STPI Print

People from the Singapore Tyler Print Institute came to our school for a printing workshop.

We started with the background, a single color print.  I covered a plastic sheet with ink, then removed ink to create designs.  I varied between the thinner, pointed tool (for thin lines) and the wider spatula (for thick lines).  By removing short, wide areas in a circle, I made a pattern that looked like flowers.  This is one of the things I'm most proud of in this piece.
I also used my fingers to remove ink, making the fingerprints along the bottom.

After that, we worked on printing an animal on top of it.  I decided to use a sheep, because I thought it would be a little funny.  When we cut out the stencil, we were left with a positive and a negative of the shape.  I put the positive in the frame so that it would print as a negative, because I wanted to preserve the flower designs in the middle.  I chose red ink, and luckily, it ended up not being completely opaque.  It's still possible to see the other parts of the original monoprint underneath it.

To finish the piece, I added some final embellishments.  Using a marker, I added an eye, a line for the ground, and small lines to give the impression of overlapping fluff around the outline of the body.  Faintly, there are also diagonal lines in blue pencil.  I think I could have done more in terms of embellishments, as my current ones aren't so obvious.

Foam Block Sculpture

Our final sculpture project was to carve a styrofoam block, which was a reductive technique that removed material to create the image.  These sculptures were meant to show cultural imagery, and from the beginning I knew I wanted to use Celtic symbols.



I noted down various symbols and sketched out the ones that I wanted to use.  I especially wanted to feature a simple Celtic knot and show where each line passed over and under the others.  I planned a basic idea for my sculpture, but I only knew beforehand what I intended for the top third and not for the rest.

 

This is the final sculpture.
The top third features the Celtic knot and a 3 spiral symbol.  To bring out the shape of the knot, I made the line go deeper in next to where the other line crossed over.  This is one of the best looking features of the sculpture, and it really gives the impression that it's a truly woven knot.  As for the spirals, there is a slight gradient that makes the centers of each spiral stand out more.  (A chunk broke off from the top during the carving, which was unfortunate, but I glued it back on and was able to continue with my plan.  Hopefully it isn't too noticeable!)
In order to create volume, I completely cut out holes in the negative space between the lines of the knot.  This was challenging, as the holes needed to be precisely shaped, but with small tools I could carefully take material away.
The next section has the double spiral symbol, which spans two sides of the block.  The edge between the two sides was rounded out so as to let the spiral flow across in a more appealing way.  The spirals curl inward, in contrast to the upper spirals, towards more holes through the block.
The bottom part was carved out like a single spiral that corkscrewed around.  The inside of the lines is convex, as if there was a cylinder inside, while the outside flat surface was made ever so slightly concave to contrast with it.

Wire Figure Sculpture

The wire figure sculpture project captures the image of a human in motion.  As an initial reference, we did gesture drawings of people in various poses.  These are two of drawings I did.

 

These were done with charcoal on paper.  Loose strokes were used to capture the position and the proportions of different body parts.  This part went well for me, as I focused on the flow in the shapes rather than trying to capture an outline.

The gesture drawings were then used to inspire the pose of the wire sculpture.

 

To make this sculpture, I used one thick wire as the basic frame (head, torso, legs) and several thinner wires for the arms and to give all parts the necessary mass.  Tissue paper was glued onto the wire figure to create volume, with some spaces being closed off and others open to air.
The pose of the sculpture was inspired by the second gesture drawing above, but more like a running pose than a lunge.
Working with wire was tricky, as it was with the earlier abstract nylon sculpture, however I found the thinner wire much easier to work with.
While my initial intention was to have the correct proportions, I unfortunately ended up making the torso too long.

Abstract Nylon Sculpture

 

This is an abstract sculpture, created with wire, nylon fabric, and colorful thread.

To create mass and extend beyond the base, thick wires were attached and bent into curves.  A nylon stocking was put over the wires to create the surface of the sculpture.  This part was challenging for me, because I couldn't keep the shape I wanted with my initial attempt, but I started over with new wires and accepted that the wires' shape will change with the nylon.

To create volume, the nylon was pulled inside, and hooked between wires on a loose end.  The colorful threads create more empty spaces and volume.

Unfortunately, I was unable to make the nylon surface itself colorful, but this was made up for with the addition of colorful thread.  I was able to successfully sew them with even spacing, and even do a cool effect with the twist of the blue threads.

Acrylic Painting

This acrylic painting was inspired by Mortis Ghost.  This is a piece of artwork he did based on his game, OFF, which includes images of various locations throughout the story.



In my painting, I used a number of techniques.
After creating a dark blue background, I used a sponge to add some black and purple, creating an interesting texture.
When I added the pink buildings, I used a palette knife to apply the paint.
The edges of the buildings are distinguished by thick paint, which physically stands out from the rest of the painting.  This is called impasto.
The white line across the top is meant to be a glaze, however, I mixed the paint and glazing medium in an incorrect proportion, resulting in it being less transparent than intended.
"Sgraffito" means "to scratch", which I used to then define the shape of the flowers.

Although I did manage to integrate quite a few painting techniques into my work, I feel as if the painting itself is too simple.  One critical element of Mortis Ghost's art style that I missed was the use of black outlines.  In the end, I did make an interesting tribute.

Watercolor Monsters

This is the water color monsters project.



In the first image are 4 sketches for possible monsters.

Designing them was an exercise in rhythm.  We focused on four main types of rhythm to use in artistic composition: regular, flowing, progressive, and alternating.
Regular rhythm takes the motif and uses it repeatedly in a similar way.
Flowing rhythm is more organic and flowing with its motif.
Progressive rhythm shows more of a sequence of change in the motif.
Alternating rhythm uses multiple motifs, which alternate.

The first sketch uses alternating rhythm in the background, with stars and lines, and flowing rhythm in the foreground with the shape of the monster.
The second sketch uses regular rhythm in the background, with evenly spaced diagonal lines (which in the final piece are bands of color), and progressive rhythm in the foreground, with feathers that gradually go from small to large.
The third sketch is dominated by the monster, giving it very little space for background, but an attempt was made to fill it with shapes of flowing rhythm.  The monster itself has regular rhythm in the triangular teeth.
The fourth sketch features alternating rhythm, with the monster having a curled appendage then a spiky appendage.  Background lines radiate outward from the center, gradually getting further and further apart as a progressive rhythm.

The first two sketches came more easily to me and were more inspired, but after making those and being happy with them, I had difficulty thinking of a couple more ideas that could possibly be better.  The two sketches alone had already displayed all four types of rhythm, but I overcame my difficulties by combining rhythms in different ways.  Those first two did ultimately end up as my final two paintings, though.



Once I had my sketches, I selected two to use for my final watercolor painting.  However, before I could begin painting, I practiced 15 techniques with watercolors. These were:

• Graduated wash - Starting with a solid color and adding more and more water
• Blending wash - Starting with one primary color and gradually mixing in another primary color
• Bleeding - Painting two very wet colors next to each other
• Feathering - Painting with water, then applying some color
• Wet into wet - Filling an area with color, then painting with another while it's still wet
• Wet on dry - Painting lines on dry paper
• Dry brush - Painting with very little water
• Lifting out - Using a dry brush to remove color from a still-wet area
• Water blooms - Dropping a small amount of water into still-wet paint to push pigment away
• Masking tape - Covering an area with tape before painting (I used this twice in the square, making areas covered with only green or blue, areas with green AND blue, and areas with no color)
• Masking fluid - Covering a (more controlled) area with masking fluid before painting
• Rock salt - Sprinkling salt on still-wet paint and removing it once dry, creating a textured look
• Splattering - Loading a brush with paint and using my thumb to spray it onto the paper
• Tissue paper - Dabbing partly-dried paint with tissue to create a textured look
• Plastic wrap - Putting crinkled plastic wrap on a painted area until dried to create a textured look

 

As discussed earlier, the final sketches I used for the paintings were the first and second one.

After lightly sketching the general shapes of my monsters, the first parts painted were the backgrounds.  For the first monster, the background was first painted yellow, then had masking fluid covering areas that would form the motifs of alternating rhythm, to let the rest of the background be painted a much darker mix of blue, purple, and black.  As for the second monster's background, it was first done in blue and brown, with the bleeding technique used so as to soften the line between the air and the ground.  Masking tape was put over the blue portion of the background, so as to leave stripes for adding a layer of purple.  This resulted in what should have been the regular rhythm in this piece, but some paint bled through the masking tape's edges.

Once the backgrounds were finished, I could safely begin painting the monsters themselves.  I first painted second monster, as I was more certain of what I wanted to do.  I first filled in the area with light gray, then used a graduated wash in the main body to emphasize the progressive rhythm in the feathers.  The eye was painted bright orange as a compliment to the blue background.  For the first monster, I filled in the area with light orange, and did darker parts with brown.  I really like graduated washes.  The more visible "ear" was done by layering yellow.

When the painting was done, final details were added with a pen, such as a line in the first monster, and all the feathers of the second monster.  The lines for the feathers were drawn imperfectly, leading to some parts being drawn more thickly to hide rough edges, which led to the rest of the lines being thickened to match.  I have seen examples of artists doing detailed watercolor paintings with feathers, but I was concerned about making them too dark for my piece, which is why I opted to draw the feather shapes back in at the end with pen.

Overall, 8/8 would buy again.

Gouache Painting

This is a gouache still life painting using a monochromatic color scheme.  A monochromatic color scheme has one color and all its tints (adding white), shades (adding black), and tones (adding gray).
At the side you can see three strips where I painted different tints/shades/tones of blue, which were then used in the actual painting.
Like in the drawing unit, the process began with rendering out the shape and doing the outer contour line.  Light and dark placement was done with the lightest tint and darkest shade, for highlights and shadows.  The rest of the mixed colors were used for other parts.
I chose blue because I thought its tints/shades/tones would look nice, but it ended up being a challenge for the actual still life part.  My original object was red, so I had to translate the red I was seeing into a vague idea of how bright or how saturated the color was.  Tones of blue were used around the edges of the "sections" to help separate them.