Inspiration for Paris Project

Things That Face Outward - Andrew Venell

Collage on 54 playing cards.

I'm interested to invlove playing cards in someway in my final piece. My initial ideas include making my own set, creating a 3D "house of cards" sculpture or using a rready made pack within a collage. To develop these initial ideas I've done some blog trawling - here's a piece I particularly like

It could be quite fun to work with 52 little compositions - as it seems this artist has done here. Then again it would be intriguing to investigate playing cards as a theme. I feel Venell has most certainly been inspired by their playful aspect, though as an artist who "incorporates new media, collage, video, interactive narrative, sculpture and performance to highlight the absurdities and anxieties of the heavily mediated life.", this seems to be a common theme throughout his work.

There's something attractive in their clean-cut graphics, their organisation into suits and the hierarchy which exists by having defined numbers. Card-games vary greatly throughout different times, cultures and purposes. - The ones we amused ourselves with in Paris were mainly to kill time during travel but were also friendly bonding experiences. Poker is a game I enjoy greatly, especially when its played in a smokey badly-lit basement,  with whiskey-based beverages and low-level smooth blues being played in the background. Thus there is are fashions/ atmospheres to consider. There is a rush of adrenaline to be had when playing a card game, from the strained concentration necessary for maintaining a poker face, to the poppy excitment of a game of snap.   

I feel there is a lot to explore within this theme, (and I look forward to doing so once I've finished the college work I'm actually supposed to be doing...) At heart though, I feel I'm most inspired by products/concepts such as a pack of cards; seemingly simple but in fact extremely complex when considered in terms of context.