Class art trip around London

11/Mar/2014

My illustration and visual media class had quite an enjoyable trip together walking and taking the train all around London to see some galleries!! We first went to the Camden Arts Centre but it wasn't very impressive nor interesting so I didn't take any photos there, oops!!

But then we travelled to the Barbican Centre where we exhibited the Momentum exhibition and this was actually the second time I went... I got much better photos this time though, so it was definitely worth going this time again. 

Such a lovely view outside of the centre!! It was literally so nice.. There was a clean river side with ducks and so many cute flowers, plus cute fountains :)

So dark and smokey inside!!! But also very interesting and it really messes with your mind and view with the minimal amounts of lighting with smoke, as well as the scary alien noises haha

It's meeeee! Photo taken by my friend, Alisa

Had lunch in the cemetery where I tried to pet a squirrel and it jumped at my hand and scratched me :( so scary 

We then continued the class trip to Pace London gallery in Green Park, where we exhibited the James Turrell exhibition ^_^ I honestly didn't understand this exhibition at all first. It was only 3 parts of a room containing 3 different screens of coloured lighting. My tutor later explained it to me that the pieces of light are to change the mood and make you feel different things

I got some pretty good photos here I think. I love how all the people are creating black shadows against the coloured screens :)

That was the end of the group trip to different exhibitions around London unfortunately!! My feet were almost dead after walking so much

Sun almost setting in London at Trafalgar Square, so beautiful ^ o ^

Hannah's birthday - 9/Mar/2014

(Late post) Also this was a belated birthday haha! Had so much fun in London with my friends. We had lunch at Tokyo Diner in Chinatwon together and it was my first time ever eating Japanese food!

it was very tasty and a good large potion for the price it came for ^_^

Haha but too big that I couldnt finish it all :( it was tasty though

Hannah bought her friend, Rina along who Alisa and I had never met before but she is a very lovely girl. Too bad that she had to leave after the meal for a piano lesson. GROUP SHOT!! Awkward photo because Alisa's arm wasn't long enough to hold the camera to get us all in the photo ;')

After the lovely meal, we went to visit our friend Nadine who was working all day at a pub in Covent Gardens. We just went to laugh at her working a bit but we ended up staying and getting drinks as well!

My first time even in a pub and I got a drink there too, coke and malibu rum eeeeeeek. It was actually really tasty!!! I'd definately like to go to a pub again too :)

Street performers in Convent Gardens acting cool ^^^^^^

Beautiful warm weather 

A cute stone stall in Convent Garden Markets, I bought myself a amethyst necklace stone here and I turned it into a necklace and its now my favourite necklace hehe ;D

Lovely blue/grey skies to end the evening in London. 

Kemistry Gallery

Today my 2 classmates and I went to Shoreditch High Street to see the Text exhibition currently being held at the Kemistry Gallery, London. Our tutor asked us to go here in place of lesson because the whole university was on strike for a day then we were assigned to do a 300-500 word essay on the exhibition after the visit :)

Inside was a bit small and cramped!!! I was expecting a larger gallery space at least. The small gallery was just a small white box and it was a bit cramped and some of us found it hard to move around each other to take photos without barging each other haha. I liked the layout of the pieces, however there wasn't any artist name plates on any of the works meaning I had no idea who's work it belonged to; I did really want to research into some certain pieces but couldn't because of that...

Gallery space maybe two times bigger than my living room.

After the short gallery visit, we snooped around Shoreditch to see if there was anything nice to see like a shopping centre or more galleries.. But there seemed to be nothing interesting around within the mile from the station - We took a trip around the streets in front of the station to see lots of amazing graffiti pieces :)

My friend pointed out the 'me gusta' meme face stuck up above this shop and it made me laugh!! It was so random yet cool.

I really loved this!! I had to run across the road just to get a photo of it. It looks so lovely - I wouldn't mind having this piece on my bedroom wall :)

On the way back to the station we saw a gate which had dozens of pad locks on it with couples' names written on it; similar to that bridge in France (I think it's France) where couples would lock a pad lock onto the bridge, write their names onto the lock and then throw the key into the river - I think it's some sort of thing to symbolise that your love is locked and will last forever! Very sweet ^o^

DIY miniature bear charm

I found the tutorial for this awhile back and kept saying I was gonna make it but never got round to it! But now I have made it and it was harder than it looked but I managed to make one and it took me about 3 hours.

It only took me so long because of the pattern pieces. The tutorial did not come with any measurements or pattern templates to print or copy, therefore It took me awhile a long time to estimate and measure out the lengths and sizes of each body part.

As you can see, my first attempt came out a bit out of proportion. I cut the legs the same size as the arms but that ended up to be a mistake and the legs came out too short in proportion to his body :s

But the rest of the tutorial was good and understanding. The little bear fits on the palm of my hand (smaller than my palm) and I'm really happy of how he turned out. I'll keep all these facts in mind next time I make another one so that it will turn out better :)

And here is the link to the tutorial I used to make this:

http://onelmon.com/blog/2013/07/mini-felt-soft-toys/

Horror character bunny plushies

For my Christmas holiday uni homework, I had to create a piece of visual fluff (something very cute). But the task given via email wasn't very clear and nor did my class understand what type of 'fluff' was expected.

So I went ahead and turned 3 of my favourite horror characters into cute bunny plush keycharms from felt. Here I made a collection including: Freddy Krueger, Michael Myers and Leatherface (from left to right). I'm happy with how they turned out, turning something scary into something cute and fluffy :) my class also really loved them too and voted me 1st out of everyone's fluff pieces ^_^

DIY kitty frame

I drew this little ginger kitten head the other day, it was also my first ever attempt of using colouring pencils in a realism piece before I think.... (I did once used watercoloured pencils in a drawing of Lady Gaga though!) But I liked the outcome of this drawing and got a few positive comments on it ^_^ umm but of course it looked a little weird only being a kitten head and no body parts!

Soooo......

I made a cute little frame for it and stuck it up on my wall; it looks smaller in photos but its bigger in reality, it's about 18cm x 18cm aprox. 

It was so easy, quick and fun to make! Firstly, cutting out the cat head neatly then cutting out a circle on some coloured corrugated card for decorative crafts! The back plate is colour card that I cut a circle out of using a pair of patterned scissors (the scissors blades are patterned so they cut the shaped edges) and then I hand cut in some holes to make it look like lace coasters, however, the card I used was too thick and I couldn't cut much detailed patterns (I was pretty disappointed about that). The 3 layers are held together with little 3D double sided sticky foam piece so the piece creates shadow and looks 3D.

Then finished off with a little ribbon super glued on :P

I loved making this! And I think it's so cute stuck up in my wall. I think I want to make a few more now and maybe I could give some out as gifts some time ^___^

Felt breakfast set charm

Made a little miniature felt plush breakfast set! ^_^ 

They're all 3D plushies attached with ribbon so they can fit into the charm thingy thing thing..  A slice of toast, strip of bacon and an egg sunny side up! I was debating whether to add faces onto them or not.. But thought I'd keep it simple without faces. I really like miniature food and I make lots of miniature polymer clay food as well :P

So here it is, fits on the palm of my hand: