For my independent project, I decided to make a series of monochromatic paintings revolving around the 6 colors of the rainbow. Each painting was done with acrylic paint, and featured a portrait done entirely in that one color. Originally, I wanted to portray the different moods and impressions each color had on me, but as time went on I realized that everyone portrays things differently, so even if I understood it to be one way, chances are a lot of other people would interpret it entirely differently. It was because of this that I decided to keep it more simple, instead focusing on just simple portraits in the designated colors. I’m a lot happier with the result, and I feel like that decision helped to make the series a bit more inclusive to the viewers. In the beginning of this project, I often found myself struggling to find the motivation to paint, and just struggled with painting in general. Painting has never been my strong suit, though after this assignment I think it’s safe to say that I’ve picked up a few things, and have even learned to enjoy painting a bit more. I had a lot of worries throughout the duration of this project, but I eventually overcame them and learned ways to avoid such struggles in the future. Of course, there were times when I hated doing this project, as anyone would with anything, but I was surprised to find I was actually having more fun with it. I wasn’t expecting to hate it of course, but I definitely wasn’t expecting to enjoy it and actually look forward to painting some days. I’m really glad I went with my gut on this one and chose to do painting this year, despite it previously not being my strong suit. I’m definitely a lot more satisfied with this series than my attempt last year.
0 Comments
For my personal goal, I decided to go with something simple and easy to accomplish- or at least for most people. I’ve never been good at keeping up with art, and consistently drawing. In fact, I often go months without even picking up a pencil, and, as an artist, that’s not something to boast about. I’ve decided to use this opportunity to set a useful goal that’ll help me now and in the future.
It may seem insignificant compared to other goals, but drawing is often hard for me to do, as I tend to get bored easily. I want to try and fight the feeling of boredom and push through it, instead of letting it push me down and away from art. I want to reach a point where I can ignore art block or whatever else may be holding me back and just draw whenever I want. I have a feeling that if I set up a solid plan, and a deadline, I can accomplish my goal. I believe that if I set aside at least an hour per week, solely to draw, it’ll become more of a routine thing and get easier. Even if I’m not in the mood to draw, I will set aside the time to draw, and if I don’t like the results then it won’t matter. I won’t erase it and give up, I’ll keep working at it to get it to a point where I’m satisfied. Even if in the end I’m still not happy with it, I’ll keep it, as it could also be a good way to measure my progress and improvement in the future. At first it might be hard to keep up with my goal, but I’m sure that as time goes on I’ll get more used to it. I also plan on expanding from 1 day a week to 2 or 3 times a week. Once I get used to it I’m sure I won’t even have to schedule it. It’ll become natural and fun once more and I might actually enjoy drawing again. It wasn’t long ago that I was writing my first SMART goal, still new to the academy and unaware of the struggles that lay just ahead. Back then, I had no idea what I was doing. I was writing my goal just to write one. What I didn’t realize then was that that goal, despite how hastily thrown together it was, would actually help more than I ever thought possible. So now here I am, once more, with the task of writing another goal. This year, though, I’m being a lot smarter about choosing one, because even though my last one did help, it wasn’t exactly what I needed to focus on. Throughout my journey in the art academy, I’ve realized where most of my struggles lay, and now know just how to fix that.
When I first came to the academy, I quickly realized that I did not have all the time in the world. I found myself quickly falling further and further behind all my peers. My grades started to drop, I often found myself spending all my time finishing up late assignments, and I started to feel lost in the academy. At the time, I didn’t realize what the problem was. I always thought that everyone else was moving too fast, but now I know that I was the one moving too slow. I always spent far too long focusing on the tiny imperfections, trying to fix them and then making them worse. Things went on like this for a while. I kept falling behind because I was trying too hard to make it perfect, but I was never even satisfied. This year, I know how to fix this issue, and it’s a lot simpler than I ever thought it could be. My goal this year is to accept that my art will never be perfect, and that’s okay. Because as long as I’m creating art and producing results, I’ll be happy. I’ll see more improvement a lot faster, and I’ll start to enjoy art once more. Over the last few days I’ve been trying this new thought process, I’ve been looking forward to art more and more, and I’ve actually been happy with my end results. It’s helped me realize that no one is perfect and we’re all in the same boat. And while some people are further along than others, that doesn’t mean they’re doing any better than anyone else. We’re all struggling, but we have to endure this struggle in order to improve. This goal is not just for VAM, though. This is something I plan on implementing into my everyday life and continuing for the rest of my life. Of course, when I need to or want to, I’ll focus on the small details, but for now, that’s not what I need to be doing. It was negatively affecting me instead of boosting my grade. I’ve actually found that a lot of my better work was from times that I didn’t worry about the small things and just worked through it. So far I’ve liked all of my art a lot more than last year, and the only thing that changed was my mind-set. I’m glad I figured out what the problem was, as now I can actually fix it and move on. I can enjoy art once more and not have to worry about doing poorly in class. At first it was rather difficult to pick up where I left off on my Independant Project, but after one or two days I believe I’m back on track. It’s still going a lot slower than I’d like it to, but I guess there isn’t too much I can do about that other than work on it more. I am a little worried about the deadline, as deadlines have never really been my thing, but I’m sure it’ll work out in the end. Aside from that, I’ve been enjoying this project, as I chose a topic that I had never really done before and it’s actually quite fun. Before now, I rarely ever used color in any of my drawings, and now that I’m doing an entire project based around colored pencils, I’m noticing how fun it actually is. I’ve also never really attempted realism before, or at least not for an actual project, whether it be personal or school-related. I’m also happy about this project because it’s giving me an opportunity to experiment and improve with different things that may help me in the future. I hope that once this project is complete, I’ll still use colored pencils, as it’s something I’d like to get better at.
For my independent project, I am planning on creating a series of 2-3 drawings with color inverted counterparts, resulting in a total of 4-6 pieces. I’ve always been intrigued by inverted colors, and thought this would be fun and interesting. It sounds a little difficult, looking at it differently. We’re all so used to seeing things in their normal color, so to suddenly change it and invert the colors would be neat to draw and I feel like it’d be cool to look at.
I plan on using colored pencils to color the drawings. For the inverted drawings, I will use black paper, and for the originals I will use white paper. I think I’m going to focus on drawing animals in a realistic style, but taking into consideration my current skill level, I may try a slightly more abstract take on it. I plan on getting one drawing done a week, giving me enough time to get all 8 finished in time for the art show. If all goes well, however, I hope to only take a few days per drawing, so I have more breathing room. I plan on displaying the drawings on a classic trifold, similar to our celebration of learning show. If the viewers are curious or willing, they can also use their phones to invert each drawing and see that it is in fact an inverted version of the original. I believe that this project can be the beginning to something new. I may discover an interest in realism or inverted colors along the way and follow that path in the future. If not, then I’ve at least discovered something fun and unique and I’ll have at least attempted it in my life. I do hope I enjoy this enough to return to it again someday in the future. On December 12th, my class got the opportunity to explore Art Point University located in Calgary. There, we got to see first-hand what it’d be like to attend an art university and even got to see the students there working on their projects.
Before this trip, I’d never really considered going to university just for art. It’s crossed my mind a few times, of course, but I never thought it’d be something I’d be interested in. During the trip, I discovered that I’d probably find the classes very interesting and beneficial to getting an art-based career. I know now that attending Art Point is something I definitely want to look into. After we’d finished exploring Art Point, we went to an art gallery a short ways away where we got the chance to admire art and learn new things. One of the things we learned about was printmaking, the art of creating images from plates or blocks. Essentially, printmakers have to scratch the image into a specially prepared plate/block. They then smear ink over it and fill the cracks. They remove the excess ink to ensure a clear result. The plate is then inserted into a machine where it undergoes pressure and leaves behind the mirrored image on a piece of paper. The process takes a lot of effort, but the result is definitely worth it. I think it’d probably take years of practice to master this and get good results every time. During our walkthrough of the gallery, I took a liking to a painting called “Playing for Keeps” by Finnuala Irwin. The colors used give off the feeling of peace and serenity all while reminding me of a storm. The painting was created with an abstract style, leaving the viewer open to interpretation. The painting looks both complex and simplistic at the same time, which I was interested by. The artist used both light tones and dark tones to battle out each other, creating depth and interest in the painting. |