Final Project

For this project I chose acrylic and graphite. I like sketching in pencil and am best at shading and creating depth with pencil, and I find it easier to create a dripping effect with acrylic paint. The background was also too big for me to do with marker or sharpie, so I chose black paint for a darker and more opaque color. Having both the graphite and acrylic gave me more contrast and allowed me to show the light and dark of depression more easily. This was a surrealism project, but I still wanted to make a statement so I chose something creepy (a mask) and used the blood to show the pain and the leaking. Had I used acrylic for the shading in the mask, I would not have been able to get the shadows the way I wanted them and if I had used graphite pencil for the background I would not have been able to get the deep, dark black color to represent the emptiness that comes with depression. The mask idea came from the fact that for a lot of people, hiding their depression behind a "mask" of happiness is easier because they don't want anyone to know what's wrong or to upset their family and friends. I think that this piece is really successful. It conveyed the message that I wanted it to with an eerie emptiness. The piece in general also looks pretty good and is neat and put together.



I picked just acrylic for this piece because it is one of my favorite mediums to use. In this art work, I tried to show that even though the world is separate and we (humans) are all different and come from different places, we all have the same roots and need to work together to make the world a better place. Using acrylic helped me to convey the message by allowing me to use a lot of layering and blending to create depth and mix/blend the colors easily. I initially used black for the continents, then went in with a dark green. I then mixed the dark green with a lighter green and was able to sort of highlight the center of the continents. I was also able to give the tree more depth and dimension by adding blacks and dark browns to the lighter browns to create shadows. I think that this piece was very successful. I was able to convey the message I wanted to successfully (though maybe not obviously) and depict it in a way that I liked and showed some of my best art skills.





I really enjoyed the portrait unit, even though I did not at first. It was challenging, but one of the things that I wanted to work on in this class was drawing people and capturing facial expression. My final project for portraits is pictured below). I also enjoyed the surrealism unit, because even though at first I (again) did not like it, I learned that surrealism isn't cut and dry, and that it includes so many different subjects and ideas. I don't really know what I would add to this class to make it better, but I really do not enjoy blogs that much. They aren't that bad, but I know some other people dislike them enough that they wouldn't want to take another art class if they were mandatory. I feel like maybe just writing a short paragraph by hand before we do the gallery walks may help some, just to answer the questions that we would usually answer in blogs. I would also not have so many presentations. We didn't necessarily have a lot, but for people who get really nervous to present it is difficult, especially when you are put in groups of people you do not know. Overall, I really enjoyed this class and the freedom that we had in our projects.






We were here. #swag #squad

Pick-Your-Own-Blog

I developed my idea for this project by brainstorming different ideas for what I wanted to do. I wanted to do an issue that was important to me and was something that I wanted to capture. I knew that I probably wanted to use acrylic (I think it is my favorite medium) but I did not know what subject to choose. After brainstorming, I decided to go to google and find a picture of a tree (I like to paint trees) for inspiration. One thing led to another and I came across a picture of a tree whose leaves reminded me of continents. I then came up with the idea of painting a tree whose leaves were the continents to show that even though we (all the people in the world) are different, we all have the same roots and need to stand together as a united front. I then crudely "sketched" a tree to try and plan out where I would put the continents. For the most part my sketch was the same as how my final turned out, but I had to adjust where some of the continents were in order to make everything fit on the canvas. I really like this project because I like the way it looks but I also like what it says. A lot of people don't see the meaning at first, but when I say what I was showing they really like it and think it's really cool. I also like it because at first I did not think that it was good, but after changing the background from just a mix of blues to more of a gradient/ombre, it created more depth which I like.

I really like selecting what I work on! I do not like to do art because someone told me what I have to do, I like to get an idea myself and go with it. Having guidelines is okay, like saying to try and pick a world issue or a certain general idea, but when it's too specific it takes the creativity out of it. I like having a lot of choice, but sometimes it does get overwhelming and I need some direction. Especially because I usually have projects that I know I want to do, but after they run out I have issues picking things to do. Overall, I really like being able to pick what I do and having the freedom to choose, but I understand that the teacher actually needs to teach and sometimes we have to have certain assignments.

Current Issues

The issue that I selected was student debt after graduating college. I picked this issue because its a huge issue in many countries, particularly America. Education is incredibly expensive, and most people don't get enough money in grants and scholarships to make it easily payable. Students look like they have all of this freedom and opportunity after college, but in reality they graduate to a sucky economy and hundreds in college debt. I feel that if students are going to be encouraged to go to college, they need to be able to pay it off in a realistic amount of time without struggling in this already poor economy. 

Only answering one question because we won the challenge. 

Teens Inspired

Bride by Beth Lipman

My final drawing inspired by Bride

2 different sketches of my idea

I chose to do a drawing inspired by Bride by Beth Lipman because I think that the glass is really beautiful and I liked the way it stood as a symbol of something beautiful being broken and destroyed. I found my inspiration in the broken glass and the emptiness of the glasses. When glass cracks, it looks almost like a spider web, so that's what I decided to do. The glasses are broken and empty, yet still beautiful, so I represented the emptiness with an eye with a web, as the eye is the window to the soul and the web represents the emptiness that has taken over. The spiders spinning their webs on and around the eye add to the effect of the eye being empty and unused while adding some creepiness to finish the drawing. I tried to make the spiders look like black widows to add emphasis on the poisonous part of love and destruction.

Change Blog

One of the challenges I encountered while working on this project was trying to make it not look like a child's artwork. After I finished my first painting session, it looked very flat and bland. I liked the winter side, but I didn't like the spring side. I ended up getting feedback from other people and made changes based on that. I added more shading to the back and foreground and I added elements from each side to the other.

I found the idea for this project from the change journal entry that we did. I painted a tree with one side spring and the other side fall. I didn't like my original, so when we got the assignment to do a change project I decided on doing a sort of "remake" of my journal entry (after much indecision). I came to terms with the fact that I couldn't draw leaves and chose to do spring and winter (because it was snowing outside) instead of spring and fall. 

I'm very proud of my final project! I don't think that's its really great necessarily, but I am proud that I was able to do something that I didn't think I originally could. I'm very proud of my work on shading with paint, as that was one if the things I came into this class wanting to learn/work on. It didn't turn out exactly like I expected, as I thought I would mess it up, but I like it. There are some things that I want to change (like the clump of snow pictured) but I am too afraid of ruining the painting to fix it. 

Portrait and Surrealism

My artistic skills have greatly improved in these first few weeks of art class. My goal in the class was to learn to draw people, and I did! I learned about proportion and how to properly shade facial features.

I don't use anything in particular to help me generate ideas for my work. I often use pictures to help me do the work (almost like a model). When I'm given a topic to do a piece on I think about what comes into my mind when I think of the topic and think of a few ideas. I then pick one that I like and then start working! I typically figure out how to approach the work best, sketch, then add value or paint. 

I think that I've had major success in learning how to draw faces/people. My first photo of a portrait looked nothing like the person I was trying to draw, but by using the grid method I was able to achieve a drawing that looked extremely close to the picture I used as a model. My challenge was definitely creating value with paint. I've definitely had trouble with it and still haven't mastered it, but I am building up by using pencil and paint together.

Art 1 Final Portfolio

1. The realism project was my most successful. The purpose of this project was to create a piece of art that had realistic qualities using value, line variety and shape. In order to do this project I had to look at a paper clip and observe the way the shadow fell and the shape of the paper clip. Creating lines that gave the appearance of dimension while making it proportional and realistic was a challenge. As far as what choices I made, I am still very happy with them. I think that using graphite was a good idea and allowed me to create shadow more easily. Having line variation also allowed me to create a three dimensional drawing  and make the lines look sharper or less defined depending on how thick the line became. I also really like that I took the advice to make the paper clips different sizes. This isn't necessarily realistic, but it creates a lot of contrast between the smaller and bigger paper clips to make the bigger ones seem bigger and smaller ones seem smaller. I could have created the shape of the paper clips better by rounding the sides more with the shadow and allowing it to really pop off of the page. Overall, I'm very happy with this project. 

2. One project where I overcame obstacles was the sculpture project. At first I didn't know what to do with the butterflies and whether or not to hang them from something or use Velcro. I ended up thinking about making it a mobile and instead if using paper like I had originally thought and used a piece of wood and drilled holes to keep the butterflies hanging. I had a difficult time getting the butterflies attached to the wooden top of the mobile, which took me some time. I ended up using fishing line and strung it through the holes in the wood. I chose fishing line because the thread wasn't strong enough and kept getting knotted. Getting the butterflies to hang down straight and not upside down or sideways. I tried using paper clips, but they weren't heavy enough so I decided to use washers instead. This worked very well, although it's not as appealing to the eye as I would have liked.

Taking risks and challenging myself has taught me new techniques that I can use in all different types of art. Having to solve problems once allowed me to think more thoroughly about other things that I did so that I wouldn't run into more problems. I also had to be creative with the ways I solved the problems, which added a lot to my project in terms of creativity and trying different things to achieve a certain look or purpose. 

3. There has been a lot of growth in my ability to draw hands! My first hand drawing is relatively realistic, but the fingers aren't all proportional. The thumb was the most difficult part for me and it ended up looking too thin. I was afraid that if too much of it was covered by the phone that nobody would be able to tell what it is or that it would look weird. Now I realize that as long as its a good realistic drawing, people will be able to tell what it is. Realistic means capturing a real image, or taking something and making it look real. My final hand drawing shows a lot of growth. My ability to shade the hands naturally has improved drastically. There isn't much shading on my first drawing that made it look realistic, but on my final I used shading to create depth and make it look three dimensional. I also learned about highlighting certain aspects of hands to accentuate where the light naturally hits a hand. In my final picture, the area between the web and base of my hand is lighter because the light naturally hits there, and the fingers underneath the hand are darker because they aren't being hit directly by any light and they're not as detailed because they're farther away and not as large. Thumbs and hands used to be too hard for me to draw and I didn't like it, but now I like it because I actually know how.

4. Getting to choose our subject matter and materials was great. I have a difficult time working under pressure and strict deadlines when it comes to art because I don't think creativity can be rushed. One example of this was the abstract project, where I did a picture of the comedy/tragedy theatre mask. I used many different mediums for this project, and it took me a while to both execute and to plan. I couldn't come up with an idea, as I'm not too find of abstract art, but I was able to pick a subject that I was interested in and wasn't rushed to complete it. I had trouble finding the right color black to fill in the face with, and that set me back a little bit. Had I had a due date, I wouldn't have been able to finish and would've been unhappy with my final project. True creativity cannot be rushed, and if I had not been able to do something I enjoyed it wouldn't have been nearly as good as I think it is now. The detailing on this project took me a while to plan and complete, and it was important for me to do the drawing in pencil first to avoid making mistakes. Having to do this in a week or only being to use one medium would've been terrifying because different materials all have a different finished look that wouldn't have been right for this project.