Art School Times

New Studio Space

2009-06-28T10:45:00.000-07:00

Over the the past month I have been settling into my new studio space, also known as me bedroom in JP. I know some people would consider this a mistake, but it has really allowed me to set things up exactly how I want them and means that my paintings are an ever present part of my life. It also allows me to work whenever its convent, instead of having to plan for the long trek out to my old studio in Southie. So let me give you the grand tour.

Here is a shot showing the work table and desk I built along with the wall I paint on. You can also see my finished work hanging from the ceiling and the rainbow foam floor pads I've put down for extra comfy painting.

This is a closer shot of my table. On the right is my desk with my laptop raised up to eye level and a big clear work space. On the left is my glass pallet with cover (opened in this shot) which helps hold in fumes. Bellow my pallet is storage for paint and brushes, and bellow that are a lot of art books.
The first shot shows how nice and tight I've fit my bed in right against my table. And then above the bed you can see my projector on the book shelf I built which the second shot give a more complete picture of.

So that's where I now live and work, now to do something with it.

2009-06-24T10:26:00.000-07:00

I have a new blog and website, find them here: aaronmsegal.com

Winter Break

2007-12-28T19:08:00.001-08:00

So now that I'm back in Portland for the holidays I'm finally getting some time to relax, play wii, go skiing, and hang out with long missed family and friends, which has all been awesome. I've also been slowly cleaning out the basement so I have a real studio space this summer; And I've been working on a new website that will have galleries of my work, an artist statement and resume, ways to contact me and a new blog of what I'm up to, which means this blog will soon be coming to an end.

Six Semesters Down, One To Go

2007-12-28T16:38:00.000-08:00

I finished out this fall semester in a very busy, but good state. 18 credits is a lot during finals, especially with 4 studio classes and a real nasty final in art history. Ultimately everything came together nicely and I ended up with some nice final projects and a solid final review.

In Drawing into Print my final consisted of a series of three etchings called Marching On, which deals with the concepts of before, during, and after, moments of conflict. I also chose to manufacture a wooden box to hold the prints.

MARCHING ON

BEFORE

DURING

AFTER

Etching, with its reliance on dark obsessive line work has a lot of interesting things to contribute to my work, and after after struggling with printmaking all semester this final has made me excited to continue next semester when I take beginning etching. I should also say that Goya's and Kiki Smith's prints were influential in this series and in my enjoyment of printmaking as a whole.

In Digital Drawing we completed two smaller projects for our final. First I made a few new digital works, this time incorporating images from my paintings. This was particularly interesting because I could completely rearrange the narratives and color schemes. I think further mixing of digital techniques will become very important in the my development of both medias.POLITICS

Second I made another short animated film. In this film a I tried to create a more complicated scene both technically, in that characters changed scale and interacted with the environment , and in narrative, in that the film has multiple characters interacting in different ways, and it has a surprise ending.

ROBO INVASION

Finally in my review for painting I put up all my paintings and drawings, including a few new ones I don't have images of yet, some of my prints, and I even showed a couple films. Our visiting reviewers were, John Baker, Nancy Davies, and Laurel Sparks. Overall my crit went very well, people were obviously into the work and interested in spending some time with it, which is always my main goal and is always nice to see. Most people seemed interested in the conceptual issues of my work and the ways I went about framing and composing the narratives, though there was some discussion of enlarging my scope to an actual societal scale instead of focussing on just one or two figures. This is a good point, but I wouldn't want to lose the relatable human element of the works as they are now. I want viewers to be able to interact with the pieces on a personal level, imagining themselves in the paintings. One thing people thought would help draw viewers in was my use of color being both candy coated and neon. This was nice to hear since I feel like I've been struggling with color, but I still think I need more complex combinations and diverse use of tertiary colors. The main suggestion for improvement was that my paint should get physically thinker and more active in-order for it to operate in the same way that my narratives and colors are. I have some mixed feelings about this because a lot of my inspiration comes from art that strictly controls its materials, like comic books, cartoons, and Japanese wood blocks. That being said I defiantly think I need to experiment with it, trying to find finesse in excess. Time to go look at Guston and Basquiat.

Show Posters

2007-11-19T04:54:00.000-08:00

Here are the flyers for Erin and my show. The name of the show is Double Doubler and the closing reception is on November 26th, starting at 6:30. The show is hung in the installation station on the 2nd floor of the Kennedy building at MassArt from November 18th to December 1st. Everybody come see it!

Hung A Show

2007-11-19T04:48:00.000-08:00

For the next two weeks My friend Erin and I have a show up in the installation station on the second floor of the Kennedy building. We spent all morning Sunday setting it up and it looks really great. It is nice to see your work in a properly cleaned and lit space, and its made me even more excited about my paintings as whole.

Painting Process

2007-11-19T04:41:00.000-08:00

TWICE IN A LIFETIME

This is most recently completed paintings. This painting may be the point I want the color to go to, but I feel like something is still unresolved in the paint-job. Overall I like this piece a lot. The three pictures show different steps in the process of making this painting.

Finished My Big Painting

2007-11-19T04:36:00.000-08:00

CALL ME

This weekend I took the time to finally complete The large painting I started over two months ago. I like the finished product, but I've changed several things in the way i go about making paintings since starting this piece and I don't think it still reflects what Ik want my paintings to be.

Color Trials

2007-11-19T04:22:00.000-08:00

TOO MUCH TIME

CHRISTMAS IN JULY

SPEAK TO ME BABE

These are three painting I finished over the weekend. I was really trying to push the color in them to pop and reflect the intensity and bizarreness of the concepts and narrative. I'm pretty happy with the way they turned out, but I think I could push the color even farther and also be a little more purposeful with my mark making.

I'm on YouTube

2007-11-18T21:08:00.000-08:00

In Digital Drawing Fred had us make a series of short films from our work in Photo shop. I chose to create several short animated films and have now uploaded them to my YouTube account. Making these pieces was hard work, but also a lot of fun, and got me back to one of my first serious artistic mediums when I was taking Animation for young people with Sharon. WARNING these films are more graphic and stupid then most of my other work, enjoy.

Midterm Crit

2007-11-18T20:57:00.000-08:00

I had my Midterm critique about two weeks ago and overall it went very well. People were interested in my work and had a lot to say about it, and even got into argument with each-other about it completely independent of me, which is always a good sign. People were interested in the narrative and concepts of the paintings but saw chances for improvement in the way I go about painting them, specifically the way I use color. Unfortunately there was less consensus about what I should actually do with the color, some wanting it to be more balanced and naturalistic, while others, like Roger and our TA Michael, said I should push my color to uncomfortable extremes. Right now I'm inclined to pursue more intense color, knowing that I can always step back if it becomes to much.

Painting From Digital

2007-11-18T20:41:00.000-08:00

GHOST YELL

As a part of Digital Drawing we had to create a real world version of one of our 100 digital pieces. This is an oil painting I did by printing out a color print of the digital image, pasting it to panel and then painting directly on top of the image. Its a technique I borrowed from my studio-mate John Skibo, who can paint photorealistic when he wants to. The process was very different from what I'm used to, but it wasn't very difficult, just time consuming, and my results look a lot like the digital version, which was my goal. I actually did two of these but currently only have pictures of the one, I'll try to add images of the other later.

Messing Around with Abstraction

2007-11-18T20:28:00.000-08:00

ROOM 237

MAN CRUSH

These are two paintings I made as a part of the painting-a-day assignment. Creating them involved scraping dried up paint from my pallet on to them with my pallet knife and then painting back into them. I'm interested in them because they are both strong compositionally and because I think the physically violent paint job has something to give to my other work. At the same time I'm hesitant to abandon the figure and more literal rendering for fear of losing the narrative element, which I feel is key to my work.

A GIANT New Pallet

2007-11-18T20:15:00.000-08:00

I built myself a new pallet with some glass from an old picture frame. It is around 3' by 4' and about three times bigger then my older pallet. This is something Roger has been telling me to do since last year, and now I wish I had listened to him a lot sooner. Having this much space is really great for me because it allows me to mix a ton of color ahead of time instead of having to mix new colors as I paint, this save me time, and more importantly keeps my color cleaner and more intense. Also there is something really satisfying filling the sheet of glass with sweet colors.

Two Small Paintings

2007-11-18T20:01:00.000-08:00

Furthur

How to Talk to Children

These are two small paintings I completed a few weeks ago. I like the way both paintings deal with varying use of texture and color. The painting Furthur in particular has some nice weird neons, which I find pretty interesting.

A Mess of Under-Paintings

2007-11-18T19:40:00.000-08:00

DIG IN

A MELDING OF MINDS

CHRISTMAS IN JULY

ALL'S FAIR

CAPTAIN SAVE A HOE

TWICE IN A LIFETIME

IT'S A LIVING

BREW HA HA

I GOT IT I GOT IT

These are a bunch of of under-paintings I completed as a part of the painting a day assignment. They are all on panel and most are relatively small, none are bigger then 2' by 2'. My main goals with these were to create interesting compositions while pushing the narrative elements to be more compelling and bazar. Also I developed titles for several of them during the process of creating them, the titles are underneath the respective paintings.

Paint Suit

2007-11-18T19:34:00.000-08:00

I bought a pair of Dickies coveralls, they're pretty great.

Two More Paintings

2007-10-22T12:06:00.000-07:00

These are two new paintings I worked on on friday. Neither is entirely done, but both are pretty far along. My main focus on the these was making the color and value work in dynamic and unusual ways while at the same time walking the line between interesting and ambiguous.

First Small Painting

2007-10-05T14:07:00.000-07:00

Today I focussed on one of the compositions I drew out on Wednesday; I think its title is "Don't Be A Stranger". I prepared a lot of colors ahead of time so I could move quickly, and for the most part I think it worked despite a few muddy areas. There are a lot of interesting things going on in this painting that I hope to continue and evolve in other paintings. i should get plenty of chances to do this seeing as Roger just assigned 31 paintings in 31 days, starting tomorrow.

Collages

2007-10-05T14:01:00.000-07:00

These are a series of of collages Roger had us make for my drawing into paint class. I still have several more to do, but here are already interesting things happening in the simplified forms and compositions.

New Under-paintings

2007-10-05T13:47:00.000-07:00

On Wednesday I started a series of new paintings on smaller pieces of panel. I moved quickly from one to the next getting the basic compositions and then slightly more detailed under-paintings. I am excited about how quickly I was able to throw together these compositions and now I just need to keep moving fast and free into the color.

More Work On The Big Painting

2007-09-25T17:58:00.000-07:00

Today I squeezed a few extra hours of painting in between SGA meetings and working in the print shop. I still like the painting quite a bit, but it has kind-of gone in a direction I wasn't expecting, which is probably a good thing. It will be interesting to see what roger has to say about it tomorrow.

Digital Drawing

2007-09-24T19:52:00.000-07:00

Our first assignment in Digital Drawing is 109 drawings derived from one initial drawing. I've only got a few done so far, but am enjoying them. I am pretty much completely new to Photoshop, which we are using to make all these drawings, and while I've picked up the basics there is still a lot left for to learn. Photoshop and Digital in general is nice because throw something interesting together very quickly, but it also can make you lazy and a really good piece of art always takes a serious investment no matter what the medium. Also, believe it or not I don't really like sitting in front of the screen for as long as a I need to to do this many drawings. The top image is my initial image, and ll the rest were derived from it. I took most of the images for them at the MFA, adding in a few images from google.

FIrst Color in the Big Painting

2007-09-24T17:40:00.000-07:00

On sunday I eventually made it into the studio and started mixing paint. Color is one of the last things in painting that I think really intimidates me because I know I can really mess it up and its not always easy to fix. The color in this painting definitely was intimidating me, and kinda still is, but things still went very well. I ended up working until midnight, when the studios close, and got quite a bit done. As far as what I'm trying to achieve in the paint-job, I still want active brush-marks, but with more structure then most of the ink drawings and engaging color, which mean being careful not to muddy and smear my paint to much. Right now my favorite part is the off white mountain side on the left, and I don't really hate any of it.

Japanese Woodblock Prints at the MFA

2007-09-24T17:24:00.000-07:00

One really great thing about Mass Art is that its right next door to the excellent Museum of Fine Arts Boston or the MFA. One really great thing about the MFA is its collection of Japanese and Chinese art. Currently they have a show, of Japanese woodblock prints, up called "Women of Renown: Female Heroes and Villains in the Prints of Utagawa Kuniyoshi (1797-1861)" that is really amazing. Work like this has been influencing my work for at least a year and really some of my personal favorite types art. The combinations of line work, pattern and simple color are gorgeous and the compositions and storytelling are really entertaining and in most cases just bizarre. Here is an online preview of the show.

Start of First Painting

2007-09-22T09:55:00.000-07:00

Following the success of the large scale drawing I've started my first real painting, and its big. This time I bought my own panel and gessoed it white before starting. ALso I did a small preparatory sketch before starting, which the painting has diverged from significantly. I think I pretty much have the under painting done and will move into color this weekend. I anticipate some challenges in this since I don't feel like I have ever mastered color, also I need to allow myself to the freedom to drastically change the composition as I add color, which could become a mess.

Large Scale Black and White Drawing

2007-09-22T09:52:00.000-07:00

Both Roger and my studio-mate Rose Sargent challenged me to make a much larger version of the drawings I showed in the last post. The idea scared the shit out of me because so much can change with scale, but once I started it went really easy and I really enjoy the current state of the drawing. I started it on a large piece of panel which already had someone else's big colorful painting on it. I painted over this, first with watered down black acrylic, and then filled in with white gesso, toning it to different grays in places.

New Sumi Ink Drawings

2007-09-22T09:49:00.000-07:00

In the first week or so of school I produced a bunch of ink drawings on paper in an effort to get back into the habit of creation as well as get some of the ideas I had had over the summer out into the real world. I think these are already a big step forward from the drawings from last year for several reasons. They have a greater range of value and pattern in mark making; they are more complex conceptually, dealing with more than just human forms; and their compositions deal with the entirety of the piece of paper.

Back to School

2007-09-22T09:44:00.000-07:00

So now I'm back in Boston and a few weeks into the first semester. This year I'm living with my friend Noel and her husband Tony, about halfway between BU and BC on the B line, at 1683 Commonwealth Ave, Brighton, MA, Apt 3. So far its been really great, our apartment is nicely sized and well furnished thanks to some sweet wedding presents and some good collecting skills on Noel and Tony's parts (Look at my sweet four-post bed and stereo system!). Also it takes 15-25 minutes to ride my bike to school and there is a Trader Joe's at right about the half way point, which is kinda perfect. Noel and Tony are a lot of fun to live with, as they have good taste in books, music, movies, and beer, also they like to cook as well so we have stopped buying things like bread, making it ourselves instead, which is both delicious and economical. Another thing that made moving in really nice was a visit from Len, Kathy, and Sean Burt, which was a really great break from the stress of starting up school and also led to me eating the best four pieces of steak in my life and finally understanding superiority of beef to chicken (Thank-you!).
As far as School I'm back in Roger's studio and also taking Drawing into Paint with him. I also have a Drawing into Print class and a digital Drawing Class as well a art history course on American art from colonial to 1940. My classes with Roger are the most important, my print and digital classes are going to be interesting because I almost no experience in either area, and the history class will provided some insight into some usually overlooked art that might actually have a lot to do with my own paintings.

Summer

2007-09-22T09:38:00.000-07:00

This summer I went home to portland and had a really awesome time. Most of it was spent working construction for may dad, building a new house with my friend Sean, my brother Camden and several of his friends. It was hard work, but it was also really interesting, and fun working with all the other guys. Portland was a lot fun and I got to hang out with some people I hadn't seen in while, which was really nice. I also had really good time with my dad and his bitchin' girlfriend Shanna. I didn't get much art done, but sometimes you need a break and it doesn't seem to have hurt my productivity so far this semester. So overall a really good few months. I'd like to show some pictures of the construction or some Wii bloopers, but I don't have those so here are some of my beard which I started about a month into the summer, my goal is something like cezanne. Also my bother is now attending Bard college and taking several art classes, he has a blog, already most of it is really good and has a much better title then mine, but why not an art school?

Final Paintings

2007-09-22T09:33:00.000-07:00

These three paintings were my last paintings of the semester and, I think, show a major step forward in my paintings. Both were created through a process of mental collage which I now rely on for almost all of my work. This basically means I throw my compositions together through a series instinctual quick decision, relying on the internet to fuel this process and provided reference images. That being said only about half of the imagery in the paintings rely on reference photos. For me this process is a way of exploring one's thought process as he moves through the internet, using links and google searches, to move from one burst of information to the next, inadvertently creating his own personal reality out of the synthesis of many different realities. In exploring this process I hope to make art that is relevant to contemporary post-modern America. I know this sounds overly complex, but the basic idea came to me while on You-tube, moving from a video of US soldiers raiding a Iraqi house, to a clip of a teenage girl singing along to a Pixies song, to film of a skate boarder messing up a trick and breaking his arm, to a small white kitten struggling to stay awake. After seeing all these images in less then 5 minutes I had to sit back consider, "What is this society that can create so many seemingly completely different scenes, and what dose it mean that I must consider them as a whole and attempt to make some sense of them?" So anyway these paintings are where this conceptualism first emerged and it continues to be central to my art making. Overall I think these are the most interesting and successful paintings I made all year, and probably ever, so that's good.

More ink drawings

2007-09-22T09:26:00.000-07:00

This is a random group of ink drawings I was doing around the end of the semester. I find them interesting because they show a lot of imagery and compositional similarities with my last paintings of the semester, and the work I have started this semester.

Illustration Final

2007-09-22T09:23:00.000-07:00

Our final in illustration was a large painting that told a story and dealt with light and color in a realistic manor. I chose to do a painting of one solider dragging another through the mud in Iraq, based of a series of photos from the NYT's website. What I like most about this painting is how I was able to include much more active brushwork, very similar to my ink drawings, while at the same time avoiding the cartoony look that sometimes holds my drawings back. Unfortunately I think the painting reads as being very flat and a little boring due to the uniformity of color and value.

Illustration Portraits

2007-09-22T09:22:00.000-07:00

The last few assignments before my final project in illustration were portraits. The first is a portrait of my illustration teacher in cowboy costume, which i think is freaking hilarious, and the second is a painting of myself as a literary character, in this case Frodo Bagins, which is probably the funniest thing I've ever painted. These are my favorite paintings from the class, because they show a much improved understanding of light, color and value, and because I think the humor I found in them has become an increasingly important part of my painting now.

Tintareto Copy

2007-09-22T09:20:00.000-07:00

Roger , seeing my struggles with composition and color, assigned a Tintareto copy for me to do. Again I worked form my computer screen and completed it rather quickly. This painting made me think more about the rhythm of mark making as it interacts across the whole canvass, as well as some basic things about color and value. It definitely has a lot of room for improvement, but it also upped my confidence and general understanding a little bit more.

Bucktooth

2007-09-22T09:15:00.000-07:00

This painting was done as sort of a first step towards what I had envisioned during my earlier dream. Instead of collaging photos I worked from a single photo I found on the internet. The picture is of a female soldier standing next to a Humvee destroyed in and explosion. I choose this photo because it dealt with war in an interesting way and because the explosion allowed me to invest in color and texture in a way, not usually found in a in realism, that also related directly to the more active ink drawings I had done before. I like this painting a lot and I think it has influenced every painting I've done since. Also I think its important to note that I worked directly from my computer screen instead of printing the image out.

Restarting over and over again

2007-09-22T09:14:00.000-07:00

So obviously I have not touched this thing in a long time, which is unfortunate but it happens. I plan on posting pretty regularly again now that I'm about a month into my Senior year here at Mass art, but first I need to catch up to the present. I'm going to quickly fill in the remaining parts of my Junior year, with probably less text then normal, then talk a little about what I did this summer and then start posting about this year much like I have before, but hopefully more often and more consistently.

Dream Process

2007-03-16T06:11:00.000-07:00

I just had a dream where I was inside my painting studio and I was discussing a artistic process to two others in the studio. It was two guys working together on a painting, I don't know who they were and in retrospect its not really important, what is important is the artistic process which we discussed and explained in detail. This process was to take a camera, I pretty sure it was a normal film camera, and take multiple pictures of a scene. In the dream it was a scene of a man laying by the side the road where the man dominated the bottom of the image and the weeds and bushes next to the road controlled the the top. The multiple pictures were all similar compositions, but things were different in each, the man changed poses and clothing, the picture was taken in different spots to change the background. Taking all the photos they were then collaged together into one image which was then turned into a painting. In the final image the man had extra limbs and the ground was mishmash of different colors and textures, all of this was assembled in such a way as to strengthen the formal aspects of the composition while elaborating on the visual impact of the initial images. In the dream this was not actually my art, but looking at it I realized how smart it was and at the end of the dream I was talking about how I needed to go get a cheap film camera and start taking a lot of photos in-order to do a similar process. Now that I've woken up and thought a little about the dream I think there is a lot I can get out of it. Right now my two big problems are color and composition. The process described above clearly addresses both of these problems; color can be derived from the photos and composition can be perfected through collage. Also some interesting narrative starts happening with the background, multiple limbs, and use of clothes. Right now I think I will definitely pursue some art based around these idea, but there is a couple ways I could see this going. The first idea is to pretty much do the process described in the dream, taking pictures of myself and/or friends and collaging to create a image to paint from. My second idea is to take pictures of strangers in public spaces like the subway, city streets, or parks. I like this idea because during my commutes I usually end up people watching for faces or poses I'd like to paint, and I think my current work is heavily informed by the body language I see on the subway. The other idea I had was to go back to the issue of war but this time use photos to help inform my understanding. I was thinking specifically of all the photos taken by the actual soldiers fighting. Conceptually this last idea is exciting for several reasons. This is the first time the public has access to so many images taken by actual soldiers in actual war-zones pretty much as its happening, so the public can see experiences of soldiers through the eyes of the soldiers, and it could be very interesting to examine this through painting. Also I could do similar work without focusing on Iraq, by using other peoples photos off of websites like flikr. Another thought I had was that I probably want to use a digital camera or digital images instead of film because digital images have much more to do with the current visual language of society. So yah a lot of thinking to have going on from 7:00 to 8:30 in the morning, I'm not sure where this will go, but I'm excited.

Self Portrait for Illustration

2007-03-10T19:55:00.000-08:00

Today I completed a self portrait for my illustration class. The assignment was a larger then life portrait from a mirror with natural light. Overall I'm very happy with it, even though the nose is way too small. What I was really focussing on was the skin tones and I think I was pretty successful with them. Hopeful I can carry some of that color into my other paintings.

Two New Compositions

2007-03-10T06:56:00.000-08:00

Over the past week I've ben working on two 4' by 3' canvasses, one vertical and one horizontal. The goal with these two is to finally evolve the drawings into actual finished paintings. So far I think I've approached this problem sort of half-hazardly, trying to capture the same impromptu energy of the drawings, but the truth is I always work better when I have some sort of plan and paintings are significantly more complicated then drawings. So my plan was / is to do that Jenny Saville copy to boost my color confidence, while at the same time sketching out possible compositions for the paintings. During European history I did two quick sketches that I then refined into the two ink drawings below. Using the Ink drawings and the first sketches I then did the final drawings on the canvasses. Each time I changed a few things and I'm pretty happy with the final compositions I have to work with now. Visually I am trying to make interesting compositions through the poses of multiple figures in a rather flat space. Conceptional there isn't any refined message, but the paintings deal with human interaction, and specifically the play between independence and dependence. Now I have to take a break from these to work on a large self portrait for my illustration class, but I'm excited to get back to them and maybe start more similar paintings.

Jenny Saville Copy

2007-03-03T15:07:00.001-08:00

After my messy paint job on my last piece I decided a good way to clean it up an gain some control over color would be do a study from Jenny Saville. I really admire Saville's combination of brush work and color along with a lot of other things. I chose to work from a close up of a hand from a book dad got me for christmas. I started doing under-painting in raw umber and then laid down color as I saw it, doing the hands first and then tightening up the edges with the surrounding colors. It took most of last Wednesday, but it was fun and I'm really happy with the results. I think I learned a lot and gained some confidence as far as color and painting process goes. So now I'm really ready to jump into some actual painting.

First Real Painting Attempt

2007-03-03T14:41:00.000-08:00

So I finally listened to all my class mates and teachers and started a painting without any real planning and just kept working on through it, and the results were mixed. The composition came out fairly interesting, but the color got a little thick and muddy and I ended-up scrapping of quite a bit of paint at the end of the day. That being said it felt good to paint all day on one piece, and the composition is interesting so I will go back into it after I refine my paint technique.

Ground Through Mark-making

2007-03-03T14:18:00.000-08:00

One of my friends is in an Islamic/ Middle Eastern Art history class and flipping through one of her books I found several drawings I found really interesting. These drawings combined finely illustrated figures on almost abstract backgrounds. Most of this art values pattern over illusionary depth, color, and form. This leads to some really interesting and unusual images, which I decided to mimic in a few drawings and a painting. The concept here is that the when I'm making the figures I'm focussing on the individual marks over anything else, so when I go into the backgrounds I thought continuing to focus on the marks would be interesting. I like how the drawings turned out, with the figures interacting and moving through the marks. The painting was less successful because color made it too confusing. So I'm still trying to figure out a way to move into painting.

Starting Paintings

2007-02-11T19:24:00.000-08:00

I've started two smaller paintings in an attempt to capture some of the same energy and aesthetics of my drawings in paint form. I approached both in a similar way to my drawings, with no preconceived plan and a limited palette. So far I like them, their compositions aren't perfect, but there is something interesting going on in both. Now I just have to decided how much I want to add to finish them. Part of me wants to leave them pretty much as is, but I foresee plenty of work left on both. There is a lot of things going into these paintings and the drawings before them that I haven't really gone into yet, but I will soon, its just to late right now.

New Brick Drawings

2007-02-11T19:08:00.000-08:00

I started this semester by doing a ton of new drawing, pushing the technique and imagery farther. I wasn't really to take on paintings right away so most these were really just doodles where I was practicing my form work, and was playing around with the materials and poses. I feel like I'm getting better, and have made plenty I like a lot, but it is still kinda hit or miss. Eventually I got around to developing a few into more-finished compositions, and now Roger wants me to move into paint. Also these weird spirt figures have shown up in my drawings and I can't explain them.

New Semester and New Studio

2007-02-11T19:06:00.000-08:00

So at the end of last semester I was able to convince Mass Art to switch from Sophomore level painting to Junior. This is really awesome because it means I will probably graduate in a year and that I get to move into a new higher level studio. My new studio is taught by Roger Tibits and he is really good and has already been very helpful. My new studio mates are also really awesome. Most of them are Seniors and all of them are really into their art and spend a lot of time in the studio, which is inspiring and a little intimidating. Below are some pictures of the studio as a whole and my new work space. Both are a mess, but that just means we're doing work.

Here I go again,

2007-02-11T17:48:00.000-08:00

So last semester when finals hit I didn't really have time to sleep or eat, so posting on this blog stopped. Now I've had my winter break and been back in school at Mass. Art for about a month and I figured it was time to get this going again. So first I'll cover the end of last semester. After the Fifty drawings I continued to push towards them becoming paintings. For my final in Wet Drawing I blew two of them up into large sumi ink drawing, done with a brush.

These drawings were are the same size as the paintings I would make next.
With the paintings I first blocked them out in burnt umber and then came in with more color afterwards. WIth the blocking in I pulled bits a pieces from all of my drawings to get my final compositions.

For the largest canvas I ended up making an entirely new composition.

I filled the backgrounds in first and then the figures

I see these paintings as a big step forward, but with a long ways left to go. They deal with the figure in really strong ways, they are well drawn, and the compositions are for the most part solid and interesting. Unfortunately the paint job is still lacking. The real problem is I treated my painting as a coloring book, drawing the lines first and then filling in the color one area at a time. His is a really bad way to paint and leads to disjointed paintings, which is what I have. That being said I have learned a tone from these paintings and the experience of pour hour after hour into them is one I will not forget. As for the semester as a whole, I am really happy with Mass Art. Thing have turned out great here and I really feel supported in my artistic development . I'm really excited to see where I go in the next year and a half.

50 Drawings

2006-11-30T18:26:00.000-08:00

For wet drawing today I turned in a set of 50 drawings that I did over a 10 hour period yesterday. The set is divided into 5 series of 10 with the intention being that each series explores compositions for my five larger canvasses. So each composition is intended for a particular canvass which is why some of them are cropped. As far as subject matter I knew I wanted to do figurative stuff that also had an element of narrative. This is the general direction I've been heading in for a while now ever since my last blob painting, which was pretty, but not very interesting, because it lacked composition and the human element. These drawing (and most of my work this year) are an intentional effort to address those problems, and it has lead me in a very new direction. To start each series I used a lot of reference images from National Geographic, but these were really just starting points for poses. Through the course of making each series edited most of the poses, combined images, and changed the people into my own characters. For the most part I really excited about the drawings I got from this assignment. It was hard work to make 50 drawings and my motor skills definitely started to fail me at the end, but I got at least a couple strong drawing from each series (not all of which are pictured) and I feel confident in translating them onto the canvasses and starting my final paintings.

6 Canvasses Done

2006-11-28T09:25:00.000-08:00

Before thanksgiving I stretched canvass on 6 of my 8 stretcher bars

In the process I got a nice blister
Yesterday I painted the first coat of gesso on the stretched canvases, and now I have to sand them smooth and put a second coat, hopefully this should happen today.

Stretcher Bars!

2006-11-19T05:04:00.000-08:00

Yesterday I spent most of the day building stretcher bars. A friend from my studio drove us over to Home Depot and then carried the wood to school. Then we took it down to Mass Art's excellent wood shop. I had never actually seen the shop before since its hidden in the basement of east building, but it was amazing. It had lots of great tools, and lots of workspace, making it perfect for building stretcher bars. The picture below shows just how big it is, and there is a whole other room next to the one pictured. To make the stretchers I bought 2*4 wood that I first ripped in half at a 25-degree angle. I then cut all the sides for the stretchers with a 45-degree miter for the corners. The stretchers are made with the sharp edge from the first rip up so that the canvass will only touch a small portion of wood. After I had cut all the pieces I glued and clamped each corner. After they dried I used finishing nails to reinforce each corner. I spent $14 on wood and after a day of work I have 8 canvasses, most of them over 30*30, this is kind of ridiculous considering a 30*30 canvass in a store can easily cost $35. I still have to stretch and prime the canvases, which will take some time, but overall I'm thrilled with how much I got done yesterday. Now i just have top paint 8 paintings over the next 4 weeks.

Figure painting 4

2006-11-16T16:19:00.000-08:00

So we did another all day pose in painting this wensday. I'm not quite as happy with this painting as I was with my last, it feels a little less polished, but there are still areas, like the torso, which I like a lot. One thing that was struggle for me, no surprise, was the background, there is just so much going on that I can't even begin to render it without losseing valuable time on the figure. This can be resolved with simplified backgounds and longer poses, but those things ar not going to happen in this class so I need to find other solutions. I'm not sure, but this may have been our last model for this semester. It's a scary thought but finals a quickly aproaching.

Completed Book

2006-11-16T09:40:00.000-08:00

Last night I bound my earlier drawings and gave them a cover. It was a process that really intimidated me, but after a few mistakes I got it right. Overall I really like how they drawings gain a whole new strength by being assembled into a book. Unfortunately its a little hard to capture in just two photos, but the images bellow show what the book looks like opened to two different pages.

Starting Gaugain Copy

2006-11-13T20:07:00.000-08:00

Today I started my Gauguin copy in painting. I spent most of my time picking the painting and then figuring out the conversions for translating it form the book to my canvass. I still had time to start blocking in the main figure, and I'm already happy with it. Obviously the proportions still need quite a bit of work, but like the pose and the way Gauguin brings it to life with very simple lines.

Bodyworlds

2006-11-12T18:13:00.001-08:00

This weekend I visited the Boston museum of science to see a traveling exhibit called Bodyworlds 2. This exhibit contains many preserved human bodies and body parts that are prepared using a technique called plastination and rearranged to reveal their anatomy. I went because I was interested in the visual impact of anatomy and because of the artistic tradition, going back to Michelangelo, of figure painting based on first hand knowledge of anatomy. I have studied anatomy through books and own one that has actual photos of bodies and organs, but seeing them in person and in three dimensions was completely different and a truly striking experience. On one level it was fascinating to see how muscles, tendons, and bone, fit together in real space, and it is undeniable that the way the human form has been arranged and displayed here is visually powerful. But at the same time the idea that this exhibit is making a spectacle of the bodies of around twenty people and animals who are dead is troubling, and more then just a little bit. Overall I am glad I went, the things I saw were incredible and beautiful, and this is the only way I could have seen them, but I am still unhappy with they way it has become a sort of tourist attraction instead of place of learning. Below are some pictures I found online because they would not allow photos in the exhibit, and this is a video which does a really god job of showing what it was like walking around the exhibit.

Fight Book

2006-11-12T17:16:00.000-08:00

I've continued to develop the ink brick drawings I posted a few weeks ago. I make a few drawings every time I'm in the studio and for the most part they are still working well and very interesting for me in the way I can play around with expressive figures. Now I've made 6 drawings for a book assignment in my Wet drawing class with Barbara. The book is titled FIGHT, and it inspired by ideas I was having about Iraq and conflict in general. Below are three of the six drawings and now I need to figure out how to bind it.

Figure painting 3

2006-11-12T17:08:00.000-08:00

In painting we did another six hour figure painting session, this time with a female model. I didn't entirely complete my painting, but I still very happy with it. At this point I feel confident in my ability rendering the human form from life and i'm thrilled with how far i've coem since my first atempt. Now I want to start working on complete paintings that integrate what I've learned from painting the figure. I hope to work more on this in the next assignment in painting which is copping a master. I plan on copying a Gauguin who dose a very good job incorporating the figure into a complete composition and finished painting.

Figure painting 2

2006-10-28T12:23:00.000-07:00

Wednesday in painting we did another whole day figure painting session. This one went much better for me. I used some preparation techniques I read about in a Ruben's book where I under-painted with a brown yellow middle tone, which latter I let show through in parts of the skin. I drew the figure with a burnt umber and then filled in from dark to light, coming in with touches of extra color in the eyes last. I think my figure is very successful, my background still needs work, but overall I'm happy with the painting.

Ink Brick Drawings

2006-10-28T12:15:00.000-07:00

Using a technique I discovered in wet drawing I have made a series of drawings that are exciting and I see a lot of possibilities for expanding them in to more drawings and hopefully paintings. The technique is one where I use a chinese ink brick, but instead of grinding it up in water to make ink, I dip it in water and use in like a pice of charcoal. This allows for a very cool combo between the drawn line and the liquid action of ink. The drawings are entirely figurative, exploring physical movement and more specifically physical conflict. I have been think about the Iraq war more often and I think these drawings are about that. Overall I think the successful drawings are really interesting aesthetically and emotionally powerful, but not every drawing works, some just look like doodles, and I'm still confused about how to turn them into paintings which will have more structure and have to deal with color.

Art History Blog

2006-10-28T12:01:00.000-07:00

Despite my inability to update this blog regularly I have started a second art blog, this one focussing on art history. Basically I trying to make up for not having a art history class this semester by doing my own exploration into artist, looking for those that I particularly like and who can influence my work. Here it is.

Figure Painting

2006-10-19T18:01:00.000-07:00

In Wensday painting we had a model in a single pose for all six hours. At CCA when this happened I would eitheir ignore her (its always a her at CCA) and work on somthing else, or quickly abstract the figure into something else. But this time the assingment was to render true to life. I hadn't done painting from the figure like that since junior year of highschool, four years ago, so I was a little intimidated, but also excited to try somthing new. The truth was it wasn't extremly difficult, the painting techniques I've picked up apply to this just like they did to the still lifes. I wish I had more time to difine the image, and put in any background, but the figure itself is succsesful. I'd like to try this again and push my self to move faster, which I know I can do. Overall i happy with the figure, but wish it was more complete as a painting.

Paper Still-Lifes

2006-10-19T17:41:00.000-07:00

So over the past couple of weeks we have been working on still lifes in Painting. For mine I built my own still life out of brown and white buther paper. This allowed me to get some interesting shapes and compositions, while at the same time limiting my color so I could focuss on form. These weren't the most interesting paintings to do, but the finished works were succesful. The paint job is solid and I was able to use color affectivly to give a sense of form. Durring a crit a clasmate said they really looked like folded paper, so thats good because I expected some confussion as far as the subject. Also Fanni thought they looked nice. The first two pictures are my paintings and the last picture is a real image of my still life, but it has fallen apart since I did my paintings.

Self-Portrait Paintings

2006-09-20T18:10:00.000-07:00

So I’ve painted three self-portraits, The first from a picture, the second from a mirror and the third also from mirror, but this time painted in a single hour. All three are monochromatic with burnt umber and titanium white; the first two our on canvass and the last is on canvass board. I pretty happy with my results, I haven’t done a portrait of any type since being a freshmen in high school. My proportions are not perfect, but the second one especially actually looks like me, and I feel like I’ve gained a lot of skill and confidence from the process.

Ikea Funz!

2006-09-20T18:00:00.000-07:00

My Aunt Phani, who is kindly letting me stay in her and uncle Jon’s house, got a big Ikea Wardrobe. So I got to spend several nights last week in Ikea Construction Bliss!

Self-Portrait Sketches

2006-09-20T17:54:00.000-07:00

Here are my first sketches in preparation for two self-portrait paintings. I think they went ok, I like the small pen one the best, but damn my head is big.

New School and New Studio

2006-09-20T16:49:00.000-07:00

So I’ve started school and I’m enjoying it quite a bit. All my classes are interesting and look like they will challenge me and push me foreword. Here’s my class list:

Sophomore Painting
Wet Drawing
Literary Traditions
American Thought and Government.
Philosophy of Religion

This totals 18 credits because Sophomore Painting is nine hours long and worth six credits. My non-studio classes are interesting because they feel more like a normal university instead of an art school. This is not bad though because I think they will be more challenging and more interesting. I’m really excited about my painting class because it gives me my own personal studio space! This is a treat for a sophomore. I have a huge amount of space and I’m already filling it with paintings. The pictures below show my whole studio space and my desk where I’ve begun working on my first assignment, a self-portrait.

Cross-Country Extravaganza!

2006-09-20T16:39:00.000-07:00

After my semester off I applied to a school in Boston called Mass Art. Thanks to Jamima and Sydney I was accepted. Katie was accepted to a lot of schools, but she decided to attend Bard in New York state. This was all very exciting, but to go to school we had to get ourselves and our stuff from Portland to the east coast. And so we prepared for a cross-country extravaganza! The only problem was I didn't have my driver’s license. So after a couple failed attempts I ended getting my license the day before we started driving across country. Despite this the trip was amazing, it took us about ten days to get from Portland to Boston driveling the northern route along I -90. We camped in state parks every night except one where it rained and cooked all our food except for some amazing pizza in Katie’s hometown, Chicago. The trip was great and it ended with a weeklong Lobster Feast in Province town on Cape Cod with Katie's dad and sister. The perfect way to get ready for college.

A Semester Off

2006-09-13T19:58:00.000-07:00

After Last fall I decided to take a semester off to, work with my dad, spend more time with Katie, and see what making art on my own would be like like. Working with dad and spending time with Katie was amazing and great. You can see some pictures of different things from my semester off in My New Flickr Account! The break ended up being an amazing experience for me, the only down side was I did very little art, convincing me I still needed more time in art school.

The End of Fall Semester 2005

2006-09-13T19:44:00.000-07:00

That last semester ended in a very hectic manor. During Finals I was really strapped for time and sleep. But things must have gone alright because I ended up with mostly A's. I was also really happy with my final paintings, going with a blue background to finish my earlier painting and pulling an all-nighter to finish the second painting. Both turned out great and I think they are some of my best pieces yet.

This Blog Restarted

2006-09-13T19:34:00.000-07:00

So I haven’t touched this blog in almost a year, but now I’m going to bring it back to life. The next couple of post will give you and update on my situation and then it should be back to the old format, with me posting pictures of my art and other things and discussing my thoughts on it as I move through my career as an art student. Ok here goes nothing…

Photoshop Color Tests

2005-12-09T17:40:00.000-08:00

I tried using photo shop to test out colors for the background in my last painting and my two knew paintings which will have similar color schemes for the figure. I think this was a good idea because it really let me play around and get a feel for how the colors will interact with the panting. Obviously there will be a lot of differences between this and what it looks like when i paint it, but it is sill nice as sort of preview. Right now i;m leaning toward the blue which I think really makes the colors pop, but I still have a few days to decide.

Jenny Saville

2005-12-05T18:12:00.000-08:00

I’ve posted two of her paintings before but never identified her as the artist so no I will. Saville is a amazing painting of mostly female nudes portrayed in a way that is both grotesque and beautiful at once. While I can see how her paintings can be more then a bit unnerving, her paint job is just breathtakingly beautiful, I really hope to see one of her paintings in person in the next year.. She is my favorite current painter and the main reason I am interested in the London art scene.

Continued Exploration of Human Anatomy

2005-12-05T18:05:00.000-08:00

In the process of preparing for my final paintings of the year I’ve gone back t a lot of the Human Anatomy books I was looking at earlier. I see this not as a search for images to directly reference in my work, but instead as a kind of subconscious education project. Basically trying to build a stronger understanding of how organic things like muscle and fat fit together so that when I start to paint it will hopefully just be an automatic part of my decision making.

Note: These pictures are inverted because I think it shows how quickly the human form can be abstracted in something else.

Mammal Anatomy

2005-12-05T18:03:00.000-08:00

My paintings have lost any direct relation tot he human form for quite some time. Despite this it is still important to me that they retain some sort of order, some sort of possibility of being an living organism. Back when I was doing the squid paintings this meant looking at different aquatic life and other animals with tentacles. Now that my paintings are muscle/fat blobs again I have been looking at Mammal Anatomy. These animal forms maintain the feel of human body matter, while at the same time illustrating vastly different body structures. I think the tail of the Kangaroo and the legs of the horse are especially interesting.

Hogarth’s Continued Abstraction

2005-12-05T18:02:00.000-08:00

I think this drawing really shows how quickly Hogarth’s illustrations can move from representational to pure figurative abstraction. This is still a drawing of a bent knee, but invert it and it quickly becomes an abstract blob.

Revisiting Burne Hogarth’s Dynamic Anatomy

2005-12-05T18:01:00.000-08:00

I know I showed some of Hogarth’s drawings earlier on, but I keep going back to them before I start painting to build up some reference images in my head. Hogarth’s drawings captures much of what I am exploring in my paintings. His human forms are beautiful while at the same time very strange. Hogarth’s illustrations exaggerate the body in a way that is both strikingly inaccurate, and aesthetically appealing. He breaks the figure down into simple geometric shapes, in many ways simplifying the complexity of the human form through abstraction. Hogarth’s illustrations are meant to provide better understanding of the body, yet they achieve this by straying from the reality of the body. Conceptually this is where I see Hogarth and me being very similar. Like him I see my works as exploring the human form by abstracting it, I have just pushed the abstraction completely away from even representing a human form.

Finished?

2005-11-19T14:21:00.000-08:00

I continued work on my latest painting on Wednesday in Jacks and all day yesterday in Franklin’s. I worked from 9:00 to about five yesterday and pretty much finished the painting. I have filled out all the forms and got them to a finished point. Each form is well painted and all the forms together relate well to each other in both composition and color. I have gotten quite a bit of positive feedback from my classmates, which is really nice, because usually I feel like people don’t really know what to say about my work. I feel like this painting is a real breakthrough; I have taken these abstract “Anatomy Forms” Which have been filling my head for the past year and finally found a way to illustrate the beauty I see in them to others. Anther nice thing about this painting is a really like the process it takes to pain, moving from stress free pre production using the overhead projector, tot he freeform under painting to the delicate and precise modeling of color and light to create the finished paintings. So I see making a series of paintings similar to this one. The only problem with this painting for me is the background; unfortunately this is a big problem. I really don’t know how to paint the background without overpowering the figure, I really just want to keep it white, but I don’t think that will work.

Finished Toy Rendering

2005-11-17T12:35:00.000-08:00

Today I turned in my final chalk rendering in design drawing. It was the also the final part to the pull toy project. It took all night, but I t turned out really good. It's a really complicated drawing and really the only thing that looks off is the shadow. The crit. went great one kid said the craft of the toy shows in the craft of the drawing and Ian said seeing the level I have gotten to makes him feel like a good teacher. Probably worth getting only 2 and half hours of sleep, probably.

Painting continued in Jack's class

2005-11-14T16:27:00.000-08:00

Today in Jacks class I continued the painting I worked on in Franklins on friday. I had felt a little daunted by how slow it had gone on friday, but today I moved to larger forms in the painting and got a lot quicker while still maintaining the level of detail from friday. Jack announced a critique next monday so I would like to have the painting pretty much finished by then. Overall I really like the combination of the forms with the more detailed and warm color. I think it's making a painting that is not only kind of interesting and strange, but also kind of beautiful, which is cool because I don't think that's usually the case with my paintings.

A Sweet Time Painting in Franklins.

2005-11-11T17:59:00.000-08:00

Painting today was awesome. I got there early and got to work on the painting I started in Jack’s. I already knew I wanted a color scheme that mimicked Cézanne’s orange cliffs and roads so first thing I did was spent about a half hour mixing colors. This was a great idea because I maintained color consistency throughout the piece. Another thing that helped with the this is I tried to keep a different brush for each tone, one for white, one for the dark brown, one for the orange/yellows and a clean one for dry brushwork and blending. I worked slow and meticulously and really close to the canvass so I could get the brushwork and color perfect. I had to take regular breaks so I wouldn’t go crazy, but he product kept drawing me back. This is the first painting I have been really excited about since the two nudes and I think its because I finally getting to do all the things I had been think about while I finished other work and dealt with midterms. Anyway I’m pumped and will really try to paint more on it this weekend.

Note: The close-up is a little blurred.

Designing a Pull-Toy in DD

2005-11-11T17:52:00.000-08:00

This week in Design Drawing we started the design process for our final project, a wooden pull toy. First we drew a bunch of fast thumbnail sketches, then we did finished sketches of our nine best and finally did a sketch rendering of the sketch we want to do for the final. My final toy is going to be one of those deep-water fish with a light on its head to lure in prey. While I’m not really interested in the design process it was fun to dream up weird toys for kids and I like my rendering even if it’s a little rough.

Beginning a Painting with My New Process

2005-11-11T17:42:00.000-08:00

This week in Jacks class I Gessoed a new canvass and then used my new projecting technique to create under painting for my next piece. The gesso job was a little rough because the canvass was pre use, but I’m synched about the painting. To get the under painting I laid out a pretty random composition of acetate shapes. I tried to layer them pretty thick to get more interior complexity and I unlock most of my early blob paintings I chose to let this form float with no clear ground or resting point. I drew in the lines I liked and then modeled out the forms using Design Drawing knowledge and burnt umber paint. This allowed me to get a really cool musclely form that I can’t wait to paint. I feel like this process of projecting is going to make it much easier to get forms I like so I can focus on the important stuff like paint and color.

Final Primitive Rendering in DD

2005-11-11T17:34:00.001-08:00

Last week I turned in this rendering with a cube, cylinder, cone, and sphere. The drawing as far as perspective is really good, my craft is pretty nice, but the gradation is still a little rough. I fell like I’m really close to a perfect drawing. From now on my class is done with primitives and will be working on designing a wooden pull toy as our final project.

Developing a New Technique.

2005-11-11T17:22:00.000-08:00

Last Wednesday in Jack’s class I pushed my new projection technique a step further. While I liked that larger silhouette shapes I was getting with my first try I felt like the interiors were lacking the depth of complexity that I was getting on the edge of the shape. So this time I bought some clear plastic sheets called acetate and cut my smaller shapes out of it. When I put each plastic shape on the projector a clear out line of the shape would be projected with the interior of the shape being a little darker then the rest of the projection. What’s really cool about this process is what happens when I start overlapping shapes. With overlap the outline of each shape is still clear and the transparencies grow one step darker with each layer of plastic. The end product is a really cool grey scale abstract image that gives me a huge amount of material as far as, line, form, and composition, to build my drawings and paintings off of. So far I have only made drawings but the obvious next step is a painting.

New Step in Painting

2005-10-31T15:01:00.000-08:00

Today in Jack’s class I pursed an idea I had a few weeks ago. I made a bunch of paper cutouts of the anatomy/organ shapes that I keep creating in both 2d and painting. Then I took an overhead projector and blew up the shapes onto a larger piece of paper. I lade the anatomy shapes out on the projector so that they combined into a larger complete anatomy form; similar to the painting I did last year. After projecting the silhouette of this larger shape I drew it out on the larger piece of the paper using nupastel. I then built up the inside of the shape by creating rendered shapes using the techniques I’ve learned in Design Drawing. I Plan on using the drawings I got today as a sort of model for a painting I’ll start soon. I really like this technique because it lets me get a lot of details in the cutouts while at the same time giving me a chance to play around with the composition before I get the final painting. Another thing that’s really cool about this technique is that it uses things from my non-painting classes (silhouettes from 2d, and rendering from DD). I feel like this technique could be a real breakthrough for me and I’m interested to see what kind of paintings I can get out of it.

Scheduling For Spring Semester

2005-10-31T14:42:00.000-08:00

The class schedule for the spring semester has been released online which means I get to start planning out what classes I want to take. This is really a lot of fun for me because I get to read all the class descriptions, which are really exciting, and I get to plan out the whole future of my education because I need to make sure I’m going fulfill my BFA requirements. My first preliminary schedual is this:

DRAW0405 Anatomy 2 MW 8–11AM Perez, V.

CERM0400 Ceramics 1:Aesthetic Multiples TR 8–11AM Toki, J.

DRAW0402 Life Drawing 2 TR 4–7PM Bao, Y.

METH0602 Aspects of Critical Theory W 12–3PM Davids, K.

VIST0634 Object Since 1970 F 9–12PM Kastner, C.

VIST0607 Figurative Painting F 12–3PM Eige, H.

The Reception

2005-10-31T13:56:00.000-08:00

So in the middle of a very busy and stressful last week came the reception for my gallery show, and it was amazing. I got there early to set up the food. Derrick and Tia made a big chocolate cake and Allie made three plates of amazing vegan sushi. At first it was pretty empty and I was kind of worried that no one was going to show up, probably because I just showed up too early. Then Kathy and Len Burt showed up to see the show and helped me set up. And just as I put the last plate of sushi out a bunch of people came into the gallery. There were a lot of people I knew, but just many that I didn’t. It was really cool to see them walk around and look at our art, seeing which things caught people’s eyes and hearing what they had to say to each other about the art. After the first round of people showed up an even bigger group came in, probably because they had all heard that we had sushi and cake, but I like to think it was amazing art on the walls that brought all the people in. After about 20 mintues all the food was gone. By the last half hour the bulge of people had shrunk to a consistent trickle. It was really just a couple friends and us. This was probably the best part of the night, just hanging out and getting to just sit back and enjoy seeing our work on the walls. I was a little nervous about the show at first but it ended up being really great, definitely worth the extra stress during midterms. After the reception I went to 2d and then worked on Design Drawing until 2:00 in the morning, then I got up at 6:00 to catch the buss to SF.

Nature Paint by Numbers

2005-10-30T14:26:00.000-08:00

I haven’t written about Sydney’s class in a while, manly because I have been struggling on the midterm project, but now I finished it last Monday and just have to print it out today. The project was to take a photo and dived it into a four-value study using Photoshop. Each value area was to be filled in with usual materials that we got to chose. I decided to make mine out of a Jenny Saville photo and flowers and leaves as my pixels. At first I thought about using real flowers and leaves, but they would wilt to quick, then I went and got some fake flowers, but they didn’t have the detail I wanted. Finally I tried taking real flowers and leaves from around campus and then scanning them into the computer. This gave me same amazing pictures and the perfect textures I needed for the assignment. Unfortunately the final piece is to big upload to this page but you can see what one of the scans looked like and the study I based the final piece on.

Setting Up The Show

2005-10-25T22:49:00.000-07:00

This Sunday Tia, Justin, Allie, and I spent half the day setting up our art show. We started off a little slow, taking some time to get the tools we needed and preparing the work to be hung. But once we were all there and ready It really came together sweet. We sectioned off the walls into four areas and some space for food and a sign for the show. Im on the first wall to your right, Allies' stuff is on the right side of the wall facing the entrance, Tia's pieces are on the left and on the third wall and behind the staircase is Justin's work. All the pieces are pretty different, but still feels like a solid show when I walk around it. Most of all it looks just really cool to have all my stuff on a big wall with good light. I ended up hanging five pieces, which is more then I was expecting, including a brand new piece. This new piece is the one i stretched last weak from the drawing I did in Jack's. After stretching the canvas I started painting it in Franklins on friday. I then spent most of saturday working on it too. On sunday when I went to set up the show I was feeling really good about the new painting and so when we had the space I decided to put it up, even though it was still wet. And I'm really glad I did because it looks sweet and when I took Jack up to the show He said the painting was a really big jump for me and has a lot more solid energy, composition, and aesthetics. Anyway I'm really excited for the reception tomorrow (starts at 5:00) and to show the work to Franklin on friday. The show is definitely the lose of sleep and lack of time for homework.

Visiting Jack’s Studio

2005-10-19T13:46:00.000-07:00

This Morning our whole class drove up into the hills above school to visit Jacks studio at his house It was a nice place on an amazing piece of property and in the backyard he had built a large studio space where he and his wife paint. Both of them are photo realists with Jack focusing on depicting scenes of the upper middle class on vacation, usually by pools. Seeing his paintings and how he achieves photorealism from such a simple technique of projecting slides to get lines and then just looking at a photo to get color and just finishing one three square inch part of the painting every six hours is amazing. While photo-realism is not my favorite type of art, it is defiantly impressive and visually deep. It was also nice to talk to Jack about what its like to work as a successful artists and the steps it took him to get to that point. Basically Jack has figured out not only how to get paid to paint, but also how to get paid to go spend a lot of time at fancy poll resorts in places like Hawaii. Impressive

Note: both of these pictures are actually Jacks paintings.

Painting Midterm Critique

2005-10-19T13:31:00.000-07:00

Monday we had our midterm critique in Jack’s. Most of the work in the class is simple figure studies so discussion was somewhat limited, but I did enjoy hearing what other people had to say about my work. When I put all three pieces up I felt like the squid just fell apart next tot he figures, but not everyone agreed with that. Most liked the figures, but many saw a lot of interest in the squid as well. Jack said that I still needed to work on composition in the squid painting, but that I had a really good grasp of using the square in the figures. He also said that my color and brushwork and getting strong and that my paintings are very aesthetic. He said that they are almost purely visual and in some ways lack an extra emotional energy that he thinks I have, but that I’m not putting in he paintings. This was a real interesting comment for me because I know recently I have been trying to make my paintings purely visual, believing this was the most pure form of art, but at they same time I new I was lacking a cretin energy which is why I tried painting the figures, because I saw this energy in Picasso and Matisse’s paintings. But now that I think about it the energy of these pieces came more from the artist’s emotional investment in the art then in the portrayal of the figure alone. So now in my new paintings I will allow my self to form more free and abstract figures while at the same time trying to imbue them with the energy that I feel really makes the human body and human existence and life itself beautiful. Sounds tough.

Stretcher Bars Built

2005-10-19T11:44:00.000-07:00

Sunday I went to the wood shop and built stretcher bars for my loose canvass that I started in Jacks class. It went smoothly and was good fun. I miss working with wood and power tools, so it building the stretcher was satisfying; I even got to use a impact driver. In the picture you can see how I plan to lay out the canvass when I get around to stretching it. As far as the painting I’m really sure if I’m all that excited about squid anymore so I may just use the drawing as a starting point for a more abstract figure.

Finished Renderings

2005-10-19T11:36:00.000-07:00

So I have been real busy the last couple days with midterms and getting ready for the show and have not been posting, but I have been doing work. I finished my renderings for design drawing on Sunday. I’m really happy with them They are well drawn and rendered, only there craft as far as smudging needs work, but for my first try at real renderings I’m pumped. Also I’m feeling really good about the DD class because I know its improving my sketching skills, and Jack worked as a draftsmen before he could make a living of painting.

Design Drawing Rendering Reference Photos

2005-10-15T17:45:00.000-07:00

In Design Drawing we are rendering a composition of a cube and cylinder, here are two reference photos I took. Hopefully I'll have the finished drawing to show tomorrow.

Haircut

2005-10-15T16:16:00.000-07:00

Got a haircut.

Full Day of Friday Painting

2005-10-15T16:02:00.000-07:00

It was long day of painting this Friday in Franklin’s. I brought both of the female figurative paintings down to work on during class. My goal was to bring them both to completion, and after almost nine hours of painting I think I’m very close to achieving my goal. Painting went very smoothly, I knew what issues I wanted to deal with form the start and spent the rest of the day working through them. I struggled a bit with a few problems, but I was never frustrated, and I think I resolved most of problems I saw at the start of the day. It was really a lot of fun and I gave me a nice feel for what it may be like to make art after I’m done with school, and it was super nice. The paintings are looking real good now, I feel like I got the compositions pretty concrete, I just have clean up a bit of the color, hopefully on Sunday and I’ll be done. So I’m feeling real good about my paintings and now I have three pieces ready for the show.

FInished!

2005-10-12T16:21:00.000-07:00

I finished my first painting of the year today by doing the finishing touches to the background of the orange squid during Jack’s class this morning. Using a red violet, a turquoises and the ultra marine blue I started with I re worked the background and bridged the gap between figure and ground through overlap and breaking overly defined lines of separation. One I also tried to work on is the right side of the painting because it has a feeling of being cut off to early. Jack had mentioned this before and that’s why he had me work on a larger canvass. He said the reason this painting felt cut off is the repletion of sizes in the legs as they hit the edge of the canvass. I tried to fix this while working with the background but I still feel like the composition is unbalanced. Despite this I am really happy with the painting and consider it a real success. It takes advantage of all the interesting shapes I was seeing while drawing these squid and as my first attempt at a complete oil paintjob I know it taught me a whole lot and looks pretty interesting to. It feels good to finally finish a piece and hopefully I’ll be finishing a few more over the next week and a half before the show.

Orange Squid Almost Done!

2005-10-10T18:48:00.000-07:00

In Jack’s class I continued work on the orange squid. Today I focused manly on pulling the orange out to the value and hue I wanted. For the most part I think it looks really good, but there are a few areas where the hue gets stronger that make the figure look flat. I think I can fix this with some glazing, and I like the color enough that I can handle a little flatness. In the paint job of the arms I’m getting a lot of cool details both in overlap and brush work, and this is really helping the anatomy feel of the piece. I will still need to improve my skills with oils to really push the details. The biggest jump in the painting today was the background. I went in with a turquoise, a purple and a light blue, and something about the extra color and texture of the oil paint just ties the whole piece together. After painting the background I finally felt like the painting is close to being done, and that’s super sweet.

Walter Pics!

2005-10-08T16:40:00.000-07:00

Walter has been really good lately and a lot of fun so here are two new pictures of the growing boy.

Friday Night Chicken Soup

2005-10-08T16:28:00.000-07:00

Yesterday after class I rode over to trader Joe's, which is difficult because you go over a bridge, and bought some much needed groceries. I also got the chicken Jack told me to buy and when I got home I started making chicken soup. I didn't use any specific recipe, just based it off what I had and what I could remember from mom making it. The only thing I did different was instead of putting the whole chicken in at once I ripped I up so I could see all the muscles, tendons and bones. It was actually pretty cool and not nearly as gross as I thought it would be. I too pictures of the the things I thought looked interesting like how the muscles overlapped on the legs, and where transparency and light showed up in the tissue. Overall it was good fun and now I have some really good soup for dinner over the next week.

Working on Figurative abstraction in Franklin's

2005-10-08T16:16:00.000-07:00

I woke up after a long thursday well rested and ready to paint. In Franklins I continued on the painting I started last week. This was interesting because Last week I felt like I was almost done but this week I painted all class and I think it will take one more day to bring it all together. I have continued to abstract the figure, while at the same time separating it a little more form the background. I think It looks pretty interesting, but I'm afraid I'm getting to sloppy with my paint. I have gotten better with oil paints as far as taking advantage of overlap and smooth lines, but I'm afraid I'm doing it too much now. Also sometimes I get really focussed in details and since I have not laid out the painting ahead of time I loose track of what the painting looks like as a whole. So on sunday I'll try to finish the pice by stepping back and coming up with plan for completing the whole thing at once. While this may not be my best pice, i think I its one of the most beautiful paintings I've done so I'm pretty psyched about finishing it before the show.