4 Principles

My theme for this assignment was Vanity.

1. Movement- for this principle, I decided to have the main focal point be highlighted by the "movement" in the piece. By having the vortex-like waves surrounding the lips/needle point, the focal point is brought to attention. This, like the emphasis & economy piece, are imaes of lips being injected with botox.

2. Repetition- for this piece, i looked into all 3 methods of inspiration- the figure was inspired by both Hokusai and Beardsley and the repetition of dots was inspired by pop art style.
3. Emphasis & Economy- this is my favorite piece. again, like the movement piece it is an image of lips being injected with some sort of botox with what could be the liquid or blood dripping down. obviously, these images are more of a critique of vanity than a commendation of it.
4. Balance- for balance, i though it would be interesting to have the figure, which should be the focal point, displaced to the corner right side of the piece so that it is balanced by the clouds of smoke billowing to the left side.


I took inspiration from two different artists- Aubrey Beardsley, as well as Hokusai. I also took inspiration from several pop art styles. From Beardsley, I really liked the narrative-esque feel of his pieces, showcasing a darker, almost grim take on people/human figures. I also looked at Hokusai's Great Wave off Kanagawa piece in particular when looking for examples/inspiration for movement. As for the pop art inspiration, I've always been intrigued by this particular style, so I tried incorporating some into a few of the pieces- with the repetitive dots and the pop-art style lips.

Project 2

Project Two THEME: Human body, “Hand”

Human body is one of the objects that have been most frequently shown up as a subject matter in the art world – because the beauty of human body is still a valuable element to study, a lot of artists continue to explore its grace. Among the body parts, hands are very interesting material: its structural form, the texture of skin, wrinkles that hold the joints… At the same time, hands are the parts that play most of roles for creative activities of human beings. Art is made by hands.

Repetition
- Keyword: “Bold” and “Organic”
The first draft was coming out of a sketch depicted like cell division. Organic transformation in terms of visual expression is treated as the most important component here. I tried to avoid patternizing objects for “repetition,” since the piece has been intended to be rough and organic. This composition could be possibly the most favorite amongst the four, because I did want to use some boldness for the compositions so I can make them stronger. It is one of my beliefs that an artwork should have a sort of power to capture the attention of the viewers at the first gaze.


Movement
- Keyword: “Pretty” and “Decorative”
The composition is based on Art Nouveau style as Aubrey Beardsley. After making a decision to refer the style, I was considering to apply a number of detailed and dedicate lines, which are the core of the style. Unfortunately, the trial is appeared as a less efficient or less powerful result. This could be my least favorite; also the outcome was not good as the enlarged sketch. At the critique, people pointed out most of things that I thought beforehand (such as too much thin lines, crowded, less effective usage of “power separation”). In addition, one of Sherin’s comments was very interesting: the hand is not involved actively as other three hands are in the compositions; when the audience looks at the piece, their eyes move around the structure and then it ends up with the abstract shapes, not the hand. The subject matter could be out of the focus.


Balance
- Keyword: “Minimalize” and “Limited”
To make a “balance,” I selected the way of using very limited shapes and elements. It is very true you can balance out by spreading numerous elements around the canvas, but I believe minimizing components in the canvas (or the screen) can lead to the maximum effects. I completely suppress blacks, showed only three structures: a curve line, a covered hand, a fracture of horizontal lines with various weights. If it is possible to point out its shortcomings, it was not so recognizable when the viewer was in relatively longer distance (“white-out”). Honestly speaking, for the progress, I would suggest it could be better if the artist–myself– was able to manage clearly in terms of handcrafts. The curve line is the kernel of this piece, but it was not clean and solid that the artist intended/wanted to be.

Emphasis and Economy
- Keyword: "Divide" and "Separation (the Center)"
The approach of this composition would be similar to what I did for the Balance. This is why I think Balance and Emphasis/Economy are interactively, closely connected to each other. However I slightly distorted the approaching – this time a huge and daring division of the canvas space is used. I also tried to depict minute details in the hand, such as wrinkles or nails, to separate the object out of the space so it can have such dominance in the composition to work as the central (as known as, “Emphasis”). Since the black in the bottom grabbed the heaviness or physical weight that eyes will feel, no white-out phenomenon was happened.



Overall, I definitely tried to approach with various ways to understand and express for each category. By exploring a lot of styles and methods, artists can get more experiences to get used to.

project 2

Project Two

My artist inspiration originated with Aubrey Beardsley. I really like Beardsley's work with simple black and white images and compositions featuring people. Beardsley's pattern work and the unnatural postures of the figures within the pieces also resonated with me.

My theme evolved into an exploration of female sexuality in regards to the elements, these elements being the four natural ones (earth, water, fire, and air). I wanted to depict women in natural settings and have them look as if they themselves could pass for natural but were really not. They are all faceless and most of them are missing the lower halves of their bodies. This is to echo the idea that female sexuality in is often portrayed as being rather stiff and unnatural, yet the perception of women as unmoving, as objects even, is so ingrained in our culture that it is accepted as a social standard.


This is my example of Emphasis and Economy. It is a close up view of a woman's torso, featuring the curve of her breast at the top right corner and the central line of her abdomen leading to the navel. I like this composition and feel that it successfully conveys economy through the minimal use of lines and forces the audience to pause and interpret the image depicted. It also emphasizes the depth of the navel through a slightly thicker line. This piece is to represent the Earth portion of my theme because her body is grounded and yet can also be read as a mountain slope. Additionally, she features curves that are traditionally deemed to be sexy and yet her lower body, where female sexuality culminates, is completely missing from the composition, which suggests that her body may be viewed and enjoyed by others, but pleasure is not reciprocated.


This is my example of Balance. I feel that the pattern of the sky is equally weighted by the waves below. There were some issues with craftsmanship here. I feel that I could have improved my work with the xacto knife in regards to the patterning at the top. In regards to concept, however, I believe that the piece successfully ties into the idea of a female in the elements. It communicates Water and a robotic stance. Her sexuality is stiff and contrasts with the flow of the waves. The pattern adds depth behind the mountain and gives the composition interest. Additonally, the pattern at the top recalls Aubrey Beardsley, the intial inspiration.

This is my example of Repetition, represented through the triangle shape of the phoenix's feathers and the repeated triangles of the flames below. I like this composition because I feel the juxtaposition of the bird and the woman with the fire gave the piece depth and made it more compelling than just a simple object floating in empty space. This piece works in the Fire portion of my theme. There was criticism that the woman appeared stiff and a suggestion that I should trace an actual photogrpah of a woman for future projects. I actually did trace an image, however, so unfortunately that did not translate. Something that I learned from this project is that if I wish to communicate unnaturalness I should really veer toward the unnatural. On the other hand, I did want to portray a certain sense of realism and evoke the "second glance" and raise questions (why does she look so stiff?). The criticism is appreciated and the suggestions are noted for the future.

This is my example of Movement because the swirls of the woman's arms and legs move the eye up and around the piece. I wanted the woman to appear firmly anchored in space (hence the large torso, also recalling a bird's chest) and yet simultaneously, she is evanescent, fading into space and being drawn toward different points. This piece represents Air and the idea that a woman may wish to fly toward a certain location and may have ambition but society drives her into limbo, pulling on her limbs with the demands that it has for women. Women must be sexy. Women must stay at home. Women must do this and that and be defined by the expectations of normalcy. I wanted to provide a bit more of an abstract portrayal that she can't really fly anywhere even though it appears she is flying because she is suspended in air. The media depicts women as being sexy objects of attention, but is that the natural way to view women?

Project 2: Type

Inspiration

I wanted to take a look at the shapes and forms of type. I tried to dissect every part of the form in my sketches. From stem to serif, close up to distant, I looked at just about every character. Strangely, I chose the capital 'A' for three of my four final compositions. I also looked at the work of Shephard Fairey for inspiration, especially his use of type and pattern.

Currently, all photos are scans of the pen version of my finals. I will replace these once I have quality pictures of the painted versions.

Balance

The goal was to use a variety of patterns to keep the composition balanced. It is also meant to evoke the letter 'A', but in a manner that does not draw too much attention to the letter and kill the balance.

Emphasis & Economy

The whole design hinges on the moment where the perfectly structured letter form transitions into the floral adornment. The background is blank as not to distract you from this single point. I had originally created this with movement in mind but noticed that the composition was much more interesting when the emphasis was on the transition. The floral design wasn't strong enough to carry the piece by itself.

Movement

This sketch came out of a breakdown of the letter. I had left many of the lines used to create the letter and liked the insight they gave into the actual creation of the form. The extension of the lines from the bold shape of the 'A' also move the eye around the composition well.

Repetition

The original concept was just overlapping serifs. Once I had filled up the page, I noticed that filling in several of the forms created a layering effect. Even then, though, the composition was still repetitive without a focal point. The dot over an 'i' creates a focal point and gives sense to all the overlapping forms.

Project 2

So my project 2 was pretty crazy exciting! I picked Aleksander Rodchenko as my inspiration. He's a Russian photographer/painter from the 1920s and 1930s and he's amazing; I can't believe I've never heard of him before. He does a lot of work with perspective, using angles and shadows to make the ordinary look new again. He's a great guy and inspiring is a great word to describe him. He manages to make simple ideas very interesting.


BALANCE

My balance composition was originally going to be my movement composition, actually! It's crazy how life works like that. This is actually a cropped and slightly modified version of one of Rodchenko's more famous works, a woman shouting happily. I like the simplicity of it, but I wish I could have redone the lines - make them straighter, stronger, all of that stuff. That said, it still conveys happiness and excitement with nothing more than the mouth and chin. That's pretty awesome.







REPETITION
My repetition piece. Look at all those lines! I was trying to make something more playful, that takes a moment for you to identify everything in the piece- like how in many of Rodchenko's pieces you don't recognize that a certain shape is really a person at first glance. There probably was a better way to do it, however - I don't like how every line is the same width. I wish I used a better way to hide the human shapes within the background rather than having the series of vertical lines. However, I'm a fan of the interplay between the arms of each character and the legs of the character behind them. It makes an interesting non-human shape out of human characters, and that's what Rodchenko's all about.



MOVEMENT
Of my four pieces, the movement piece was my favorite. In its first revision, this piece only had the man in front, no bars in the background. However, the bars add a lot - they help reinforce the movement going up and to the right, and they also look like volume bars, which gives a 'raising the volume' look to it all. That could be a little cheesy, but because it's not super-obvious and it's paired with the man in his really dramatic pose looking skywards, I like how it works. I wish I had another chance to cut the man out, though - I think the muscles on his arm look a little cheesy. Craftsmanship with an xacto knife turns out to be incredibly tricky! I don't know how everyone manages to be so precise with the thing.




EMPHASIS/ECONOMY
I was a huge fan of this at first, but the more I think about it the less I like it (although I still think it's pretty good - but it definitely could have been made better). The idea was to create something very Russian propaganda-style - so we have a person working hard (with his nose down), and the top of his head becomes a rising sun. I know, super propagandistic, right?! In retrospect, I think this design was overly simple. I like the face that it's symmetrical, but I can't help but feel like this would be better if we had a profile of the man and there were more sunbeams.

Project 2

Movement

I was debating between whether to put this image in movement or balance. In the end, this image seemed to have more movement than balance. I wanted to interpret the scene when Dorothy's house was being blown away by the tornado. Inspired by Alexander Rodchenko I wanted to  use text throughout my pieces. I remembered that i used to draw tornadoes in elementary school by scribbling throughout my notebook and I though it'd be interesting to use that same technique through blocks since i was focusing on stripes and lines. 

Balance

When designing this piece, I wanted to focus on Alexander Rodchenko's technique of using a prominent image in the foreground. Though I did not completely center the image, I wanted to make the ruby slippers pop out of the image and in a sense make a statement. Keeping the theme of the ruby slippers from The Wizard of Oz I used the wicked witch's striped socks to incorporate the stripes that are visible throughout all my pieces. I balanced the stripes from the socks with what I tried to make as blue birds flying over the rainbow. By going in and out of shoes, the rainbow gives a sense of movement but in this case I felt it was more obvious that the stripes were balancing off the socks. 

Repetition

When creating this piece, I definitely had Rodchenko's poster pieces in mind. I wanted it to seem like the tinman was speaking. However, instead of covering the piece with text, I combined his techniques by incorporating the stripes into the piece. The background obviously became unified repetition as I tried to make the stripes as even as possible. I tried to incorporate lines in every way possible whether it was the tinman himself or the way he was speaking and especially the background. I tried to use different thicknesses of lines to make some parts stand out more than others. This piece was a way for me to be obvious in every form. It was obviously repetition and it was obviously from The Wizard of Oz.

Emphasis and Economy

While doodling I thought of the hourglass from The Wizard of Oz. I though that it'd be interesting to focus on the point when time shifts from one point to the other. When thinking of how to interpret the grains of sand, I thought the point of shifting should be interpreted to everything pointing to that point. I used the disintegrating stripes to also form an arrow pointing towards that one point when one point in time becomes another. I also tried to offset the evenness of the piece through the heavy black block at the top of the hourglass. 

Inspiration

My inspiration came from the artist Alexander Rodchenko. When I first looked up his pieces, I immediately noticed that he used  a lot black and white photography. He focused on the use of stripes and grids. I thought, especially for a project that could only be in black and white, that the use of his techniques would be interesting. He also made posters that made statements. For example, he took an image of a girl seemingly screaming or talking and used colorful words coming from her mouth so that her motion was implied. He made sure that his figures were the prominent image regardless of the busyness of his background. My theme was The Wizard of Oz and I incorporated his techniques through different scenes from the movie. 

Art Deco in Fashion

My theme for project 2 was Art Deco in fashion. I am really interested in the female figure and how it was portrayed through the style of Art Deco. It entails an elegant, glamourous, functional, and modern style. Often the figures are very elongated and focus attention on the curves of the body through elongated lines and a sense of fluid movement. In addition many pieces were based on geometrical shapes. I wanted to explore the ways in which I could further modernize the techniques of many Art Deco/fashion artists. My inspiration came from artists such as Aubrey Beardsley and some old vintage magazine covers. The first of the four pieces represents emphasis in economy. The implied lines paired with the simplicity of the image really captures the viewers eyes to one single focal point. The second piece demonstrates repetition. I chose the cheetah pattern because it is a very popular print today. Again I used the technique of implied lines. I felt the interesting shapes of the cheetah spots were both harmonious but maintained variety. The third piece represents movement although it was very hard to decipher during the class critique. I constructed her hair as very wavy/curly like it was almost blowing. Also the repeated interchanging black and white lines in the background was meant to engage the viewers eyes to follow the rising and falling pattern. Or even imagine the them moving to fill the entire background. The last work of the four represents balance. Although the large black space on the left seems to offset the entire frame, I tried to use the repeated dots to balance the left side. Furthermore, I placed the woman off center to the left in order the give more room to create more dots while leaving less room to the black space. Overall I could not be more pleased with my work. The amount of time and effort placed into the process was never-ending. However, I could have probably tried to represent movement and balance a little clearer.