Interviews
TVC Interview: Dr. Peacemaker Alexander Efeoghene’s Fabric Collage Painting Technique
His use of Fabric in Impressionistic Painting style on Canvas and Divergent Grounds.
In general terms the word fabricating has to do with manufacturing, making or to construct. In this paper Fabricating Painting connote production of visual paintings, using pasted, cutout fabric pieces onto selected surfaces to express figure, object and landscape genres of Art. Visual paintings were produced in fabric collage technique, through rigorous studio research activities into newer method to express-self in unconventional medium (or media), differently from traditional use of paint and brush media on surfaces. Works on display expresses landscape sceneries, figures, still and natural object concepts which addresses current human and societal lifestyle and issues, such as commerce, music and entertainment, cerebration, local events, insecurity and so on.
Overtime, artists have produced collage paintings using pieces of plastic, paper, metal, wood, glass, tapestry, method. Some use fabric prints, organza, quilt materials in their collage work. These methods, and recently that of fabric colouring, dyeing, and bleaching, have failed to attain expected visual painting effects. Over-dependence on the canvas as a main ground, limits further exploration of new work surfaces to express fabric collage painting. Exhibited works reveals the possibilities of realizing painting effects in fabric collage technique, using unaltered (uncoloured, undyed, unbleached) fabric in their original colour grades on divergent grounds, as against the conventional practice on canvas ground. Thus, this study expressed visual concepts in fabric collage technique on varied grounds such as, wood-board, glass, ceramic tile, lithographic plate, mesh, paper card, straw card, bamboo and glass bottle.
The design of the study is exploratory. It was expressively carried out under five stages, from fabric sourcing, selection and preparation of work grounds, fabric colour categorization and cutting to desired sizes with tailor' scissors, application of glue to ground and fabric pasting onto surface. Five (5) Research Questions were raised to guide the study, and Abraka culture which centered on the Impact of the Women in Development was selected through the simple random sampling technique. The production stages began with sketches, application of glue and fabric pieces onto selected grounds until the desired visual painting was achieved.
Specifically, the findings revealed that the painting principles of light and shade, tonal values, colour opacity and transparency, harmony and contrast, depth, and aerial perspective were realized as evident in the paint media (figure, portraiture, object and landscape genres of painting. The implication is that impressionistic painting style could be realized using fabric collage method on different grounds, independent of the traditional fabric alteration, while respective grounds had obvious effects on finished fabric work.
Works on display are in four categories, expressing the progressive evolving of traditional impressionistic paintings in acrylic paint medium on canvas since 1995. The 2004 research exploit into unconventional use of (plain and patterned) fabric, to express painting on canvas ground (termed Early collages). It was a technique discovered while working with a class of elementary school pupils in Lagos. The third category is the 2014 - 2016 MFA research (Masters in Fine Arts, Uniben). This was the advance stage of fabric collage rendition on canvas, - expressing the all the elements and principles of Art and painting. The fourth category of works was the recent successes attained in 2017 -2019 at the Uniben, PhD program. At this stage, plain fabric was explored to achieve a more advanced impressionistic and expressionistic painting style on selected grounds.
This solo Art exhibition is aimed at opening new vista into novel researches in Fine and Applied Arts Department and in Mountain Top University, - one of Nigeria's foremost private Institution, to successfully pioneer a degree program in visual and design fields of creativity in 2020. It is therefore recommended that researchers, visual artists and designers a, access available information in this study to adopt new approaches in their creativity; - as this will advance and contribute to existing knowledge in studio practice and in academics. Adoption of fabric collage painting technique will expose students to new methodologies in their creative endeavours and productivity (using unconventional approaches as against traditional practices). Thank You, and happy viewing.
Peacemaker A. Efeoghene, PhD. Research Fellow, MTU. Dec. 2021.;
Interviews
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