Lidded Vessel

When did you step back and analyze you work during this project? Yes, after every change I made I always checked my piece all over again and made sure it was what I wanted before I continued. I love zombies and I had a specific dull and lifeless creature in mind and I intended for him to turn out that way or it wouldn't have had the same affect as I wanted.

Did you consider how ideas would work before you tried them? Yes, I made sure that I thought of every possible thing to do before I settled on one. For instance I contemplated over how to do the eyes of the zombie, unsure if I wanted him to be realistic or not, but then I realized I wanted him to seem more dead than alive which requires a bit of both realism and exaggeration. So I settled with a bulging eye and a a good mixture of paint.


Did you ask another student for feedback during your work process? Yes, because I am not the only one at my table who likes zombies and I knew they would have some outstanding feedback to give to me. I also listened to their ideas and tried to incorporate it into my project which turned out nicely actually. I was able to get the opinions of all sorts of people and that helped me to see my piece in a new way wih every suggestion, so I;m grateful they gave me such advice.

Did someone help you understand important information or inspire you? Yes, the people at my table helped me find the right colors for the zombie and helped figure out which texture looked best. The important information they gave me to remember was that zombies are living dead, so they have grimy skin and rough patches and dead parts but they somehow seem alive as well even with all the signs of death. I had to keep this in mind because I didn't want my zombie to look alive and well, but alive and deadly or sick. 

Wearable Art

 

How did you use your own unique ideas in your work? Yes, I designed this 3 piece set of jewelry after I came up with the theme "bath time". After thinking of three mini parts of a child's bath time I decided to create art that represented it. So when I made my bubble necklace I wanted to make it out of a soft and clear material and oddly enough I chose glue. Then for the boat necklace I decided a sturdy material would be preferable. So I made each tiny ship out of clay and painted them with acrylic to give them bold colors. The third one, which was rubber duck themed was my favorite because I twirled yellow ribbons around it

Did you use a source for inspiration, then combine it with your own ideas to make it original? I didn't exactly have a source of inspiration, I kind of started with an idea and began to branch off from there carefully planning each part of the project, treating it as a separate entity.


Did you learn new techniques or processes as part of the work for this project? Yes, I created new ways of using everyday art materials and I found I really like these methods. I was able to create circular dots that looked like beads out of hot glue and used everyday wire to make rings that connected them. I had never made rings out of wire to connect beads before and it was an interesting method, a bit hard, but all in all very fun. I was also able to use wires in much more interesting ways, such as with the rubber duck necklace. I twisted the wires to give them each a design of their own.

Did you gain skill with familiar materials? Yes, since I used to make my own jewelry very frequently I thought I had gotten every process down, but apparently that was not the case because I had not gotten much chance to use different wires and metals, I was not able to use them to their full ability. With this project I was able to play with the different ways to use wire and figure out how to incorporate it into my project nicely. Over the course of the project I gained new skills with the materials and was able to successfully put them to good use.

3 Mini Lidded Vessels~

These are the three small lidded vessels we completed in class. I made one green with a palm tree on it and the other 2 a deep ocean blue to go with a more tropical feel.

Sculpture Artist

        Jordi Diez creates art sculptures of human figures and creatures with scrap metal. He had graduated  with honors in sculpture from the Complutense University in madrid in 1990. Jordi is also Barcelona based. I chose him because the way he shaped the metal to create figures is overwhelmingly accurate and the forms of the human body has always interested me. I chose him over the other artists because the work he does captured my love for plain and simple designs that show everything. The color of his work is also silver and silver is not too showy but it stands out just enough to be noticed.









http://www.jordidiezfernandez.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=section&id=5&Itemid=72
http://www.thisiscolossal.com/2014/02/figurative-sculptures-welded-from-steel-scraps-by-jordi-diez/

Relief Art

Questions

How did you use your own unique ideas in your work?
I incorporated my own ideas into my work by first considering what topic I wanted to communicate through it and then figuring out how I wanted to present it. I decided to start out with throwing out ideas and began to think of a deceased dragon whose body was sunken into the dried dirt and I worked my way from there. After I sculpted the head I wanted the bottom plate to have texture so I used paper that I shredded with water in a blender as a carpet for it. And I covered it in glue to make it shine slightly. In order to show growth even after death I decided to use colorful flowers. I twined fake red flowers into a crown for him to wear and make some "sprout" from the dried lava.
Did you use a source for inspiration, then combine it with your own ideas to make it original?

I think I got the inspiration for flowers on  skull from the Day of the dead in mexico. I've often seen art celebrating that holiday with skulls and flowers and I think it popped into my mind.  But I also used my own ideas with the different mediums mixed together and the overall layout of the piece.

Questions

When did you step back and analyze you work during this project? 

Every time I added something new to my piece I sat down and looked it over to make sure this is precisely what I wanted to do with it. I also considered the location of the piece before creating it in hopes that I would stay on track and keep the overall image for the project in mind.

Did you consider how ideas would work before you tried them?

I first considered the location of my piece, and the theme I wanted. Then I tried to find a style that matched both of those ideals. I felt that hollowing the skull would also make it less heavy and it did. then I decided to paint it to add color with only blacks and whites. I liked how those ideas turned out and Im glad I put thought into it before hand. It really helped influence the way I created this piece because I was able to consider all possibilities and test them out.

Friday :O

The camera blurred everything u c u"

Unconventional! n v n

Questions

How did you use your own unique ideas in your work? I decided to create something using a load of different bunch of materials and thought of ideas that would work best together.

Did you use a source for inspiration, then combine it with your own ideas to make it original?

I used my knowledge of multi-medium pieces to help myself compile an idea and use that to complete my project. 

Questions

What is this artwork intended to say? It's suppose to show who I am through a reflection of a mirror and show what I love by having art materials and different materials make up the whole piece.

How is this artwork about who you are or what you like? It shows that I love art and that I love different types of mediums and materials that you can use to create all sorts of pieces. It's also a reflection so it shows my outside appearance as well and what I look like.

Questions

Did you try something that you weren't sure about as part of this project? Yes, I mixed a bunch of different types of styles and colors into this piece, hoping to find a middle ground that reflects everything.

Did you pick a material or technique that was new or different over something that was familiar?I picked a bunch of familiar materials and used them in unfamiliar ways, hoping to get creative and create something visually pleasing and thought provoking.

Questions

When did you step back and analyze you work during this project? Every time I added something new I analyzed my piece to make sure it was turning out how I wanted it to. If it was I continued on piecing together my project bit by bit changing my idea along the way.

Did you consider how ideas would work before you tried them? Yes, and no. I like experimenting and especially with this type of piece I wanted to take things step by step and see where they ended up. So I had some sort of idea of what I wanted I just tried everything until I found my happy medium.

Origami Project~

Questions

How did you use your own unique ideas in your work? I used my own ideas in this piece by creating a uniquely shaped box heart and painting and adding things you don't think would work together but they seemed right to me.
Did you use a source for inspiration, then combine it with your own ideas to make it original? I got my own inspiration from pondering on how hearts worked. Then I thought that maybe I could make a heart that pumps diesel instead of blood and worked using gears. 

Questions

What is this artwork intended to say? My art is intended to say that most things are not what they seem because the gears are sewn inside the heart and that life leaves you broken and scarred (hence the scar shaped paper running up and down the sides) but you can handle it.

What issues are you examining through your artwork? I think the paint consistency isn't the best but I think it adds to the roughness look :o

How is this artwork about who you are or what you like? It shows my love for how things work or how they seem and takes them into a new thought process.  It also shows how I was able to use many different and fun materials and shapes together in one piece which I find in itself is an accomplishment.

Questions

Did you learn new techniques or processes as part of the work for this project? I learned new techniques on this origami piece by making a 3D shape out of cardboard, which is something I'd never actually done. I also learned how to use paper and paint is a way that blends well across the piece.

Did you gain skill with familiar materials? Yes, I'd used paper before but I enhanced my skills by creating them into new shapes and using them in different ways instead of as the plain old canvas, they're normally used for.

Vessel Project~

Questions

Did you try something that you weren't sure about as part of this project?  Yes, I tried to created my elephants ears around the body making sure it would slide out so that the opening of my vessel would be locked and secure. Sadly, it shrank in the kiln and the ears do not work as they intended to, but hopefully I can apply this knowledge to my future projects~

Did you pick a material or technique that was new or different over something that was familiar? I picked a material that I felt was familiar to me, because I remember I love working with clay, but I hadn't used it in such a long time that It was like a whole new material. I'm glad I got to work with it again and became a little less rusty.

Questions

How did you use your own unique ideas in your work? I tried to create something I didn't think I'd ever seen before, which was making an elephant into a sleek shaped kettle, and I just tried to imagine what kinds of things I could add to it to make it even more interesting.

Did you use a source for inspiration, then combine it with your own ideas to make it original? After I finishing sculpting my piece and had it fired I realized it I could make it fun by taking some inspiration from the elephants in Dumbo because it would be much more interesting than having a plain old elephant. i would get to create the lil hat and frills and add extra colors and shades.

Questions

When did you step back and analyze you work during this project? Yes, I tried my best to monitor the progress of my piece and make sure it was coming along how I wanted it. It actually did most times except when the top shrank in the kiln, which I suppose couldn't be helped u x u"

Did you consider how ideas would work before you tried them? Yes I, carefully planned the design of my elephant before forming it because I had a specific idea about how I wanted it to look and made sure my ideas matched my vision.

Visiting Artist~

Bryant Holsenbeck is an environmental artist who uses trash that would otherwise have been thrown out to create artworks that people can come to enjoy.I'm hoping to be able to learn how to reuse unwanted materials to create lively pieces that will reduce the waste that concentrates into a eye pleasing.I think the project will be very helpful and thought provoking, but I probably wouldn't get better until a couple tries and pieces 

I plan to create a colorful frog for the project~

After~
It was as fun and a great learning experience.
I had a hard time deciding the color for my frog, but tat was really the only struggle I had.
I think the shape of the frog was successful, being able to create the legs and form the body helped alot with the filling and wrapping~

Book Carving

I wanted my book carving to have meaning and show many different emotions in one piece. I thought that although it was important to have a very clear idea of what you wanted to do, you cannot plan everything because then there would be no emotion in the art whatsoever. I realized as I was cutting that my design was extremely intricate and I also realized the book was a little too thick, which caused some problems. In order to overcome these problems I adjusted my design slightly to make it simpler and then I added more things to be cut in my design to help get deeper into the book. I wanted my design to be symbolic in a variety of different ways. First the eagle carrying a watch is mean to represent American life draining the time we want to spend on ourselves and the eagle chasing after the butterflies shows how life hunts down the free-spirited people who are still trying to chase their dreams and forces them into the reality. Yes, I used acrylic paint which would cover the words and I wasn't sure if I wanted to take that much of the book away but I watered some of it down so that it is visible and I also created minuscule figures of butterflies which were terrible to cut out. I feel this project was overall successful because I'd never worked with books before and my designs were trickier than they needed to be.

Amusement

For our amusement project I decided to create a world of dream and fantasy, since many find comfort and amusement in world of myth and wonder. I incorporated variety in my piece by adding multiple characters both good and bad and then created an atmosphere that shaped their personality. I wanted soft materials and dark rigid shapes as well as smooth light colors. In my piece I used a little bit of everything from watercolor to fabric and colored pencils. At first I was confused on how to put this all together, but I knew I wanted there to be a splice of everything in it. In order to make it work I had to spread the different mediums all over the page to get everything to blend smoothly. Our time spend on our visual journal gave us a chance to be creative and test out new materials as well as help us to decide which ones we liked best. I found out that gluing things on top of fabric comes off easily. Some challenges I faced are determining where to place certain mediums and how to mix specific themes together in a way that makes them belong.

Non Traditional Portrait

After deep consideration and thought I chose myself, because even though I have many people that I love I wanted others to see me in a different way.I spent an eternity, digging through the depths of my brain, trying to uncover the things that make me who I am. When I had found a sufficient supply of ideas, I began to eliminate them by efficiency and methodically. Finally, I came across 3 ideas 2 of which seemed impossible. The third was excruciatingly time consuming, but I had found it to be the one with most rewards. I had decided on compiling my piece with the medium of...The Apex High School Marching Band. This material proved to be difficult, but in the end it helped to show how much of an impact marching band has made on me in the past two years. I feel it is important to create the person you chose out of something that defines them, because it helps you to see their personality as well as their looks. I took a risk when I chose the difficult medium of The Marching Band. I had to draw the layout and place everyone, while finding a time for them to all meet me, and didn't interfere with practice. My choices made the picture feel personal. I used the band that I'm in and the field that we practice on, which made the photo special to me.

Sticky Situation

For sticky situation, I sketched out idea's which consisted a tower of candies, crayons lit like candles and a pile of glue splayed on a table with strung beads and ribbon. After a long elimination process I decided this would be the funnest and more colorful out of all the other choices. I think my ideas were pretty interesting, but not too far out of the box. I was able to incorporate rhythm and pattern with the beads and the colors. I chose to use acrylic because I wanted a solid feel to the painting and I wanted to be able to blend colors easily. The acrylic made it easy to add highlights to the lighter regions of my painting, and easier to add dark spots to the shadier ones. The mini lessons helped me to think about all the ways I could use each paint, by trying different brushes and different surfaces.

We got to design shoes :o

Our school got an amazing opportunity to be entered in he Vans competition and although my design was not picked, I am _very_ pleased with this design. I was up against tons of artists who are more experts on design than I am and yet I feel accomplished because I tossed so many ideas for these shoes out and was constantly gulping up new ones to test out. I like how this project prodded at my more creative side, it gave me a chance to scrawl ideas around until I was satisfied. Because this project helped my creative side to show, I would probably guess that I may actually try to decorate some shoes later on in life. Who knows? Life is full of experiences that I wanna try, and for art in general there are hundreds! :3

We bleached T-Shirts in art~ < o w o >

To relax a bit after our Landscape Painting, we got a chance to be outside and bleach some black t-shirts. I, being a music lover, couldn't resist making a shirt with the word "Bass" taped to the top. While we had the option to dip ours in bleach, I resided on sprayed mine lightly because I loved the light dots the bleach left on the black shirt. It was a fun project because we got to move around and be outside instead of sitting behind closed doors. Moving around and changing your surroundings while working always gives me a new perspective, makes everything a bit more exciting and helps to break the sadness of a boring, routine. I'm glad we did this project because every seemed tired of painting for so long. I really love the shirt I got out of this and have worn it a couple times since I made it already. I can see myself actually doing this on my own quite soon, because it is simply and is a great way to customize clothing. < > w < >

Landscape Painting~ ^^

For my landscape painting, I wanted to experiment with different styles and compositions to create a storm  over a lake. I haven't been able to paint since sixth or seventh grade in middle school and I was really excited to work on getting better. I decided to attempt to compose a scene that would appeal to me and marvel me every time I looked at it. I started with a concept based around water because it is my favorite element. First I began to compose my painting, which started with me forming different angle view sketches and mentally adjusting minor details. After toggling my brain, I finally decided I wanted a lake in the front of my painting, buzzing with bouncing water droplets, and giant, husky trees being sunk down by the heavy downpour of rain. Which would all be slightly illuminated by the clouds and high up ripples of lightning. I wanted to add the feel of a more gloomy scene while maintaining a thin wave of comfort. My light source was subtle and faintly created by the far away flashes of light the storm had brought. I used that to add value and shade to my trees as well as my lake. The objects I painted worked perfectly with my color scheme analogous blue, blue-green and green. I attempted to widen my variety of brushstrokes in this painting. I dabbed small strokes on the lake for a rain affect and I tried longer strokes for the trees. For the clouds I used a sponge because it gave the wispy, almost non-existant form. The shading was rather fun, I got to create  darker areas and lighter areas to make my painting look and feel more alive. I'm glad I was finally able to paint again and I'm proud to say I was able to use the brushes and the paints I bought for home confidently~ 

My Pastel :3

I began to plan my composition by trying to figure out which objects would look best together and which ones could be spread out. Then I began to doodle thumbnail sketches, which are small sketches that help you determine your layout. The viewfinder also helped me when I wanted to figure out how I wanted to see the picture, such as from which angle and how close or how much I would see. To make the items in my pastel drawing appear three-dimensional, I used shading and changed the value of the color to try and re-create lighting affects. In order to create a light source I used a single light in one place, which acted as a guide.

Clay Project

Medium: Clay
Size: 3.5 inches tall and 1 foot and 1 mm wide at the top.
The design element that was stressed most for this project was form. I, being indecisive and always willing to experiment and create something unique, I decided to create an eight pointed star, that when placed in my square slump mold, formed a flowery look. I liked how the slump mold helped the points upward, and allowed them to touch gently. From this project I learned that in everything you design, form and shape matter. Just one slight of the hand could cause something delicate to break or to wriggle around and wedge itself uncomfortably, causing cracks. If I were to do this project again, I would want to apply the red clay thicker, because it seemed to have lightened in the kiln, and maybe attach the points together a bit better. Although it was a bit of a wilder design, which took a bit of effort, I'm very proud of how it turned out. I love working with clay and although I may not have the delicate hands for it yet, I hope I do one day. This piece of art actually holds my little trinkets and pens for now, and is a constant reminder that, "No, I am not the best, but I am improving, bit by bit, and  loving it every step of the way." ^^