Artistic Musings

Day three of the home-bound debacle. I did do work today but none of which I can put up here! Most of it was done in my 3D sketchbook or in Photoshop. Instead I had a bit of a rambling artistic thought and that thought was this: When do you really feel like an artist?

I mean it, when are you finally able to look at your work and just instinctively know that you are an artist, when do you feel it? Professors like to tell you that you are in effect an artist right now, but I know that most of us including myself don't feel that way. I feel like an artist in training. Of course I love what I do and am having so much fun! I suppose that the time when one feels like an artist is an individual experience...but there has to be a generalized time when you just feel it doesn't there? Like after your first exhibit, or after your first big commission or job? I was watching this show off Netflix the other day and one of the characters said something that really struck me. He said that even though he was a lawyer, he didn't feel like one. That he still felt like he was playing dress up in his fathers clothes and would be found out at any moment. Sometimes that is how I feel. Like I'm playing dress up in grown up clothing and sooner or later someone is going to drag me back down to earth kicking and screaming.

I think that that is what's so wonderful about the art world though. You never have to come down to earth. I know that feeling of accomplishment will come eventually..but like I said. Right now I'm just an artist in training. That is what school is for after all isn't it? I don't think you can really LEARN to be an artist, but school is there to cultivate your talent and help you to translate all of those ideas in your mind onto a canvas or something similar. They give you the tools for your craft.

Well! Tomorrow I will have some more pictures to post hopefully! I'm thinking about doing a really gross series on the inside of my throat as I've had mono. Except make several versions ranging from the realistic disease to a cartoonized version of little monsters running up and down my throat infecting me with their disease ridden fingers. I'm pretty sure I'm going to start in on that tomorrow just for fun, it's my sketchbook after all the professor said it should be a place for random-ness and individuality!

Beginning of the Sketch A Thon!

Day two of at home illness nursing! My brother is actually going through rooms in the house he never enters just to avoid coming into contact with me, it's like I'm typhoid Mary! Anyways, today consisted of sleep and practice sketches in the sketch book and work on my Digital project! I feel like I've kinda over done it in that area because now I have two working drafts and I don't know which concept I like. So me being me I'm going to finish both drafts and then pick which one I like as the final at the very end. And maybe print the other one just for fun anyways.
The first image here was actually the second reconstruction I did today, I just like it the best out of the two! The original is by Gustave Courbet and is called The Desperate Man Self Portrait painted in 1845. My sketch was done only in vine charcoal once again. I would say it's because this was only meant as practice...but the shameful reality is that my charcoal pencils were all worn down and I was way too lazy to lazy/exhausted to actually go get a

sharpener from the drawer in the kitchen! So I stuck to vine charcoal today which is desperately in need of some serious spray fixative. In fact I kind of despise vine charcoal it practically falls off of the page if you breathe too hard I don't think I did so bad on this fellow! He was actually a lot of fun to draw because of how dramatic his expression is. It's as if he just woke up and realized he has an exam that started 10 minutes ago. I am familiar with that expression. I chose this image to draw partially because of that very expression and partially because of the way the shadows play on his face and his arms. It really emphasizes the planes of the face and the three dimensional quality of the features. The muscles in the neck and arms are also very defined. The sternocleidomastoid muscle is in sharp relief there on his neck which plays a part in the lighting I would think. In order for that muscle to stick out that way his head would have to be turned, muscles strained, it plays together well with the artists over all concept. I think as far as my reconstruction went I managed to do a good job on the upper half of the head and the quick sketch of the hands/shirt etc. The lower half of the face I shortened slightly. When looked at by itself I think that the proportions of the face still fit and it still looks pretty decent but when compared to the original.

This second sketch I'm not as big a fan of mostly because I don't think I picked a very good reference painting this time. The painting is gorgeous don't get me wrong but for the purpose of what I am trying to learn I don't think it fit very well. I just kinda got caught up in the pretty face. And THEN I ran into vine charcoal issues! Seeing as this was the sketch I did first today I had to cover it while doing the other sketch. Yeah it got all wiped off. All of the shading, and in particular the lips, got smudged leaving the outline and vague shading that didn't make sense. I tried to fix it but the mouth needs to be redone most definitely. At least the lower lip does. Looking at it like this is actually making me mad I just wanna fix it now! But oh well I will work on it in the morning!
The reasons I chose this image initially were because of the light in her hair. I really liked how the artist made it feel as if it was real strands of hair without spending time drawing out every strand. The way he treats it is almost gestural. I was also attracted by the fact that her neck looks so skinny she could be anorexic. How does a neck that thin hold up someones head? I don't think it's possible, especially because compared to her neck her head does look rather large. This painting, A portrait of Julia Saner an up and coming model, was created by an artist named Danny Roberts. The fact that it's of a model kind of explained the whole stick like neck, and really makes me worry about the whole concept of anorexia in the modeling industry...I mean when did THAT become the standard for beauty in any country? But that is completely off topic! The point is, I think my sketch exercises for the day were pretty beneficial. By analyzing my own work up against artists such as

Roberts and Courbet I find that I am coming to a better understand of what works and what doesn't when working with the human face. Roberts painting does give the illusion of weight and a three dimensional form but not in the same way as Courbet's. His shading is more subtle, lighting more even, and it's a little harder to imitate because it the planes of the face aren't entirely clearly defined. It's like when you look at a person standing in front of you. Yes you can draw that person, but in order to do so you have to work out where the planes on their face are and how the light is hitting those planes etc. It can be tricky! Courbet uses very strong lighting that clearly defines all the planes, even though the light source itself seems a little ambiguous (both arms are in harsh light but on opposite sides? I'm still trying to figure that part out). I find this kind of work interesting though. One artist strove to show the beauty of the person, the other strove to show the emotion and personality.

Yet another long post! I don't know who reads this but whomever you are I am sorry that I seem to be rambling so much! But this is an art blog and these are my thoughts on said art. Plus...I'm sickly and have nothing else to do besides work on my projects, write here, and watch Gilmour Girls on a loop while I fall in and out of sleep!

So goodnight blogger land! Tomorrow will bring more musings, rantings, ravings, and hopefully more sketches. Until then!

Bronzino Reconstruction

So, I am confined at the moment to my parents house because of all things I had to come down with it appears that I have mono! I blame it on public transportation. Anyways because of this I will be writing here a lot more over the next few days since I have off from school for the rest of this week and will just be working on..well school stuff..while trying to rest and get functioning for school Monday! Basically in my misery I am going to inflict my rantings on my lovely blog here, all about art of course but far more detailed than they have been recently because I have the time to talk and think!
This entry is...more practice for that final project in my Drawing Observation and Invention course! This was a lot easier to do though in my opinion. When you look at another artists work and try to imitate their style and recreate the piece the planes of light are already defined, it is simplified for you. As my professor says, doing reproductions is like learning from the masters. They become your teacher as you try to solve the problems they already found solutions to by picking apart their work and imitating it the best you can. Our assignment for homework was to do this with Bronzino's painting Portrait of a Young Man. Seeing as we were instructed to use charcoal (that is the medium that our final portrait will be done in) the challenge became slightly greater. How do you imitate PAINT with CHARCOAL?? Ideally he chose this painting because it simplifies shadows, showing a clear sense of where the light is coming from, and there is a solid feeling to the young man in the portrait. He has "weight" to him as my professor would say.

Honestly I tend to find the young man in the portrait a bit pompous. It doesn't help that I had this image recently in an art history exam so I'm geared towards thinking that. This is only a cropping of the actual image. In the actual one you see his whole torso and his arms, two bannister looking objects near him, and a book in one hand. The banisters are adorned with mythical figures heads that pretty much stand for foolish youth! He was poking fun at those who thought that he was in fact a pompous and foolhardy young man without any real good sense. I think knowing this about the painting helped me to work on the reconstruction, I looked much closer at the features and was able to attribute emotion to them. For example, his eyes have always looked kind of sleepy and aloof to me. As if he is just tolerating whatever it is you might be saying. His eyes are also slightly...skewed really. When the painting is looked at head on it looks like he has a lazy eye! One eye looks straight ahead at the audience
while the other eye looks over to the side slightly. According to my art history professor this was to give the painting a bit of life and make the eyes appear as if they were following you when you walk past it. Meaning viewed from the side it's suppose to still look like it's looking at you. I don't know if that actually works or not...but it is definitely interesting!

My reconstruction was done in two nights, mostly because my illness is greatly impairing my ability to sit and work through anything all at once due to pain and exhaustion! But after those two nights of working on it this is what I came up with! Not perfect I know, but I think it's pretty good! I tried to focus more on the face and the accuracy of the shadows than on the clothing...mostly because there are a lot of folds in that clothing and I really don't think that was the point of the assignment! Looking at it now I realize I subconsciously fixed the eyes so that they were facing the same direction.  And I think that I made his posture better? In fact I think my version is even more lazy than Bronzino's! But all in all I enjoyed doing this portrait, I enjoy reconstructions period. Each one is like a personal challenge. You are trying to be as good as someone who has already been proven GREAT.
Seeing as I have Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, and part of Sunday here at the home of the parentals I'm going to use that time to my advantage! I will be doing a few more portrait reconstructions in my sketchbook, just with pencil but all focused on shadows and depth of the figure. I have my portrait here to work on as well but I won't post that until it's finished. I have my 3D Process sketch book to work on which should be fun, my professor thinks of our sketchbooks as collages and journals and whatever we want them to be. She instructed me to have many pages filled out on Tuesday of next week because I'm missing class this Thursday. I also have art history stuff here to read up on, and another kind of self portrait for Digital! I'm kinda excited about that one because it isn't a literal self portrait! I get to make things interesting and play with photoshop some more! I also might have a paper to start revising all things depending!

So yes! Lots to do which means lots of posts here as well! But for now this invalid needs to get some sleep, so goodnight until tomorrow Blog Land.

Foggy self

A quick 15 minute sketch of what my final will look like...very vague but I kind of like it like this. As if I'm looking through the fog or something its vague but still enough so you can tell its me in a way. This is done with vine charcoal and a regular pink eraser.

Sketchity Sketch!

So here is what I have been up to!! Again...for the umpteenth time my phones camera isn't the best but this will at least give everyone an idea. In my Drawing Observation and Invention class we have been working on portraiture for this first unit. Meaning lots of self portraits which is of course new territory for me! New territory seems to be a theme this semester. I feel like self portraits are difficult anyways...I have never looked at my face and tried to see it's planes and angles and shadows before...and that's now all I can see. Anyways, the assignment was to practice drawing our noses, eyes, and mouths. And thus here it is!







Yeah...alotta practice! Tomorrow begins the final draft of the portrait. I have already done one mock up and another will be done tonight, both will be posted tomorrow! For now I am off to write a rough draft of a paper comparing two lovely statues from the Baltimore Museum of Art for my Writing About Art class! Writing writing writing!

The Cardboard Catastrophe

The awaited cardboard thing! I have to admit I kind of surprised myself here. I don't know HOW I managed to survive last night through all the crazy insane cardboard madness until four in the morning until I MOSTLY got it to look the way I wanted to! The pictures below show the beginning and the end of the process, I was too frustrated to take too many pictures during the whole middle part of the production. Keep in mind I'm using my phone for these pictures I don't have a great camera with me at the moment so the quality of these pictures is going to be crapola but it will do for now. In the pictures you can see the original frame work of the sculpture, the geometry of the back and back of the head, and the beginnings of the workings on the face. Then you can see the finished product as it was just before I turned it in this morning! It's a big weight off my shoulders that is for sure, I never would have imagined making a bust out of cardboard would be something I would have done ever.

Over all impressions...I am actually kinda proud of myself! This is something very new for me, most of my work is drawing or painting of some sort. I'm not FULLY happy with the lips but I think it does resemble me. Maybe not to a T but there is definitely a resemblance! The most intimidating part of it I think would have to be how to do the eyes...and that hat. That hat gave me so much trouble at one point I thought I was going to ruin the whole project at 2 in the morning the night before! First I made a hat separately but the cardboard wasn't flexible enough and it didn't fit with the shape of the head at all and needless to say I wasn't exactly a happy camper! Finally I actually molded the hat onto the head itself by using the separated brown paper from the corrugated cardboard which was a lot more flexible.

Next project? I am making a clay thing-a-majig for that class of a very stylized sunflower. We are going to be making these things, then making a mold out of plaster and casting them again in paper. Each of our pieces will be fit together to form one giant abstract nature artwork. Should be interesting! Aside from that I am doing self portraiture in Drawing Observation and Invention. I will put up the brief sketches tomorrow, for now here is the anticipated CARDBOARD CATASTROPHE! Which may not have been such a catastrophe after all.

         

Aggregations

Alright I know I said I would post up the cardboard sculpture but I felt this had to be put up first! Cardboard sculpture will be up Wednesday night however.
This post was inspired by a show I went to the other week called Aggregations and it was absolutely incredible. The exhibit is being shown at Towson in the Asian Arts Exhibit which was beyond convenient. The artists name is Kwang Young Chun and the images below are only a few from the gallery and all of them are made from tiny triangles of mulberry paper from old Korean books he had collected over time. He uses natural pigments for the color and shading in the artwork. I think part of what made his work so exciting for me was that it was slightly three dimensional and yet the shading added a completely different dynamic. If at all possible it is definitely something I would recommend anyone seeing! From far away you get these gaping crater effects but when up close you can see individual lettering on the triangles from the books and how the shadows of each triangle play with each other. When asked the artist revealed that some of the triangles took as much as 8000 folded pieces! The artist himself was hysterical and it was neat to be able to see someone who had stayed true to himself to the point of creating his own style of art that is unique and different. I can only imagine the level of patience and determination it would take to create even a FRACTION of one of these pieces of art!!
Aside from the art work, which as I said was definitely awe inspiring, the gallery itself really added a little extra something. The lighting in particular was really effective in that it shone down on all the pieces from above. The lighting was soft enough to not take away from the over all work yet it emphasized all of the triangular pieces by casting new shadows that mingled with the manufactured shadows. This was only interrupted a couple times during the artists talk when one woman hit the light switch with her elbow and shut off the lights a few times!
Again it was an amazing show and I highly recommend every one who sees this to go and look at his work up close! But for those who can't here are some images from the show, and a link to the calendar associated with this event:

AGGREGATIONS