Completed Studies: 'Techno 001 - 004'

 

'Techno Study 001' Mixed Media on Paper, £00 mm X 300 mm, April 2021

These recently completed, paper-based studies form a kind of aside to my on-going 'Constructed City' paintings.  They were made fairy rapidly, as my latest, more ambitious, 'CC' piece unfolds at a somewhat steadier pace.

Anyone following my progress on here, will be familiar with my tendency to compartmentalise work into discrete projects, and with the convulsions I regularly perform to make distinctions between them.  I recognise that probably all means far more to me, than to many others.  However, it does serve to rationalise the multiple strands of thought running through my head, without my becoming totally overwhelmed.  Inevitably, there's never enough time (or energy) to make everything I'd like to, or to properly process the steady drip of new ideas.  A degree of conscious organisation thus feels essential to whatever workflow I do achieve - however anal it might sometimes appear.

'Techno Study 002', Mixed Media on Paper, 200 mm x 200 mm, April 2021

Consequently, whilst the visual language on display in these studies is clearly related to that of recent 'Constructed City' pieces, they do feel like a separate in a certain key respects.  Perhaps most importantly, there is no source subject here.  Each of my 'CC' pieces relates  to a specific subject source (and possible associations) - however convoluted the processes of translation and media-switching involved in their development may be.  In truth, all that process may be as important a theme, as the actual construction sites that seed them.  Nevertheless, retaining some vestige of specific subject within each one still feels very important.  In the 'Techno" studies however, there is genuinely no actual subject.  Each evolved intuitively (and relatively rapidly), as a purely formal exercise - and with little sense of exactly how they might end up.  In essence, they are improvisations on a general theme.

'Techno Study 003', Mixed Media on Paper, 300 mm x 300 mm, April 2021

As far as any external stimulus does go - the clue is in the title.  These are mostly interpretations of, or responses to Techno music.  Doubtless, there is some relation to all the complex geometry of the 'CC' work, but definitely more relevant here are the structures to be found within the roster of fairly regimented electronic music that dominated much of my current listening.  In one way or another, each of the studies reflects the particular discs that have been on heaviest rotation during its production.  My last playlist  outlines my most recent enthusiasms - many of them tending towards the more aggressive or spartan end of industrial Techno.  However, the truth is - I've been enjoying electronic music of many stripes for decades.  The influences feeding into the next batch are as just as likely to turn to early Detroit or Sheffield, or to the IDM, Dub Techno, Glitch or Minimalism that still fascinate me - as to the more punishing, so-called 'Birmingham Sound', that fed these four.

'Techno Study 004', Mixed Media on Paper, 200 mm x 200 mm, April 2021

What I am telling myself, is that the rigorous, four-square frontality of these images is an obvious response to the relentless 4-4 rhythm of much Techno.  Certainly, there are no  diagonals or curves to be seen here (unlike the 'CC's) - for now, at least.  The juxtaposition of crisp edges, meshes and intersecting lines, with more nuanced veils and fields also seems to chime pretty well with the sequenced beats, melodic pads and aural textures of the music in question.

I've no idea if these small studies will lead to anything more significant.  I do know there'll be some more, and that, if nothing else - they already provide a refreshing punctuation to the methodical labour of my other work.  It's probably also true that they serve as a useful (and fun) test-bed for application methods and potential marks, at the same time.