Art 2 Final Portfolio

1.  The project I thought was most successful was the "Light Bulb" piece that I did in pen.  The theme was "Scientific" and I decided that light bulbs represent the theme very well. The first step in creating this project was to plan out how I wanted the light bulbs to be displayed on the page.  Then, after I figured this out, I lightly sketched the light bulbs on the piece of paper and after finalizing the sketch, I drew over it in pen.  The aspect of shading was used in this project by placing small, condensed dots in the darker areas, and spaced out dots in the lighter areas.  This technique is called "Stippling" and I feel like I did a good job depicting the shaded areas through this technique and throughout the overall project.  I think the choice I made regarding size was very good, because since stippling is a tedious technique I wanted to make sure I could use this technique with the size of my light bulbs and maintain control over the individual's attention that is looking at this piece of artwork.  Overall, choosing light bulbs and then placing the symbols for elements in the background accurately represent the theme "Scientific," and the use of stippling was well portrayed to show the shaded areas of the light bulbs.      

2.  The project that I felt was least successful was my "Up Close and Personal - Gum" project.  This piece shows someone blowing a bubble with their piece of gum.  The background is a pattern with diamonds that have shading within them ranging from dark to light as it gets closer to the middle of the diamond.  I did not like the overall outcome of the project because I felt it was much unplanned and the entire piece did not make much sense or send a message to the viewer.  If I were to change this piece I would start off by changing the entire idea.  I would not do a person blowing a bubble but instead draw something with more structure and perspective such as a soccer ball, because I play soccer, and I could focus on the hexagons on the soccer ball.  In addition, if I were to have done a soccer ball, I could have it sitting on grass and I could focus on the shading of the ball while sitting in the grass because that is a very prominent aspect regarding that idea.  Lastly, an individual blowing a bubble depicted the theme of up close and personal but it was very generic and not the best idea I could have thought of for that specific theme.  Overall, although I was not fond of the piece as it came out, I am content with the way the shading came out within the piece.

3.  The two pieces that show my growth as an artist is the abstract and shoe collage project.  In the abstract piece I used paint so I applied the materials gently yet thoroughly and used easy/light paint strokes to the painting.  My artistic vision and creativity were not used as much in this painting because the purpose of this project was to directly depict the abstract photo that was in front of me.  The use of principles and elements, intuition, and subject matter were all used together because I used the principle/element of blending a gradient that I already knew how to do and my intuition told me how to carry through with it at difficult points in my project.  Lastly, the subject matter was simply abstract; therefore, it was not entirely structured and planned set and stone.  The second piece I did was my mixed media "Shoe Collage".  The application of materials was a variety because I used regular paper, paint, and tissue paper as my three mixed mediums and my technique and skills were mainly used in placement of the different aspects of this project.  My artistic vision and creativity were greatly used in this piece because I definitely stepped out my comfort-zone.  I placed each famous Disney character on top of a piece of paper that corresponds with that shoe and Disney movie.  Once again, the use of principles and elements, intuition, and subject matter were all used together because the principles/elements I used was mainly creating a collage and not having all the shoes be too structured, and my intuition told me where to place each element and not have a set in stone way of displaying them.  Lastly, my subject matter focused on the shoes of famous Disney princesses and the corresponding elements in the background of each of shoe.  Overall, I felt that these two pieces showed my growth as an artist because it allowed me to step out of my comfort zone.          

4.  The two mini lessons that I thought were the most beneficial for a particular project was the candy and soda can.  Both of these projects focused on the concept of blending.  The candy was drawn using chalk-pastel which was very easy to blend with. The soda can was drawn using oil-pastel which was also just as easy to blend and show a gradient.  I thought that the instructions given were enough to ensure success on both these projects. The concept of blending is not difficult but I still struggled to fully blend some parts of both pieces because I did not want the pieces to look too blended or too chalky.  The particular project I used the blending techniques I learned in these two pieces were for the "Up Close and Personal - Gum" project.  Although this particular project was not successful, I was happy with the way my blending turned out which was uprooted from my candy and soda can mini lessons. 

5.  My favorite medium that I used throughout the entire semester was paint.  This painting was one of my most successful projects.  I showed the progression of eating an apple and different stages that correspond with that.  Paint was my favorite medium because not only was I extremely familiar with it but I can also convey gradients easily with this medium and make a unique piece.  Originally, I was not going to do the progression of an apple and instead do two big apples that were cut off the canvas.  However, my teacher gave me this idea and I thought it was very interesting/different, and I portrayed the situation well.  In addition, the theme was "Sticky Situation", and as apples are being eaten, they get sticky on your hands and I felt that the idea of apples represented the theme accurately as well.  Overall, I really enjoyed the progression of this painting and I felt it was one my successful projects that I used an enjoyable medium for.