The Sinclair Building

A project titled 'Observation and Communication' which brought together a culmination of powerful techniques and processes, which would mesh together to form an incredibly in depth body of work working towards and producing a poster advertising/creating awareness of a chosen building in Sheffield.

I took to the streets in search of a structure I personally found interesting both aesthetically and historically, which took a good while before I found what I believed was the perfect subject. A business that had grown over 30 years getting larger through filling a block of terraced properties, which then was renovated into a sleek modern facility for both the Sinclair China and Glass shop, and four stories of luxury apartments. The Sinclair Building on Sheffield's Glossop Road stands out from the surrounding buildings mainly due to its night black colour but also its ora of elegance and sophistication. What could be better to explore graphically than a subject with multiple personalities and a history of architectural traits?!

Above is an example of some initial sketches I took whilst standing outside the building on the street, this was in fact something I had never done before in a busy city so in itself was a big experience. To have so many people walk past and try to take a glimpse of what you are doing, you create interest in every passer by which can be both daunting and exciting at the same time.

Dry Point Etching

A technique which I was very familiar with due to having produced several pieces during my Fine Art A-level course. Dry point etching and printing is without a shadow of a doubt one of my favourite ways to create drawings and prints. It has all the abilities of producing an outcome of great detail similar to using a very fine tipped pen.

Detail is very important to me and even in very simple looking pieces I always look to create depth and emotion within the work, always looking at how I can make it exciting. Etching really gives me an opportunity to fully explore depth and detail due to the fine-ness of the marks made and how they are positioned, for example in the piece below you can see how I have cross-hatched the shadow and left the majority on the light areas unmarked.

Cross hatching allows you to show different tones by increasing or decreasing the amount of lines used in the hatch rather than blocking or smudging as you would with pencils or pastels.

Sketching and creating images of our chosen building and its surroundings was the main focus of this project, the poster had to have a hand made feel, although it would all be composed and finished using photoshop and my scanned images later on.

After much drawing and experimenting with different techniques in doing this, looking at colour, monochrome, tinted drawings, I came to a decision of which of my pieces to use for the final outcome. It is an A1 charcoal piece which to me really explores the black of the buildings bricks, but at the same time adds a richness and incredible rush of emotion and excitement, perfect for the nature of the architecture.