gouache drawings

first semester is drawing to a close and i've been preparing my documentation for final crits and beginning to think about what i can do with my pieces, whether that is storage, selling it, or disposing of it. i have mixed feelings about what i've accomplished this semester, or rather mostly in drawing. i have no regrets about concept studio and i'll talk more about that class later, but i think drawing is one of those subjects that i've had, relative to my other pursuits, a lot of training in. i didn't really expect to learn a whole lot from the class and even now, i'm not really sure if i did. practice is inherently good and, if anything, the class pushed me to try new ways of drawing (line control, mediums, aesthetics, etc) and to work in larger formats. this is some work from the end of september (because i've been really bad about documentation) and i'll put up some other work later. 

32" x 40"

black paper base: 22" x 30"

the top was based from a photo i took on a hike with friends back in spring of 2009 (so sophomore year of high school) and /was/ the largest drawing i've done at the time (i've worked larger for class since). the bottom is two sheets of 22" x 30" arches paper (one black, one white), where i tore up the white paper and pasted it atop the black one. the part painted on the black is an abstraction of brick buildings, whereas the part painted on the white are abstractions of cliffs. sort of playing with organic lines vs the regimented. mostly just an attempt to draw something that's not a direct depiction of something, which i have never really done before.

i'm not sure if the latter was a success, but i got positive feedback in crit and my teacher really wanted me to continue with it on a huge scale (like to fill an entire room, ie: Ellis Gallery on campus), had i the funds of course. which ... i don't haha. and i think that's the difficulty of a lot of art-making: it's generally really expensive to create and the process of creation lends itself to playing with the (expensive) material.

never quite free

18"x 24" acrylic on canvas
self-portrait, tons of fun and perhaps my most mature painting to date. trying a new method of applying paint, though the nuances of the colors and texture got lost in the upload...
planning on doing a couple more in this style with the overlapping faces and whatnot.

bits

of my sketchbook.

old (think last summer):

new (think last week):

acrylic

pencil and gouache

bonus:

white acrylic paint on black illustration board, and then chalk pastel on top.

lately artmaking has become an extension of an impulse. i have little desire to make thought-out and deliberate pieces and find myself drawing and painting much more out of a feeling or an immaterial gesture. i am happy for this change. i think this is how i should have began as an art student: not studying and conquering concerns of technique but drawing and painting purely for play. i look at my portfolio now and it is so devoid of creativity, and i think about myself and am disturbed by my ingrained limitations and the constant rehashing of the same thoughts and ideas. in the past year i have been realizing all of this, and while i have been first working on overcoming fears and limits in thought, it is now time to move on to overcoming fears and limits in action.

ap paintings

last minute work woohoo!

oh boo all the colors look crap with blogspot's image quality...

consolation

mom: "why do you paint all these dark things?? i don't like dark things..."

acrylic paint on black illustration board, lol.

come back home

1.5 hours, acrylic on black illustration board
just playing around with alla prima painting. i really like not having to think when painting! so much more relaxing, so much more free.

RISD hometest

finally getting around to uploading these, found out i was accepted on friday! :)

1: the bike (drawn from life, for like three weeks i had my brother's bike just chillin' upside-down in my studio. i only worked after-dark so i could get the artificial light to give consistent shadows)

2: two sided drawing (the heart is cut out of the paper, a literal reassertion of my message: the lack of love)

monotype prints

painted with acrylic on either a plastic panel or a sheet of palette paper and then pressed onto paper. first attempt at printmaking :) so much fun!! i love the unexpectedness of the print. unfortunately i didn't have my own acrylics with me, and the art class at my school has pretty limited colors and terrible quality paint, so there's no depth of color in these. i think my favorite type of paper for prints is canvas paper (like the first), the texture makes for a really cool brushed effect.

old digital stuff

dug these up for a couple college portfolios. the first from the end of freshman year and the latter from the end of sophomore year i believe? hence why the style is still anime-ish and the shading so lacking in depth of color. just figured it might be good to throw in some proof of my experience in painting in photoshop, and i haven't really finished any digital work since. it's something i want to get back into though, when the time permits.