This is a working journal of your life as an artist over the next nineteen months!

How do I start?

Put your name and address ( or school address ) inside the front cover.
A telephone number is useful – after all you don’t want to loose it!
Oh yes, also put the date.

Then leave the first double spread of pages blank, these can be used as a table of contents later. Now number the rest of the pages on the bottom right.

What do I put in it?

Well, who am I? What am I interested in?

To get some of the answers make a mind map starting on page one and two, the first double spread that’s numbered. You might need to use more pages!

This will give you clues to two lines of research.

Now you will have some idea of the subject matters you are personally interested in. These can be related to your personal heritage or community, or to the way artists respond to their culture or the way art is used by a culture. Select the one subject you find the most interesting and briefly say why.

Also you will have some ideas of what to draw, paint, make in clay, metal or glass. Sketch out your ideas with notes about what it is you’d like to do and why you think it is important for you – not just “I’d like to do it”, but “I’d like to do it because . . . . . ”.

How many pages have you used - 5, 6, 7, or 8?

Discuss these ideas with us.
It does not matter how wild the ideas are, nor that you might have no idea how to make them real nor where to start your research. The important thing is that you now have something to work on.


Good Working Practices

When you finish working in your IWB for the day always put the date, including the year! This is not only so we can mark it in monthly chunks but for the reasons of … see the next paragraph!

When you sketch an idea, or when out drawing in a café or park, etc., always sign or initial your sketch/drawing and date it. ( This is for copyright / provenance reasons )

When drawing from observation always write down where the subject is, why you are drawing it and, if on location, a short note as to the weather, lighting and other interesting points you were unable to include in the drawing. A photograph of the subject can be very useful at a later stage if you are going to develop the sketch into a painting or sculpture. Take your camera with you!

If you are using pencil or coloured pencil or soft pastel to draw with always fix it. You can get a can of fixative at an art shop or use ‘firm hold’ hair spray. Watercolour or acrylic paints do not need fixing as the paints contain an adhesive.

If you are using oil pastels, glue in a sheet of tracing paper, greaseproof or typing paper along the bound edge of the page to cover it and so protect your artwork and the facing page. You can do this also to help protect soft pastel drawings. Use UhU, PVA or some similar glue, Pritt Stick is not permanent enough!

When you write in your RWB use a black or blue-black pen, and write clearly. This is because we will need to be able to read it, and you will have to photocopy pages to send to the IB art examiners. You can make your RWB a pleasure to look at and read. Even writing is an art form, and one can take a degree in lettering and calligraphy!

When visiting exhibitions and art galleries collect postcards and brochures, stick them in. Refer to the historical / social influences on the artist. Write your personal impressions. This goes for field trips and holiday travel too.
If you are using the www or a book to find information always give the full reference. You may need to refer back at a later date. The format for this is the full web address and the date you accessed it, and for books the author, title, publisher and edition date and page numbers. For periodicals the name of the magazine, issue number and date, and of course the page number, author and title of the article. The same idea goes for television programmes and films! Sources of information must always be acknowledged – even the postcard that you stick in your RWB.

You remember you numbered the pages? This makes it easy to refer back to an idea or thought. Ideas will keep recurring, but also developing. Sometimes the development can be stimulated by an exhibition or another piece of work you are doing, or something you have been researching.
On page 60 you might sketch an idea and remember you did something similar before and write: -
“The idea / sketch on page 27 has possibilities for a painting, see my notes of ‘x’ exhibition on page 56.”
Also remember to cross-reference on pages 27 and 56!

Never ever cut or tear pages out from your RWB! Nor stick them together even if you have made what you think is a mistake or a terrible drawing. The RWB has to show mistakes, good work and very importantly your development as an artist over a period of time.

Make comments on your feelings, how your work is progressing, what successes you have and also on research and technical problems and how you have overcome these.

Make comments on your attitudes about life, social, cultural and political concerns. These can be related to artwork you are researching and / or to artwork you are producing. Through your research you will find artists often make such comments!

When trying out new media, experiment with them and find out what you can do with them and make notes as below.

Make notes on which materials you have used in your studio work experiments. The type of paper, the type of media, what type of glue gives the best results, which clay you used and how wet it was, which glaze and what temperature it was fired to, etc. this will save much time when later you need a specific result!

Work generates excitement and energy – have fun!
Guidelines for Critical and Contextual Research

Among the “Good Working Practices” we have mentioned collecting postcards and brochures when visiting art galleries and exhibitions, and to make notes about the historical / social influences on the artist, and writing your personal impressions. Also, artists make comments on their attitudes on life, social, cultural and political concerns.

These comments put the artwork into the context of the social, historical and cultural period in which they worked, or now work. This connects the artwork with the time it was made and this makes your understanding clearer as to why the artists did what they did. You will find that the patron or organisation that commissioned the work put definite limits onto the artist – for example the Pope on Michelangelo. It is interesting how Michelangelo got around some of these so he could fulfil his own vision, but not without some heated arguments! You could ask yourself whether that is true today, or is the artist more autonomous?

The IB expects you to look at more than one culture. This is probably easier than you think! Just make a list of the artists you already know and find out where they came from. As your work in the studio and in the RWB progresses we will make comments and often suggest relevant artists to look at.

It is a very good thing to read the arts page in newspapers and articles in the art periodicals in the library as well as the craft ones in the 3D Workshop to get an idea of what the current trend and style is now. Plagiarism will be frowned upon; your own words are more exciting. You will find some of the “art critic” language strange and often too verbose! However you will need to use some of this special language. Reading the reviews will help you to understand it and so to use it in context. You might not agree with what is being said, say so and why! The critic is not always correct.

Use the language of the artistic elements and analyse the composition! Make you own judgement of how effectively the artist has used colour, line, tone, shape, pattern, texture, form and space.
Is the composition such that your eye is lead around the picture or sculpture, exploring and experiencing the subject?
What is the mood and how has that been created?

We have other handouts on criticism and there are useful books in the library.