand he had a huge role in starting off a lot of the Young British Artists, but I would liked to have seen (or understood) more of these inspirations in his own work.
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