Wave collage

I went back to do more research work on the element of water and wanted to continue using the materials of ink and bleach on a variety of papers to create a wave inspired collage. I covered textured wallpaper with ink and planned to bleach it too but liked the effect without ink so left it as it was. I experimented using different dilutions of ink in order to achieve different tones of blue.

Wallpaper effect

Wallpaper effect using diluted ink

I covered a page half in concentrated ink and half in diluted ink and then experimented with different dilutions of bleach to see what patterns I could achieve. 

Diluted ink and bleach

Concentrated ink and bleach

Using all these papers cut to different sizes and shapes, I then created a collage of a wave inspired by a research image from my original visual research.

Wave collage - final result

Bleach and Ink

One of the more unusual techniques I've been using in my art has been bleach and ink, which is where you paint the page with ink (I used a bottle of quink) and then bleach out areas with household bleach. I had used this technique before in the earlier stages of this art course and had enjoyed it and wanted to explore it further. It also felt relevant to the work I was doing and seemed to have a connection to the element of water.

I was inspired by artists who had done drip paintings such as Jackson Pollock and combined this style of painting - as I felt it linked to water - with the technique of using bleach and ink. Below are two paintings I did in this style, which I did on my table top easel to make them easier to do.

Bleach painting 1

Bleach painting 2

The work I did for this section, which is the water section of the research, was not actually done in this order as I messed up my timetable slightly so the next bit was done at a later date.

I did further research into artists who used bleach and ink in their work and whilst I wasn't successful in finding any professional artists, I did find some amateur artists whose work inspired me. In particular I liked the idea of using wax as a resist before painting the ink across the page, so this was something I tried next. The image I chose to use this technique on was inspired by Hokusai's wave printing.

Hokusai's Wave Printing

My bleach, ink and wax interpretation