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| North American Totem Poles |
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| North American Artefact more subtle colours varries from use of bold primaries |
I briefly looked at the Maia Conran exhibit at the Pheonix Gallery, but otherwise spent the majority of the day at the Royal Albert Memorial Museum and Art Gallery. I found the RAMM much more useful for gathering inspiration and drawings than I had expected I would. I began by browsing around the collections, looking for objects of interest, notable patterns and motifs. I liked the element of history which drawing from the collections gave to my work and this also corresponded with my ideas which have been developing about art which is representative of other cultures.
I found some interesting wooden carvings with very stylised floral images and also a lot of interesting and really delicate depictions of natural forms in a collection about lace making. I managed to record relevant design ideas from these fairly quickly. I was aware of time constrictions so then began to be more focused with my research as I realised how big the museum collection actually was. I went upstairs to find the World Cultures section as I thought this might be interesting and found a collection of North American and Asian artefacts which were full of colour, pattern, culture and history. Several of the items on display were also of interest because of their depiction of characters and stories - whether it be the mish-mash of strange and wise looking faces on North American totem pole or tiny Asian figurines of mythical beasts and goddesses. I spent quite a long time recording an accurate drawing of the totem pole and from a stylistic point of view became very interested in the way in which one face flows seamlessly from another by using connecting features which both images share. For instance on the large totem that I was looking at the ears of the cat figure also make up the wings of the owl sitting above it. I thought this was something which might be worth considering in terms of creating a sense of flow and connection in my own designs and also in creating the kind of dense and intricate imagery that I have been wanting to achieve. This trip has led me to want to do more drawing and research of this kind within my project and I would like if possible to pay a visit to similar exhibitions at some point during the Easter break. I would also like to do some follow up research at the library into North American art and related subjects.
Royal Albert Memorial Museum
Pitt Rivers Museum
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