MAKING A ZINE!

I have returned to UNI!
Our first mini brief that we've been set is to make a ZINE! I love zines and the quality and asthetic of them is something I've been passionate about for a while now!
I began to think about my summer work and how I could develop and extend on this in order to make a zine to represent Angela Carter.

WHAT DO I WANT TO SAY ABOUT CARTER?

• I would like to have a comment on the delicate nature of her work, I feel that it sometimes feels almost 'dainty' yet at the same time beautiful and powerful.
• Femininity
• Freedom
• Empowerment
• Exploration
• Sexuality
• Vulnerable
• Overcoming emotions and violence
• Women as objects, but at the same time, overcoming this.
• Myths and Magic
• Distortion
• Imagination 

To me, from my research so far, Angela Carter's work is so natural and almost feels 'cold' and whimsical. I began my research for the zine by looking at other illustrators work that gave me the same feeling as I get when reading Carter's work. 

Miroco Machiko

 

Aiden Koch

DESCRIPTIVE WORDS FOR CARTER. 

WHIMSICAL
Playful quaint or fanciful, especially in an appealing or amusing way.

ENCHANTING 
Delightfully charming or attractive

SPELLBINDING 
Holding ones attention completely as though by magic/fascinating.

When reading carter's writing, I almost have a specific feeling or emotion. I feel like it's enchanting and natural and almost empowering? I feel like her words have a colour palette in the way that she writes. I explored them with colour pencil but I want to look at this more and more to really pin down how I feel about her work.

 

From this experiment I feel that I have made a solid start on my research and the potential 'theme' of my zine. i want to look at the colours in her work and also the metaphors that she uses and I've fallen in LOVE with!!♡♡♡

 I made another experiment with colour and added a relevant quote beneath it in order to explore how the colours can work together in different mediums.

 

"No. I was not afraid of him; but of myself. I seemed reborn in his unreflective eyes, reborn in unfamiliar shapes"

Although I was happy with the outcome of this experiment, I feel like some of the colours are too bright and for me, doesn't accurately represent the emotions and feelings being Carter's writing. I'm going to work SO hard in this whole project to really hit the nail on the head by finding what her writing means to me in a visual form!

 

I tried again with the exact same idea and took the mark making and colours that I liked from the previous experiment and looked at how this can be used to make a series of colours and marks that I feel is more representative of my inital feelings to Angela Carter's work. I might use this as a page in my zine, I feel like the quote is relevant and suggests a blur or a whirl of emotions, which is for me, the same explanation that Carter was trying to imply through her writing,

AFTER FIRST EXPERIMENTS, WHAT DO I WANT TO SAY IN MY ZINE? 

• COLOURS (the colours I feel Carter's writing style represents)
  

• SHAPE/PATTERN (the whimsical flow of her writing style and how I feel I can portray this through shape and pattern.)
  

• METAPHORS (in some way represent the metaphors that Carter uses in her work, I'd like to look at her writing as a description piece and see how I can use drawings and image making to represent these metaphors)

Following on from my first experiments and creation of the page for my zine, I thought about how I could make the zine flow through.
I could make these pattern/colour driven designs in different colours that represent different sides of Carter's writing. 
I feel so FAR, through my first bits of research that Carter has three different 'sides' to her writing style, or I guess for me, three different feelings depending on the story of poem that I'm reading.

THE NATURAL SIDE.
Green, Blue, Brown, Turquoise, Mustard

THE FEMININE SIDE.
Red, Pink, Gold, White

THE PURE SIDE.
White, Yellow, Pink, Silver

I created similar expierments, based on this theory and I was quite pleased with the outcomes.

 

I happy with the colour themes that I've used for these patterns, particularly, the pink one, I did this on a smaller scale, perhaps that allowed me to focus in on the shapes rather than the smaller marks getting lost in the context of the bigger marks on the page! Although to give them some context, I'm considering adding drawings over the top of them relating to the quotes. 

In my work last year, I haven't really made such almost 'abstract' work, I found myself sticking to the obvious, trying to avoid work that would make it less straight away 'obvious' about what I was trying to say, but I'm actually really happy with how I've explored Carter's work and have found what I like about her writing, I'm more able to make relevant work that actually has context and meaning behind it!!

I looked back a my summer work and though about combining some of my life drawings with the coloured background, it would add context and create an interesting difference between the more defined lines and the messier coloured backgrounds.

 

Although not the most proportionally accurate life drawing, I like the pose that the woman has, I feel she's vulnerable yet is somewhat empowered by her naked form!! 

I started to experiment with overlaying her body on the colour and after a few experiments I realised that I didn't want the drawing to be so obvious. I eventually came up with the final design which I felt showed the woman in a subtle yet effective way, exploring the way her body is a secret and she feels vulnerable yet at the same time she's on full display 'AS BARE AS A LAMB CHOP'. 

 

Following the success of this image, I took a similar approach for the white patterned background. I wanted a simpler image, so thought about Carter's exploration of the natural world and thought about using a simple image of flowers.

Following on from the theme of flowers and nature, I began to consider the use of a more delicate approach.

Over summer, I had been collecting pressed flowers in order to respond to this project. I feel like dried and pressed flowers are not only delicate, but they're also beautiful and empowering, they represent many things about carter's work.  I have used the pressed flowers in a multitude of way throughout the zine by collaging them in various patterns and shapes around the page. I was really pleased with the outcomes of this and I feel like it represented a multitude of things that I was trying to say about Carter.

 
 

Summer work and Initial Drawings for Angela Carter

Once I had begun my research on Angela Carter by reading some of her work and stories, I began to respond through drawing and visual imagery.
I really enjoyed the freedom of this work, I hadn't been set a specific brief but I was really enjoying just being able to make drawings for my own reflections and research.
I specifically focused on the metaphors that Carter uses in her writing. I looked at my favourite quotes from the stories of hers that I had read and thought about colours and ways of thinking that I wanted to represent.

Alot of Carter's work looks at the female form and feminine imagery, for a while now I've been wanting to improve on my life drawing skills and I felt that this would be the perfect opportinity to improve this. I found a life drawing website and began to make quick sketches to get the inital form and shape of the body before making more detailed sketches and works! I really enjoyed this mini task I set myself and I'm going to attend the life drawing society this year in order to improve my skills even more! 

I thought about the locations and colours that Carter writes about in her work, I particularily like the quote from 'The bloody Chamber' 
"Sea; sand; a sky that melts into the sea - a landscape of misty pastels with a look about it of being continuously on the point of melting."
and based on this, I used spray paints and gouache to create a 'misty' pastel scene trying to bring my images of Carter's description to life, I was really excited by using all of these colours, and whilst being away from Uni over summer I forgot how much I love creating and being imaginative!

Overall I'm pleased with my initial visual research of Carter's work, I feel I've made a very good starting point in order to make an informed start on the new brief when I return for the start of second year!

SHORT STORIES

Following on from the bloody chamber, I decided to read some of Angela Carter's other short stories, next was

⌇THE COURTSHIP OF MR LYON⌇

Again, started this tale with no idea of the plot or ANYTHING, so i took notes of quotes and lines that stood out to me or reminded me of why i chose Carter in the first place!

PAGE 46 "The storm had cleared as the moon rome and now a glance between the velvet curtains revealed a landscape of ivory with an inlay of silver"

PAGE 48 "There seemed a heavy, soundless pressure upon her in his house, as if it lay underwater, and when she saw the great paws lying on the arm of the chair, she thought they are the death of any tender herbivore. And such one she felt herself to be, Miss Lamb, spotless, sacrificial."

PAGE 49 "But he, hesitantly, as if he himself were in awe of a young girl who looked as if she had been carved out of a single pearl"

⌇THE TIGERS BRIDE⌇

PAGE 71 "The tiger will never lie down with the lamb"

PAGE 71 "The annihilating vehemence of his eyes, like twin suns"

PAGE 73 "Watching me peel down to the cold, white meat"

PAGE 74 "The beast and his carnivorous bed of bone and I, white, shaking , raw, approaching him as if offering, in myself, the key to a peaceable kingdom in which his appetite need not be my extinction"

Both of these short stories explored the well know tale 'Beauty and the Beast', I found it so interesting to look at the story in a different way, a way that showed the beast (male) as a dominant creature from the outside, using his appearance as a way of intimidation but in reality, he is infact a victim of wanting the beauty of the female form. showing FEMALE DOMINANCE?!

THE BLOODY CHAMBER!

To start off my research on my chosen author ANGELA CARTER, i decided to read her most well known tale:

⌇ THE BLOODY CHAMBER ⌇

I knew nothing about this story beforehand so was INTRIGUED and excited to find out the tale.
The first thing i noticed about Carter's writing was her use of metaphors, i had such vivid imagery in my head, this will be really helpful for me when coming to creating illustrations and images based on Carter!

I noted down quotes from the story that I particularly liked, some being metaphors, some just quotes and sentences that stood out to me:


PAGE 8 "A collar from which my head rose like the calyx of a wildflower."

PAGE 8 "I swear to you, I had never been so vein until i met him"

PAGE 8 "Sea; sand; a sky that melts into the sea - a landscape of misty pastels with a look about it of being continuously on the point of melting."

PAGE 9 "A mysterious, amphibious place, contravening the materiality of both earth and the waves with the melancholy of mermaiden who perches on the rocks and waits, endlessly for a lover who had drowned far away, long ago.

PAGE 10 "I imagine myself the queen of the sea"

PAGE 10 "The play of the waves outside in the cold sun glittered on his monocle."

PAGE 11 "He stripped me...as if he were stripping the leaves off an artichoke"

PAGE 11 "Sheilding her face with her hand as though her face were the last repository of her modesty."

PAGE 11 "As bare as a lamb chop"

PAGE 13 "The girl with tears hanging on her cheeks like stuck pearls."

PAGE 14 "I had seen his deathly composure shatter like a porcelain vase flung against a wall.

PAGE 15 "Voluptuous Cheese"

PAGE 15 "He seemed especially fond of it, my breasts showed through the flimsy stuff, he said, like little soft white doves that sleep, each one, with a pink eye open."

PAGE 17 "No. I was not afraid of him; but of myself. I seemed reborn in his unreflective eyes, reborn in unfamiliar shapes"

PAGE 18 "The key to your heart? Give it me!"

PAGE 19 "A man whose skin, as theirs did, contained that toad-like, clammy hint of moisture"

PAGE 20 "The taps were little dolphins made of gold, with chips of turquoise for eyes"

PAGE 22 "The castle would shine like a seabourne birthday cake lit with a thousand candles"

PAGE 22 "With the jewelled turban and aigrette on the head, roped with pearl to the navel"

PAGE 26 "I might find a little bit of his soul?"

PAGE 26 "There is a striking resemblance between the act of love and the ministrations of a torturer"

PAGE 27 "And this skull was strung up by a system of unseen chords, so that it appeared to hang, disembodied, in the still, heavy air, and it had been crowned with a wreath of white roses and a veil of lace, the final image of his bride.

PAGE 33 "The turquoise eyes and the dolphin taps winked at me derisively"

PAGE 36 "The heart shaped stain had transferred itself to my forehead, to the space between the eyebrows"

PAGE 37 "The mass of lilies that surrounded me exhaled, now, the odour of their withering. They looked like the trumpets of the angles of death."

PAGE 38 " 'You disobeyed him,' He said. 'That is sufficient reason for him to punish you.'
                  'I only did what he knew I would.'
                  'Like Eve,' he said." 

PAGE 40 "A neck like the stem of a young plant"

PAGE 40 "A little green moss, growing in the crevices of the mountain block, would be the last thing i should see in all the world."

PAGE 40 "The puppet master, open mouthed, wide eyed, impotent at the last, saw his dolls break free of their strings"

PAGE 41 "The maternal telepathy"

When reading the bloody chamber, i was so engaged and enthralled by carter's writing, I think thats how I found myself taking so many notes of quotes!
All of the quotes I have noted down here speak to me, but the larger ones I specifically like and are somethings that i'd like to explore further.

One thing that really captured me from reading The Bloody Chamber was Carters comparison of females to nature and delicate specimens, her writing paints a portrait of females as something so precious yet so powerful and dominant. 

From reading the bloody chamber, I got the impression of womens reliance upon men, the facinasion and desire to be wanted and loved, yet ability to grow apart and stand alone, this is so so interesting to me! I can't wait to find out and explore more!!

DECISIONS!

The author I've chosen to focus on is...

✧:*~*:✧~✧:*~*:✧

ANGELA CARTER 

✧:*~*:✧~✧:*~*:✧

• During my research, I felt most excited by Carter's themes and topics that she appears to focus on in her works.
• I love the idea of 'adult' fairy tales, the idea of remaking something that is so familiar to us is something that's really interesting to me and I so so intrigued to find out more!
• I've always been curious about the idea of feminism and I think this will be the perfect opportunity to find out more.
• I quite liked that Carter doesn't have much imagery in her work, this will be helpful as I don't want to be influenced by existing artwork that might form or shape pre-existing ideas in my head!

Angela Carter

When starting to research Angela Carter, I was instantly drawn in by the idea of:

• GOTHIC fairy tales
• enchantment!
• feminist themes

Before I even knew what any of her stories were about, images and thoughts rushed to my head with ideas and emotions, i felt so excited!

I instantly began to research Carter and her life!

LIFE

• Evacuated as child during the war to live in Yorkshire with her maternal Grandmother.
• Battled anxiety as a teenager.
• Attended university of Bristol where she studied English.
• Married in 1960 to Paul Carter but divorced in 1972.
• Relocated to Tokyo where she claims in her book 'Nothing Scared':

"I LEARNT WHAT IS WAS TO BE A WOMAN AND BECAME RADICALISED"

• She explored USA, Asia and Europe and spent the late 1970's and 80's as a writer in residence at universities.
• In 1977 she married Mark Pearce and had a son.
• Wrote her most famous novel 'The Bloody Chamber' which 

"IS ABOUT DESIRE AND DESTRUCTION AND THE SELF IMMOLATION OF WOMEN, HOW WOMEN COLLIDE WITH THEIR CONDITION OF ENSLAVEMENT"

• Two of her stories were made into films:
• The Company of Wolves
• The Magic Toyshop

MAIN THEMES IN CARTERS WORK

• The female form and the power of femininity. From my overview research of Angela Carter, I have an idea that her passion for exploring the feminine charm and beauty is a main theme that runs through the majority of her stories.
• Her stories seem to enchant me, I'm excited by Carters work and I really want to find out more about not only her life and herself as an author, but I want to discover more about the idea of feminist themes in her work. - The idea of femininity and using it in life is something that I've always been curious on, I'm unsure of the way that carter expresses her ideals in her work but that's something I'm really intrigued to find out!

WHAT INTERESTS ME?

• Carter's PASSION in her work, through her travelling and her experiences I feel that i'll be able to get a great range and eclectic mix of ideas and imagery that I can use to represent her!
• Unlike other authors I have explored, Carter doesn't have a lot of imagery with her work that will pre determine what my work might possibly follow to be like. (I say this but I hope when it comes to it, I would create work using my own styles and thoughts anyway, but it always helps to not have images that might influence me anyway)
• Her themes interest me, like i've said, i'm intrigued to find out about the female enchantment and how Carter writes about this.

STRUGGLES I MIGHT FACE?!

• I don't want my work to become to 'cliche' when exploring the topics of fairy tales and femininity, i feel like i could fall into a TRAP of typical imagery already relating to these topics, I'll have to be EXTRA wary of this!!