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Referral Task (‘How I Will Use the Foundation Experience to Improve’)

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Referral Task (‘How I Will Use the Foundation Experience to Improve’)

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I’m both very insecure and very stubborn, so I end up (on my mother’s words) “asking for help and then refusing the solutions” a lot, mostly because the solutions I’m given are not the one(s) i want (i’m also very perfectionist). I do talk to the tutors a lot (admittedly, mostly the ones I already had classes with on pre-foundation, as I’m more comfortable with them, so I don’t feel so much like a bother), but don’t always follow their advice. Usually, when they don’t tell me what I want to hear, I feel like I’m simply not being understood, so I try to explain myself, then I start feeling like I’m probably coming out too defensive – which I am – so I end up just agreeing and then doing it my way, anyway, because I hate admitting that I’m wrong. It feels like failing.

As for with the other students, it’s at the same time easier and harder to talk to them about my projects. Harder, because they’re not there to help me, they’re there to do their own projects, so the talk ends up being rushed, because everyone needs to get back to work. And easier, because we’re closer, and they’re having to do the same exercises, so they can understand better where I’m coming from. Also, since we’re on equal footing, it’s easier to admit when I’m wrong.

When I follow through with an advice I get during the work, I mention it on my Reflective Journal, especially if it comes from a tutor. The same goes for problems that are pointed out on the final versions of the projects, especially if I agree with them. So far, I haven’t redone (or even worked further on) any of my finalised works, but this will probably change with the Self-Publish project. My zine was something very close to what I hope to be doing for a living one day, so it’s easy to see why the fact that I wasn’t happy with the final result bothers me more than usual.

When it comes to managing my time, I’ve been doing better than last year. I’m spending more time at EBAC, working on my projects there, because it helps me focus, and I’m usually more productive than at home. I guess it could still get better, because I end up not having time for anything other than the projects, except on the weekends. During the Self-Publish project, my time management reached a critical low, and I ended up having to miss a couple of classes to complete the zine in time (but this is also due to poor technical choices in the beginning of the project, so it shouldn’t happen again, I hope).

I keep getting on my own way when it comes to my work, and this is something I fully admit, and try to improve. Being open to critiques and advice is something I’ve always struggled with, even if I actually actively seek them a lot. I expect myself to always get everything right on the first try (even if, realistically, I know it’s not possible), and then immediately get defensive when someone brings to my attention anything that shows that this wasn’t the case. “The first step to recovery is admitting you have a problem” and I’ve already taken it, but there’s a lot more ahead. I’m aware of where I need to improve the most, and I’m trying to, but it’s hard to change something that’s always been an integral part of you, so it takes time.

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Today we spent the first half of class organising the independent publishing fair and had the crit on the second half. For the crit, we were paired up and asked to give feedback on each other’s works.
I was paired off with Lucas. Looking through my zine, he found it funny seeing the heroes having those accidents in the middle of battle (so I’m glad it worked) and also complimented the anatomy in the drawings (which is something I’m always trying to get better at) and the male heroes’ reactions to the wardrobe malfunctions. Including the male heroes was an afterthought that ended up costing me quite an amount of time, so I’m glad it’s at least paying off.
He also asked me if there was something I regretted or thought I could’ve done better, and I talked about how (due to unfortunate artistic choices and, consequentially, lack of time) I didn’t get to really colour it or draw any sort of background, and the work ended up a bit duller that what I initially had in mind.
When talking about his work, he also mentioned how his final work has a lot less material than what he initially planned, so I’m guessing this is something most of us are gonna have in common. But, in the end, no one other than you knows what you had idealised, they only see the final product. And we even actually talked about how hard it was giving useful feedback today, because everyone’s works are looking really good.

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Since my last entry, I've essentially only been drawing the illustrations for my Zine. I made the dumb decision of drawing everything with a smooth lineart, which is really hard for me, not to mention unpleasant. This is actually probably my biggest obstacle when it comes to my art. Drawing digitally is much more practical and efficient, but my sketchy style doesn't look as good on the computer as it does on paper, so I end up forcing myself to do the aforementioned smooth lines -  which not only suck out all the enjoyment from the experience, but also devastate my efficiency.
In fact, the characters' lineart has taken so long (I only finished today afternoon) that I had to give up colouring the drawings or doing any kind of backgrounds, instead just using shades of grey (no pun intended) and strategically zooming in on the characters.
Besides that, the only things worth of notice that happened were my decision to include some of the female characters' closest male equivalents in the illustration (so that the reader could have something to compare their outfits to) and the changes I made on the cover [Image], mostly due to the fact that the zine is now in black and white: Instead a soft yellow background and a showy blue title to reminisce of comic book covers, the background is now plain grey - so that it doesn't conflicts with the interior - and the title is now handwritten and in white, with the only bit of colour coming from the newly-added red cape (mostly because I didn't want it to be so plain, but I've also been toying with the idea of the cape since I first thought of the cover - initially deciding against it because it's cover the butt on the back, but I've found a way around it).
To be honest, the way the cover turned out (specifically the combination of female silhouette and the handwritten title)  definitely reminds me of something, which I'm sure is where my brain took the inspiration from, but I can't remind what. I'm currently between female-focused self help and teenage romance books, but google isn't really helping.

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Today we basically worked some more on our self-publish project and had a photoshop workshop. For my zine, I picked the 8 superheroines I'm using (here's hoping the cover doesn't count on the page limit, but my backup plan is to do one that's disconnected from the other pages), then I wrote down the problems with their outfits and possible things that could go wrong mid-battle because of them [Image 1].
I also decided the order in which I'm drawing the characters (tried to alternate Marvel/DC and leave room between wardrobe malfunctions on the same body parts) and thought about the cover (I'm not sure about the background yet, need to test it on a finalised version first) [Image 2]. The one thing left to decide is the title. I thought about "Super Wardrobe Malfunctions", but I'm afraid it's too big and/or too on the nose...

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On the first half of today's class (the second was reserved for presentations) we worked on brain-storming and developing ideas for the "Self-Publish" project that was started yesterday (I missed class). We were supposed to think of 30 ideas [Image] and then, in groups of around 4 people, discuss them.
Out of the 30 ideas, one was a reprint of last year's zine with a few modifications (it was A LOT of work), one was an animation for a cartoon opening starring my dog, which I've had in mind for a while (I quickly gave up on this one because I don't really have any experience with animation) and 28 were zines that were basically collections of drawings revolving around the same theme.
I realised my ideas were also almost all revolving around fantasy and mythology, which are topics I've always been interested in and are very fun to draw, but in the end I ended up choosing something about superheroes (specifically "the absurdity of some superheroines' uniformes", which - as a comics reader and a feminist - is something that frustrates me immensely). I ended up liking this exercise a lot more than I expected, and there were some topics that I didn't entirely let go of, instead just choosing to explore them on my free time.
My idea for this zine was to draw scenes of battle where the superheroines' nonsensical uniforms got in their way (using actual famous superheroines, with actual nonsensical uniforms). Zaíra then gave me the idea of including comparisons with redesigned uniforms, which I really liked, but ended up scrapping after finding out about the 8-pages limit. And then I spent until lunchtime listing the superheroines I plan on using on the project (I tried to pick only ones whose uniform hasn't been redesigned to fix the problem, because then it kind of missed the point).

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Today we had half the day to build a 3D object from a picture we'd taken [Images] (preferentially one of the 60 from that exercise) and the other half to organise the room and do the crit, because tomorrow is a holiday. In my opinion, it didn't really work out. The 3D objects all came out either half-baked (like mine, sorry) or incomplete, and the crit lasted a lot longer than it was supposed to, making the last students having to rush when talking about their projects and delaying the life drawing class. We, again, had the kind of crit where we go around the classroom, with the teachers, and each one of us talks about their project and receives the feedback, which I usually prefer, but it takes very long, and definitely isn't the ideal for a day where everything had to be rushed. It especially bothers me because we didn't really do anything on monday, so the filters and destroying photos exercises could each have been pulled a day and we could've had a whole day for the 3D project yesterday, and leave today all for the crit.
As for the 3D object, I chose the image I thought would be the easiest one to make something out of, a photo of a kneaded napkin. I first used some white sheets of paper to reproduce the object, but then Monique told me I was supposed to use the actual photo I'd brought, so I did it again, this time using masking tape to represent the knots.
I really didn't put much effort on this project, and it clearly shows. I don't think I even really understood what we were supposed to do (as demonstrated by the fact that what I first did didn't fit the criteria), and, on top of that, I picked a weird photo that was doomed to come out ugly no matter what. Everything I did in relation to this project will only serve as a reminder of what not to do in the future.

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Today we spent the day "destroying" some of the 25 old pictures we were told to bring on the beginning of the week.
The first exercise was "adding". I had some pictures that showed the sea, so my first thought was to include mermaids in one of them [Image 1]. I used correction fluid to white-out the spots where I planned to put the mermaids, but it backfired when my markers didn't work on top of it and I had to use gouache. I didn't really like the result, and it definitely looked different from what I had pictured in my head. I wanted to do something a lot more defined, where you could really see that they were mermaids without having to think twice, but it ended up looking like a kindergarten painting. But, admittedly, the gouache isn't the only thing to blame. I really underestimated how small the mermaids were going to be, considering the scale of the photo.
The second exercise was "subtracting". I had a picture with a bunch of boys in football uniforms, doing a team pose [Image 2], and decided to scratch out their eyes and mouths, giving it a very horror movie vibe. There was also another boy in the background, not looking at the camera, and I scratched his entire face - which was a possibility that I had also considered when thinking about what to do for this technique. I really liked the result, and it was very fun to do, so I tried it with another photo that had a lot of people in it [Image 3], again scratching the whole face of the one person not looking at the camera. Then, Michael suggested I tried something with more detail, like carefully cutting out the eyes/mouth, so I started adding other creepy elements to some photos [Images 4-6, some were done after this part of the exercise].
The third exercise was "stitching/knotting", so I picked two very contrasting images - one of a very fancy living room and one of a very poor neighbourhood - and stitched them together [Image 7]. I like how the stitching looks, and will probably use it again at some point, but the final image itself seemed too basic, and too cliché.
The fourth exercise was "cutting/piercing/punching", and I decided to cut hear shapes around a dog [Image 8]. It's not very aesthetically-pleasing, but it looks cute and was fun to do, so...
The fifth and final exercise was to mix some of the techniques we used before, and I chose to mix the scratching and the stitching (kinda) and create more creepy images (I actually just added the sewing thread to a couple of images I had already scratched for fun but shhh) [Images 4 and 6]. It was very fun, I really enjoyed the result and it's definitely something I plan to do again in my spare time.
Overall, this exercise was a lot better than I'd anticipated. Was it worth the 125 reais and leg rash from walking that costed me the photos? No. Did a scalpel fall on my foot and opened a hole in it while I was sewing some pictures? Yes. But I discovered I really enjoy doing something I never thought about trying, so it definitely wasn't entirely bad.

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Today we spent the day planning, building and testing manual filters for our cameras or phones [Images 1-2] - as in, filters to be installed in front of the lens, instead of added after the photo was taken.
I'd brought acetate paper and tracing paper to use on my filters. I experimented colouring the acetate with markers (bottom corner of the camera in red, edge of the camera in black and whole camera in blue) and making leave different kinds of marks on the tracing paper (scratching, poking a medium-sized hole, poking several small holes). I was actually expecting the tracing paper to be a lot more transparent, so I had to improvise there. My favourites results, out of those, were the red marker and the small holes. Both of those blurred part of the picture, one giving it the effect of literally "seeing red" and the other making it seem like the world is fading.
After that, I experimented with rubylith, both whole and poking a hole through the middle. Just the rubylith sheet in front of the camera makes it look like infrared vision, which is a very cool effect, even if it limits the vision. And, with the camera looking through a whole in the rubylith, it looks a bit like the red marker on acetate, but all-around and a lot stronger. I may actually prefer the marker, though, it's more subtle.
I'd been using masking tape to stick the "filters" (pieces of paper) to my, so why not give it a try and make a filter using just the tape? So I cut some lines in a small piece of tape, leaving it looking like a curtain, and the result was actually pretty good, it looked like seeing through very thick fog.
Then, I used some coloured tape to try to mimic the effect of the red marker/poked rubylithe, only in pink (because I love pink and Letícia had just taken a very good photo using a pink filter). It worked well, but I don't like the sade of pink I had enough to prefer this to the red ones, they give off an stronger vibe.
Finally, I used some multi tacks to create what looked like a binocular lens, which was more fun than aesthetically pleasing. There was some tack left, with a crack in the middle, so I experimented it and it looked quite cool. It made a monocular lens shape, but the middle - for some reason- also looked faded. It gave me the impression of memories, the way they're sometimes shown in media.
Leopoldo talked to me and said I should build a device that allowed me to use a filter a bit farther from the camera, and so I did, using thick paper and coloured tape [Images 3-4]. As more of a test, I used an X made out of coloured tape as a filter, but it wasn't very interesting.
Then, I used some strings on the edge of the device, trying to make it look like a (cartoonish) spiderweb, but they always ended going all to one corner, or forming the shape of an onion, so this didn't really work out either.
My last filter was a sheet of yellow cellophane. Unfortunately, it was too clear, and barely appeared on the photo - even after I tried painting it with an orange marker, so I had the idea of drawing in it. I drew hearts, and they were fun, but too corny. And I also tried to use the blue marker to make it seem like there was water coming down on the sheet, and it actually gave a great effect, but the blue looked too artificial.
I always leave those experimentation classes feeling like I didn't do enough. Everywhere I looked I saw some amazing filters, with a lot of shapes and colours, that made what I'd tried look very bland and amateur in comparison. Even if I liked some of the filter I made, none of them are really original or different

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Today we were supposed to bring a research on old camera technologies, a collection of 60 photos we were to take following a list [Link] and 25 old photographs. And we ended up not really using none of those things. Both the collections of photos were only spread out on tables and discussed among groups (mostly about why did we choose each image), and the research was barely even mentioned.
It felt like the day was more about the writing analysis with Pauline and Carlos (for part of the class) and this week’s teacher presentation (César’s). I hope the “homework” we were supposed to bring today is going to be more useful on the rest of the week.

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Today was the day we staged our process and had the group crit on the project. My protest, which was initially about some things on EBAC I'd been unsatisfied with, became more of a call to action, asking my fellow students to speak up when they feel that way, because that's the only way some change can actually happen.
The materials I brought to said protest [Images 1-3] consisted of a placard and a poster I'd made yesterday and a couple of motivating phrases stuck to the wall.
The placard has a drawing of Michael dressed as Ygritte, from Game of Thrones, famous for the phrase "You know nothing, Jon Snow", which is also here, but with a twist. The "You know nothing, students snow" part is something I came up with on monday, referencing the feeling that we were being looked down on from our tutors. Crossing the word "know" and writing "say" on top of it, is meant to represent that our demands not being taken seriously is not necessarily because we aren't taken seriously, but maybe because we're not doing a good enough job of expressing our dissatisfaction to the people who can actually do something about it - hence "They can't hear us if we don't talk".
The poster had the phrase "Different, people, different creative processes" on it, which is something I came up with on wednesday, for the collage poster, and was also made yesterday, but with serigraphy. Each word is meant to represent a type of thought process. The first has a digital vibe, representing people who like to develop their ideas on the computer. The second is very sketchy, representing people who like to draw what comes to their minds. The third is calligraphic, representing people who like to write down their thoughts. The fourth has lines connecting the letters, representing people who simply go from one thought, one idea, to the other in their heads, not feeling the need to out them. And the fifth has some pieces of the letters missing and some added, representing people who like to do a basic layout of their initial idea and then cut out and reorganize pieces of it. I had to cut the stencil for this with a scalpel, and there's some parts which are very thin and delicate, so it was very time-consuming and stressful (and involved a lot of tape), but I'm very proud of the fact that I was able to do it at all.
Besides the stuff surrounding me, I also taped a cartoon I did yesterday on the door to the teachers' room [Image 4]. The original draft of this cartoon was actually done on monday as the basic proposal to my project [Image 5], and I feel it really explains well what my main issue is.
To protest, I arrived earlier and sat in front of the lifts on the 4th flour so that the people arriving would see me. But I don't feel like I was very successful. For once, everyone arriving was too busy with their own projects to pay much attention to mine. And, despite the "Different people, different creative processes" sign on my lap, I think it didn't seem really clear what I was asking people to speak out about. The cartoon would've helped a lot, but it was a bit far from where I was seated and was apparently so small and/or discreet that even some people who opened the door didn't see it (even if I did use red tape on it). I tried to hold the poster instead of the placard, so that it would call more attention to it [Images 1 and 2], but it probably didn't change much.
After lunch, we organised exhibitions of our projects [Image 6] for the crit - including the registers of it taking place (in my case, with pictures). But, before we started with the crit, I asked to talk to the class about my protest. I was counting on this happening organically through the afternoon, like on last friday, but it wasn't the case. And, as I didn't feel my protest itself was very effective, I had to do something so that everything wouldn't have been for nothing.
The crit consisted of two parts. In the first one, we walked around the room with post-its and wrote short comments to three works of our colleagues'. In the second one, we were paired up and had to talk about our project to our pairs, using the feedback we'd received to improve it, and then write about each other's works [Images 7-8]. I didn't really like this style of crit, and neither did almost everyone I talked to about. Last week's style worked a lot better, in my opinion. Everyone could explain their projects to the tutors and fellow students and we received feedback from our tutors and anyone who actually wanted to add something. Yes, it takes longer, but it's much more rewarding. I understand the importance of having us comment on each other's work, and challenging us by making we express ourselves in short texts, but not everyone receives quality feedback, and this prives us from the opportunity of having our tutors comment on the final product of what they helped us construct through the week.

P.S.: I know "strength" is written wrong, but now it's too late

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Today we were given the briefing for this week's project, and then were instructed to start working on it by picking 6 "values" from a list, choosing 3 from those,  making "word maps" and then creating a phrase (related to one of the 3 final words) that will eventually be used in the poster we'll create this week.
Honestly, this process made no sense to me (and I didn't see many people very enthusiastic either), especially because in the briefing, they showed us posters that didn't even have words, or where the words just complemented the image. It's a valid thought process, but it definitely doesn't work for everyone. There were many people who had already decided on a topic close to their hearts prior the activity, and had to go through all those steps simply because they were told to. Suggesting a different way to get to a solution is great, but making your students go through it whether they find it helpful or not is inorganic and puts us and our creative process in a box. And that's what my protest is going to be about.

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Today we presented our letters [Image 1-2] and received feedback. The first part of the class was used to finish anything and organise the presentation [Image 3-4] and, in the second, we walked around the classroom, with the teachers, explaining each our own projects and commenting on the others'.
The biggest criticism I got was that my letter was unrelated to the picture we took on monday. It was even pointed out that I could've cut the cake in the format of the letter I used on the prints, which I'd thought about, but there was a miscommunication with my order and the baker already cut the cake in the C-shape, so I didn't get the chance to do it. But, despite this, I really liked how this project turned out (and how it tasted).

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Today we were supposed to start making our 3D letters. I started looking for researches online and with family and a cake pan big enough with my classmates. Daniel said I should decorate the cake, and - after some time looking up stuff online - I remembered a doughnut-looking cake I saw some time ago, and thought it'd be nice to make a bite shape out of the missing pieces.
The big problem is that I don't actually know how to cook, and I was afraid of messing up and having to do a cake multiple times (and not even on my kitchen, I don't have an oven, so I'd have to use Zaíra's). I asked Daniel if I could order a cake instead, and he said yes, citing Marcel Duchamp's Readymades as an exemple of how you don't have to be involved in the whole process for it to be art So, at lunch, I ordered the cake at a store near EBAC and spent the rest of the day doing the tray and helping other people with their projects.

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The class was divided into two groups. My half stayed with Daniel to start planning the 3D letters we have to show friday [Image 1].
My letter is a C, so I started with what I assumed was going to become my biggest problem: how to keep it standing. My first idea, which I had yesterday, was to make it out of plain surfaces, specifically triangles, probably made of cardboard. The second idea, which I had in the beginning of class, was inspired by the Ñ someone made on last year's foundation, which was shaped like a melting ice cream. Mine would have the melting material accumulating at the bottom to keep the letter upright. I also did some variations (mostly so it wouldn't look too much like it's inspiration) like a "skeleton" showing up under the melted part, or a candle. And the third option I thought about after seeing the slide presentation Daniel showed us. There was a Y from last year with was lying down, so - now knowing this was possible - I thought about a round cake with some pieces missing. At first I wanted to do it with papier-mache, but by the end of the day Zaíra had convinced me to make an actual cake (mostly because she wanted to eat it).
On the second half of the day, Michael (who is reading this, hi) told us to create an entire font based on the style of one (2D) letter we had previously done [Images 2-5]. The pencil draft went well, even if it took longer than expected, and so did the pen parts I used a ruler on. But, when it came to drawing cleen lines freehanded... Things didn't go so well. I still have a lot of work to do on this area.

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Yesterday, we were given a homework. We had to pick one of the designs we created for the letters and cut them up from coloured paper (I admittedly picked #5 mostly because it was the easier one to cut, but it ended up really becoming my favourite after Ana pointed out it looked like a 40s typography). But there was apparently a mix-up and we were actually supposed to make stencils [Image 1].
The class was, again, divided in two groups. My half stayed in the classroom with Ana, did the stencils, and used them to make coloured patterns [Images 2-6]. I had a lot of fun, but after seeing everyone else's works I felt like I didn't experiment enough, and only really tried different things with the last two - and, even then, I only really liked the red C on stencil from the penultimate one.
After lunch, we worked on Screen Printing with Solange and Marcelo, on both the classroom and the printing room. Sol saw me using nail scissors to cut my newsprint and made me use a scalpel, despite my protests. But I have to admit it worked out way better than I expected, even if it was just three curves. That done, we headed to the  printing room and worked, in pairs, on the first colour of our artwork-in-the-making [Image 7]. I'd already had a class about that technique last year (albeit using the actual silkscreens, instead of newsprint), so I could just enjoy the process now. For the second colour, we could choose between waiting for the silkscreens to dry or doing the second colour with the stencils. I was going to wait, but it ended up taking too long, so I went with Plan B. It didn't come out as uniform as it would with Screen Printing, but it ends up giving each work it's own look [Image 8 for two exemples].
Overall, today was a very fun day, not sure if in spite of or because the fact that I was already familiar with both the techniques we tried. But, honestly, I'd say the most notable event was successfully cutting something with a scalpel for the first time in my life. I definitely don't feel confident on my hands yet, but the possibility of improvement never seemed so real. And it might look like I'm being dramatic - which, well, I always am - but my incapability of doing a smooth lineart is something that holds me back a lot, considering I want to work with comics.

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At the beginning of the class, we were divided in groups of 3 and presented the research we were assigned on friday. Then, it was explained to us the project we were going to work on for the rest of the week. It's about typography, which I always immediately associate with Leopoldo, but he's not on the list of tutors for this project, so I really don't know what to expect.
The first exercise we did today was writing our names out of materials we found in the classroom. I did mine mostly with pens I had on my pencil case [Image 1], so it was way easier than I thought when I found out I had to write my whole first name, and ended up being actually quite fun.
Then, we were given until after lunch to find shapes that resembled all the letters in the alphabet [Image 2] and upload them on Padlet. I liked the exercise itself, but having to take time from lunchtime to do it didn't really seem fair.
When we got back to class, we were divided in two groups and each one looked through it's members' letters (I, in particular, also had to look for something U-shaped, because I ended up not liking the one I had). Then, we were each assigned a letter and asked to create 5 typographic looks for it - uppercase and lowercase - based on the picture we'd taken of this symbol. Mine was a C and it was, coincidentally, my least favorite picture, because you don't really notice the C-shape right away (in fact, more than one person thought it was an S). It's a picture of the stairs, which are in spiral, so I focused not necessarily on the steps, but mostly on the pole in the middle that connects them [Image 3]. The first three designs came easy to me, but the last two - which I had to think harder about - ended up being my favourites.

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Today was the final day of the collections' project. We spent the first half of the day - and an hour after lunch -  finalising and organising our exhibitions I  was under the impression that our final work had to be composed by the collections alone, and planned on sticking flyers made with them [Image 1] all over EBAC (which I did - and I did end up printing them at EBAC, but only because my intention now was that they actually looked a bit trashy), but yesterday I found out we were supposed to bring the work we made through the week, and today I discovered we were not only allowed to but encouraged to showcase them as well.
First I talked to Monique and she said my material seemed to have a very clear division and I should only show part of them, that blended better together [Image 4, except the ones in pencil], but I really liked two other ones [bottom 2 on Image 3], so I decided to show them but make the distinction between the two (accidental) themes clear on the exhibition (I also took off most of the red ribbons on the white dog piece).
Then, Ana said she really liked the two works I'd decided to add, and that I should make at least one more. I had time to spare after sticking the flyers, so I did it [first one on Image 3]. And, after that, the last additions were my favourite flyer (the one with my dog) and the close-ups in pencil that I'd forgotten about.
After organising our exhibitions, we were divided in groups of four people and instructed to walk around the room and give feedback to each other's works. Mine mainly said that the two parts of my works were too divided, location-wise, and looked like two different collections. The suggestion I received was to place the coloured works (which originally were on the column near the black and white ones) on the glass beside the others, and so I did [Image 2].
In the end, I think this project in on itself wasn't the important thing we learned this week. It felt more like a test run, a way to really understand how this year is going to work - especially because we didn't even present it to out tutors, but to each other. And the fact that it felt a bit pointless is probably a big part of the reason why I didn't enjoy it, even if there were a lot of stuff about it that I had fun doing.

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On the first part of the class, Monique and Marcelo showed us the techniques of Drypoint and, briefly, Relief printing. We practiced Drypoint, creating images related to our collections' themes [Image 1]. There were some very beautiful things that came out of this exercise, but I really don't include mine among them. I didn't particularly enjoy this technique, both because it seemed too much (dirty) work to a result that looks really similar to what you could do with graphite powder and a pencil, and because it's hard for me to make things I'm satisfied with when I have to work with clear, firm lines, especially when they have to be made on the first try.
On the second part of the class, Solange taught us another technique called Monotyping and I liked this one a lot better. It was very fun to do and I really liked the results [Images 2-4] - even if the 3rd one came out a bit too dirty. I do feel, though, that I didn't explore the technique enough, and just basically did the same thing three times. I'd like to try this again, this time without having to stick to a theme and being able to just play with it.

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Today we basically organised and reorganised our collections in different places and ways.
We were asked to think of three new ways to arrange our collection. My original one was a poster with a collage of all the pictures, promoting adoption. My new ideas were 1. The same as the original, but instead of, the whole picture, I'd put just the dogs on the poster, as if they were stickers, 2. Life-sized cut-outs of the dogs stuck to the walls and 3. One (or more) poster of the dogs in the style of missing pet posters, but with a twist. Instead of asking to contact a number if you've seen the dogs, I'd just mention how cute they are [Image below]. My favorites were the last two ones and I ended up ditching the "adoption campaign" idea.
A "do it first, think second" approach is really not my thing, I'm too much of a planner, and really hate making stuff that end up not being on the final product. Sketches are my way to go. Then, if it's a big thing, I do a rough version on the computer, where I have the same freedom as with traditional work, but without wasting material and being able to just "undo" whenever I make a mistake. Only then I start on the actual piece, whether it's by working manually and using what I did on the computer as a guide, or by finishing the work on the computer and then printing it. What this all means is that I ended up doing most of my work today on the computer, filtering, cropping and organising the pictures.
In the end, I decided against the life-size cut-outs for a variety of reasons. The bigger two being 1. Too much paper to use on something so brief, especially when I don't even have as big of a connection with photos I took on my phone as I'd have with, for example, drawings that I made. And 2. I have shaky hands and zero ability with a scalpel. The dogs would turn out terribly bad-contoured. But there's more stuff against this idea: I'd take up space in the whole room, likely getting in the way of other people's collections. Not all the pictures are in good enough quality to be printed life-size. A lot of the pictures don't have the full body of the dogs and/or have a person, object or Instagram sticker covering up part of their body. And so on. I really like how this idea would ideally look like (a room full of life-sized dog pictures? Heaven. Only thing better would be actual dogs.) but realistically I know it wouldn't turn out like I want.
So this leaves me with the missing posters idea. And, now that I've set on it, I'm planning it better. I'm doing multiple posters, maybe even some with a single dog for the best photos (definitely doing this with at least my dog). And I'm thinking of adding a "call this number [EBAC's number] to talk about it" on the bottom or something. Also, I'm pretty sure it should be "these dogs" instead of "those dogs" and it's bothering me. And, when I'm done, I'm thinking of sticking the posters not only in the classroom, but all over EBAC.
Overall, I didn't do much on my project today manually, but I've gotten a lot further on the planning and organisation, so I'm happy.

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Today we had to reinterpret our collections with other styles of art (mainly drawings), trying to use as a big a range of materials and scale as we could.
My first drawing was one of my dog, made with coal. I chose this because it gives a nice texture on hair, plus her fur is mostly black [Image 1]. As far as my ability with coal goes, it's quite good, but, overall, is not something I would post online or anything.
My second work was a few guache paintings of some of the dogs in my pictures. I did a silhouette-ish style that allowed the dogs' features to be perceived without having to contour them [Image 2]. The paintings were fun to do and came out interesting (though the chihuahua is looking like some kind of chupacabra).
I liked the silhouette thing, so I also used it on the next work, a paper-on-paper figure of a dog mid-jump catching a ball [Image 3]. I didn't really use a reference on this one, just did it from my head, but really liked how it came out. My only complain is that the lines that form the separations could be a lot smoother - I'm not really good with scissors or utility knives.
I ran out of ideas and asked Solange for advice. She told me to draw close-ups of the pictures I had, to the point they barely looked like dogs anymore. I did them with mechanical pencils and liked both the process and the results so much that I did three [Images 4-6]. This is definitely way more in my comfort zone than the other projects. They were very fun to do and I was very satisfied with how they came out.
Then, Ana was looking through what I'd done today and mentioned how she liked the divided-silhouette effect on the paintings. I showed her the other piece inspired by them and she said I should do more. I tried, but it was near the end of the class and it ended up a full silhouette, with it's biggest differential being the ribbons [Image 7]. I didn't really like doing this one, especially because my scissor was too bulky for the job, and the result was not what I'd planned, but I still liked it. It looks cute.
I enjoyed today's class, but didn't really see a pourpuse to it regarding the actual collection project as a whole. My guess is the collection is just being used as a means to an end on this first week.

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On the first part of the class, we showcased our collections and divided ourselves in groups to identify, comment and leave questions on other people's collections. Mine (pictures of dogs) haven't been printed yet, so it was "exposed" on my phone. I received three comments, one asking me why I'd chosen this theme and two suggesting that I should filter either only the pictures of dogs I saw on the street or only the ones of dogs I saw on Instagram (one specifically said I should only keep the photos I took).
I'm not following this particular advice because I want to make a poster promoting adoption of rescue dogs, which are usually mixed-breeds, with how "every dog is a good boy", as in, a dog doesn't need to have pedigree to be a loving company. But the pictures I took on the street don't really show much interaction between the dogs and their humans, and I don't have enough from Instagram only to make what I want - especially not of mixed-breeds. I did, however, remove the pictures I had that weren't directly of dogs (drawings of dogs, dog-shaped toys and decorations, pictures of pictures, etc) - which, admittedly, I was already considering doing because of the poster idea.
On the second part of the class, we were supposed to actually organize our collections in ways we wanted to expose them. As I said, I didn't have the printed pictures, and didn't want to print them at EBAC because the printer is terrible, so I asked Michael if I could do something today and something different tomorrow, with the already-printed photos, he said yes, as long as I already had the prints ready by the beginning of tomorrow's class.
So, for now, I just left my phone on a pillar at the center of the room, with the collection album passing on a slideshow.
Finally, by the end of the class, we divided ourselves in two groups, according to which side of the classroom your work was on, and walked around explaining why we had displayed our collections the way we did. Again, mine wasn't ready so I just explained what I was planning to do.
There's another student who's doing a collection of animals and her pictures are really good. Mine aren't very high-quality because 1. I'm really not much of a photographer, 2. I took the pictures with my phone, 3. I was more preoccupied with having the dog on the picture than the picture looking good, because a lot of them I took without the owner's knowledge and I didn't want to wast the time of the people I did ask permission to. I told César that I was worried about the quality of the pictures and he just said I had until Friday to take better ones, but then I face the same problems I did with the ones I already have, so I'll probably just filter the pictures and pick the better ones (I do have over a hundred, so there should be a good amount of decent ones).