Faculty Letter of Support

Botanical Motifs and Surface Layering in Arts and Crafts Design (Excerpt)

My student's proposed research relates to my own creative work that makes extensive use of actual and conceptual layering. Not unlike 19th century artists of the Aesthetic Movement, I am involved in investigating ways that late 20th century industrial processes can be inventively, sensitively and provocatively applied by today's individual artists and craft-workers as high level commercial alternatives to mass marketed items.

For many years I have used journals to document my thinking processes. My notebooks combine writing, visual studies and associative links that I call ideational processes. These highly layered studies take many different visual formats. I hope my student's attempts to locate artists' journals will uncover a treasure of local resources that could be shared with other Art students in the Art Foundation. This type of adjunct visual assistance can serve to reinforce and solidify student artists' understanding of the role the artist's journal plays in the creative making processes. By the example of her own paintings, she will likewise prove the impact that extended observation, research, and field work have on provoking her own concepts and contemporary views.

Student Proposal