art business

Hm.
Going away to art school in the fall. Here's what I did last semester in my Drawing/2D Design class. :)


- This is an unfinished still life. The paper is 18x24", but the space I'm working on takes up maybe 1/2-1/3 of the page. I probably should have waited to finish this before posting it, but I don't know when I'll get around to that. The stipple technique kind of hurts my eyes after I work on it for 3+ hours without a break. I start to get dizzy :P


- Not EXACTLY my favorite piece, I have to re-work the face and give it a wider range of value/soften the outlines. Otherwise I like it. 18x24 on off-white drawing paper with compressed charcoal/charcoal pencil.


- this was for my Drawing I class, which is a basic beginner class in which the majority of the homework assignments were to copy xeroxes of other things. This was one of them. Copied to a 9x12" piece of drawing paper with graphite pencil from an 8x10 image. This took maybe like a total of 5-6 hours.


- not my favorite either, but I did put a lot of time into it. I wish I would have changed the angle of the sharpener in the beginning because the angle was awkward, and the circular metal piece with the holes in it was JUST off from being a perfect circle, so it came out wonky. 18x24 on drawing paper with micron markers.


- another unfinished piece D:. I have to again put more tones into the face and work on the hair, but the basic jist and shape of the face is done. I was never really a big fan of self portraits because I've always dreaded having to draw myself, and I would always make things up to fix the features about myself that I didn't like- I don't really care anymore. It's beautiful in it's own essence; I'll deal with my actual body in the mean time :P 18x24 on off-white drawing paper with graphite pencil.


- nude figure. Professor told us to just outline the figure, meh. Not much to talk about here really. 18x24 on drawing paper with graphite pencil.


- another figure, except male. Added some value because this pose was around an hour and a half. Regret doing it on newsprint ( I wasn't listening when they said how long the pose was, I was used to quick 20 minute ones!), reworking the paper kind of wore at the image, but it's all good. 18x24 on newsprint with graphite pencil.



- Don't remember exactly how long this pose was- I wish I would have gotten her face. Might play around with this image and some tracing paper/markers. We'll see ;) 18x24 on drawing paper with graphite pencil.


- Another figure drawing. Longer-ish pose, but not that long. 18x24 on drawing paper with graphite pencil.


- this is probably my favorite of the poses, and most difficult (and longest) , from that figure-drawing session. :) 18x24 on bristol board with graphite pencil


- now this is from my 2D design class. Hated the class at first, but then it became my favorite. We had to create 3D intersecting shapes using 3-point perspective. So much fun. :) 18x24 on off-white drawing paper using micron markers.


- I have to take a better photo of these: these are three SEPARATE images, I just merged them together because they were a set and this is how I wanted them displayed next to each other. Each image is a drawing of an apple, portrayed using different techniques. Each image is 6x6 with an 8x8 border on off-white drawing paper with micron markers.


- Grand finale! haha. This was my final project for 2D design. We were given a source image by the professor, and he told us to reproduce the image to be at least 18x24", using an interesting grid technique. In each box/shape that made up the grid, we had to use different media or somehow make it look like a mess when you got up close, but when you stood back, you can see an image. The inspiration for the project was Chuck Close, and the way he has treated portraits as small images within one large one.
The background is actually a collage of an old cut-up watercolor painting I did a while ago. The actual face of the old man (I don't know who he is! Sadtimes.), was made using a combination of old newspaper(from soviet estonia XD lulz), charcoal, graphite, ballpoint pen, micron marker, aaand I think that's it.
As for the grid, it was hard to transfer from an image that was somewhere around 4x6" big to an 18x24 image, especially since this grid was almost impossible to transfer by hand(see down below). Used a projector etc to transfer it. I wanted to make it almost look like broken glass around his left eye, but in the finished image it's difficult to notice from far away.
This was so much fun to make, I'm contemplating whether or not to do more portraits in this style. 18x24" on bristol board, mixed media.

A WIP and some close-ups:







Sorry for talking too much XD I just liked the process and maybe if you're artsy you'd like to try something like this as well! I'm not gonna hog all the fun. I don't make art to please other people or to be unique or quirky. I make art because I enjoy it and I really feel happy when I'm doing it. I want to learn/show other people how much fun/how relaxing it is. Give it a try sometime :P

That's it for now. I'm working on an oil painting (oh jeez) of my dad and my brother for my dad's birthday towards the end of July. Plan on spending the next two weeks on that. Should be decent :)

Toodlelooo

I haven't really been doing much. Just been going through paperwork, handing in essays, and mailing things in regard to attending college this fall. I only applied to one school, SUNY Purchase, and seeing as how I got accepted LAST summer, I should have it in the bag. I would just feel like shit if I got rejected, mostly due to the fact that I applied for the WTC Scholarship, and was awarded full tuition plus room&board, supplies, books, food and etc. So if I didn't get accepted to Purchase, it would pretty much just be a kick in the shins for me. I just want to go there and stop stressing about things.

In other news... well, there really isn't much other news.

My dad and I were talking the other day, as we were driving down the road to get back home, how Jesus and Buddha wouldn't have lasted 10 minutes where we live, right now. Their love for humanity would pretty much disintegrate and they would realize how terrible the human race is. Once you think about it, anyone could have love for the human race if they did what they did. Just take off into the wilderness/desert and not see anyone for a long time, and then maybe you'll feel like you love everyone a little more. But, hell, if you stick them on Long Island in present day, I highly doubt they'd still have those ideals they had a while back.

And you know, times aren't terrible. Compared to 500 years ago with serfdom and child labor(among other things), we've really evolved positively as a species. I'm proud of us.

But times aren't hard, no, when they're compared with the past. Just people still generally suck.
Things are okay.

We also conversed about the events of 2012, and all the different people having something to say about it thousands of years back.
And you know, something probably WILL happen.

But I think rather than have the human race be completely destroyed, I just think it will be some sort of awakening. The people left, after some sort of natural/unnatural disaster, will wake up in some way; spiritually or otherwise. I don't doubt something will happen.

You can't prove anything exists, either. Solipsism is interesting in that way, but I'm not quite talking about Solipsism. I'm just talking about the plain fact that you really don't know what's real and what's not. I used to be dead-set against anything metaphysical, or the belief in any kind of sense that the norm of humanity can't necessarily feel or experience.

Who's to say these things exist/do not exist?

The universe is simply a big circle of recycling energy that passes in and out of things, through things, under things and over things. We're all giant masses of energy.

And I think this image of energy is often perceived as this all-knowing being, known as a 'god'. I think this image of a god makes it easier for people to understand the constant flow of energy; it makes it easier for people to explain strange occurrences, or 'sixth senses'.

There are so many things that exist that we, speaking as a regular human 'know to exist, but can't sense it'. Such as electromagnetic fields and different gases.

Humans might just be made, molecularly, not to be able to pick up these things. But think about how many different types of things there are in the universe that we may not be able to sense.

There are endless possibilities and endless suggestions for what kind of unknown things are out there, but you still can't prove that anything is 'real'.

I guess I could say, if I wanted to identify myself with a certain 'belief', that I would be Solipsist or something along those lines. That the only thing you know that exists is your self. But you know, even then, you can't be too sure about that either.

I don't really think much matters, really. I'm just here to be happy. Genuinely happy. And I think I'm going in the general direction.

I don't know what I'm getting at, I promise I'll post something of 'significance' sooner or later. I just don't have much to say.

OOPS

Jeez. My bad. I forget about this thing so often that it may as well just not even exist.
u_u

I've mostly just been consumed with school work. Even though I'm going to community college(not for long), the fact that I've been taking honors classes and laborious art classes seemed to have made my experience a lot more time consuming than one would think. I'm nearly done with this semester; Tuesday is my last day. I've got some final projects to finish, but the bulk of my work is done. Thank goodness.

I would like to plan a road trip to Boston. After mulling it over and talking about it a little bit with teh Steve, I decided that would be a good trip to take since I haven't been anywhere of interest since last August when I went to Estonia/Finland. If my calculations are correct, this trip to Boston has the potential to be more exciting than my trip to Finland. We'll see.

I'm contemplating whether or not to post my artworkkk. I can never get decent photos of anything; there should be a course on how to photograph your artwork properly. Jeez. Maybe I'll make a post later, I don't feel like going through everything right now and taking photos.

However, I don't really think anyone reads this, but if you have been looking forward to an entry, only to be disappointed that I haven't posted for months, I apologize. Not much has been going on though, to begin with, so you weren't missing much. :p

Moy galupchik.

So, I forgot to mention that for my birthday my dad bought me an accordion.


!!!!!


I'm a bit anxious to take lessons despite the fact that I feel awkward playing it; I really want to be able to play a few good songs on it, at the very least.

He said he's wanted to get me one for a few years after he noticed the majority of the music I listen to involved accordion usage, and I think I may have mentioned wanting to learn how to play one at some point.

Nevertheless, I took some photos! I don't have any of me playing it(lolol), but it's beautiful. It's a Hohner Arietta 1B- I'm not sure of accordion types and specifics yet(if I would have bought it myself I would have researched a bit more), but I'll find the rest out. I know there are like a billion different types of accordions, like the kinds with the typewriter-like keys on the side instead of the buttons. Those are pretty cool.

Anyhow, yes. Photos*!

I perhaps should have taken some photos with the billows extended, maybe I'll do that when I get photos of me playing it.

:]

In other news, my love for the musical ensemble Beirut has been rekindled. Not that the flame ever went out in the first place, but I was able to find some of Zach Condon's earlier work from before he formed Beirut(even though, if I'm correct, most of the instruments heard in his album(and I'd imagine many other songs in Beirut), Gulag Orkestar, were actually played by Condon and then mixed).

His earlier work(from before he traveled around the Balkans at age 16) was more mellow and electronics oriented. I actually think he did most of his work with cheap computer software. It still included his voice, although in my opinion I don't think his voice suited the melody. It's still beautiful music though, extremely relaxing.

RealPeople holland(I could be mistaken, so don't hold me to this) was the name of his project before he formed Beirut. I think you can buy/download the March of the Zapotec/RealPeople holland EP. It's really great.

I also discovered "A Hawk and a Hacksaw" the other day, from looking up similar artists to Beirut. Just as amazing, and even more so a little bit due to the general lack of vocals. I have a soft spot for instrumental music I guess.

Well, I guess that's it. I've been doing more artsy stuff; I spent around $150 yesterday on acrylic paints and Bristol paper(OUCH), but $50 of that was spent on a decent-quality easel. I needed one in the worst way. It can hold pretty much any canvas up to maybe around 5' tall. It's pretty durable too, even comes with a carrying case. Haha!

I'm excited to get painting, but also not so much. I'm kind of awful when it comes to acrylic paint, I'd rather use oils or water-soluble 'oils', most probably because I'm a blending fiend.

I think I need to get some of that jelly-medium to make my acrylics more blendable. The name escapes me at the moment.

My drawing classes are going well though. I just wish I was taking more than two, and didn't have to write essays on the Battle of the Nile or what I want to do after college.

I can't wait to go to art school, actually.

And I also must add that Long Island(more specifically, where I live) will be getting around 12-15 inches of snow by tomorrow morning.

I will probably need to move someplace warmer in the near future. I found out that it is a fact that I hate the cold weather. Which contradicts moving to Canada in the future. Bahhhh.

Well, I guess that's it.
If you live around here, godspeed with this snow business.
Oof.

* the dark background in the photos was achieved using the brush>darken tool in Photoshop. Useful and effective, I'd say.

Update!

I'm feeling a little sad lately that I haven't been able to take photos of the things that I've been working on! Since Christmas I've made scarves(knitted and assembled fabric), a fleece blanket with an applique, a pot holder, more electronics cozys, and a bunch of drawings and whatnot. This makes me sad. Eventually I'm going to have to wrangle up all the people who I gave that stuff to and get them to take photos of them! Hehe.

Any how; since I've been living at my dads house, my room has been a mystery. It's dimensions are about 8'x8', which is the size of a typical American household closet. =P

But recently I've added color and storage to make it more like a room, and I even have a floor to do crunches on. Who knew.
So I'm posting a picture entry today! Because everyone loves photos.

This is a photo of my room as you enter it! There's Sophie on my bed, and my large green pillow, and my dry-erase board, and my side table, and the little pink panda on my windowsill named Small Arms.

This is my messy desk space. I stood on my bed so you can see the mess clearly. There's my door to the right, it actually IS a closet door my dad bought from Home Depot. Ahaha. My dad also recently stuck that shelf up there, but now I have no clue what to put on it. I'm stumped.




Now this is getting to the real messy part where I keep my craft stuff towards the top, my jewelery/hair things/makeup/lotions in the middle, and my clothes hanging up to the left and on the bottom in those ugly baskets. I wish I could find cuter ones but I'm just broke, so they'll have to do. You can see my poor keyboard hiding behind the mounds of clothing on the wall. It's so huge, so I have no place(not even anywhere else in the house) for me to set it up and use it. =( My ceiling fan is up there too; it's super dusty and the light does not work.




Here is a better view of the mess, near my window. There's my phone, my lamp, my painting tape, my drawing pencils, and my flowery necklace that my mom bought me in Hawaii. Those red curtains were actually once sheets, but I cut them up in the middle and used the hems as rope things to tie them. Very unprofessional, I know; I plan on finishing them... SOME day. Those pink/green/purple bins up on my shelving hold my sewing notions, patterns, fabric, and the last one holds all my felt and embroidery thread and such. They're a little too small to hold everything, so they're kind of exploding.




This one's a bit dark, but I wanted to add it so you can see outside. That's my neighbors house. I wish we could get a 20 foot tall fence to keep all their noise out.






I wanted to throw these in because while I was photographing this stuff, Sophie was being really cute on my bed. Teehee.



This is a photo of my wobbly night table. I used that fabric to make a part of a scarf, and used it to cover the ugly thing. There's my hair drier, a photo of my old dog Eiffel, my lamp, a photo of my mom and I, and my alarm clock. Oh, also my phone.



This is Small Arm chillin' on the photo of my mom and I with my scarf on, with my bookend hand thing, and one of the unopened moleskin books my boyfriend got me for Christmas =) I'm using the other two.



A photo of two photos of my dad and I! I love this so much. I loved my elephant hat. It's a little red because my curtains tend to glow when the sun shines on them. Magic curtains.



It might be a little odd to say that this garbage pail is my favorite thing in my room. It was originally a pail with images of Spiderman on it, but I painted over it with acrylic paint, and stuck a cute little panda on it. This is where I keep my jewelery and my hygiene/makeup things. I hate the new Pepsi logo, by the way.



This is on my desk. I have an office-supply fetish.



Another shot of Sophie lyin' on my bed. I have a huge mirror in my room. It's the only one in the house. Lololol.



These are my rainboots, Christmas wrapping paper, and the stuffed dog I got when I had my tonsils taken out when I was 12.







This is me after waking up and taking a photo of my recent knitting. Excuse the sleepy.



Here is Sophie with my knitting. Cuuuute.

And here is my latest drawing of a bunch of squiggly lines and a colored blob thing. And the skeleton looks out of proportion because I was looking up at him, and he was wearing a poofy hat; we were assigned to draw just the negative space. The first one was drawn in my larger moleskin sketchbook, and the second one was in my 18x24" Strathmore drawing pad. It was for my drawing class.






That's it for now. When I think of something cool to post I guess I'll do it.

Also, I started a weight loss blog with my pal Jessica from the Not Cool Club. If you're looking to lose weight, you could check it out, it might provide some inspiration. XD

Alrighty.
Toodles.

Well, SHAME ON ME!

I'm afraid I have some apologizing to do.

Unfortunately since I'm not a famous blogger yet or talked about on YouTube, I haven't really been checking back here as often as I'd like to.

Some stuff has happened in..... a month and a half. LOL.

Not many important things though.
I mean, I do have a new president.
And I heard through the grapevine that he speaks fluent jive, although don't hold me to it because I'm afraid I can't provide proof of that.

We've been having really cold weather here lately except for the last two days which have been absolutely gorgeous. It's been around 60 degrees(F) yesterday and today, except today the wind was so strong my car was being pushed onto the median of the highway! It was frightening but I just kept pretending that I was playing Project Gotham Racing and then at that point I felt like I needed a pair of goggles. Sometimes I get a little crazy with the driving and I make zooming noises as I weave in between cars when I'm late for school or something else. I get all crouched over the steering wheel to, leaning with the turns and moving my neck. It's a little frightening.

I also sing when I drive- but I know everyone does that. What I have noticed though is most people stop singing when they're stopped next to other cars at a red light.

I don't; I can't decipher whether or not this is admirable or really silly.

Anyhow, this week has been weird. I was in so much pain from a bladder infection on Sunday that I had to scoot to the hospital and get an IV of morphine. I haven't been to the hospital since I got my tonsils out in 5th grade. I miss those guys.

Oh, I also started going to community college. Not the best when you're trying to show people up as to where you're attending school, but the classes are informative and all's I really needed was a place to do my artwork in. Trouble is, I'm only taking two art classes. And one of them I've only been in once, because I was out this Monday due to my illness.

I'm a little scared about that class, because we have no school this Monday either. So that's 3 weeks of me not doing anything for this class, and it's 5 hours long that meets once a week. My professor is not answering his e-mails, so it looks like the next day I have class(Tuesday) I'm going to have to go to his building and try to find him. Hopefully during my three hour break I can catch him while he's in his office and ask him what I should do. I have proper hospitalization documents so that shouldn't be a problem. Blah blah blah. This is exciting.

Not much else to talk about today except the wind, really. Shit's banging on my windows and there aren't really any trees near my window at all. Which would suggest that the wind is picking up debris and flying it into our house. I'm going to have to inspect the damages in the morning.

Speaking of, a lady who has the same name as me mentioned that her Psychotherapists office is looking for a secretary/receptionist. Somehow I wish I would have stuck with wanting to study psychology, this is a pretty good opportunity to have a great looking resume.

Anyhow, tomorrow morning I've got an informal interview with this lady at a coffee shop that's halfway from my house to hers. I'm hoping that I don't have to tell her that I need to get going by 2:30, because I don't want to have to explain to her that I have my OWN psychotherapist to see on Friday's at 3:00pm. LOLOL.

It feels weird telling people that I have to attend a doctors appointment every Friday at three. I wonder if it sounds suspicious, I wonder if it makes them think I have some rare condition. Maybe I do.

It's just nice talking to my therapist. She's very helpful when it comes to talking about eating habits because she happens to specialize in weight control and eating awareness. It's great. I'm learning a lot.

Anywho, there's my life, pretty much.

Tomorrow is Friday the 13th. I wanted to make happy Friday the 13th cards for all my friends, but then I realized that I don't really have any friends. HAHAHA.

Oh, life.

You can tell me about yours if you want. Or if you have plans for this Friday. Or if you are excited about President's Day this Monday.

I'd also like to wish Mr. Charles Darwin a very pleasant 200th birthday!
:D