Contextual ResearchLeonid Afremov | Focusing on colour and medium

Tang Yao Hoong | Focusing on negative space

Moises Levy | Focusing on black and white, composition, and light

Work that relates to my location (place in question). Focusing on how Afremov has expressed trees and benches.

LEONID AFREMOV

Biography:Born 12th July 1955 in Belarus. Who mainly works with palette knives and oils, he is an Israeli modern impressionistic artist. He was raised in a traditional Jewish home. During college, Leonid Afremov was introduced to the work of March Chagall, Picasso, Dali, Modigliani and the 19th century French Impressionism. His early artistic work was very influenced by Chagall and Modigliani. Afremov devoted a lot of his time to art; he participated in various school exhibitions and sold some paintings. In 1978 Afremov graduated from the Vitebsk Art School as one of their elite members. After that he took private lessons from local famous artist Barowski who was teaching art when Marc Chagall was still living in Vitebsk.

LEONID AFREMOV

Features – He paints mainly landscape, city scenes, seascapes, flowers and portraits. His work is considered very colourful and bold. He changes an ordinary looking area into something more visually interesting using bold multi-colours. Colour – His work is multi-coloured, bright and bold. He experiments with a range of colours which makes a fairly dull looking scenery into something more interesting and aesthetically pleasing. The skies in his pieces are quite rich usually quite rich blues and lilacs and the trees are usually rich orange, browns (if depicted in autumn) and fresh greens (if depicted in summer). If the scene is set in the evening, the trees have multi-coloured leaves. Composition - The scenery he paints usually has a lot of depth and distance to them meaning you can see quite far into the distance in his pieces. Usually the scenes are going in a certain direction; from the side. Mood – His work has quite a calming affect as it is aesthetically pleasing despite the overload of colour and, sometimes, clashing colours.Materials – Leonid Afremov has used oil paints for his work.

Work that relates to my location (place in question). Focusing on how Yau Hoong has used negative space as a technique.

TANG YAU HOONG

Biography:Tang Yau Hoong is a 25 year old artist, illustrator, graphic designer living in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. With a passion for creative thinking, he creates art that is conceptual, surreal and fun in a simplistic and unique way. He works with various clients for advertising, editorial, and many other design projects. When he is not doing commercial work he enjoys making art and immerses himself in his personal projects. The artists that Tang Yau Hoong is heavily influenced by are The Head of States, Frank Chimero, Nick Dewar, James Joyce, Luke Best, Josh Keyes, Paul Blow, Pietari Posti, Christoph Niemann, The Small Stakes, Emiliano Ponzi and many more. YauHoong tends to create conceptual based illustrations. He finds “hand drawn and clean vector quite ‘compatible’ as I think these two different approaches could be combined perfectly and the result is really fresh. Instead of describing the drawing style, it would be easier to define my work in terms of theme and concept, and they would be illusion, nature, universal and conceptual.”

TANG YAU HOONG

Features – Tang Yau Hoong uses a lot of techniques however I am only focusing on his use of negative space. I have found out that ‘Negative space is, quite simply, the space that surrounds an object in a image. Just as important as that object itself, negative space helps to define the boundaries of positive space and brings balance to a composition.’Colour – Yau Hoong uses bright, bold colours which makes his designs look eye-catching and interesting. Sometimes the colours are not natural e.g. the trees would be purple instead of brown and green, this makes the image more bold and interesting to the viewer. Composition – Tang Yau Hoong’s use of negative space which adds a new layer of complex composition as the image doesn’t just deliver just one scenario in the design but two for the viewer. Some of his work has a lot of movement and it can take a while for the viewer to realise there is two scenarios adding interest to the design. For example, the design of the deer and the long trees, the trees actually grow into being skyscrapers. Mood – Yau Hoong’s work is clever as there are more than one element in his designs that surprisingly complement each other intriguing the viewer.Materials – Yau Hoong is a graphic designer.

Work relating to my location (place in question). Looking at how Levy has captured the shape of the tree, material of the bench, and the light passing through the tree.

MOISES LEVY

Biography:

MOISES LEVY

Biography: Born in Mexico City in 1963

Moises Levy works in the city as an established architect. His earliest interest in architecture and photography occurred on a trip to New York City when he was 13 years old. He was fascinated with the buildings and the evening shadows of the city.• In 1982, when he began his studies in architecture at Universidad Iberoamericana in Mexico, his appreciation of the natural relation between light and architecture was deepened. Subsequent travel to Boston, Paris and Venice served to illuminate the unbreakable bond between architecture and its relationship with light. It was this early interest in the qualities of light that lead Levy to photography, and as a counterpoint to his work as an architect he has now been drawn to landscape work. In 1998 he began to explore photography even more, with a broad interest in artistic composition, influences, history and styles. Although much of his photographic studies have been self-taught, he has taken several workshops along the way. While his career focuses on architecture, he states he has a preference for landscape photography because it lets him be more organic and flexible than work as an architect. Levy works with: Alpa and Hasselblad Cameras with PhaseOne IQ260 digital back.

MOISES LEVY

Biography:

MOISES LEVY

Features – The features of Levy’s work tend to be black and white, of the natural environment, emphasising soft textures that contrast with hard textures, interesting compositions, and use of light.Colour – Levy uses few colours; he uses black, white and grey. He tries to make the few elements of the photograph stand out in an interesting and striking way to sometimes highlighting the texture of the object by only using a limited range of colour.Composition – sometimes uses the golden section in his photographs. His photography tends to have a simple composition with very few components as possible.Mood – I find the mood of Levy’s photography quite melancholy, mysterious, and thought provoking as they are simplistic, striking, and bold.Materials – Moises Levy tends to work with Alpa and Hasselblad Cameras with PhaseOne IQ260 digital back for his photography.