Final Reflection Essay

I have learned a great deal of factors through the events of entering in an art course in the last year of high school. It has helped me see a different outlook towards art and its virtuous perspective and creation invokes me into a greater sense through my own creation. During my life in my second half year of art, I have experienced various types of art from the past along with my own strengths and weaknesses. By examining all the artworks I have committed to design and create, there were a show of improvements and challenges through the projects that were created in Art II.

            In some cases, throughout the semester, I have become aware of some of the challenges I had to face along the way that I would never have assumed to have difficulties with this year. One of the challenging projects I have ever encountered had to be my Chuck Close Self-Portrait project. Although it was sort of easy to create a realistic face similar to the original image, I couldn't really figure out what sort of symbol would work for it at all that represents who I am. They kind of throw off the image that I wanted to create and because of that, I’m not entirely happy with my piece. Not only are the projects challenging, but one of my weaknesses that I can’t seem to overcome sometimes is figuring out what I wanted to do for each and every one of my projects assigned. My ideas don’t pop out like they should in most cases and because of that, the outcome of my projects are very plain and poor. Conscious towards my flaws, I can be able to figure out what needs to be fixed in the future.

            Aside from all the challenges and weakness that is reflected through my art, there were some that displayed a greater improvement in addition to my achievements. Out of all the artworks I have done through the second semester, one of the projects I have seen the most improvement on was my free choice project. Seeing how I was able to set up this painting using collage of various materials such as watercolor, paint, and oil pastel, I was able to evoke how I wanted everything to be without even realizing. This helped me not only enjoy oil pastel more, but also combining different media as well.

            During the course of my semester, as my artworks improve through each and every one of the projects that were assigned to us, I have noticed some of my abilities have increased as well.  For example, in my viewfinder project, one of the capabilities I did well one for that project was the ability to blend various colors with color pencils to develop a smooth texture to the creation based on the actual image that was portrayed to. Not only was my blending a great success, but being able to figure out how dark the shading needs to be while create a very obvious focal point was my second ability that I improved on when I was working on my free choice. I enjoy experimenting different materials during my time with my free choice project as It helped me understand how I can work on something I am not comfortable with to something I can.

Overall, I believe that my improvement for this year has been slowly improving as the marking period passes by. Although my creative thinking skills and ideas have not been in its best qualities, I did learn a few things from one project to another. Using some of the ideas and pieces that I have inspired me during my time in art, such as Alice Neel’s show of insecurities through her painting and the symbolic use of creating a logo design, I can expand them through my life beyond high school by taking all that I have learned and add onto the work I will be doing for art next year in college, including the side jobs that I will be performing in the future. Art had guided me through all these years. Although this year may seem a bit difficult to be able to express much of my creativity onto canvas, it helped me understand more about myself in many ways and will be a great influence for future preference. Gaining this experience and having support from others as well as the teacher was something that made me understand how art influence me into being who I am today. 

Dream Mobile Sculptures

Artist Statement: 
In Art II, our next project that we decided to work on involves something in what we dream of. In the development of creating the project, we are using various types of materials for each object that represent our dreams: cardboard, paper mache, clay, nature/found objects, paper, fabric, and something to make an abstract artwork. What I wanted to express this project is to show the dreams that make me who I am right now and what I want to gain for in the future. From what I have seen, it seems to involve more on art and traveling. One of the things I struggle on for this piece is the abstract art and the found objects since I couldn't figure out what other ideas I could do for it. As for my strengths, it's more towards the ideas that comes out of my head in how I wanted everything to look like. Overall, I believe that my work of art is fine, but it should be improved more further into the future.

Marking Period 4 Free Choice

Artist statement: In Art II, we have decided to create another free choice for the last marking period. For this project, the main idea I wanted to work with involves a theme that describes more of wishful-thinking and dream. I wanted to show something that relates to love and hope. In order to create this project, I decided to use various of materials that I haven't really thought about using to challenge myself in my craftsmanship and use of colors. The media I worked with were watercolor paint, pencil, paint, and oil pastel. Creating this piece was not an easy task. In the beginning, I didn't really know what project I wanted to do and was struggling for the perfect idea. Out the blue, I decided to create something that involves with fairies and nature. With that, I began creating this piece. The easiest part for me for this artwork, personally, were the facial structures and fixing my problems as I go along with my work. Overall, I believe that this painting is really unique in it's own sort of way. Although it didn't seem much of my best piece, being able to try something new and working with a collage of different materials was one of the things that helped me provide more use towards my artwork in the future.

Watercolor Painting Portrait

Artist Statement:
In Art II, we have begun creating an artwork that is inspired through Alice Neel's paintings. Using her ideas of the use of watercoloring and theme, we created a painting that represents our insecurities within ourselves. Few of my insecurities that I wanted to reflect on towards my creation revolves around depression and loneliness. In order to make it reflect more for the audience to understand the painting, I made the model sit behind the wall, looking away from the audience with a depressing look on her face, while holding her legs and arms together, feet inwards. Using watercolor as my medium, I used various of cool and dark colors to help show more of an insecure and depressing look. Overall, I am sort of happy with my artwork despite the mistakes I have made along with my model's body proportion.

Viewfinder Project

Artist Statement: In Art II, we are create a viewfinder project that involves with an image of some sort and a viewfinder. By attaching the viewfinder onto an image, I begin to take a big and little cut-out circle paper and work on what is being shown on the viewfinder. The material that is used in these artwork are mostly color pencils. While using color pencils, we have to create the piece accurately to what the viewfinder shows. By blending varieties of colors such as green/yellow, green/black, and orange/red, I created a smooth texture from the artwork. Originally, these viewfinder artwork is actually a variety of leaves and an image that looks like a heat ray. These actually work well with each other. My strengths throughout my artwork are blending and getting an accurate color and location of where everything goes. My weakness, however, throughout the whole process is being able to actually get ALL of the accurate colors in there. Overall, these artwork had a nice blend to both colors and looks very nature-like. 

Bell Ringer Practice Sketches

Chuck Close Self-Portrait

Artist Statement:
In Art II, our next project that we were working on in class focuses on a chuck close self-portrait project in which we use symbols around our portaits that represents us and our identity. What I did first for this project was creating a grid on both my photo that I'm using with a poster I'm going to work on for this process. After that, I get the basic outline of where everything goes (contour drawing). Once that was done, I start using the symbols that represents me in many ways. What most of these symbols visually tell to other audiences describes how unique I am in my own way and things that make up who I am now that influenced me. Finally, I stat shading in all the things that I needed to be shaded to the value it needs to be. Overall, I am sort of happy with my work except my symbols. I think that it needs to be worked ona little bit more. The whole reason why I created this piece was to actually figure out if I know myself well enough to actually identify my identity.

Non-objective painting

Artist Statement: 
In Art II, our next project we did involved with non-objective artwork. For this project, I decided to use acrylic paint as my medium and a mat board as my surface to create a splatter paint artwork. While doing this, we had to use a specific color that defines our self from our personality. From what we had done, we used a personality quiz to figure out what color describes us. The outcome for my personality quiz was blue, which describes me as a loyal, reliable, kind, and trustworthy person. Using that as my main focal point of this painting, I used as much colors as I can that involves with blue, however, I also used some other colors that will help bring out the blue to grab the audience's attention from the painting. Although blue is mostly my personality color in this painting, I'm also a white as well as I show peace, self-sufficient, and neat. Overall, I believe that although it was my first time doing something out of the ordinary (and messy), I enjoyed creating something like this that shows an overflowing emotion towards the painting. 

3rd Marking Period- Free Choice

Artist Statement:
In Art II, our class decided to create another free choice for the third quarter. For my project, I decided to create something unique that represents love, sadness, and longing. By doing so, I did a few sketches along the way to figure out how I wanted everything to work out. After I found what I wanted to do, I started sketching where and what things I want to include in my artwork using a large piece of paper and pencil. Once I was done with that, I started coloring everything using color pencils for the shading and everything, and white acrylic paint for the shining portion of the artwork. Overall, I was happy of how well my shading worked out, but I wasn't too happy about my use of coloring nor the girl in the picture. It was a bit iffy to me, even now. The true meaning I wanted to show in this project was to do something that relates to true love and sorrow. I came up with this idea with the emotions that I've felt in a similar experience and pour them into my artwork.

Metamorphosis project

Artist Statement:
In Art II, our next project is a metamorphosis project. For this project, the images I used to create this piece was an image of a lily and a dove. I decided to draw a lily personally because it was one of my favorite flowers that represents a sweet, calm, and independent side of myself while for a dove represents the love, freedom, and knowledge I've attained throughout my years. The process I made to create my metamorphosis in book form was starting of with a contour drawing of the images. I then follow it up with the shading  to make it look realistic, doing the process over and over again to each box while slowly making it look abstract and into a dove. Because of the petals from the lily, it was an easier way to form it out as the wings and body structure of the dove. The technical strength on this artwork overall was my accuracy in outlining the images onto the paper. As for my conceptual strength, it was figuring out which image works better with one and another. The only problem I had with this project was being able to shade in everything nicely.

Logo design

Artist Statement:
In Art II, our next project that we were working on revolves around us and creating a logo design that represent/identifies us. For my logo design, I created a pice that somewhat relates to nature and peace. I used my last name to represent myself and my family. As for the owl with a heart shape on it, it represents love and intelligence. What I did first in the process for creating this piece was doing some thumbnails for ideas that could help me get my draft/sketch starting. After that, I begin to work on my rough/final sketch to get the basic idea of how I want everything to look, where the color should be, and the outcome of it all. Finally, I used a large mat board and sketch the basic outline of my logo and use paint to color in my design. All of the colors represented in this artwork represented something similar about myself.

Identity Silhouette

Artist Statement: 
In Art II, we created an Identity Silhouette that reflect something about us. Using the stars and a significant pose everyone knows of, I reflect my idea of freedom and creativity. I included some bright colors to show a brighter reflection of my personality using a mixture/combination of cool and warm colors. Taking that into consideration, I used a large piece of white construction paper in order for my partner tracing my shadow figure. After that, I started painting it in black with the background colors in simple and unique colors that pop out of the painting. Soon after, I made the foreground using some colored construction paper in star shape figures.

Physical Aspects of Identity Life Drawing

Artist Statement:

Rather than looking towards what I see beyond my imagination to what I do almost every day, I began to look towards reality. In fact, for our next subject that we did in art, we begin doing realistic art and figure models with our partners. Every model that is being drawn and structured gives off a personality that many people cannot see. My drawings represent that sort of style and characteristics. I first start off drawing some gesture drawings to get the basic structure of where the body is using a color pencil as my basic material. After that, I soon started working on the outline of where things go such as the creases, wrinkles, and simple outlines of the face. Finally, once I figured where everything needs to go, I begin working on my final work with a mechanical pencil of .5 lead and started shading using a normal number 2 pencil. It was a bit tough in the end as I started getting all the details and shades all together, but it was really fun to do. Though it would be nice to make the model pose a style that most fashion workers usually do during photos, I wanted to draw a figure that shows a physical aspect of what that character is like every day and their expression.

Gesture drawings/sketches:

Contour drawing:

Realistic drawing:

Newspaper Expressionism

Artist Statement: In Art II, our class is creating a new project that involves with expressionism. Using a newspaper as one of our main media, I decided to create a reflecting message that involves speaking out to the world and protesting in what we believe is wrong. As I lay my newspaper down, I gesso one side that I'm not using in a couple of layers. After it has finished drying, I used the other side that I am going to use and paint most of them black, leaving a photo and some words still seen-able. Soon after, I decided to use some paint and soft pastels to brighten and show the main focal point of the piece. In doing so, I als added in a few worlds with both paint and charcoal to represent my piece a little more.

Printmaking

Artist statement:
In Art II, our next project in that class was printmaking. We have to do a design that represents a thing or person who influenced us to who we are now. For this piece, the person who changed me the most throughout my entire life in this world was my best friend. To represent her, I decided to do something that she likes (for this, it's the wolf) and her personality along with it. What I did first was outlining the designs on a block of wood/linoleum using a pencil. After that, once I figure out what to carve out and what to keep, I use the gouge to carve out the wood/linoleum. After working for a couple of days carving everything that I need to carve, I began to start inking my artwork. Setting the inking plate and brayer down, I add a little bit of ink onto the inking plate and smooth it with the brayer, rolling it down till the ink is completely flat. Once I have the brayer covered in ink, I roll it out onto the wood/linoleum and set it on a piece of paper. Burnishing the back of the block, I slowly remove it from the paper and created one of the printmaking. I did this a few times in order to get a nice piece out of it. The main focal point of this piece is the wolf and the fog and trees as the background to represent a more mysterious, brave, and bright feeling towards the artwork.

Pop Art

Artist Statement: In Art II, we created an artwork that emerged during the mid 1950s known as pop art. In this assignment, we are required to create the aspects of pop art that reflects who and what we are. Considering that I'm so use to drawing characters of my own, I decided to try working on a comic that's usually popular around then. Using a clean mat board, I decided to sketch out the basic outlines of where things needs to be on it. After doing so, I then begin to color them with simple and contrasting colors, using acrylic paint as my material. In order to see the outline that I've made, I used a black acrylic paint to thicken them. Soon after, I began making pixels in my artwork by putting small pinkish dots. With both the colors and pose/expression being used, it symbolizes my soothing side after all the emotions that I tend to take in.

Free Choice Artwork

Artwork Statement:
In Art II, we have given an opportunity to express what we like to do with what we do best with our own unique style. For our free choice, I made a drawing in a large, white paper using a mechanical pencil of 0.5 lead with chalk pastels as my materials. This artwork shows a better concept of what I like to enjoy doing every day. This piece is an inspiration from the Bible about Adam and Eve. It gives off a perfect meaning of nature and the beauty behind it.

Identity Box

Artist Statement:
In Art II, I have created a box that shows the identity about my characteristics and interest. Using clay as my sort of material, I began to wedge the clay out to flatten the holes and began coiling my box into a shap of a jar. As I was done with the coiling process, I start to smooth our the edges of where the holes are and began to create the objects relating to myself. On the outside of the box, I reveal some things that people usually see me while on the inside, I tend to conceal things in that not many people see me in that sort of idea. As I begin to make this artwork, I not only created it to look unique, but to show everyoen the real me that people know and don't know about me.
 

Abstract Art

Artwork Statement:
I believe that everyone has a beautiful side in them, yet they tend to reject that truth. I was one of them too, until I recognized that being beautiful on the outside doesn't mean anything. It's what's on the inside that counts. For this abstract artwork, I used oil pastels to create my image on a 8.5" x 11" piece of clean, white paper. I started coloring the basic colors first and slowly blending them with other colors to show the direction of where the light is pointing.

Realistic Art

Artwork Statement:
I took consideration of creating this doll as my realistic artwork specifically because it was one of the first gift I got from my aunt back in Wisconsin. It's a special gift that I've gotten from her. This doll shows a personal side of me that tells others how calm, independent, mature, and bright I can be. Using a pencil as my material, I drew my artwork out of an 8.5" x 11" white piece of paper. As I am drawing, I'm looking at my object to figure out the basic posture of the body and work my way there with the details, especially with the shadings.