Old School

Check out this blast from the past that I never photographed until now

This was a color study for my color theory class. We were given three images to choose from. This is a background from Disney's Snow White. I even painted birds on acetate but they sucked so I threw them away after the project was done. Its all done in water color on a 22x30  300lb sheet ripped to size. I'm still really proud of it. There aren't a lot of class projects that I've done over the years that I can say that about this long after the fact.

Ahhh Yeaaah Christmas in..Spring Quarter.

Beginning of the quarter always hurts so good. You remember that feeling as a kid when you got your school supplies? The new crayons and markers, pencils and pencil boxes? Multiply that by a thousand for art students. Both in the feeling and the price. Next quarter is all about printmaking and painting, so freaking excited. I just got all my supplies for the quarter.

WIP it good!

Only four weeks left in the quarter...battle stations!

The assignment was single point perspective with windows and door...I went a little over board

How to ruin a still life in 5 easy steps.

Right, so allow me to preface this by you about my classes this semester. Quarter. DAMMIT.


Anyways. I'm actually taking art classes this time around. Excited? Just a little. So I'm taking beginning painting, which in all fairness should just be called "Play With Expensive Oil Paints 101" But I need it, because apparently the word, watercolor is synonymous with shitting your pants.

Moving along, I am also taking beginning drawing, which is a necessary evil in my mind. My rendering skills are my weakest link and so I figure I'll start from the bottom but presently I'm bored to tears but still trying to challenge myself.

My last class I am so excited about, its lithography, and we're printing on actual stones, not plates (squeal!).


Alright so circling back around to my painting class our second assignment was a still life of pears and apples. Once upon a time...

Simple enough, however we were challenged to use only complimentary pairs. Some girl actually thought red and orange were complimentary. Holy crap. So things started out well enough, I set mine up and chose purple and yellow as my pair.

Things seem to moving along smoothly here, I'm liking the warmth of the colors and the complimentary neutrals I'm making as well as the kind of impressionistic brushstrokes, but then I decide that I should probably block in the majority of my canvas with color. Mind you there's really been no instruction at this point as to technique so this is me playing and experimenting.

Really happy at this point but I started to struggle with keeping my darks dark and my highlights light. But I'm enjoying the process.

Here is where things start sink. I've blocked in most of the paper towels and now start to overwork the fruit until I'm starting to lose all those nice expressive strokes, and this is when the shit started to hit the fan so to speak.

WE ARE GOING DOWN CAPTAIN. Oh. em. gee. What the hell happened. Why did some one not talk me off the ledge once they saw the cad yellow on my brush?! Friends don't let friends do this to their painting.

Dearly beloved, we have gathered here today to recognize that this painting has been over worked like hooker. At this point the "salvaging" that I was attempting was not happening. I put down the brush, remade the still life and started over. Sadly though, I don't have pictures of that paintings progress, its still at school but I shall update you all post haste when I return.

This next week should be rather hectic because I'm moving closer to school and organizing that should be the biggest pain in the ass.

(In)decent Exposure

So this summer is brings along some pretty cool things. One of which being myself and a very good friend of mine, Bobby and I are curating the show at Intel. Which is freakin awesome.
Another is that myself and another friend of mine are organizing an art show at a local coffee shop that has become my real life version of the bar from "Cheers." Basically it will be organized as such:

• Each show will be themed (we don't want your shit you threw in a closet) for example our first one is: A visual representation or illustration of your favorite song
• At the end of each show we will have a reception, bring as many people as possible because the more people the more successful it will seem to the owners and they'll keep it going.
• You can sell your work, so far there is no discussion of a cut.
• Please write a small artist statement to go with your piece/price/your name and how to contact you
  
• space is limited so nothing obscenely large (try to keep it around 22x30) if you must go big or go home.
• All canvases must have hardware, all other pieces must be framed, 2D work only
• You will have approximately a month to get it done, each show will be hanged the day after the old one.
  

Where the Madness happens.

Okay so my studio was absolute chaos up until about 2 days ago and went through to bring some order to what I was doing. And then I took picture to prove it (and remember what its supposed to look like)
This is kind of an over all shot of the whole studio with my wall of old paintings, sketches and (new) prints, etc.
More of a close up of where I keep all of my art books and my little painting station complete with self portrait mirror.

My clay table that my dad and I built out of a door. You can see my necessary liquid staple maker (aka tea/coffee maker)
My drafting table, this is where I do most of my drawing and painting...and yes, farmvilling. Oh and my obscene collection of glazes

Here I made myself a little inking station for my lino printing and woodblocks. The cat box is a make shift wedging table, its almost completely filled with plaster. and the other two shelves of Shit I Don't Know What To Do With.

I also have stuff that I've been working on that I'll post later tonight.