FINALS! and other things that are not so finals.

Huzzah, huzzah! I am done with school. And with the end of school always come finals... So let's get those out of the way. Beware:  angsty experimental teenage art student projects ahead....

First up is my Life Drawing final, which was titled "Toxic Swamp Thing." We had to somehow show the correlation between how the environment affects humans or how humans affect the environment, and how that might affect us all in the long run. It had to use collage and multiple mediums. So I decided to do something slightly political, dealing with the oil spill, but I wanted something very colorful and surreal as well. So this is what I came up with....

My next final was Concepts in Drawing, where I had to do a triptych. A triptych is a series of three that somehow connects but also works as individual pieces. So I brainstormed for a bit and thought of things in threes, and came up with my own version of Speak No Evil, Hear No Evil, See No Evil. I had to use at least three different mediums so I used watercolor, ink on vellum, and oil stick pastel along with watercolor stained bulsa wood. I wanted to try and do lots of things with contrasting textures and expressive qualities along with very clean and modern ones.

Here's the piece as one:

And now seperately:

And I have one more final, my Sketching for Design final but that's still sitting at school and I'm too lazy right now to drive all the way down there to pick it up! But once I have it back I'll post it!

And now for some random personal stuff. I got my housing for England!! All the details are still being worked out but I'm set to be living at this place, Bernard Myers house in a section of London called Camberwell. Here's a couple pics that show what it looks like:

And now for a beautifully cheesy look at what my room will most likely be like:

I'm really happy I get my own room. It's about 5 or six of these rooms in a flat and then we all share a kitchen and stuff. 

And a little cafe down the road that I will probably be spending some time at:

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So yeah!! So excited. And nervous. And excited...

And nervous.

But a bit more secure now that I have housing!! 57 days till I leave! Not like I'm counting...

And that's all for now! Hopefully now I'll have time to do some projects of my own that I've been wanting to do.... Oh and now for a real quick word about something I think everyone needs to see. 

 Toy Story 3 just came out, and being a massive Pixar fan I went and saw it at midnight and it was incredible. Another beautiful, sophisticated and complex movie by Pixar. But besides that, something equally powerful if not more so for me was the short that preceded it. I've always loved Pixar's short films, but this one has by far become my favorite. If you haven't please please go see this movie and short, you won't be disappointed I promise. And if you're that skeptical, the short is actually on iTunes right now. But let me tell you, seeing it in 3D is worth it. They mix 2d animation with CGI in a way that I've never witnessed before, and seeing it in 3D only makes you appreciate it more. And the message it brings is even more powerful than the visuals, which is saying a lot.

And now I'm done! Hope to be back here soon with more news and work. Thanks for reading!

-Liam

Ebony and Ivory

Alright so since the last blog was all about color, I decided to do one in black and white because I've been working a lot with that as well. First off I did a project in my concepts in drawing class that was supposed to be Noir inspired. Basically we had to put a toy of some sort in a space and somehow make it seem mysterious, like a film noir movie. So first I took some pictures of this gnome I have in black and white to see how I could approach it.

For the space I decided on a hallway, as they always seem creepy to me. I used gouache and charcoal to try and get some different textures going on, and this was the result.

Next up is stuff for my Sketching for Design class. To start off, I've finally fallen in love with an art tool. I've heard people say a lot "oh this is my favorite writing pen" or "whenever I use this pencil I get the best ideas," and it didn't make sense to me until now. Behold.

This pen is amazing. I don't know what it is, but whenever I use it I get my best sketches. So I'm glad I found it. It makes me quite happy. Here are some of the sketches I've had to do from life for my sketching class that have come from this pen:

I also had to do a car project for this class. Not being a car fan, I wasn't excited. I'm still not excited actually. But the project ended up coming out alright.

 

I also had to do a metamorphosis project, where I had to mix an animal with a machine. I went through a few ideas (elephant-bulldozer, ladybug-clock) but landed on a giraffe-crane. I'm pretty happy with the results, although I need to rework the feet because I didn't realize until after I inked it that this giraffe would have no way to move.

So that's all for now folks. I'll leave you with a couple more black and white photos I've taken to help me with some of my projects.

Any comments are welcome! Thanks for reading!

-Liam

The World is a Carrousel of Color

OKAY. Here I am, updating the blog finally. Sorry for the delay, there's just been lots going on. But in turn I have lots to show!! This post is going to be about color, because the past few weeks that seems to be the main focus of two of my classes. I've been using pastel for the first time ever, and although I do like some of the effects it has overall I'm pretty much done with it. Way too messy, smudgy, and difficult. But I got some fairly good stuff out of it so there you go.

This first piece is just my first experience with pastel done from a strange still life involving cloth and parasols:

After that we were given an assignment to do a series. The series had to consist of five different images that all relate in some way, while also using specific color palettes. So I decided to do a series based on basically how men's clothing and style is kind of a lost art innit of itself. The result came out kind of pop art-y but that's alright. Below each image I'll put which color palette I had to work with.

Colors I Hate

Colors I Love

Primary Colors

Harmonious Colors

 Nocturnal Colors

I got really good feedback on all of them and overall I was pretty happy with how they came out. Only thing I'm not satisfied with is that on the colors I love one, I wasn't sure which color to do the skin tone in, so I just did it in regular flesh tones. But I'm not sure if that was the right choice. Suggestions?

 

And now, another naked person. In my life drawing class we also have been using pastel, and for one of our projects we had to do this man in pastels but without any flesh tones, black, white, or gray. So this is what came of it:

 

And now lastly is my least resolved piece but colorful nonetheless. First I have to set it up though. I went into my Concepts in Drawing class and my teacher told us to cut a piece of this butcher paper as long as our height. So we did that and put them all on the wall. Then she told us to:

1. Paint a metaphor of ourselves, the first thing that comes to mind.

2. Go to the piece to your right and divide it into thirds using abstract shapes.

3. In one of those thirds, draw something your mother would like.

4. Turn it upside down.

5. Go back to your first piece and destroy the part that you think is keeping it together.

6. Unify the piece.

7. Go to the piece to your right again and get rid of any trace of the artist that preceded you.

8. Now go home, ask a friend for an idea for a self portrait for you, and do the exact opposite on it.

Needless to say, this exercise was exhausting. I asked my friend for a self portrait idea and she told me to do my self looking into a mirror with a mirror behind me, and show all the different reflections. So I thought the opposite would be me between brick walls...

It's strange but I guess interesting in a way. There's so many layers. I decided to do it a bit abstractly since that's what the background seemed to call for. Anyway, that's all for this post. I'll post more often I promise! Let me know what you think....

-Liam