Printmaking Workshop,

What does the Sagrada Familia’s form tell us about its function?

Antoni Gaudi, La Sagrada Familia, Basilica

The Sagrada Familia is a basilica that has been under construction since 1882, designed by Antoni Gaudi. Gaudi dedicated his life to this masterpiece and near the end of his life he even lived in the Basilica. When Gaudi died in 1926, only a quarter of the construction had been completed. Construction is estimated to be finished by 2026. 

Gaudi was always inspired by natural forms and once said ‘originality consists of returning to the origin’. He stayed true to his words and did not include straight lines in his designs as nature has no straight lines. The Sagrada Familia is one of the most well known buildings designed by Gaudi and inspired by the natural world. It’s function is to be a place of worship, however Gaudi uses the idea of nature to uphold religious values and reflect biblical moments. The inside of the Basilica has been designed to look like a canopy of leaves while the pillars, which are 22 metres high, are intended to look like huge tree trunks. So that inside it feels like a forest where the canopy allows a lot of natural light to shine through. Another fascinating feature of the Sagrada Familia are the two main facades. One façade is the Passion façade, and the other, the Nativity façade. These two represent the birth and death of Jesus Christ. On the Passion façade, the stained glass windows are green and blue, which when the sun shines through them, drench the whole Basilica in blue melancholy light, to reflect death. On the other hand, the windows on the Nativity façade are red and yellow which then allow orange light to shine through to represent birth. These aspects of the natural world are used by Gaudi in his architecture to give the impression that we are in a natural space. 

The Sagrada Familia’s appearance reflects the importance of the natural world and brings us closer to the origin which is nature itself. When approaching the Basilica from the outside, you feel overwhelmed by the monumental scale of the construction and the details of the façade. This building gives an instant impression about it’s function, as a place of worship, glorifying something higher and sublime.

~I have used my own photos.

Sources:

https://theculturetrip.com/europe/spain/articles/15-amazing-facts-you-need-to-know-about-la-sagrada-familia/

https://blog.sagradafamilia.org/en/divulgation/stained-glass-windows-how-they-were-created/

https://www.barcelona-tourist-guide.com/en/gaudi/sagrada-familia.htmlhttps://time.com/sagrada-familia-barcelona/

painting work in progress.......

Some prints of plants that I have been working on in the textiles workshop. This explores negative space, the space inside and outside of plants. Some are studies painted directly onto the fabric with ink and some are printed in coloured ink.

My own photos for my Pathway project which were inspired by Charity Henderson’s work. She paints portraits in neutral tones and blurres them out slightly at the edges creating a smudged effect. Some parts of her portraits are in focus and some are completely blurred. I experimented with putting plastic bags in front of the face to made some white highlights and putting tracing paper on the face to smudge features

Recent lino cuts for my project re-connection. Looking at folk stories in modern day contexts. The top right lino cut was inspired by the Russian folk story, Vasilisa The Beautiful and the second lino cut (top left) was inspired by the Mexican folklore character La Catrina who is a symbol of The Day of The Dead.

Sculpture workshop : Today I cast my sculptures in plaster and after painting them with shellac, I covered them in PVA glue and sprinkled them with copper and oxidized it so that in a few weeks they will go green. This will give an old feel to the sculptures. I am also going to paint some with acrylic paint and some with shoe polish

My animation called, ‘My New Home’ inspired by Lauren Child’s book illustrations and animated stories about ‘Charlie and Lola’. The theme throughout is about our ever changing environment and the environmental issue of sea pollution. I loved making this animation and I especially enjoyed taking all of the photos, Sooooo many photos :). I used a light box to create a slightly translucent effect. The piano music was composed specifically for this animation and played by my sister Zuzy.

Resist dyeing. I decided to try resist dyeing again but this time with some different ingredients. These included, glutinous rice flour, rice bran, salt, water, glycerine and calcium hydroxide. First I mixed together the rice flour and bran and water together to make a dough and I then steamed the dough in dumpling sized balls for about an hour. While these were steaming, I put two table spoons of calcium hydroxide into one cup of water. I had to be careful with this as calcium hydroxide can be very dangerous if it come in contact with skin. I wore goggle, gloves and a mask. Once the balls had steamed I mixed them with glycerine, salt and the water from the calcium hydroxide. The chemical had settled at the bottom leaving me with just the infused water, I mixed it in. This created a smooth paste with which I printed my designs . This paste was a lot stickier than the last one I made so I was hopeful it was going to stay on during the dyeing process. Once it had all dried, I dyed the fabric. After leaving the printed fabric in the dye for an hour, I took it out to find that all of the resist paste had unfortunately dissolved. Even though it didn’t work, I learnt a lot from this process, it was interesting to experiment with all of the new ingredients.

The process of making and editing my animation on Adobe Premiere ^^^ In the first half of the animation the music is my sister playing the piano and then for the second half, I used traditional music from different countries in the world. The animation is called ‘The Blooming Heart’, and explores the idea that the earth is more diverse than it seems, despite its small size in comparison to the whole universe and that traditional culture is still important in out interconnected world.

Casting and making a mould from a real pig’s heart. I am planning to suspend it at my end of year show and have threads come out from it. This was a really interesting experience, I am happy with how the plaster cast turned out. I had to make multiple versions as the artery on the first cast broke. It was quite delicate.

I painted the cast with a PVA glue and water mix and then painted on top :)