Q: Has your definition of art changed from the beginning of this class? A: My definition of art has definitely changed since the beginning of the class, I use to think that art could only be a thing like a painting or a portrait, even a well made sculpture. But, since I've been taking this art class, I've learned to appreciate more forms of art, such a graffiti, nature art, and more free form pieces. I love how I'm able to see and love more kinds of art in the world around me. I can see the different forms of art all around me, just like the little styrofoam sculpture that I made in class one day. (picture below)
Q: Regardless of whether a project was successful or not, describe the one where you learned, grew, or developed the most from? A: I really enjoyed doing my weaving project as the last thing I did in this class, and I do think that it was successful, I think that I definitely learned a thing or two about patience from this project. It took me 3 weeks to finish, and I had to redo different parts of it two or more times. I learned that good art may take time to complete, and it is worth it to change what you don't like. (picture below)
Q: Which project was your most successful? Describe the theme and or topic and the process you went through to complete the project. A: My most successful and my favorite project was my 2 in 1 piece. The theme was an eye turning into a road, I always enjoyed drawing eyes, so when this one turned out so realistic looking, I was really pleased. I had to carefully plan out this project beforehand, and I decided to use oil pastel as my medium for the bright colors and how easily it blends, and now it's my favorite medium to use. (picture below)
Q: Do over: If given the opportunity, which project would you do over? Describe why and how you would redo this project. A: If I were given the opportunity to do over a project, I would completely redo my art journal page. I wanted the lines to be straighter and more precise, and just to have a prettier outcome overall. I would also do a different theme, I'm not sure what though. (picture below)
Q: Medium: which medium did you most enjoy working with and why? Which medium did you not use but wish you had explored? A: My favorite medium to use was oil pastel, because of the beautiful variety of color choices, and the way that the colors can blend together. My 2 in 1 piece was a great example of how much I love this medium. I also wished that I would've explored chalk pastel, the colors are really pretty and soft, not as vivid as the oil pastel. The projects that I saw from other people who used chalk pastel were all really pretty, but it's still really messy like charcoal, which I probably wouldn't enjoy. But, oil pastel remains my favorite. (pictures below)
Although I only had time to do one project, I chose to do a weaving, because it was a new challenge that I've never done anything similar to, and I have always loved the way that tapestries and weavings look on a larger scale. The most challenging part of this project was definitely the two black triangles in the corners of my piece. It was extremely difficult to get the lines to be straight, and even when I tried my best, they were still jagged and wavy, but I embraced it! I really love the way that my final project turned out, and I'm proud of all the time and effort that I put into it. I actually really love all of the little quirks and abnormalities that it has, such as the wavy lines and the holes in the middle. At first, I was mad that I couldn't make my piece perfect and flawless, but once I got into it, I actually grew to love all the little things that made my weaving different from anything that anyone has made before. This piece is drastically different from what I first envisioned. In my head, I wanted to have black triangles in all of the corners, and a pink diamond in the middle. But, when I realized how difficult the triangles were, and how imperfect they were, I scrapped that idea and just started doing whatever I felt like would look good next... and I'm so glad I did! I really do love my final piece.
My piece is representing the word jewelry, so I used the glitter, and the "pearl cluster" in the shell to represent that. I think that I represented it pretty well, but I could've made it a little bit more obvious. My piece has five layers. The first one is an ombre oil pastel layer, the second I taped over parts of my ombre layer and spraypainted the rest black. For the next layer, I dipped bubble wrap in white paint and blotted it all over my piece. After that, I taped over parts of my piece and then blotted on different shades of blue. Next, I taped over different sections and put on gold glitter. Lastly, I made a 3-D oyster shell and made a little "pearl cluster" to go inside for the last layer.
For our stop motion video, I worked with Kristin Fast, we both made the pipecleaner people and painted the set and props, and then on the first day Kristin took the pictures and then I adjusted and repositioned the people; I wasn't able to be there for the second day of filming, and she did a great job! I think that the video was very successful in the way that the pipecleaner dance moves flow smoothly, and the pipecleaner people look really cute and they move with the music! If I were to do this project again, I would get better lighting and I would take more time so that there wouldn't be parts of the table in the frames, and the picture in the back wouldn't move around as much. Overall, I'm really happy with how our video turned out!
My limitation on my "Artists Solve Problems" piece was that it had to be 3-D. So, in order to do this I wanted to make the tutu for my ballerina out of something that would pop out, but I didn't have any fabric or materials that are conventionally used for a skirt. So, I got the idea to use paper airplanes. Once I made all of the airplanes, I overlapped and glued them together in the shape of a skirt. Then, I spray pained the whole thing with pink paint and added silver litter to make it even more girly. Lastly, I painted on the silhouette. The only real problem I had was that I couldn't get the airplanes to stick together and to the paper, but I was able to overcome this issue by overlapping the planes and gluing them in a certain way, and then I put glue on the folds so that it would stick to the paper. Overall, I am very happy with how this piece turned out!
In my land art piece, I made a large flower out of other smaller flowers. I learned that you need to take time to pick out your flowers carefully, and make sure that you can get enough weeds and flowers to fill up the spaces in the fence if you're doing a piece like this. I think that this piece was successful in the way that the colors looked and that it sort of looked like a flower when you put all of the pieces together. If I did this piece again, I would change the type of flowers that I used, and I would also make a stem for the flower out of grass.
In my newspaper art piece, I learned that I had to crumple the newspaper pieces many times to get the desired effect, and I also had to glue the pieces together in many places, on the paper as well as to each other. I think this piece was successful in that it portrayed the idea that the newspaper is made out of a tree, and the cycle goes on. The only thing I would have changed is that I would make the "trunk" of the tree longer and I would also add a tire swing made out of black and white newsprint.
My object art flower ballerina piece is probably one of my favorite things that I made this unit. I learned that you have to make sure that all of your components (if you get them outdoors) must be completely dry or they won't stick to the paper. I felt that this piece was successful in that the flowers look like a full ballerinas skirt. The only thing I would have changed is that I would have made the sketch of the girl a little bit more detailed and realistic. Overall, I really like how this mini lesson looks.
The difference between getting inspiration from another artist and stealing their work is a very fine line. The key difference is that when getting inspiration means that you take bits and pieces from their ideas or work, whereas stealing takes the entire idea or piece and recreates it exactly. It is definitely ok to take parts from other artists pieces, as long as you give them credit, because then you won't be plagiarizing their work. Or, you could modify it so that it isn't too similar to the original artist's work.
I chose to combine an eye and a road after sketching out a few different ideas, and then it just came to me! I really enjoyed learning how to draw an eye, and then one day when I was drawing the eyeliner, my arm slipped, thus came this (eye)dea! I picked the medium of oil pastels because I think that they are fun and easy to use, and the vibrant colors worked very well for my piece. If I could change one thing about my piece, it would be that the sunset would be blended more evenly and the colors would melt together more smoothly. In my opinion, the most successful thing about my art piece is how realistic I was able to make the iris of the eye. Also, I really liked the skyline in the back and the dark night sky. Overall, this is my favorite piece that I have ever drawn, so I am extremely happy about it!
Of all of these assignments, I definitely thought that the forced perspective photos were the most enjoyable and the easiest to do, because I was able to be creative and think of new, creative ideas to portray. The most difficult one to do was the charcoal drawing, because it was extremely messy, and I found it really difficult to get the dark darks that I wanted to incorporate. Also, it was hard to make the objects look realistic.
In my final piece, I drew a candle, an icecream cup, and a dog collar. I used my life as a source of inspiration, incorporating things that I enjoy and use/ do often. I drew a dog collar, because I love my dog Rockie. I drew an icecream cup, becuase I work at an icecream shop and I also love icecream. Lastly, I drew a candle because I have alot of candles and I love how they smell. So yes, I used a source of inspiration... me! I gained skill with familiar materials by using graphite pencils, I just tried to make my blending skills better, as well as trying to make grater contrasts between my darks and lights. So that's all you need to know about my still life!
I really enjoyed doing this forced perspective assignment, it was really interesting how you could make something look so big or small, and still have it look realistic. I enjoyed being able to take pictures for this assignment, because it's much more fun and a lot easier than just drawing a picture (((in my opinion)))! The only thing I would've changed would just be having more props and having ideas planned out beforehand. Overall, this was a really fun and creative assignment!