Here are the two works from Frank Stalla and Mateo Lopez, which give me inspiration to utilize a broad range of materials such as wooden bars and aluminum and to perfectly match with the core object of my work. What I have obtained from Mateo Lopez was his initial thoughts of using waste materials in his office. The work in the series was made in the artist's New York studio before lockdown, using cardboard, acrylic paint and plastic grommets. This idea was really inspirational to me and I immediately went searching in the streets of Peckham to find waste materials that I could use for my studies. 

 

I was extremely inspired by Alfred H. Barr when I read his book Cubism and Abstract art, and I started to figure out how to utilize the cubism in art to express the modernism phenomenon in our society. According to Barr (2019), we don't describe the appearance of objective objects, but introduce objective objects into painting, so as to integrate the performance of concrete objects themselves with the performance of abstract structural forms. Vargish & Mook (1999) mentioned that cubism supports us to define the value and status quo of Modernism by using fragments and different social elements, including cheerfulness and hatred. Along with the thoughts mentioned above, I considered this integration could enrich the description of the complicated social situation, the intricate line and scattered images represent the chaos and alienation under the rising of capitalism and economic development today. And Platt (1988) also noted that people could use particular organ to understand the world, using subjective understanding to influence the nature and painting should use its own language to control and guide the audience. After tangling for a while, I finally decided to use laser cut method to create complicated elements and use cubism to describe the sense of alienation and chaotic social order. 

 

After exploring the art work of Mateo Lopez and Frank Stella, I started to make pure handmade wooden bars to intensely combine elements of buildings with human emotions. People from urban areas, living and working in modern and fancy tall buildings everyday with pressure from a complicated society, are unlikely to reveal their real emotions or hardly be happy when they have to encounter unexpected social situations. Therefore, the use of wood could create an opportunity for the geometric figure to integrate with the biomorphic shapes, which represent the desperation that some people feel living in urban areas. Apart from that, in order to have a better reflection upon urban life nowadays, I used aluminum instead of wood to suggest more advanced buildings, and instantly highlighted the opposite perception of people living in a high-class buildings. 

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References：

 

Barr, A. H. (2019). Cubism and Abstract Art: Painting, Sculpture, Constructions, Photography, Architecture, Industrial Art, Theatre Films, Posters, Typography. Routledge.

 

López, M. The waste of my time(2020), Composition #14

 

Platt, S. N. (1988). Modernism, Formalism, and Politics: The “Cubism and Abstract Art” Exhibition of 1936 at the Museum of Modern Art. Art Journal, 47(4), 284-295. 

 

Stella, F. Kastura (1979)

 

Vargish, T., & Mook, D. E. (1999). Inside modernism: Relativity theory, cubism, narrative. Yale University Press.