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  • Heterogeneous drawing - Ranald Sherriffs
  • In urban sociology, fragmentation refers to the absence or the underdevelopment of connections between the society and the groupings of some members of that society on the lines of a common culture, nationality, race, language, occupation, religion, income level, habitat or other common interests.

    The drawings presented, form a body of work that is based on ideas around fragmentation and in particular, Patch Dynamics. This is a conceptual approach to ecosystem and habitat analysis that emphasises the dynamics of heterogeneity within a system whereby diverse patches of habitat created by interventions or disturbances are seen as critical to the maintenance of diversity. The drawings parallel this in that they have no definite shape and spatial configuration, or heterogeneity and that they not only allude to notions and aspects of division and isolation of physical and metaphorical landscape, but also social and socio-economic relationships. The drawing processes employed also parallel the phrase “shifting mosaic” (Bormann and Likens 1979) used to describe the theory that landscapes change and fluctuate in relation to structure, function and composition.

    The drawings are also linked in that although they are separate (and separated) from each other, migration and transference of iconography, marks and gesture does occur from one drawing to the other, thus becoming the mechanism by which seed ideas are spread.

    The drawings are also an attempt to offer us a spectrum of fragmented, divided and detached experiences rather than a unified whole. They are both connected and disconnected, having been divided and having their unity destroyed. This is a conscious attempt to mirror the disruption of contemporary social habitats into isolated and small patches. The images are an attempt to communicate this layering of different worlds of introspection where small and unobtrusive details gradually come into focus, alluding towards some past or connected event that functions as a bed of metaphor through which we are able to establish a half-knowledge of what we are seeing. These details become potent signifiers that, despite their subtlety, often become as important as the over riding image.

    References
    Forman, R.T.T. (1995). Land Mosaics: The Ecology of Landscapes and Regions. Cambridge University Press.
    Rozenzweig, Michael L. (1995). Species diversity in space and time. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.


    Biographical information

    Ranald Sherriffs MA (RCA)
    Artist and Senior Lecturer
    Course Director and Program Manager in Foundation Art & Design
    Department of Visual Art at Coventry University
    info@ranaldsherriffs.com
    www.ranaldsherriffs.com

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