Venus of Where?

Yeah, yeah. Almost two months without a blog update; I've been slacking. But instead of boring you all with stories about how I was ridiculously busy with final projects, entertaining my parents who came to visit, trying to take a break from the world, and reading an obscene number of comics, I'll just jump in and tell you about my favorite painting I've done.

The mission for our final Figure Painting was to take the model and place her in an environment.

Initially, I was thinking of doing something completely fantastical and crazy in the background, like aliens attacking, the apocalypse taking place, unicorns, dragons...

But then I thought about the pose (which was debated about for almost an entire class period because compromise doesn't make people happy...) and this painting from art history came to mind.
So I decided to mesh the two together: A parody of a painting from art history with surreal and fantasy elements. Oh, and a mini self-portrait, too.

We were on a pretty tight schedule and only had a few weeks to work on this one. I ended up putting in around 12 hours of work in one day to finish it in time for our final critique. Thankfully, I wasn't alone...I had some powerful backup in my homie and former roommate Marcel. He was there working on about eight of his abstract paintings at once. It's always great to have someone to bounce ideas off of, especially when he's Marcel. Check out his new website, by the way! iammarcel.com

And here's the end result. See the little mini-painting of Venus of Urbino in the background? Isn't it clever? Isn't it?

There's a little cow there, too! For all of my out-of-state homies, that's the Empire State Building in the background. And Godzilla.
I was going to add more to the table there, but I was running out of time and had no references for what I wanted to add. So a lonely egg timer sits on the table, waiting for the day it will be used. Unfortunately, that day may not come because Godzilla is not far away.

It sorta looks like me. Am I tipping my hat or is it slipping off my head? And what is that mysterious book? Marcel suggested that it be "Mein Kampf" and I thought that would be hilarious because my sense of humor has been twisted by my friends. But I left it blank.

Ad a closeup of the model, Lauren. It took me forever to get her face ironed out...the way it connected to the neck and the shape of her face and a billion small things were throwing me off. So I added more hair so you can't see much of the neck and it was magically fixed! Cool how that happens, huh?

3 Hour Portraits

So, I managed to get not one, but TWO portraits done this week! With the big painting out of the way, I had yesterday and today free to pursue additional paintings. Since I only got Louisa's back, I really wanted to paint a portrait of her.

It turned out that Louisa was only going to be posing on Tuesday...so I kicked things in gear and finished a portrait of her in 3 hours! I'm pretty happy with how it came out. She said that I caught her on a tired day, but she didn't seem too tired to me!

And today, I got one of Evangeline. I think it looks a lot better up close; please click on it to see more detail! I had trouble with this one, partially because I ran out of steam, and partially because the lighting was really tricky. Her entire right half was a mystery to me because her head was illuminated from the side/back and there wasn't much light on that half of her face. I tried to catch some of the highlights on her eyelashes, but that might've been too much to attempt with the brushes I had.

Another issue I had was with the canvas. I bought a pre-made, triple-primed canvas from Utrecht. The surface was smoother than a baby's bottom, which is often a good thing, but I had major issues getting the paint to stick. The previous portrait was done on a canvas I stretched and primed myself. With a surface that is a bit rougher, it took the paint a lot easier; paint on the Utrecht canvas didn't want to stay in one spot and smudged very easily. Definitely prefer stretching and priming my own canvas for small, fast paintings.

Super proud of these, mostly because I accomplished them in a short time. Granted, they are on small canvases- E is 11x14 and L is...something bigger. 14x16 maybe? Something unusual.

Maybe I'll post some of my photography work next.

Waiting for the semester to end,
-J

Evangeline and Louisa

Several weeks ago


Last Wednesday

I finally finished this two-figure painting in class on Wednesday. It's really interesting to see how certain things changed in the process. In this painting, the woman in the foreground (Louisa) ended up changing a lot. Her pose shifted bit by bit as the weeks passed.

At the pressing of my professor, I changed her head almost completely, among other things. Since we're slated to have the models for another week, I'm planning on taking a smaller canvas that I've had laying around to make a quick portrait of her.

Here's a closeup of Evangeline.

I might go in at some point and make the right side of the hair a bit darker. The highlights on the left side might not be as bright as I like, so I may also fix those. But as you can see, not much changed in the weeks.

Overall, I think this is my favorite painting that I've done so far, perhaps because we had a really long time to work on it. Even though we had two models, I felt like I had enough time to work each thoroughly with just enough time to develop a simple background. I almost wish that I painted the classroom instead of a flat purple background, though.

Many thanks to the two awesome models! Working with students must be interesting, if only for the weird conversations one can overhear. As always, thoughts and criticism are welcome in the comments!

-J

Great Successes and other Fun Things!

Guess who's going to be a Toy Design major next fall!

ME!

BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

I heard last Saturday that I got into the program and the first thing I did after calling my mom was to update my Twitter and Facebook status....sorry Blog, you kinda got shafted. But better late than never, right?! RIGHT?!

...right?

***

Things continue to fare well in my other studies. Since we're pretty much at the midpoint of the semester, there should be a lot of projects due and tests coming up. Fortunately for me, that doesn't really seem to be the case and I only had one midterm which was this past Wednesday. Woo, Maya Art and Civilization! Interesting class, indeed!

In Painting class, we began work on a new figure painting, this time with two models. It's a pretty decent setup, and both models are really awesome and fun to paint. I think this week will be our fourth week working on them. Here are my progress pics:

At the beginning of the second week.

My professor pointed out some major issues with the figure in the foreground, which I fixed last week.

Her back looks a lot better, doesn't it? I also had to change her face because she is now looking in a different position when she poses. I'm mostly disappointed about the face. Here is a closeup of what it looked like before:

I wasn't finished painting it and I thought it didn't look that great anyway, so it's not that big of a deal. I think my professor is irritated/concerned that I put in too much detail in facial features so soon XD. Here's a closeup of the other model. Lookin' all nonchalant!

We still have 3 or so weeks left to work on these, so expect them to look plenty different by the end!

***

Look for an update on what we've been doing in photography and Abstract Painting soonish! I promise!

Yatta!
-J

Two From A Series and More Progress

Finally, an update featuring actual Abstract Paintings!

Here are the two paintings from the series of four that I am working on right now. The one on the left is based off of this sketch:
And the other is based off this image from a previous blog post. The colors on both ended up being modified quite a bit. It's getting a little frustrating to keep everything parallel and squared. I have two more paintings to do and our professor is shooting for a deadline in two weeks, so I've quite a bit of work to do yet.


In other news, here's the latest progress on my self-portrait. We only have one more session to work. Again, I have a lot of stuff to do: Thicken the wrist, finish painting the hand, paint the apron, highlight the hair, add facial hair...those are the basics. It's really tough to paint a hand while posing...

Other classes are going well. Life Drawing is getting better, Photography is interesting, and Intro to Toy Design is a lot of work. I'm also taking a Mayan Art course, which is really interesting. I'll post some work from my other classes sometime soon. Time is running short-the Toy Design home tests are due March 6th!

CRUNCH TIME!

I'm So Vain...

...I probably think this painting is about me.

Sorry, couldn't resist. It isn't about me, it is of me!

So, here is a series of progress pics taken over the past two painting sessions. In Figurative (Figureative? We're painting the figure, but I don't know if we're painting figuratively...I'll stick to "painting" for now) Painting, we're doing self-portraits from observation (using a mirror).

Yes, a lot of things look "off" about it, but I think it's coming together alright. It's tough to paint yourself using a mirror and with one hand pulling an eyelid up partway...I move around a lot, to say the least. But I'm having a lot of fun painting it. I wish it were a more comical, exaggerated face.

I've also picked up a fan brush, which has been interesting to use. I have always been fascinated by their shape and when the local art store had a big sale, I couldn't resist picking one up. So far, I've only really used it for blending, which it excels at. This is both a good and bad thing; It makes beautiful transitions, but it moves me away from more expressive color placement and brush stroke. But I'm okay with that because I don't do expression very well, unless it involves a punching bag.

***

As for my other classes...well, I'll upload some pics of my other work whenever I remember to take pictures >_<. But so far, the semester has been going fairly well. I've been preoccupied with my Toy Design home test, which is chugging along slowly. I'll post all about that when I'm finished with it.

'till next time,
-J

Self portrait re-re-re-re-MIX!

So here is a very bad cell phone photo of out first Figurative Painting project: A larger-than-life self portrait. This is on a 3' x 5' canvas. The very same canvas that was the star of my last post, in fact! It's pretty close to the first self-portrait I did last year. Almost a bit too similar, but the inclusion of my hand tosses something new to the mix. My middle finger is pushing my eyebrow and eyelid up, which is why that side of the face looks funny. Actually, a lot of things look funny in the drawing...but this is just underpainting. Once everything gets colored in, I'm sure it'll look better.

Just to be safe, I'm going to start using a mirror that I don't have to hold. It's hard to paint a hand when it's holding something!

I'll keep you guys posted on progress.

-J

End of the Semester

Look at me, I'm sheepish!

Whew!

I am SO tired right now. For the past week, I've been going to bed around 3 or 4 AM and waking up around 8 or 9 for class or to do work. Thankfully, with the passing of Thursday, the semester has officially ended for me. Unfortunately, I've been super-busy packing my stuff and moving it into my apartment! I haven't had much time to relax, but today I took it easy after moving a bunch of stuff in the morning.

Anyway, time for the interesting stuff:

Tuesday was the day of my class' Cluster Review. We gathered all of our work and had a critique in front of all of our professors. Naturally, it was a ridiculously long process: we went from 9:30 to almost 6 with an hour long break for lunch. Thankfully, my abstract painting teacher Jeff Way brought us bagels!

My critique went really well. I actually wish I heard more negative comments from my professors, but they didn't have much of that to say. The only thing I remember them saying is that I might think or plan too much. Here are some pictures of my work:


We had to display three paintings from each class, not including homework paintings from Figurative Painting class...

...In addition to both sculptures, our best few drawings, and a few prints. I need to photograph more of the latter two. And on the floor are some of my embossings. I'll photograph or scan those too, when I get the chance.
You can see two larger drawings we did in Life Drawing class here. They're pretty recent.
And here is a closeup of the last abstract painting of the semester. I rather like it, but the blue and yellow one is my my favorite.

All in all, an enjoyable (but long) day. It was really cool to see my classmates' work collected together.

***

Winter break has pretty much started and I'll be going home on Tuesday (assuming this crazy snow isn't going to delay the flight). Super-excited to see my nephew, but I'll probably need a flu shot before seeing him. I'm coming back to my apartment on the 10th and will spend the remainder of winter break cleaning up, organizing, and working on my Toy Design home test! Expect a few updates on that, but not too many! I don't want anyone to steal my ideas now, do I?

Anyway, updates might be a bit scarce over the next few weeks, so don't worry about checking on a regular basis! 'Though if you do want to stay updated on my latest blog posts, follow me on Twitter! You can reach my page over on the right side of the page.

I know we can make it if we take it slow,
-J

Vicky and the Statue

Finished the last figure painting of the semester on Tuesday. At least, I think it's finished? Let me know what you guys think. Like I said before, we had to use non-naturalistic colors, and this is the result. I'm actually pleased after staring at this photo for a while; I hated the painting for the longest time. I really love the statue's face.Vicky and Statue

30" x 40"
Oil on canvas

And a peek at what I'm up to in sculpture:

Oooh, mysterious! Even I don't know what's happening!

Coming out of his cage, and doing just fine (for now),
-J

Wrench in my gears

This figure painting really has me lost. The wrench tossed into the mix: non-naturalistic colors. I'm having a lot of difficulty making up colors that match the values that I see. I suppose the problem could be my attitude. Perhaps I should view the requirement as something that will push my artwork in a new direction rather than as a wrench in my cognitive process.

Whatever the case, here are pictures. As per usual, I take a particular interest in the face. And naturally, the rest of the painting lags behind a bit. Professor fixed up the model's face during the second half, which is why it is much less defined fight now.

After the first session of the day

At the end of class. Essentially, more stuff filled in.

Closeup of the statue's face. Easier to paint because she doesn't move.

***

In other news, I got an apartment. Expect a blog post with some pictures of my tiny hole in the wall sometime in the near future!

-J

Clutter

So we've been working on this new painting for two weeks and have two more weeks to finish. I won't lie-I'm having a bit of difficulty with this one. This is mostly due to the fact that we aren't supposed to use naturalistic colors. Here is what the painting looked like at the start of class last week:


But my teacher wanted me to add a bunch of stuff to the background. She says she likes the idea of this painting feeling very cluttered. This is how it looked at the end of class:

At first, I didn't agree with the clutter in the background because I wanted to have a big empty space. I'm not particularly sure why, but now it makes a lot more sense to have more objects in the picture plane. I like my composition a lot because there are two faces: the actual model and the statue in the foreground. Now I have two 'happy places' I can work on when I need a break from the other bits of the painting.

Rather than match the real-life colors, we instead have to focus more on the black-and-white value of the colors. Here is the above image in grayscale.
I think the figure may be too dark....Potentially not a problem if the statue stays light and the background color changes. We'll see how it comes out.

Finished (?) figure painting

Yesterday was the last day we had to work on our current figure painting. We only had 3 hours, so I picked up my brushes and went to work and tried to get as much finished as possible.

I immediately hit the feet, hands, vase, carpets, and mirror. The foot was super-tricky; if you go back and look at how the painting's changed, you will see that the foot's position changed about 20 times. In the end, I sorta fudged it and made the orange pillow cover up part of it. The mostest trickiest part was probably figuring out how to render the carpets. I ended up just mixing more intense colors and doing random highlights...I'm not sure if there are enough, but I'm overall happy with how the painting came out.

This area is one of my professor's favorite sections. This photo is pretty bad...point-and-shoot cameras aren't very good at taking pictures of paintings. I might have to pick up a DSLR sometime soon!

And here's the face again. The only thing I did was add highlights to the eyes and maybe a little bit to the hair. It's still my favorite part of the painting, but every time I look at it and compare it to the model, I notice a dozen things that are wrong. Oh, the problems of an artist.

Here are a few pictures of the critique setup we had going on. It's really cool to see the range of styles within the class.




Hope you enjoyed seeing the progress of this painting, probably the best figure painting I've done so far. Our next project in class is a still life with reflective surfaces...should be interesting to say the least.

Steady, as she goes
-J