This document contains summaries of artworks created by Bhavika Bhatia for her AS and A2 level art courses. It describes 10 pieces created in 2013-2014 with themes of "Express" and "Destruction". The pieces used various materials like acrylic paint and printed images to depict emotions and flesh. Influences included artists Danny O'Connor and Jenny Saville. Later works explored femininity and how artists defy stereotypes through 3 monochrome drawings showing women struggling against societal expectations.

1. bhavikaBHATIA
PORTFOLIO

2. 2013 December,
This piece was created as part of a
series of around 10 for my AS-Level
artwork. It revolves around the theme
of “EXPRESS” and is meant to evoke
certain moods and feelings from the
viewer. On this A2 piece, I used acrylic
paints and images in the background
to represent the inner mechanisms and
moods that one may feel at the back
of their mind, and how this emotion
sometimes shows through their
physical appearance. For this particular
piece, I used a color scheme that
evokes calmness and a mellow
atmosphere with images that create a
similar effect. To portray how one’s
emotions take over their physical
appearance, I very subtly allowed the
images in the background to be
revealed slightly under the face, and
continued this pattern, intensifying it
with each piece, throughout the series.

3. 2014 January,
This piece was also created as part of a
series of around 10 (theme: EXPRESS) for
my AS-Level artwork, and is one of the end
results, meant to evoke certain moods and
feelings from the viewer. The materials used
were acrylic paints, and printed out images
that were stuck both over and under the
portrait. In order to reveal how one’s
feelings can take over their physical
appearance, and not just mental, I used
images that connote sinister and horrifying
situations, to reveal the distress that one
feels when overwhelmed with emotions.
These pictures are subtly conveyed with thin
strokes of white paint outlining them in
random areas, e.g. the hand on the bottom
left, indicating a sign for help. I used
influences from artist Danny O’Connor, such
as his use of free-flowing lines and textures
such as those created by bubble-wrap, in
order to mimic the flow of thought, fluid,
targeting the physical aspects of the person
in subject. I also portrayed this harshness
through the use of a scraper at the bottom
of the piece, where a mood of sharp pain is
implied.

4. 2014 January,
The final piece of my “EXPRESS” series, this
reveals the lack of sanity, the madness that one
becomes engulfed in upon being consumed
entirely by one’s thoughts. The whole series
showed a gradual buildup of thoughts consuming
one’s whole mental and physical self, and
releasing into a final result, which is this piece.
Here, I have developed into using Danny
O’Connor’s influence to a large extent, with his
unrealistic facial color scheme of reds and
purples, indicating distress, and also his free-flowing
lines, mimicking the ‘movement’ of
thoughts and nightmares. The facial expression
also parallels this, while the technique of bubble
wrap implies a feeling of being trapped and
suffocated within this consumption of one’s self
by their thoughts. The subtle images are still
present in this piece, along with text, which I
added in for further effect. The text reads
“LIMIT”, which is a distinct and subjective word,
interpretable to the viewers, although I intend it
to imply the feeling of being trapped by
thoughts. This piece overall shows a distressed
person, being consumed from all angles with
reminders and indications of anxiety, angst, and
fear, as a result of over-thinking and thus
becoming a victim of themselves.

5. 2014 February,
This is an image of a piece that I created in
mid-February as part of my AS-Level exam
unit and it revolves around the theme of
DESTRUCTION. The destruction of flesh
was an interesting topic for me, and
therefore I chose artists such as Jenny Saville
to influence my work, as can be seen by the
rough brushstrokes and the focus on fatty
areas such as the thighs, to enhance the
effect of mass surfaces of skin being naturally
flawed. I used dark, and, to an extent,
unnatural colors, as did Saville in much of her
work, to depict the gruel and repugnant
appearance of human flesh as a victim of
damage and destruction. This piece, and the
topic as whole, challenged my abilities of
figurative drawing, as a lot of my work was
often out-of-proportion and took a lot of
practice to improve, and also my ability to
paint human flesh tones. I used mixtures of
acrylic paint colors, and, for this piece, some
oil, to better the blending, which proved to
be effective in creating the subtle softer
areas, e.g. the stomach.

6. 2014 February,
To continue my exploration of
destruction of skin, I created this piece
as a response to many of artist Jenny
Saville’s works, so as to test my skills
and abilities of working with different
tones and planes of lighting and
shades. This piece was produced on an
A2 piece of paper and I used acrylic
paints of shades such as burnt umber
and yellow ochre to create the flesh
tones that were so detailed on this
image of a pair of knees. The theme of
destruction is constantly present in the
way that I used my brush, creating
harsh brushstrokes and subtle
elements of red on the skin, stimulating
a burnt effect. I enjoyed creating this
piece because of its close attention to
fleshy-details, e.g. the tones and the
contrasts, as can be seen by the
highlighted areas at the top of the legs.

7. 2014 March,
This acrylic painting of a stomach employs
unnatural colors upon the flesh including
turquoise, and orange, in order to enhance
my exploration of destruction of flesh. The
reason I chose this area of the body to
study (the stomach and thighs) is because
of the fact that they are taboo, and always
hidden by people who are too self-conscious
of their image, or even that they have
conservative views and believe in modesty,
and as a result, such areas of the body are
often hidden away under the veil of
clothing. My work shows that all parts of
the body, even those that are not exposed
to the public eye, are destructed, and this
idea originally stemmed from the theme of
“Fire, Earth, Air, Wind,” which was given to
me by exam board Edexcel, from which I
derived “fire” and associated it with
destruction. This piece conveys skin that
is almost burnt, and completely severed,
despite being underexposed, thus
emphasizing the idea of flesh as a
vulnerable object, a constant victim of
nature.

8. 2014 March,
Because I wanted to enhance my flesh-painting
skills, I continued with the series that I had
started in January that was themed around the
destruction of flesh. This destruction, in my eyes,
can befall through countless occurrences,
whether natural or man-made. The piece on the
left conveys an injury to the skin, and I felt that
this would be interesting to paint because of the
physical nature of the destruction. Not only did it
encompass an interestingly colored bruise, but
also a gruesome scratch. This fit perfectly with
my topic and therefore I used a syringe and
acrylic paints to create this piece. For the scratch,
use of red with the syringe created the dripping
effect that I blended into the skin, as I did with
the purple of the bruise. The reason for my
blending is to reveal how the destruction is
embodied into the skin as a part of it, while the
dripping effect connotes a gradual deduction of
flesh, having been consumed by this destruction,
and, as a result, dripping off, reducing,
disappearing. A challenge I faced when creating
this would definitely be blending the red
‘scratchy’ effects into the flesh tones, as it felt
almost impossible to fuse such an unnatural-looking
tone into that of the skin. However, with
the use of a dry brush, I managed to do so
successfully.

9. 2014 August,
I began this piece during the summer of
2014, straight after my holiday to my
homeland, India. After having been in
the Indian environment for two weeks
and participating in events such as
weddings and festivals in the country, to
say I was inspired would be a heavy
understatement. The diversity and rich
culture famously held by India made me
feel a yearning to create art relevant to
the experience. As a result, I used an
A1 size of canvas-textured paper and
began drawing an image that I found
online. I chose that photo in particular
because I felt that it captured perfectly
the essence of Indian womanhood, and
immediately felt a connection to it. The
traditional red ‘tikka’ on the forehead,
for example, drew me in to the photo,
and I was inevitably stimulated into
painting it. I used acrylic paints for this
painting, using flesh-tones such as
burnt and raw umber, crimson, yellow
ochre, and titanium white. This piece
was great practice for me, as it had
been a while since I had practiced my
portraiture skills, although when I first
attempted this piece, I struggled
significantly when it came to capturing
the perfect skin tones.
My A-Level art work in which I used influences from Jenny Saville allowed me to
use the same influence on this piece, where my brush-strokes were similar to
Saville’s- thick, visible, and rough. I did this deliberately in order to expose subtly
the struggle faced by a woman in her day-to-day life, in particular in India,
where women have struggled for years to overcome rough sexism and backward
beliefs. Although I hugely enjoyed creating this painting, I failed to finish it due
to time constraints and school re-opening. Nevertheless, I plan to complete it in
coming weeks so that I can begin all over again on yet another piece.

10. 2014 October,

11. 2014 October,
For my A2 art project, I chose to study my
topic under the title of “The representation
of femininity in visual art and how various
artists defy stereotyping.” The reason for
this is my own personal experience as a
female in a patriarchal world, and the
discrimination and lack of equality that we
face, even today in the ‘developed world’.
Therefore, I began to study various artists
such as Jenny Saville, Tracey Emin, Tamara
de Lempicka, Zoe Leonard, as well as the
Western mass media, and explore their
interpretations of womanhood and
femininity. As a result, I was exposed to
various opinions on feminism, feminine
aesthetics, sexuality, and just what being a
girl, in general, is, in the views of different
people from different periods of time and
various cultures.
My objectives were to discover the way in which
stereotypes of women, created by mass media, are
defied by visionaries of the art world, and how. I
created this sketchbook over a number of weeks,
about three, and filled the pages with ideas,
annotations, and responses on how others explore
the question of my topic, and how I myself interpret
femininity and womanhood.

12. 2014 October,
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13. 2014 October,
My A2 topic for Art revolved around the question of how various
artists defy stereotypes of femininity, and it led me to explore my
own views on the issue. I believe that women are victims of a
patriarchal society and are constantly being forced to change
themselves to fit with the latest trends, or religions, beliefs,
cultures, etc. The list is endless. To portray this view in an artistic
method, I created three monochrome pieces implying this sense of
being trapped within the expectations of a misogynist society and
being unable to freely express oneself according to one’s individual
personal preferences. All three of these pieces employ use of
willow charcoal, pitt charcoal, conte stick, and a fine-tipped eraser,
in order to create the highlights that allow for a more realistic
piece. Drawings #1 and #2 depict women attempting to alter their
faces and distort them so that they can become fitted to their
societies, conveying how a woman must change herself to become
a part of the developed world. Drawing #3 conveys a face being
pressed against a glass surface, and I did this to show the meaning
of what it feels to be a woman in today’s world. The glass is a
metaphor for a boundary that women are unable to pass, blocking
them from enjoying themselves and being free to their own
accordance. There is an element of suffocation here, shown by the
planes of lighter tones. I wanted to portray how femininity has
been altered to fit to the needs of others, primarily males, and how
women must sacrifice parts of themselves, regardless of the
consequences, to fit into these requirements.
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