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What are the four areas of the revised project grid that you used for this project?  How did you use them -- explain any changes that occurred as you worked.  What aspects of your artwork are strongest in your opinion?  What did you learn about media, composition, or approach by working on your independent project?

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What are the four areas of the revised project grid that you used for this project?  How did you use them -- explain any changes that occurred as you worked.  What aspects of your artwork are strongest in your opinion?  What did you learn about media, composition, or approach by working on your independent project?

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For the last project I wanted to do something fun and simple so I decided to do an abstract piece. I chose figurative, acrylic, tape masking, and asymmetrical balance as well as incorporating a bit of abstract. For the subject, I chose to do figurative because I haven’t drawn a figure in a while and I wanted to incorporate one in the final piece. For the media, I decided to use acrylic because it is very easy to use and it drys down fast making it easier to finish it in time. For the technique, I chose to use masking tape and put different strips all around the canvas. Then I went in each one of the shapes that were created using the tape and used different color paint to make it look abstract. For the composition, I chose to include a bit of asymmetrical balance in the background so I decided to do a bunch of little bubbles and then one big bubble on the opposite end. As far as changes go I didn’t have that many changes. I had little changes like making the back of her head bigger and I kept changing the ponytail from being thinner to a little more bigger. Another change I made was adding a big silver bubble to make the asymmetrical balance a little more clear. My strongest part of the piece was definitely the figure. I thought that I would mess her up a lot but it ended up looking better than expected. The figure was also the part I was worried about because I didn’t want to make her look deformed. In this project, I learned to go really slow with painting the edges of any subject otherwise it will end up looking very uneven and unfinished. I also learned that when you are taping off any area, you need to make sure that it is smoothed on there or else the line will not come out as sharp. Overall, I thought that this project turned out better than the first independent project. In this one, I felt a little more confident with the outcome of the entire piece, especially the figure. This piece was definitely a lot of fun to do.

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What are the four areas of the revised project grid that you used for this project?  How did you use them -- explain any changes that occurred as you worked.  What aspects of your artwork are strongest in your opinion?  What did you learn about media, composition, or approach by working on your independent project?

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What are the four areas of the revised project grid that you used for this project?  How did you use them -- explain any changes that occurred as you worked.  What aspects of your artwork are strongest in your opinion?  What did you learn about media, composition, or approach by working on your independent project?

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This project I wanted to do something with nature so I decided to do an outdoor scene and make it a little more cartoon-like. I decided to use nature exploration, oil, complementary colors, and circular for my grid choices. For the subject, I chose nature exploration because I haven’t done anything with nature in a long time so I decided to use nature in my piece. For the media, I chose to use oil paint because I love how it’s very thick and doesn’t dry down fast. I also haven’t used oil in a while and I wanted to do something else besides acrylic. For the technique column, I wanted to use just complementary colors for my piece. We did a project like this before and I liked how it turned out so I wanted to use it again. I decided to use green and red for my colors because I liked the greens that came out of mixing the two colors. For the composition, I decided to do a circular type of arrangement and keep the middle mostly blank. At first, I had no clue what I was going to do for this piece so I decided to just go for it and think of the idea as I went along. I went through a ton of changes. In the beginning, I wanted to keep it just flowers but then I changed it to an outdoor scene with a couple of flowers. Then I decided to and a tree with a swing and a girl swinging on the swing, but then I got rid of the girl and kept everything else. Finally, at the last minute, I decided to add a mountainscape in the background because I thought that my piece was missing something. I think that my strongest part is the big flower and the mountainscape because they turned out to be a little better than I thought especially since the mountainscape was a last minute decision. I learned that it is really hard to create the exact colors I wanted with the complementary colors. I was trying to create a brown color but it kept going too red or too green and not a brown color. Overall I thought the piece was okay. I wish I had more time to work on it and make sure that it looked a little more realistic. I think that I could have done it a lot better.

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What are your most significant areas of artistic growth? What artistic struggles did you learn from?  As you pursue art for pleasure or maybe even as a future career, what subjects or new approaches would you like to try?

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What are your most significant areas of artistic growth? What artistic struggles did you learn from?  As you pursue art for pleasure or maybe even as a future career, what subjects or new approaches would you like to try?

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Areas of Growth:
This semester I was really struggling with ideas. I always dreaded starting a new project because I would have no idea what to draw. After the chair project, I started to get better with coming up with ideas. By the end of the semester, I felt confident in my last piece because it turned out so much better than I thought it would. This semester, I also grew in my technique, especially with painting in acrylic. In the beginning, I was having trouble with small details and sharp lines. By the end of the semester, I was able to do both of those things without any problems/very little problems.
Struggles:
This semester I was having problems with some of the projects. The brick art wall was definitely a project that was very hard for me. I was having a ton of issues with painting in the grooves of the brick and keeping my lines straight. I was also having problems with getting the colors that I wanted for the tree. I wanted them to be a little bolder and lighter and I wanted to almost look like watercolor. Sadly it did not turn out that way. Next time I will definitely take my time and make sure that I test the colors before I put them on the piece.
Future ideas:
I would definitely like to work on nature and animals next as well as some new media. I have always wanted to try the pan pastels so maybe I can use those in my next piece. I would also like to work on improving observational drawing and figures.
Conclusion:
This semester was definitely not my best work but i definitely learned a lot from each of the pieces. I hope to keep improving and learning new techniques in the future.

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Independent Project 2: figurative, acrylic, using tape to make abstract pattern, asymmetrical balance

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Independent Project 2: figurative, acrylic, using tape to make abstract pattern, asymmetrical balance

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Independent Project 1: nature exploration, oil, complementary colors, circular

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Independent Project 1: nature exploration, oil, complementary colors, circular

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In this piece, I wanted to do something that wasn't normal so I decided to take the text from a book and put it in the background and keep the paper/book blank as if the words fell out of the book. I didnt want to just include a quote in my piece, I wanted to do something different so that is why i chose to use text in the background. Then I felt like something was missing from the piece so I decided to add a quote that relates to what my piece is about. I tend to keep my subjects in the middle so i decided to switch it up and move the book to the corner of the artwork. After finsihing the whole piece using just black and white I still thought that there needed to be some color so I decided to add little shapes with different colors around the whole piece. One thing I would change is get rid of the quote and do something else like a forest or something coming out of the book but since I didnt have enough time to do it I decided to add a quote instead.