Tom Abbiss Smith. 1301006. Illustration Year 3. UNIT BA3B

Secondary Research - Franz West

Secondary Research - Franz West

“His early work was inspired by the Viennese Actionism movement of the early 70s, consisting of applying or “adapting” new materials to everyday objects such as wrapping coke bottles in gauze or creating large “sausage-like” sculptures out of welded metal. During this time, West also developed a series of Adaptives, humorous plaster abstract objects meant to be worn on the face or around the waist.”

Secondary Research - Vorticism

Secondary Research - Vorticism

“Vorticism combines the geometrical fragmentation of Cubism with Futurist-style machine-like imagery, in order to illustrate the dynamism of the modern world. Lewis considered Vorticism to be a genuinely independent alternative to both Cubism and Futurism. He was impressed by the strong structure of Cubist painting, but declared that it lacked life when compared to Futurist art. The latter, however, he criticized for its lack of structure. Vorticism was intended to combine the best elements of both. Although - optically - Vorticist painting can look very similar to Futurist works, philosophically they are relatively distinct. Because while movement was the key feature of Futurism, modern industrialization was the key motif of Vorticism, expressed in a ‘dry’, stripped-down, angular style.”

“The New Vortex plunges to the heart of the Present: we produce a New Living Abstraction”. Signatories to the Manifesto included Lewis, Pound, Dismorr and Wadsworth, as well as the French sculptor Henri Gaudier-Brzeska (1891-1915) and the English painter William Roberts (1895-1980), a close friend of Lewis.”

Vorticism seems relevant to my work in the context of Kafka due to the intentions of the work expressing dynamism of the modern world. I feel the progressive style in which Kafka wrote contains these aspects and feels respective. Wyndham’s polemicist attitude within Blast magazine acted as a critical and satirical response to art history using literature and visual art “which seeks to shake and unsettle the mind rather than cultivate or “improve” it. The thoughts of the manifesto making up this vortex are therefore wildly and wilfully contradictory, at once revolutionary and reactionary.” - http://www.spikemagazine.com/wyndham-lewis-blast-an-explosive-journal.php

Secondary Research - Vorticism

http://vorticism.co.uk/vpages/vorticist-manifesto/ - Inspiring my decisions within the layout in the concertina outcome.

Secondary Research - Vorticism

“The first section of the journal starts with a sequence of twenty-odd pages which are presented like a manifesto. Each page has a dramatic piece of graphic design, in which the editors ‘Blast’ and ‘Bless’ different things - often these are the same things. It is sardonic and humorous to read, but has a great vitriolic tone as well.” - I feel the contradictive and abstract quality of this explained manifesto feels relevant to my own work in the context of BA3B, and post graduate studies, due to my interests in the unconventional and rebellious art forms. The idea that Blast is a critical magazine feels reflective of the malice and hatred Kafka had for his father, I find the dissemination of Blast just before WW1 helps elucidate the functionality of the magazine and suggests how one in modern times could work satirically to current events and topics.

The use of the powerful and impacting Grotesque typeface within the front cover of the magazine feels both ahead of it’s time and also particularly rebellious, enforcing the satirical and avante gard content. The use of this typeface within my own outcome similarly utilises the impact of the font as a way of relating to my abstract and unconventional content, while maintaining historical context, directing the viewer back to the dark and abstracted times of WW1 and WW2, a time in which Kafka similarly wrote his stories.

Secondary Research - Vorticism