Essay Questions:
1.) How did you apply what you learned in Art 1 to successfully complete the Identity Project? Talk about your knowledge of materials and what you've learned about working with themes.
- Firstly, my identity project was a sketch of Mahatma Gandhi using his own spinning wheel to make his clothes. In this sketch I decided just to use the basic skills I've learned throughout this course. Such as, value, perspective, and proportion. I learned that value is a skill that can really make your artwork look very realistic and appealing since it can also consist of highlights and darker shades vs. lighter shades. On the wooden piece where the spinning wheel is placed on top of is the area where I tried putting the most amount of value. I thought that the corners and especially wherever there were two things intersecting, was the area I would put a much darker shade. On the edges of the wooden piece, I put the highlight where light would reflect in real life. This made this piece of the work more realistic. Next, I used perspective. Since the spinning wheel was placed in an angle, I had to make sure each element of the wheel was facing towards a diagonal instead of a front profile. This was maybe the hardest part of this project, since the spinning wheel had to look symmetrical yet in an angle. I also made Gandhi sit in a diagonal position so it could correspond with the direction of the spinning wheel. Finally, I learned how to use proportion in the correct way. I mostly used proportion obviously for Gandhi's body. Based on an image I was referring off of, I saw how his head was rather larger at the top and got a little narrow towards the bottom. His ears were also noticeably pointing outwards, with the glasses resting on them. His physicality was an interesting part to draw since he had a skinny and bony structure. Although these were the main parts of the body, the smallest part, which were the hands took the longest time to draw. I wanted him to be seen as if he was holding a threading spindle that was coming off of the thread from the spinning wheel. I had to draw the thumb in front of the spindle's handles, and the rest of the fingers underneath like he was gripping onto the object. The fact that this was the smallest feature of the drawing was a challenge since I had to make the details of his hands to still look realistic. All of these ideas and skills I learned in Art 1 so far, have really helped me in drawing objects and people in a complete different perspective, which eventually made my artwork look a lot more appealing.
2.) What was your most successful project this semester? Describe the project and your work, then explain why you picked it.
- I believe my most successful project was the tea lamp (flower piece) and the zentangle. The zentangle was my first project in this class, and was luckily an area of art that I was most comfortable with. For that piece, I used dividing lines to separate the specific areas of where I would fill it with designs. This helped me a lot, especially since the paper was quite large. As I kept going with the intricate designs within the dividers, I didn't even notice when the whole paper got to be filled. Using lots of designs from my henna ideas, I used the technique of repetition. This was the main factor of this project that really caught people's attention. Although people thought that it's a paper filled with very different designs, it's actually just patterns that have been repeated randomly throughout the piece. For example, at the bottom of the paper, where there is the circle, I used the same pattern over and over again to fill up the circle. This gave a detailed effect since the pattern itself was so intricate. Doing this, I kept going on to fill the whole paper within a span of 3-4 days. I also learned to put value and emphasis onto the major lines of the art piece.
For my tea lamp, the medium I used was clay. That was my first time using clay to mold into something that was functional. I felt that the best part about this project was the painting of it more than the sculpting. I decided to use a lot of vibrant colors along with white to highlight some of the designs. I noticed the the clay piece was going from up to down towards the bottom center. Using this idea, I wanted to use a repetitive design that would get smaller and smaller as I was painting downwards. With the many options I had for colors, I used bright yellows, pinks, and reds. On the contrary, I also used a dark blue, a light blue, and a magenta color at the top. Since the clay piece was quite small, I had to really make the designs tiny in order for the detail of the painting to show. I also learned that layering colors on top of each other can also give an interesting effect. For example, on the border of the piece I drew petal-like designs that had white layered on top of it. I liked that part a lot just for the fact that it looked like actual petals. These two artworks are very special to me since I did my best while learning so many things throughout.
3.) Do over - what was a project this semester you would change if you could? Describe the project and your work, including what you didn’t like about the work, then explain what you could have done differently to improve the result.
- If given the chance, I would definitely want to redo the block printing project. This was a project that I didn't really realize was going to be so difficult at first; therefore I took it as an easy project at first, later seeing that it affected my prints quite a bit. I think I should've known how to use the tools on the rubber pieces a lot better. I also was a little confused on what colors to put for the piece, since we needed 2 different colors. The matching of the first color and then the new color on top of it was the biggest challenge, since you didn't know how it was going to look after you peeled it off. If I had more time to practice and learn how to match up the colors then I would definitely would want to redo this project just because it looks so interesting in the end...if it turns out correctly!
4.) What is a media that you enjoyed working with this semester? Write about what the media was, explain why you liked it and give examples of work you created with it.
- I really enjoyed the stop motion app for the change project. I did a henna tattoo on someone's hand and took pictures of the design developing from the beginning to the end. I have done henna for a very long time now, but I never thought that I could make it look even more interesting through this type of media. The stop motion really made the design look like it was growing from a simple design to an intricate design. Seeing something that I'm so used to doing, now through a different perspective made the change project really interesting for me. The fact that it was something new and different made me want to choose this media, and then use it through a type of art that I'm so used to doing.
Artwork and Reflection:
- For my reflection I chose to redo one of the warm-ups, which was drawing a face. I feel like I did this better because I added a lot more value, especially in the hair and below the neck. I emphasized her eyes a lot more, with the highlight within the eyeball. Overall, I kept the features on her face very dark, with subtle detail within. For example, the lips have a dark outline, and then within the lips I drew lines to show the curve, or shape of the lips. I also changed her hairstyle, and position of the flower to make it be seen in a different perspective. I think the proportions of the first try were not as great, since the eyes were a lot larger than any other feature; so I made sure the nose wasn't too small, and the eyes didn't dominate the entire face. I tried to balance this with her hair to take up most of the forehead so the face wasn't awkwardly large. For the flower, I put more value that radiated from the center, as if there were two colors blending with together. Overall, I tried to focus more on value for this piece.
1.) How did you apply what you learned in Art 1 to successfully complete the Identity Project? Talk about your knowledge of materials and what you've learned about working with themes.
- Firstly, my identity project was a sketch of Mahatma Gandhi using his own spinning wheel to make his clothes. In this sketch I decided just to use the basic skills I've learned throughout this course. Such as, value, perspective, and proportion. I learned that value is a skill that can really make your artwork look very realistic and appealing since it can also consist of highlights and darker shades vs. lighter shades. On the wooden piece where the spinning wheel is placed on top of is the area where I tried putting the most amount of value. I thought that the corners and especially wherever there were two things intersecting, was the area I would put a much darker shade. On the edges of the wooden piece, I put the highlight where light would reflect in real life. This made this piece of the work more realistic. Next, I used perspective. Since the spinning wheel was placed in an angle, I had to make sure each element of the wheel was facing towards a diagonal instead of a front profile. This was maybe the hardest part of this project, since the spinning wheel had to look symmetrical yet in an angle. I also made Gandhi sit in a diagonal position so it could correspond with the direction of the spinning wheel. Finally, I learned how to use proportion in the correct way. I mostly used proportion obviously for Gandhi's body. Based on an image I was referring off of, I saw how his head was rather larger at the top and got a little narrow towards the bottom. His ears were also noticeably pointing outwards, with the glasses resting on them. His physicality was an interesting part to draw since he had a skinny and bony structure. Although these were the main parts of the body, the smallest part, which were the hands took the longest time to draw. I wanted him to be seen as if he was holding a threading spindle that was coming off of the thread from the spinning wheel. I had to draw the thumb in front of the spindle's handles, and the rest of the fingers underneath like he was gripping onto the object. The fact that this was the smallest feature of the drawing was a challenge since I had to make the details of his hands to still look realistic. All of these ideas and skills I learned in Art 1 so far, have really helped me in drawing objects and people in a complete different perspective, which eventually made my artwork look a lot more appealing.
2.) What was your most successful project this semester? Describe the project and your work, then explain why you picked it.
- I believe my most successful project was the tea lamp (flower piece) and the zentangle. The zentangle was my first project in this class, and was luckily an area of art that I was most comfortable with. For that piece, I used dividing lines to separate the specific areas of where I would fill it with designs. This helped me a lot, especially since the paper was quite large. As I kept going with the intricate designs within the dividers, I didn't even notice when the whole paper got to be filled. Using lots of designs from my henna ideas, I used the technique of repetition. This was the main factor of this project that really caught people's attention. Although people thought that it's a paper filled with very different designs, it's actually just patterns that have been repeated randomly throughout the piece. For example, at the bottom of the paper, where there is the circle, I used the same pattern over and over again to fill up the circle. This gave a detailed effect since the pattern itself was so intricate. Doing this, I kept going on to fill the whole paper within a span of 3-4 days. I also learned to put value and emphasis onto the major lines of the art piece.
For my tea lamp, the medium I used was clay. That was my first time using clay to mold into something that was functional. I felt that the best part about this project was the painting of it more than the sculpting. I decided to use a lot of vibrant colors along with white to highlight some of the designs. I noticed the the clay piece was going from up to down towards the bottom center. Using this idea, I wanted to use a repetitive design that would get smaller and smaller as I was painting downwards. With the many options I had for colors, I used bright yellows, pinks, and reds. On the contrary, I also used a dark blue, a light blue, and a magenta color at the top. Since the clay piece was quite small, I had to really make the designs tiny in order for the detail of the painting to show. I also learned that layering colors on top of each other can also give an interesting effect. For example, on the border of the piece I drew petal-like designs that had white layered on top of it. I liked that part a lot just for the fact that it looked like actual petals. These two artworks are very special to me since I did my best while learning so many things throughout.
3.) Do over - what was a project this semester you would change if you could? Describe the project and your work, including what you didn’t like about the work, then explain what you could have done differently to improve the result.
- If given the chance, I would definitely want to redo the block printing project. This was a project that I didn't really realize was going to be so difficult at first; therefore I took it as an easy project at first, later seeing that it affected my prints quite a bit. I think I should've known how to use the tools on the rubber pieces a lot better. I also was a little confused on what colors to put for the piece, since we needed 2 different colors. The matching of the first color and then the new color on top of it was the biggest challenge, since you didn't know how it was going to look after you peeled it off. If I had more time to practice and learn how to match up the colors then I would definitely would want to redo this project just because it looks so interesting in the end...if it turns out correctly!
4.) What is a media that you enjoyed working with this semester? Write about what the media was, explain why you liked it and give examples of work you created with it.
- I really enjoyed the stop motion app for the change project. I did a henna tattoo on someone's hand and took pictures of the design developing from the beginning to the end. I have done henna for a very long time now, but I never thought that I could make it look even more interesting through this type of media. The stop motion really made the design look like it was growing from a simple design to an intricate design. Seeing something that I'm so used to doing, now through a different perspective made the change project really interesting for me. The fact that it was something new and different made me want to choose this media, and then use it through a type of art that I'm so used to doing.
Artwork and Reflection:
- For my reflection I chose to redo one of the warm-ups, which was drawing a face. I feel like I did this better because I added a lot more value, especially in the hair and below the neck. I emphasized her eyes a lot more, with the highlight within the eyeball. Overall, I kept the features on her face very dark, with subtle detail within. For example, the lips have a dark outline, and then within the lips I drew lines to show the curve, or shape of the lips. I also changed her hairstyle, and position of the flower to make it be seen in a different perspective. I think the proportions of the first try were not as great, since the eyes were a lot larger than any other feature; so I made sure the nose wasn't too small, and the eyes didn't dominate the entire face. I tried to balance this with her hair to take up most of the forehead so the face wasn't awkwardly large. For the flower, I put more value that radiated from the center, as if there were two colors blending with together. Overall, I tried to focus more on value for this piece.
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| Original Redo |
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