We had a great seminar with two artists Fiona Grady and Daniel Silva on Monday, October 15th. Fiona and Daniel showed us a series of amazing visual project in direct ways and shared with us about creative processes through their works. Honestly, this was the first time I communicated with artists in a such close distance. It was really helpful to have chance to ask them some questions and get the answer directly about research and creation.

Here are some reflections about the seminar.

Fiona made her presentation in a very literal and well organized way, she showed us massive detailed information about “why does she research” “what are her research methods” “what is the specific process”. For me, the way she used to show information is really easy to understand, which would be a good sample to do presentations. So next time when I have to do presentation Maybe I can list some key words on the sliders about the structure of each section, it would help audiences have a clear logic about my context.

The way of doing research varies from artists to artists. Both Fiona and Daniel have their own pattern/ approach of researching. I think the range of Fiona’s research is widely which from content and environment to practice and experiment. Although finished the image work, she try to find more possibilities of the work like making 3D sculptures by using different materials. It makes me to reflect on my own projects which I did before. They normal ended at the evaluations, and I rarely do such a kind of thing Fiona do after a project seem like had been finished.

I think Daniel does his research in a deep way which means he focus on a detail of his concept and research around this this. For example, when he did a project called “wax and guts, 2008”, he mainly focus on the materials, so he just researched a lot on this aspect, and finally he achieved good works. It reminds me that even if a tiny idea could give me inspiration to develop a project, just to find what I am interested in.