Richard Sweeney

Thought it would be appropriate to take a look at some of Richard Sweeney's work. His work is very delicate and graceful. I love the curves and pleats in his work which add texture. I especially like the Motion Forms he has produced. A method called wet folding was used, which allows easier manipulation of the paper. The shapes produced remind me of waves and other organic forms found in nature. 

This is an Ink on paper mono print by Sweeney. It is very expressive and tonal, something I will have to try out myself in my sketchbook.

Playing with paper..

I found this on the Internet. It is appropriately named 'Holding on to Myself.' The artist is Peter Callesen. His website also has many other inspiring and intricate designs using both the cut out and the negative space left within the paper to form an image. This particular design shows how simple designs can sometimes be the most effective.  

Below I have produced my own interpretation of his work. It was only a quick experiment and obviously isn't as effective as Callesen's original piece. The aspect that makes his piece more effective is the use of shadow and the figure dangling from the page. It's amazing what you can do with a piece of paper in a minute or two..

First Workshop Session

We had pleasure of working with Richard Sweeney in our workshop. He set us the task of creating 3D forms from a single sheet of A5 paper, we couldn't use any sort of adhesive, or extra paper so had to improvise with tabs, folds and slits to connect sections of the paper together. This limits what you can do slightly especially when producing delicate forms. I found it quite tricky keeping parts of the design where I wanted them as they kept popping out so to speak. I experimented with scoring, cutting, folding and twisting the paper. However I could of expanded my experimentation by trying to rip and tear the paper, so this is something I will try in my own time (hopefully).

Just a few images of forms made in today's workshop with Richard Sweeney..

One of my favourite techniques I used to create my pieces was scoring; using this method allowed me to create delicate and elegant forms consisting of curves and twists, similar to those found within nature.