Visual Distortion

The Idea of this Exercise was to push us towards a deliberate stylization.

I began with drawing a dog from the internet.

I then tried to distill his features down using the minimum amount of lines! This was not easy... I regretted choosing this kind of a dog, but I persevered.

After this I collected a stack of magazines to use for the collage versions of the dogs.  My choice of textures and surreal elements added different dimensions to the original dog, changing or enhancing different aspect of his character quite a bit. This carried through to the drawn versions of each one. My children helped me name the different dogs that emerged!

banana split

Moustachio

Spike

I realised that I had 3 very different dogs on my hands now, so I made a little scene for them, where Moustachio became the teacher and the others two little dogs with a mischievous side

Mr Moustachio's PE lesson

I took Moustachio and did a more detailed drawing of him. It was interesting that I would never have come up with a dog like this without pushing through the process of creating the collages. Unfortunately he is poles apart from the original dog the characteristics of which are more apparent in Banana Split and Spike - playfulness, fluffiness etc. 

I decided to try something else and painted Moustachio on silk and expanded his character with a few quick images created by collaging tissue and paper and silk offcuts. 

Moustachio doesn't like baths, because he is quite vain and thinks his colours might run.

Moustachio has a bath

 He likes to think he is capable of deep existential thoughts

Moustachio thinking

 And he dreams of being a country lord

dreaming of the country

And owning his own park.

Moustachio goes for a walk in the Park

I got a lot out of this exercise, although I allowed Moustachio to dictate his own personality, I think that I have learnt quite a bit about ways to delve into the business of stylization.