1. The obvious difference between my two pieces is the medium and skill level. My first piece is a pencil drawing that is uncompleted though I don't think completing it would have made it look better. I think my interpretation of the theme beauty is represented in my first artwork but not very well. My final is a watercolor painting. Over the course of the art semester, I've definitely gotten more comfortable using different mediums. The watercolor and small touches with colored pencil add lots of contrast from my original pencil drawing. I interpreted the theme of beauty in my first piece as seeing something in the mirror that you weren't proud of or something that was completely different than how you expected. And though I think this could be interpreted for theme, I sort of redid that idea in my final. I did the similar idea with the mirrors and the face but for my final I did many mirrors. My proportions in my final are not correct but I think that’s the beauty in it. I don’t think when you look in a mirror you will be completely satisfied with the outlook but it’s how you see yourself on the inside. I purposely didn't want to draw the actual facial features like a mouth or eyes or the ears. I drew things that people are usually very critical over. People today are obsessed with the idea of having perfect eyebrows or perfect hair or defined cheekbones, it’s ridiculous. I think I have improved using mediums but also interpreting theme.
2. a) I did my identity project based off the book Schizo. I decided to portray the main character, Miles, who has schizophrenia. Mental illness is a sensitive topic that I think is brushed by but is very serious and should be discussed. I feel like it either goes unnoticed or it is overused. Though I have never experienced or seen someone experience having schizophrenia, it is obviously a disorder that takes over your life. Though this is a poor example, on a TV show I watch, there is a schizophrenic mother and though it isn't the “real thing” I still think it is eye opening to see the effects. You can read all you want on the disorder but it’s not real until you see it or experience it.
d. I would consider the silhouettes of the boy, the crows and the power lines to be symbolic to schizophrenic. As I said in a previous blog post, there’s a reason I didn't actually paint a boy or the crows and I just did the outline. Miles sees these black crows when something bad is going to happen though no one else experiences those thoughts except him. I think the silhouettes really symbolize Miles’ schizophrenia and just schizophrenia in general. Not all schizophrenics see black crows but I think it’s symbolic to say that they can't decipher between fantasy and reality.
d. I would consider the silhouettes of the boy, the crows and the power lines to be symbolic to schizophrenic. As I said in a previous blog post, there’s a reason I didn't actually paint a boy or the crows and I just did the outline. Miles sees these black crows when something bad is going to happen though no one else experiences those thoughts except him. I think the silhouettes really symbolize Miles’ schizophrenia and just schizophrenia in general. Not all schizophrenics see black crows but I think it’s symbolic to say that they can't decipher between fantasy and reality.
3. I really enjoyed the limitations project and the character remix/ 2-in-1 project. Looking through my blog posts, those are the units where I really enjoyed the artwork I produced. When we were learning about observation, I think the “tutorials” you did really helped, especially where we were drawing the hallway, hands, and facial features. Although I wasn't very good at drawing the hands or facial features, I probably would have worked harder on them if I knew we would have to do a project or blog post about them to reflect on the skills we learned. Drawing the hands just to have a warm up began to make the warmups less fun I guess. When we aren't doing art/ in the middle of art for a blog post, I like doing short warm ups that will improve the skills we are learning during that unit.