whiteforest art

A Semester's work from Painting Class

2009-12-10T09:50:00.015-05:00

Finals are here so I'm almost done with this semester. Today, I had my final critique with my Painting professor. By the end of that class, I have completed eight total works. Three of them were paintings on large canvases or panels we built and stretched ourselves and five were on 9" x 12" pre-made canvases.

This is the very first piece we made. It is a self-portrait done with a glazing technique on a 9" x 12" canvas. I used oil paint and a glazing medium a liquin original on this piece. Glazing involves laying down several layers of translucent paint (one at a time) over top of each other. This way the colors are not blending physically, like mixing colors on a palette, but optically. For example, when yellow undertones shine through a translucent layer of blue, they appear green.

This is another self-portrait on a 9" x 12" canvas. For this piece, we had to paint ourselves in one sitting, experimentally mixing all sorts of usual colors together while the paint was still wet. Also, my professor had us paint the canvas completely with Alizarin Crimson (red) first!

This is the final self-portrait we did but we painted it intaglio. Impasto is painting with very thick amounts of paint so that ever brush stroke or scrape of the palette knife is visible. Vincent van Gogh is famous for using this technique.

One class, we all took a field trip to a very beautiful and big park in Richmond called Maymont Park. We painted little landscapes in the Japanese garden there. In my painting, I have a dramatically high horizon line, thus focusing more on the reflection of nature in the water than the actual physical trees and bushes. The tree does some very interesting things; the shadow from the tree diagonally points to the left but the reflection switches to the right.

We painted a still life on the first of our large hand-made canvases. My teacher set up several still lifes, one of all glass objects, one of all metallic/reflective objects, one of all white objects, and one of all wooden objects. I chose to paint the glass still life because I liked the assortment of bottles and I wanted a challenge. My painting looked so much different (not as good) for our still life critique; since then, I painted over all of it for my final critique with my professor. I'm glad I redid it because it so much better!

Here again is the portrait piece. I did go back into it and repainted the neck to make it match the face color better. I also corrected the circle behind her. Even this looks better now, in my mind.

Then we had a mixed media project. I chose to make another panel for this piece instead of a canvas. My idea for this piece was painted cake, so much cake that it make you sick. I was influenced by Rococo things and Marie Antoinette's quote "Let them eat cake!" I definitely have a love hate relationship with Rococo Art. It's very pretty and whimsical but it is art for rich people about being rich. I tried to illustrate this through the disgusting amount of sweetness. I did not use any really food! Instead I used polymer medium and gel to create the illusion of frosting. Polymer medium and gel are used with acrylic paint. They allow you to extend the quantity of your paint by mixing a little bit of paint pigment (or color) into a large about of medium. I used the medium and gel for their physical characteristics. Polymer medium is very soupy and dries clear when it's used by itself. The gels come in different viscosities. There are heavy gels, smooth gels, regular gels, etc. I selected the get that had the same viscosity as frosting to mix with my paint. Then I put that "frosting" into a cake decorating bag with tip and literally frosted my panel. I had laid down objects, like clocks, frames, and modeling, along with insulating foam to give my panel more dimensions of depth. All of the little "candies" were made out of polymer clay. I had so much fun on this piece!!!

The last piece we did was a free choice. I chose to paint a cityscape of a place in my sister's most recent novel. This city, a legendary city, is lit by a giant moon rather than the sun. This might one of my favorite paintings that I did this semester (the portrait being my favorite)!

The End of Digital Printmaking

2009-11-04T09:23:00.009-05:00

My five weeks in the Digital Printmaking of my Materials class have come and gone. We finished the class with eight prints and my book The Hidden Face of the City is now available on the website lulu.com. It's so cool to think that I've actually made a book; you don't believe it until you're actually holding the book in your hands! My book ended up being 30 pages long with four poems written by my sister.

This is my favorite page: the Seven Dwarfs' cottage. The creepy grinning figure on the magic mirror is my version of Death from Hellboy II and it holds the red apple that 'kills' Snow White.

Although I felt some of the assignments in Digital were rushed because we only had five weeks, the class made me appreciate Photoshop more. Throughout the entire class I had a distinct image or look I was going for on Photoshop but I could not get it to work until the very end of the class (funny how things work out like that). What I was striving for was a print "painted with patterns or textures". The cartoon show "Chowder" on Cartoon Network uses the same idea: all of the characters' clothes have patterns on them and as the character moves across the screen more of the pattern is revealed (as if the character's shirt is moving along the pattern). It's hard to explain...

Bellow, is my first attempt at paste-ing in patterns. The assignment behind this print was to create four prints using scanned images or things. I scanned in cool different textures (knitting, cloth, metal hair clip) for all of the different parts of the elfin knight's armor and background. I also collaged sketches of faery creatures in the background. After this was done, I still didn't feel satisfied!

This is just another of the scanned prints.

This one bellow is the one that finally worked out!

So what I ended up doing was scanning in a line drawing that I had done in pen and on that scanned image I copied and pasted textures or photos into each of the distinct shapes of the drawing.

If I had figured out my idea earlier, I would have tried to make more prints using the same technique.

Portrait Paintings

2009-10-29T15:26:00.008-04:00

We just finished portrait paintings in my basic painting class. What my professor did for this assignment was take photos of each of the people in my class and print them out. Then each of us (the students) drew from the pile of pictures she took and had to paint that person. We could take on whatever kind of concept we wanted with the portraits and didn't have to paint each other realistically. The girl that I picked had really cool hair that reminded me of a halo. That and the fact that her head was slightly tilted to one side and faced the camera head on inspired me to paint her like a Madonna or an early Christian icon painting. While painting, I also drew a lot of influence from the art nouveau artist Alphonse Mucha because his works contain a lot of haloed or framed women.

Here's my painting.

This was painted with oil on a wood panel that I built myself. I love how the wood panel is so appropriate for my concept: all of those early Christian icon paintings were usually painted on wood for alterpieces. Also, the student that I painted is an art history major so there is that reference to her in the painting.

Madonna and Child painting.

This and the early Christian icon painting bellow both have a lot of gold in the background. This was done so that the figures are pushed forward as well as making them look like they are floating on golden light when sunlight hits the background.

Early Christian icon painting.

Here's a good example of and Alphonse Mucha print.

Digital Printmaking

2009-10-01T13:42:00.010-04:00

We are making our way through Digital Printmaking, the second section of my Printmaking course this fall semester. We've made digital prints using photoshop and scanned images. I've also gotten a chance to do some fun photoshop tutorials. This picture I did below was a "city ink" style tutorial that makes any picture look urban and 'popping fresh'! I thought it would be hilarious to do it with one of my French Rococo Pirate costume pictures. Here's what I would look like as a pirate in some cool city!

Right now we're working on books. Everyone is making a 20 page book in photoshop that we will send to lulu.com to get published. I'm so excited about this project. Even when I was in etching, I had heard a rumor that in digital we made books and knew immediately what I was going to do. I started taking photos and drawing/painting images early on! The idea or concept behind my book is based on a phenomenon I encountered last year: I noticed all of these picturesque scenes in Richmond that if you boxed out the rest of the city surrounding it, the building or whatever it is doesn't even look like it's in Richmond. Sometimes buildings look like a tower in Germany or, as I like think of them, holes into Faerie. That's when my concept really takes off. I'm going to emphasized these non-Richmond cites and describe them as holes or portals into the Faerie world with creatures coming out and mortals getting trapped in. The book is a journey of discovery; it starts off with pictures of just Richmond, then progresses to distorted pictures of Richmond that focus primarily on the interesting building or feature, and then the faeries take over. My sister has written up poems to accompany my book, one being the introduction. It's amazing how perfect her poems are for my book when she hasn't actually seen any of the pages or sketches!

Here are some spreads from my book (by spreads I mean the two corresponding pages, so imagine them divided down the middle as they would be in a book). Enjoy!

A New Semester!!!

2009-09-30T09:34:00.013-04:00

I bet you're hoping that the long break between this and my last post means I've been up to a lot of work and have much to share but sadly this is not the case. Over the summer, I experienced a 'loss of creativity' and hardly drew or painted like I normally would have. I am happy to say, though, that my creativity is on a rise as this new semester begins.

I'm taking a really exciting class on different forms of printmaking. The class is made up of three five-week sections. The first section was etching. I've already handed in my final portfolio for that portions so it's over now. I'm currently in digital printmaking and then I'll be going to litho (lithographs). I love etching! I had not realized that the verb 'etching' does not describe the action of drawing with a needle tool onto a copper plate but rather soaking the copper plate in an acid bath so that the acid burns (or 'etches') the lines into the copper. Can you imagine my confused-open-mouth expression during my first two etching classes when my professor kept saying things like "you could get a deeper line by etching for twenty minutes rather than five"? I was sitting there thinking "how can you draw a line for twenty minutes. Now, etching is like common sense to me! Before etching, you apply some sort of ground on the copper plate that protects it and you remove the ground when you draw or mark on it. The acid then 'etches' away the exposed copper. There is one technique, called drypoint, which you draw right onto the copper and don't put it into the acid bath at all. I guess that's what I thought etching was!

We had to find a printmaker/artist and pick out two of his or her work that we would make prints in response to or inspired by. I picked the Japanese artist Yoshitaka Amano. My first print is a combination of drypoint and hard ground. Hard ground, a blackish liquid that dries into a hard coating, is one of the two different grounds you can put on a plate. The resulting etched lines are crisp and pen-like.

Here is my first selected Amano piece, a print of the character Vampire Hunter D.

In this piece, I was inspired by Amano's 'epic figure' as I like to call it; I loved the isolated figure with his flowing cape and dynamic pose. In my own print, my figure is a sort of grotesque monstrous creature but rendered in a very beautiful graceful manner. I like the idea of body parts switched or in unusual places; here, I put the arms where the wings would be on the back (if humanoids had wings). The birdman, as I tend to call him, has two faces and, I like to imagine, another or more that we can't see.

Here's my final print.

My next piece, titled "The Bonfire, an Aboriginal legend", illustrates an Aboriginal legend about the creation of the sun that I found in a children's book back at the library. The story goes: Baiame, the creation god, was creating all sorts of creatures but they weren't right, they kept growing bigger and bigger and ended up fighting or eating each other. At this time, there was no sun so Baiame and the other god Punjel lived out in the cold Milky Way. They kept gathering wood for a great fire. Punjel asked Baiame when they were going to light the fire and was peeved to find out that fire hadn't been created yet. Baiame told Punjel not to rush his creations and sure enough an egg fell from the sky. Punjel tried to catch it but it broke all over their fire wood and errupted into a blazing fire. The gods could finally see the beautiful world Baiame had been making (I think it's funny he's been working in the dark) and admired his handy work. Baiame then desides to make delicate and complicated creatures like silver fish, tiny bugs, lizards, birds, and man for the world. At the end of the story, the fire starts to go out and Punjel urges Baiame to relight it but he just says that man will call the light their sun and every time it goes out they will sleep and Baiame will relight the fire for the new day. (this is my favorite part) Punjel askes Baiame what is sleep. Baiame says sleep is like death but not death. Man needs to sleep because life tires him or her out. Punjel says in response "How odd". This story is so 'deep' within its simplicity. I hope my print does it justice!

Here's the other Amano print I selected.

The Amano print I picked for this particular concept had lots of textural details (squiggles and lines) that I thought would be great for the portion of my print where the firelight reveals Baiame's creations. This print is primarily softground, the second type of ground that is waxy and keeps the texture of the tool you use to expose the copper underneath (so a pencil line will etch and print out like a pencil line, a marker line will look like marker, charcoal will look like charcoal, etc.)

Here's a close up of the wonderful, textural 'squiggles' I was inspired by!

And here is my final print! I'm supper pleased with how this one turned out.

Je suis une PIRATE francais!!!!

2009-07-07T15:57:00.009-04:00

I am a french PIRATE! Avast ye!!!!! Here is the complete costume: corset overdress, blouse, pantaloons (aka britches), white leggings, shoes, fan and wig! I'm extremely happy with how my costume came out; it's very Marie Antoinette and incredibly ridiculous. Who in their right "pirate" mind would go treasure hunting in such a silly ensemble. Both my dad and my friend's dad had the same reaction: "I thought it was a pirate costume". Weren't there any French pirates?!!!! I guess most people today think of Jack Sparrow when they hear "pirate costume". Well, I don't!

Here I am looking sweet!

Here, looking sweet with the fan!

I changed my color scheme. Instead of golden britches, I went with a powdered blue. The shirt is a cream color, not white.

Detail of the overdress and the lacy blouse.

The make-up is so fun to do! I used red lip stain, pink eye shadow for the blush (because I don't have any red blush), and liquid eye liner for the beauty mark. I think scars over my left eye would add some edge to this fluffy pirate.

Au revoir! xoxo

French Pirates!!!!!

2009-06-02T19:03:00.010-04:00

My sister has gotten far enough on her next novel to read parts of it out loud (that's approximately 20 chapters). The part that she has read to me is set in a french fairytale style. Imagine satin dresses with lace, buckled shoes, britches, and of course fairy godmothers! This set me up in a Marie Antoinette mood. I've been watching movies set in that French Baroque or Rococo time period, such as Blackadder with Hugh Laurie as Prince George.

I prefer Prince George over House any day!!!!

I've also been reading french fairytales illustrated by Edmund Dulac as well as drawing my own Rococo fairy pictures.

This drawing is done with graphite and colored pencil, like the faery queen in the previous blog entry.

I definitely drew this fellow while watching Blackadder.

A couple of days ago when I was thinking of pirate costumes for a Live Action Role Playing Game, I realized I could make a French pirate costume! Let me back up. Live Action Role Playing Games (LARPs) are similar to those murder mystery parties where people dress up and play a character. The LARPs my brother and I participate in sometimes have murders but are set in the future or fantastical worlds. The next LARP planned is a pirate one and I've decided to make a Rococo Pirate costume. I've already started part of it. The costume has a brocade over dress (the only part I've made so far), britches and a blouse.

This is the first thing I've sewn that's had boning and eyelets in it. I'm extremely happy about how it's coming along!

My color scheme is going to be a silver/gold over dress, dark gold britches and white blouse. This isn't final. I'm going to the fabric store tomorrow to pick stuff out.

Looking Through Old Sketchbooks

2009-05-28T18:49:00.011-04:00

Along side eating, napping, and drawing, looking through old sketchbooks is one of my favorite pastimes! You get to uncover anew lost characters, creatures, or stories. As well as see how your style has changed. Sometimes I redraw these lost old sketches. Recently, I got a chance to look through my old sketchbooks when I started the illustrations for my sister's novel (those will be a future entry). In one of them, I found a colored-in-drawing I had done of the cruel elfin queen from the Tam Lin fairy tale.

Here's a close up. Just a tid bit: the day I drew this picture, on August 2nd, my mom told me to draw ugly things. Yep, this was the one that started it all.

Below is the original. I love the style of the Tam Lin illustrations. They are my favorite out of all of the illustrations in the Enchanted World : Fairies and Elves book. I'm particurally drawn to tall dark Queens, such as this one and the Queen in Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. They are regal, cold, and awesome!

This book is beautiful and a treasure. My mom says she bought it in a used book store when we were very little so I've always remembered us having it. The illustrations include paintings by Arthur Rackham, Edmund Dulac, J W. Waterhouse, John Anster Fitzgerald and others. The Enchanted World is a series of books each dedicated to different topics, such as fairies and elves, dwarves, giants, and even the fall of Camelot. I can tell you that I was surprised to find this series in our local public library. The fairies and elves book is the only one we have. I frown at the $7.50 marked on the inside because this book is priceless in my eyes.

Anyways. After looking at that drawing I did, I decided to do something in the same fashion (graphite with colored pencil). This faery maiden, whatever you like to call her, is not anyone in particular. She's probably one of many faeries glimpsed in their glimmering midnight procession.

The close up.

Ugly Creatures

2009-05-19T21:47:00.011-04:00

I found this wonderful book in Barnes and Nobles called On Ugliness edited by Umberto Eco. It has great photos from art history of Medieval and Renaissance illustrations of hell, the final judgment and other stuff (Dada art, Mythological inspired drawings). There is even a photo (mind you a photo) of a man holding another man's severed head! How disgusting, I know, but really cool in a bizarre way!!!!! I bought the book with some of my birthday money!

The book!

As you can tell I have embraced my mom's advice of drawing more ugly things. I've never really explored animal creatures and humanoid monsters before in my art; I mostly drew elves and faeries and other such things. As a result, I don't have a storage of grotesque images in my head so I have to use outside sources for inspiration. I look at objects around me and see if they have an interesting almost beastly form to them or I refer to picutures of insects. Sometimes I just use the basic human figure and distort it in uncomfortable ways (elongating the neck here or giving it extra arms etc). This particular lady faery's head was inspired by a Kleenex.

This next one is a page of assorted monsters I created. I just sort of compiled them together on the page as I thought of them. It's interesting how they flow together; that was unintentional.

For this first one, I thought it would be interesting if the creature had its arms on its back and the wings in the front, opposite of an angel or something. The body is more delicate but creepy and pointy none-of-the-less. The head is your average gargoyle/goblin head.

This next one is my favorite. I envisioned the pose before the creature. I'm not exactly sure what it is doing; it's sort of siting on a cloth strip that is holding it in mid air. I'm really excited about the hollowed out chest and multiple faces. This is definitely the most dynamic one.

This guy reminds me a bit of Predator, which was not my original intent; I think it's because of the hair and face. I was going for a buggy sort of spider look for the eyes (it has lots of eyes) and and a skull/bone head with no bottom jaw. Its armor and blades are part of its skin, I guess like an insect. I imagine it being a soldier or guard to a fortress. All the intruder hears before they are slashed across the face is the clinking of hooves on the stone floors.

Mom requested this ugly fellow. She asked my to draw something that smiles like her sometimes. Of course I exagerated it; she never looks like she's about to eat someone. The hood he... or it is wearing in not clothe, but its own skin. This fellow is completely dressed in his own pooling, wrinkling skin. I would be surprised to ever see him not hungry. Ever wonder why he has two hands tied to stings when he has four of his own? They make it easier to gather his food, not the salad kind of food, mind you.

This final creature has three mouths on his face. Those are all tongues coming out; they smell the air like snake tongues. The body is most definitely inspired by an insect. Rather than legs it has arms that taper from muscle to just bone. I would love to see it scuttle around. Oooh gross!

School is out for Summer!

2009-05-19T15:33:00.008-04:00

I have finished my first year of college and summer has come almost not soon enough!!! The last project I worked on was a collaborative sculpture piece with my friend. We made wooden puppets; she designed a goat/frog prey creature and I designed its cat/bird-of-prey predator creature counter part. It was killer!!! Our puppets required sanding with drills, rasping, laminating plywood, getting gorilla glue all over our hands, and lots of other sweaty physical labor. My thumbs were cramped for two weeks!!!! In the end we didn't finish the projects by critic day because the puppets were way too ambitious for the amount of time we had to work. We still got good grades because all of the time we put into them.

I desperately need my summer now to recover from our intensive puppets and I hoped not to work with wood for a while. But alas! Mother dear is re-doing the kitchen and I had to help sand down all of the cabinets to remove the varnish. Once again, I find myself using power tools.

Moving out of the dorms gave me a chance to uncover some of my old and new drawings and I have selected a few to share with you:

This drawing was our second flayed muscle drawing, this time of a leg and arm. I like this flayed drawing the best!

This next drawing was our final assignment in my drawing studio class. We had to do a drawing of the nude figure. I drew mine with NuPastel on tainted paper.

This piece, neither a drawing nor a painting, was actually from my fall semester. Ever since my mom told me to draw more ugly things, I have been ...well... drawing more ugly things. This creature was inspired by a clock in my sister's living room. Okay, for those of you wondering, I used markers, my Prismacolor markers.

This final piece is an oil painting I did in my Project: Painting and Printmaking class. The assignment was to trade painting surfaces with someone else in the class, start a painting, trade back with that person, and then respond to what they had painted on your canvas or canvas board. The girl who traded with me painted something that looked like dreadlocks. Mom asked it she could have this painting the second I showed her it; I don't know where she will put it.

Our Salon Exhibit of 2009

2009-04-19T20:13:00.006-04:00

In my drawing studio class we are having a show in the Locker B50 Gallery. This gallery is literally a locker. A student at VCU started exhibiting work in her locker; the school liked the idea and installed hard wood flooring and lights in the locker. The locker gallery also has regular hours and little receptions for each new show there. My professor got us a show in the Locker 50 Gallery. In order to get as many student works in as possible she made our drawing minimum 2 inches, either height or length, and our maximum 6 inches, either height or length. Also, we are going with a Salon theme. The Salon was an annual exhibit in Paris during the 1700's, 1800's, and 1900's, where contemporary art was on displayed. Unlike exhibits today where there is about six feet of space between each work of art, the Salon had paintings touching each other and right ontop of one another (this cramped look is another incentive to get as many drawings in the locker as possible).

To complete our miniture Salon exhibit, our drawings have to be inspired by a 18th, 19th, or 20th century French painting. My drawing is actually based off of an English painting: portrait of Mrs. Richard Brinsley Sheridan by Gainsborough.

Here is my inspiration. I picked it because I like the feathury nature of the brushstrokes.

This is my version. It is 2 3/4 inches by 3 1/2 inches big, pen and ink. I guess what makes it contemporary is the crossed-legged position and the clothing. Otherwise, the trees and landscape are eternal (the great thing about nature!). To personalize it further, I hid seven faery faces in the drawing. Becuase it is such a small scale I don't think anyone would be able to find them without help but good luck!

See how small it is?!!!!!

My 'second' spring break.

2009-04-12T20:41:00.006-04:00

We have been making a lot of progress in my drawing class. We finished portraits a long time ago and have moved on to the human figure. First we started with the skeleton.

This is an ink drawing or really an ink painting. It's huge; somewhere around 27" x 30". It started out as a line drawing in graphite and then I painted/hatched ink over the graphite filling in the value.

Now we are working on muscles studies. This is a "flayed" figure drawing: a drawing with no skin so the muscles are visible. We had to use muscle diagrams in order to fill in the muscles (after all, our model still had his skin on :) ). We aren't allowed to use shading or value on these drawings, yet, so the muscle fibers act as a the value and provide extra movement to the figure.

This weekend I went to Virginia Beach with my family. It was wonderfully relaxing and I didn't get any work done (much like a second spring break).

Here is the family on the beach. It got much colder so we had to wear sweaters and jackets.

We found a poor dead bird on the beach. It was lying in such a poetic pose that I felt compelled to take a picture of it.

Finally, here is something I drew in my sketchbook. Normally when I'm at the beach I draw pictures of mermaids and beachy things, but instead I drew elves and woody things. Maybe I didn't listen to enough summer or seaside music. Oh, well.

Ahhh the self-portrait!!!

2009-03-22T15:13:00.009-04:00

Sometimes I find self-portraits more interesting than a regular old painting because we get to see the genius behind the work. It's curious to see how the artist represents himself or herself. Are they shown with their 'tools'? Do they express an emotion? Or do they remain as enigmatic as before? I am bringing up self-portraits because I had to do my own for Drawing Studio. We used medium toned paper and black & white nu-pastels.

What does my own self-portrait say about me? Maybe I'm curious, contemplating the meaning of life and my purpose on this earth, or I'm just smiling ever so slightly because doing it more would hurt my face after a while. That's what it shows! A lazy couch slug!

Art history provides us with many wonderful self-portraits, a few of which I treasure! My first favorite self-portrait is of Durer, a Northern Renaissance artist (which means he wasn't in Italy but he was well known there!). After traveling to Italy, he picked up the tradition of the 'artist genius'. In Northern Renaissance, artists believed their talent came straight from God, while in Italy, they believed the talent was credited more to the artist and saw them as intellectuals. Durer liked the 'artist genius' and brought these views back with him. In his self-portrait, from 1500, he shows himself in a frontal pose, which had always been reserved for Christ. This way he is the artist genius and source of his own talent.

My second favorite self-portrait is of Rembrandt, a Dutch Baroque artist. He painted lots and lots of self-portraits, about 80 or so survive today. This provides us with good documentation of his life. In his earlier work, he is lively and young, but after his wife died, his portraits became more somber. His work is well known for having a psychological element.

My final favorite self-portrait (for now) is of Angelica Kauffman, an English neoclassical artist. Throughout the Renaissance and Baroque, there were not that many female artists. They painted still lifes and portraits and couldn't paint the nude figure. This makes Kauffman even more important to art history! She was seen as a prodigy at an early age and travel around Europe meeting the prominate art figures of the time. She was one of the founding members of the Royal Academy of Art in Britian, which opened 1668. Unlike most female artists, she didn't paint easy portraits but instead painted history paintings. In this self-portrait she is shown with two pupils. She always paints herself with her tools to show that she is a painter because many male artists said that a man painted the paintings for her. In this particular painting, there are no men, except for the marble bust of her father in the background. I love how she paints fabric so naturalistically.

Lion Demon

2009-03-17T19:38:00.009-04:00

Hurray! We finished our second project in Space Research! For this project, I decided to make a Mesopotamian lion-demon mask. Lion-demons are a hybrid creature, having a lion head, donkey ears, and bird feet. It has the torso of a man. I just bought an illustrated dictionary of Ancient Mesopotamian gods, symbols, demons. The second I saw this demon, I knew I was going to make in cardboard somehow. To have that human lion hybrid, I made the lion head into a mask so that my body could be incorporated into the piece. It's a pretty big piece but it's not that heavy.

The mask has a wonderful regal profile and is best viewed from this angle. Here it is displayed on my lovely stand for our critic in class today.

Here is the mask being worn. Like I said before, it's not that heavy because it is made out of cardboard. It does get warm after a while. I feel pretty cool with it on.

In Neo-Assyrian and Neo-Babylonian periods, lion-demons are protective creatures against other demons. They are relief sculptures in kings' palaces and clay figurines. In old Babylon, the lion-demon was a bringer of disease and death.

And on another note, Happy St. Patrick's day.

Value Drawings

2009-03-05T11:12:00.006-05:00

We just finished our value drawings in Drawing Studio. We did one in class and one at home. I had never done a 'true' value drawing before; consequently, the process was very foreign to me (but I enjoyed it and would do another in my free time!). First we did a line drawing of the objects or still life. Then we toned the entire paper. Basically, we took our graphite stick or our charcoal stick and put an even layer of graphite/charcoal on the entire page. We made it fairly dark, too! Then we started with the eraser and added values with it by erasing some of the tone and added darker values with more graphite/charcoal. I used graphite on both of mine.

This is my in-class value drawing.

This is my at home drawing.

So our value drawings are done and we started portraits followed shortly by figure drawings. I'm really excited; I didn't expect myself to be. We got to draw a model in class, my first model!!! We didn't have that much time in class to draw because we critiqued our value drawings. I wanted to make my drawing look like a Renaissance drawing, like one of Leonardo's, so I used cross-hatching rather than blending of graphite.

Can you guess which one is mine and which one is Leo's?

What I did with my Snow Day

2009-03-02T21:01:00.004-05:00

I did nothing with my snow day. I went for a walk and took pictures of the snowy city landscape (see blog post 'Winter Walk'). I worked on my cardboard Mesopotamian lion demon mask and am almost done with it. I ate a slice of cheesecake while watching Pan's Labyrinth, which made me sick. Then near the end of the movie, my laptop froze and I had a five minute freak session as I tried turning off my laptop and getting the DVD out. I fixed it and finished the movie. I colored in some coloring books and watched TV. So, I didn't do very much today.

Here is the Little Mermaid page that I colored today with my markers (I sound like such a kid).

I actually started this drawing yesterday when it first began snowing. She's some sort of snow faery. Back in high school, I painted a series of watercolor paintings of Snow Queens spurred on by The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe movie. Here again I used my markers but with colored pencil added in. I found these really awesome photos of a Snow Queen ballet through Google on the Internet machine. The costumes are sweet and the theatrics are haunting in that fantastically cool Ice Queen way! I wish I could see it live (or at least on television)!!!

If I could go back and live my snow day over, I would try to get a lot more done. Maybe like a nap or two. Oh well, Friday is suppose to be a high of 68.

Winter Walk

2009-03-02T09:11:00.000-05:00

It is the second day of March and it snowed in Richmond! This morning I woke up to find a wonderland of ice and frosting outside my window. My dorm building sits right on the corner of Monroe Park and the view is gorgeous! The trees and benches are laced with white! And to top it all off, my classes are canceled for the day!!! I haven't had a 'real' snow day in a long time. So before the sun came out to melt all of the snow, I went for a Winter Walk in the park and down Franklin St.

My child named Nano

2009-02-23T10:52:00.000-05:00

So far in my Space Research class (sculpture), we have finished one project. I know that is a long time to spend on one project but the materials we used required 'making' time and 'drying' time. We made galvanized steel hardware cloth armatures for a papier mache exterior. This wasn't the flour and water papier mache; it was the shredded paper, saw dust, marble dust, water, and wood glue papier mache. It looked a lot like tuna or cat vomit.

Anyways. For this project we had to recreate a pre-existing object but enlarging it or shrinking it. Or we had to take an object and actually build off of it as if to customize it or something. I made my silver nano ipod, but it's not really my ipod. It plays on my ipod's name. You see, there once was a time when I hated my ipod because I didn't like it or want it. I wanted a black 4GB ipod but Cosco didn't have any so I had to get a silver one instead. I know this sounds very selfish of me but I was buying it myself. In my anger and frustration, I named my nano ipod the Silver Monster. So I made a silver monster papier mache sculpture who is coincidentally named Nano.

I didn't want my silver monster to be too big, preferably 2.5 feet tall. He ended up being the size of my refrigerator in my dorm room. He's child size so he's my little child.

Here, mother and child are posing and holding hands, how cute!

Now the mother and child are dancing. Yeah, the sculpture looks heavy but it really isn't.

That project is finished and now I'm working on a cardboard Mesopotamian Lion Demon mask. Sounds cool, huh?!

Two Perspective Drawings - dedicated to Fillippo

2009-02-18T19:31:00.000-05:00

In Drawing Studio, we have finished studying perspective! We had the choice of doing a one or a two point perspective drawing in class and then doing the other at home. I did my two-point drawing in class, so it shows off the wonderful building and hallway. This building is very... peculiar. My teacher warned us that we can't trust anything that we see, meaning some of the walls aren't perfectly vertical and the ceilings aren't exactly horizontal. Yes! They slant ever so slightly that you can't tell unless your staring at them for three hours with a ruler!!!!! My wonderful professor gave us of the choice of drawing the building as it is, with all of its imperfections, or draw it assuming everything is perfectly horizontal and vertical. So in the end, I made an ass out of myself and the walls and ceilings. Here is the proof of our humiliation:

Then for my second drawing, I hunted around for the ideal spot to draw: someplace that was quiet, had interesting architectural features, and a Starbucks... The Library!!!! No surprise there, right? This is by far my favorite of the two!

Who is Fillippo you wonder. How could I forget?! I dedicate these two perspective drawings to Fillippo, Fillippo Brunelleschi that is! Brunelleschi was an early Italian Renaissance architect who built the Dome of the Florence Cathedral. He is also credited with figuring out linear perspective!! Ah ha!!!!!!

Still more still lifes

2009-02-03T21:23:00.001-05:00

Still more still lifes but perspective drawings are on the horizon. In fact, we've started studying perspective in Drawing Studio! I can sit down while drawing my 2 point perspective of the hallway (a nice break from standing for 3 hours :) ). Here are the last two still life drawings I did for homework.

I've been really busy lately with all of my art projects and haven't really found time to draw in my sketchbook. It takes me a whole week to finish one fun little drawing. The last things I had drawn were the dress designs for Nora Davenport. I decided to color in the second, more elegant dress and include some sort of faint ballroom background. I definitely like this dress better than the first!!!!

Then I drew, or started drawing (because he's not finished yet), a picture of Mr. Woodrosin. He's a very fun character to draw just because he's so laid back but also extremely mischievous.

Library Day

2009-02-01T20:53:00.000-05:00

Today is Sunday, which means it's Library Day!!! Not only did I look at the juvenile books but I actually worked on a paper, but who cares. The interesting book I found today is called Kate Greenway's Family Treasury with the subtitle: "Selections from Kate Greenway's A Applepie, Book of Games, Marigold Garden, Mother Goose, and Under the Window". The book is a compilation of nursery rhymes and very old game descriptions, such as "follow-my-leader", "puss in the corner", and my favorite, "battledore and shuttercock". The illustrations for the games and rhymes are done with Regency style clothes.

I thought this one was particularly pretty. The rhyme is very nice, too. There are some incredibly funny rhymes. My favorite humours one from the "Kate Greenway's Mother Goose or the Old Nursery Rhymes" section goes:

Goosey, goosey, gander,

Where shall I wander?

Up stairs, down stairs,

And in my lady's chamber:

There I met an old man,

Would not say his prayrers;

Take him by the left leg,

Throw him down the stair. (59)

What I want to know is why the old man was in the lady's chamber... hmmm. Beside this book, I checked out the Heartache of a French Cat so I could show you how amazing the illustrations are. This is one of my favorites:

Isn't it beautiful?

Looking back at this book and the new one inspired me to draw my own Regency pen drawings. My subject matter is the main character of my sister's story The Tale of Miss. Davenport and Mr. Woodrosin (I'm not sure what else to call it because I don't think it has a real title at the moment). This is Nora Davenport, the heroine of the story. The book takes place during the Regency Era, which means empire waists!!! I love that style and live for any chance I get to draw it! These are two styles for Nora's masked ball gown. Her dress's theme is butterfly/fairy.

I personally like the second one best. It's extra elegant!

Recently, I finished reading Neil Gaiman's latest novel The Graveyard Book, some what inspired by The Jungle Book, but is about a boy who is raised by ghosts in a graveyard. I loved this book. It had a very uplifting ending but I still cried (I cry at almost everything). At the end of the book, I felt like I had to draw something so I drew the Grey Lady whom everybody rides eventually at the end of their life. Dave McKean, one of my most favorite illustrators, illustrated the book. I pictured the Grey Lady differently from his version. I saw her hooded, very much like the Virgin Mary (I don't know why but it looked cool). Here it is.

I'm very pleased with this drawing. Sometimes I begin my pen drawings with a graphite foundation but this one I went straight at it with pen. Again, I'm very happy with it!

Greenaway, Kate. Kate Greenaway's Family Treasury: Selections from Kate Greenaway's A Applepie, Book of Games, Marigold Garden, Mother Goose, and Under the Window. New York: Derrydale Books, 1979.

Holy Cow!!!!!

2009-01-29T18:52:00.000-05:00

Oh my goodness! Today, something, or someone, very exciting happened. I went to my sculpture class early, by about two hours, so that I could get some more work done on my project. As I walked down the hall of the building to my class room, I noticed a large loud crowd of people waiting outside the projector/lecture room. I thought nothing of it and went in to work on my sculpture. Well, those people outside of the room were waiting for a lecture given by none other than... drum roll... Korto from season 5 of Project Runway!!!!

It wasn't until the end of the lecture that I found out what was going on! I could have listened to her talk about her fashion work!!!! I'm so mad at myself. I did, however, see her walk past the room. I saw her amazing hair first and noticed she was wearing a purple coat... and carrying a black bag... but not to get to psycho lets stop there. Me and another girl from my class went out to get "a drink of water" and watched Korto take a few pictures with people and leave the hall. What an exciting day!!!!

On another note, cheap markers are amazing. You don't care about ruining them by blending like crazy because they only cost five dollars. Heck, you could just get more. I bought these markers right after receiving the book Hellboy II: the art of the movie for Christmas, which had all sorts of concept drawings and even sketches by Guillermo del Toro from his sketchbook. He used markers on all of his drawings. They looked so cool that I went out and got my own markers. Here is my own monstrous creature sketch using markers like del Toro.

This next drawing is much better and I drew it with my markers just to show how amazingly they are! The drawing took me forever because I didn't really have time to work on it. Well now it's done!!! Ha haha ha.

Mannequins and Skulls

2009-01-28T13:20:00.000-05:00

Oh, sculpture and drawing. I never managed how tired I would be after each of my studio classes. I find that I'm more tired after drawing studio. How's that possible? All you do is stand and draw, right? That's exactly why, all we do is stand... and draw. It's fun and relaxing but I'm not use to standing up that much. I guess you can call me weak. One of our recent homework assignments was to take a drawing we did in class and finish it up at home. Here is the in-class drawing I chose to finish:

I had seen this exact same mannequin in student drawings from last semester. I have to say she looks better in the drawings than in real life because a few of her features are only painted on. Like her eyes, for example. This makes it really hard to draw because we are only using line, no values allow. Paint and the likes are not in the linear plane (only if there is a thick amount of paint that creates a three dimensional form that you can touch). But that is not the case so we can't draw her eyeball only the bulge of her eye. Skulls are always fun to draw. I still need to spray fixative on the drawing so it won't smear (because I used charcoal). But I can't do it outside because it's raining right now. And I can't do it inside because the spray gives off toxic fumes. Can't spray outside, can't spray inside. That's a good one m'lord.

Heartaches of a French Cat

2009-01-19T12:20:00.000-05:00

Sundays are the best library days! They just has that bookish feel that summons me to the library. Yesterday I felt the weekly summons and went to the library. The book I picked out to read was The Heartaches of a French Cat by Barbara McClintock. The book had absolutely no text; it was completely illustrated. Only two spreads were in color. I love McClintock's style. I would describe it as old Victorian pen drawings. Stories by P. J. Stahl and Honore de Balzac, illustrated by Grandville (a french illustrator), greatly influenced her.

Here is the book cover. I would love to show some of the pictures inside of the book but I can't find any online. I had the same trouble with the other book, Snow.

This is a drawing by Grandville. He has an anthropomorphic style, that means he attributes human qualities to animals. Yes, I had to look it up but how else do you learn? Her style is very much like Grandville's except her animal heads are less naturalistic; they are lighter and more cartoony. Cartoony isn't bad; actually, I prefer it.

At the very beginning of The Heartaches of a French Cat is a character list with pictures. I thought it looked nifty and decided to do my own character list in the same sort of pen and ink style with the characters of the Croaker Norge story my sis wrote. Here they are!

The hero of the story; Croaker Norge

The traveling bard; Timothy Gildersleeves

The witch; Pip

Lady Gwendolafina of Eppsbeck, aka Gwennie

The bandit King; Rufus

I know none of this makes sense but enjoy it anyways!!

From 'A Haunting' to Snow!

2009-01-16T20:55:00.000-05:00

Today has been quite a day even though I had only one class and it ended at 10 am. I'm starting to feel the weight of homework assignments once again. For my Drawing Studio class we had to do a 18"x24" line drawing that should take us approximately three to four hours. I managed the four hours, with a few food breaks and phone calls home here and there. I am extremely happy with my finished piece; it looks all cool and linear. I got quite a lot of eraser bits on my pants and on the floor; however, it's not as bad as the 14 charcoal drawings which had me breathing charcoal profusely (my snot came out black!).

Here's it is!! Just as I started sketching out all of the shapes of my random objects, I realized I had to blow my nose really badly! Too late!

While drawing, my room mate and I watched two episodes of 'A Haunting'. That show tells the story of real ghost experiences and hauntings people had. Along with interviews, the shows has actors play out the story (there are a lot of fast camera bits with faces and bodies imposed over the video making it really spook, at least for someone like me who can't even stand watching trailers for scary movies!). Well, after watching two hours of this show, I didn't want to be left in the room alone. So when my room mate went to the gym, I went to the library. One of my favorite things to do at the library is pick out a couple of books from the Juvenile section and sit near a window to read. Today, I picked out the book Snow by Uri Shulevitz. I really like Shulevitz's style and will add him to my contemporary artist list.

There was one figure in the book, Mother Goose, who intrigued me the most. Shulevitz made her nose and chin curve like a cresent moon (so she looked like the man on the moon with a body attached!). I really like that and did my own drawing inspired by that.

This guy, I've decided, is a guard to the king of the moon people's castle (who live on the moon). He doesn't look like a happy fellow; he probably is bored of just standing next to a moon rock wall. I had left all of my drawing pens in my backpack, which was back in my room, so I had to draw this picture with just my markers. I love those markers; sometimes cheap art materials are the best!

Winter Break

2009-01-14T12:41:00.000-05:00

I can't believe that winter break has come and gone already! I had a very relaxing time at home with my family and didn't do very much, especially art. After a long action-packed semester of art classes, I took a break from doing any "art" art. Sure I sketched in my sketchbook, but I didn't paint or anything. What I did do was make clothes. Inspired by many of the clothes (actually, all of them) in the movie Penelope, starring Christina Rici, I made myself a dress to wear on Christmas day.

For Christmas I received my own sewing machine (up until this moment I've been using my sister's). I'm extremely excited about it and foresee many more garments in the future!

Here is the link to a video my friend Rachel and I made for our Time Studio class. The assignment was to make a performance that has three elements. For any of you who are confused like I was two months ago, performance art it live art made by artists. Performance art usually isn't very theatrical, but mostly makes political, economical, etc. commentaries on society. For this 3 Element project, we were required to have three elements in our performance that lasted 3 minutes, for example of a performance would be me watching a movie infront of the class and making comments about the movie aloud or something. The elements would be myself, the movie, and the class. Yes, this is a very different and interesting art but it is also extremely fun. So, here is the youtube link for one element of the performance piece Rachel and I collaborated on. Enjoy! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G75ACqs2Rzo

The End!

2008-12-11T17:04:00.000-05:00

I'm done. The paintings are finished. I've learned a lot making my projects. There were lots of things to consider beyond just the subject of my paintings. I put a lot of thought in how they will be displayed. The last problem I must solve now is where to hang my paintings; we're running out of wall space in my house.

The End is Near...

2008-12-07T10:56:00.000-05:00

Wow! I'm almost done with my three paintings. All I have left are a few touch-ups and wiring the back! I've really enjoyed this project. I painted the background twice on this painting, again. I'm much happier with the final product so all of that work was definitely worth it!

Final Painting

2008-11-28T21:17:00.000-05:00

This painting is coming along very nicely. The Elfin king is being snared and trapped by thorns for stealing the peacock box (featured in the second painting). Although my back is really starting to kill me (after painting hunched over for a week), I'm really enjoying this project. I can't wait to see them all finished.

One done, Two more to go

2008-11-28T20:40:00.000-05:00

I finished the first canvas from my fairy illustration project. This painting introduces the two characters of my story: an Elfin King who rules over an underground kingdom and a Faery Queen who rules over the forest kingdom. I'm excited about how it turned out.

I've actually started my second painting... and finished it. I've gotten a lot done this Thanksgiving break while home. Listening to Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell on CD really helps pass the time while painting. I absolutely love this book!

THE BACKGROUND!!!!

2008-11-25T12:14:00.000-05:00

I'm really excited about the background of my first canvas! It is really coming along. I'm so glad I got rid of the blue because the yellow checker background is so much nicer. I've decided to include text in the pieces after all. I was having such a hard time trying to incorporate all of the parts into the illustration that it became to much.

Painting and Erasing

2008-11-23T17:21:00.000-05:00

My painting is slowly trucking along. I finished the characters yesterday and today I started the background and the throne the king guy is sitting on. As you can see from my pictures, I changed the color direction I was going with for the chair. It is now white. The background I had momentarily painted blue. I hated it right away and wiped all I had done off. I feel like I didn't accomplish much today but really I had. Most of what I had done I painted over.

Self Portrait cont.

2008-11-22T19:00:00.000-05:00

Well, I've drawn out the designs on the three 24"x18" canvases and started painting the first one. I'm really happy with what I've done so far; unfortunately, it took me all Saturday to do it. These paintings have so many details that they are going to take me forever to finish!!!! Ahhhhhh!

I like to watch the painting evolve in the pictures!

Self Portrait

2008-11-21T18:45:00.001-05:00

Our latest Surface Research project is a self portrait except we don't have to make it a portrait. For example, if we like puppies then we could do a painting of puppies and it is a self portrait. I am doing a three canvas panel that illustrates a fairy tale that I wrote. Here are concept drawings and designs.

Okay, I can't seem to upload more pictures so I will try again later.

Color

2008-10-22T12:47:00.000-04:00

These two pieces were an exercise we did in class.

I painted the black and white piece first (it is india ink on watercolor paper). The colored piece is acrylic paint on canvas. The original picture for these abstractions is actually one of the five "close-ups" of a charcoal hand piece (from the 14) posted on September 11th. Can you figure out which one it is?

Big Print

2008-09-29T16:26:00.000-04:00

Final 2!!!!!

2008-09-16T13:36:00.000-04:00

Okay, here are my final 2!!!!!

2008-09-11T15:21:00.000-04:00

Not done yet!!!!

2008-09-10T14:01:00.001-04:00

With this project, we have to choose one subject, such as a portrait or an object, and show it move from the foreground to the middle ground to the background. If you haven't guessed, my object is a "ring". No, not a hand; although I really like all of my hand pieces.

FLIP BOOK and the pictures keep coming...

2008-09-08T06:56:00.000-04:00

This is such a messy project!! I keep finding charcoal dust all over my dorm room, even in places where I didn't set up my paper and draw. I also noticed that my snot has become black too. How in the world was that happening?!!! I haven't been sticking my charcoal covered fingers up my nose. Then I realized I must be breathing in the charcoal dust! Weird, huh?

And even more Flip Book!!!!

2008-09-05T12:04:00.000-04:00

Flip Book cont.

2008-09-04T15:42:00.000-04:00

Flip Book Eraser Drawing

2008-09-04T06:55:00.001-04:00

Using charcoal and a piece of 22"x30" paper, we are to draw 14 separate drawings from observation. This means we draw one complete drawing, erase it, and draw another drawing on the same piece of paper. We do this 14 times. I've only drawn two so far and already my paper is getting smudgy.

5 Ways project to One Minute Movie

2008-09-02T06:55:00.000-04:00

TIME STUDIO is such an interesting class because I still don't know what to expect from it. Our first project, 5 Ways, required us to pick a topic we're interested in to investigate and then find 5 ways to present the information to the class. I decided to investigate the circus; I've always been really interested in circus costumes and make-up and I know how to juggle so this topic was very appropriate. My 5 ways ended up being an article about the history of the circus, a job application for the circus, designs/sketched of my own circus outfit, me performing juggling tricks, and a video of a professional juggler.

Then our next project was to make a one minute movie (one shot; no editing) of that same investigation. I bought costume make-up and painted my face, not like a clown, but more like the Cirque du Soleil make-up. It took me about an hour to paint my face.

2008-09-02T06:49:00.000-04:00

Our first assignment for SURFACE RESEARCH was to draw/paint 72 self portraits on a 22"x30" piece of paper. I was dreading this project at first but once I started I had a blast! I definitely know my face by heart now!!

Hello!

2008-08-21T15:07:00.000-04:00

Welcome to the whiteforest art blog!