Creative Voice
Class: ART 111 - Design and Composition
Professor: Erin Beckloff
This project was very open ended. We were given a list of questions to answer such as "What collections do you have and why," "What are some quotes/texts that inspire you," and "Who is the most influential person in your life," and from those questions we were given the freedom to choose a theme that was significant to us. The assignment was to create two works, one in black and white, one in full color mixed media, that revolved around our themes and went together as a series.
I drew inspiration from ideas of the past and the present, not compared to each other or one given greater importance over another but simply in the same space to show growth. My sketches were divided between using images of my previous and current houses and using a baby picture and a recent picture of myself. While I found the architectural studies compelling, I ended up going with the latter because it felt more authentic to my body of work.
This was the final concept sketch, done in Photoshop.
My black and white piece is a picture of me at two years old overlaid on a space-themed background, done in acrylic paint on illustration board (11x14" with a two inch border). The figure sits in the bottom left corner looking up and to the right as a mirror to the figure in the second composition. I chose to paint the gradient from darkest at the bottom to lightest at the top to represent the idea of moving towards an unknown future, and the cheerful expression on the figure's face shows an excitement at what is ahead.
The full color piece is a picture of me taken two days before the final painting overlaid on a space-themed background, done in acrylic paint on illustration board (11x14" with a two inch border). The figure sits in the bottom right corner looking up and to the left so as to mirror the figure in the first composition. Responding to the first painting, the gradient goes from lightest at the bottom to darkest at the top to represent a feeling of finally being in the future and not quite knowing where to go from here. The figure looks somewhat more concerned, but still curious, as even through all the unknown he is intrigued by what could lie even further ahead.
