For my first gallery visit, I went to the Tate modern to explore different styles of art and photography. I wanted to see if i could gain any inspiration for my own A2 unit, however I did not really find anything that would fit my theme of distortion. However, I was able to admire the processes behind the artists work. For example the dark rooms allowed us to focus on the artwork itself without the distractions of other people around. All of the exhibitions were different forms of art which allowed me to discover a range of mediums. A few photographers I found were Lorna Simpson and Bernd and Hilla Becher, however these artists work did not relate to my theme. Although I didn't gain any inspiration from these artists I still enjoyed looking at their work.
2) Gallery del Academia (Venice)
Over the summer holidays I visited Venice which gave me the chance to explore a different styled gallery. The Academia gallery was a great place for me to gain inspiration for my own theme of distortion. However, due to Italian culture, this gallery had a lot of very religious artwork meaning that I did not find a lot of specific artists or pieces of work that I would gain inspiration from. However one piece of artwork which was a painting on a door allowed me to come up with my own idea to fit my theme of distortion. I found it fascinating how the artist painted an amazing piece surrounded by gold decor onto a plain door to make it look more interesting. This gave me the inspiration to use plain doors with an amazing landscape photoshopped into them to make it look as if the doors were portals to other worlds. I also looked at the textures of a lot of artwork such as the black and red cloths which I could also use to further distort images. Overall, I gained a few ideas whilst visiting this gallery however due to the religious themes I did not find as many art pieces that inspired me, although the few that I did find gave me many ideas to build final pieces out of.
3) Serpentine Gallery
The Serpentine gallery had a lot more modern art compared to the last gallery I visited in Venice, allowing me to find different artists and artwork to help me gain ideas for my theme of distortion. This gallery had a wide range of modern art mixed with distortion techniques which were relevant to my theme of distortion. The serpentine includes a lot of landscape artwork as its focus and artists such as Alex Katz. I would also like to use landscape in my pieces which meant that I was able to explore different pieces which were considered surreal. This meant that I was able to brainstorm more ideas which would help me come up with a few final ideas. The majority of the artists had more abstract artwork which meant that this gallery was the most successful in terms of coming up with ideas for my theme of distortion as I felt that I have a wide range of choices to branch off of due to my theme having a variety of different meanings.