Visual Art Week 3 & 4 – Developing a visual language

This week, students were inspired by the artists’ work in the Bark Ladies exhibition and were interested in developing the potential for story telling and also developing their own visual language through the exploration of line and pattern.

This week we worked simply using white pencil on black paper. Students were interested in accessing their own visual memory of patterns in nature.

They were inspired by Ms N Yunipingu’s white acetate drawings in the NGV Bark Ladies Exhibition.

‘Her vocabulary captures the essence of nature... In 2009 Ms Yunipingu removed all figurative components in her work, so that only the cross hatching remained.’

Students worked towards developing their own visual vocabulary, where their marks, patterns and line work have a personal meaning to them. These will be explored over the coming weeks in a variety of ways through a variety of mediums. Awakening visual memories of patterns noticed, registered and explored in the past will come to the fore the more they are accessed and reflected upon.

When we create our own visual language we can begin to communicate our own visual stories through our artworks….

Below are some examples of our mark making and patterning explorations…

In week 4 we explored our immediate surroundings to find natural materials to make brushes. Our aim was to further investigate the idea of mark making and pattern and experiment with a range of materials to create our own patterns, marks and visual language.

We were inspired by Naminapu Maymuru-White-
‘who maps out stars and galaxies in graphic black and white ochre…’
Naminapu uses a skewer stick and Marwat, (human hair paintbrush)

We reflected on the Marwat, human hair brushes made by Rarriwuy Marika when she visited our school as artist in residence in 2015.

We also learnt that:

‘It is customary for Yolŋu artists who paint Country and the stories it holds to use materials collected from Country…’

So this week students collected materials from nature from around the school and proceeded to make their own brushes. The results were very interesting. Students were amazed by the range of materials available to them and also are excited to experiment with the brushes next week to see what kinds of marks and patterns they make.