Pearls and Pinball

Hello everyone! I would like to let you all know that I am not giving up on the whole blogging thing, but the last two weeks have been terribly busy....but in a rather good way. I am very sorry for missing things like art postings and Trinkets for Thursdays. As an apology I am posting this Dior commercial that I found really intriguing. Hope you enjoy!

I hope you all enjoyed that I much as did. So pretty and shiny! Haha, anyways, I would also like to let you all know that there will be an art post soon and that you will be getting a Trinket for Thursday this week. As you go about this week, try to find something pretty to make you smile. No worries, you will find something pretty, after all, beauty is in the eye of the beholder. And, as always, it's the random reasons...

Silicone and Fishes

Good Monday everyone! Hope you are doing well! It has been a crazy week. Quick recap:  My family came into town the weekend before last, it was a blast. This last week has been a series of running to classes, running to work, then running around trying to get homework finished and tests studied for. Thankfully this last weekend was great. I actually worked both Saturday and Sunday, but C.J. and I spent a lot of time just having fun. No homework this last weekend! That was super nice! Last night he popped Star Wars into the DVD player.....and so I can now say that I have seen Star Wars (even if it is only like an hours worth). Haha. Anyhoo, classes today were pretty good, and most of them let out early. So I have an art post for you and a surprise too!

Art Project Numero Uno:  Clay tile, with flexible mold, and mother mold.
Class:  3D

This project has been extremely stretched out as far as the time frame goes. But anyways, we were told to make a 4 inch by 4 inch tile out of clay. The design was completely up to each individual, but it had to work when 9 of the same tile were laid together. I chose to take my inspiration from the Aegeans and the Italians, and then add some of my own flavor to it. It was both an additive and subtractive process. Here it is:

The finished tile:

So there is that project....well, part of it. Because of the weather we were not able to cast our flexible molds out of the silicone sealant as soon as we would have liked. Then, we had to let those dry before we could cast the mother mold out of plaster....which we did today. So...hopefully soon I will have my nine tiles cast out of plaster. Want to know the best part about this project? We get to paint the tiles in as many colors as we would like! I am so excited!

Project Numero Dos:  Zoology Study

Class:  Drawing 2

Oh my goodness. If you have ever been down to the basement of Life Sciences West on campus you will know why I could not look at a glass jar for a few weeks without getting queasy. If you haven't been down there...let me fill you in. You see, below the classrooms of Life Sciences West lies the most perfect venue for a haunted house. No, there are no ghosts, but there are a lot of dead things. The basement is home to the Zoology collections museum which has animals dating back to before statehood. Impressive! So to help you get the visual, think of those shelves you can buy at Walmart and Lowes for your garage or shop....now think of those completely full of various sizes of mason glass jars...you have your pints, quarts, gallons, 2 gallons...etc. Now fill all of those jars with a liquid that looks like Miso soup....minus the tofu. (yum...right?) No. Now...stuff various types of animals into those soup filled jars. Gross...I know. They have all kinds--fish, snakes, frogs, bugs, polar bears, sharks, pigs....you name it, they probably have canned it. Now...that's not all. They also have several sets of drawers that when pulled out reveal dead birds...they are not stuffed either. They just lay side by side in the drawer blanketed with the smell of moth balls. As you walk out of the museum you can see the many deep freezes that line the basement hallway....creeeepy. Animals in jars not your thing? That's ok, they have deep freezes on the first floor with dead mammals and bones....also blanketed in moth balls. So...you might be wondering what I decided to draw....dead snake....dolphin skull.....Elvis the iguana? Nope...none of those. I chose to draw the live fish in the aquarium in the break room. And I loved it! Here are the fish from the break room. (Disclaimer: these fish were alive, not floating in some nasty Miso soup look a like jelly)

Fish One:  Graphite Pencil

Fish Two:  Ink

Fish Three: Charcoal

Now, the project included six drawings, 3 different mediums, and two types of reference materials. The fish above were all live subjects, and the fish below were all drawn from photographs.

Fish Four:  Graphite Pencil

Fish Five:  Charcoal

Fish Six:  Ink

It was a fun project to do, mainly because it was different than what I would normally draw. The live, fast moving fish were a challenge, but I really enjoyed studying the fish and finding out the functions of their designs in order to accurately draw them.

Here is the aquarium where the first three fish live, and then all of the fishies together. :)

Now...for your promised surprise. Well, my current Drawing 2 project involves using one of my fish drawings in an installation at the Postal Plaza in downtown Stillwater. The Postal Plaza will be the new OSU art gallery, and will be hosting a building reception on the 19th of this month. The awesome news? My installation will be seen at the reception! Hooray! I am getting very excited! Here is a link to the art department's blog talking about the reception:

http://osuma.wordpress.com/2011/10/10/transforming-the-postal-plaza-genus-genius/

I will post pictures after the reception. Sorry for the extremely long post today, but I needed to get some art on here. Hope you all have a fabulous week, and remember to just keep swimming. And, as always...it's the random reasons.

A Trinket for Thursday

Hello everyone! Today's trinket is about a very cute movie that I am watching right now.  Watch it.

Goodnight all!

Have a wonderful weekend, and don't give up on the art post...it is coming very soon. This weekend, try to relax and tell someone you love them. And, as always...it's the random reasons.

A Trinket for Thursday

Hello everyone, hope you are doing well! Today's trinket comes from my Italian Renassance Art History class. Today we studied portraiture and looked at paintings of the Duke and Duchess of Urbino. This peice features the duke and his very idealized wife on the front and then pictures of them in their separate carriages and chariots on the back. Here is the front:

His face is "messed up" because apparently he is missing part of his face, including his upper nose and eyeball. The artist spared the duchess of looking like her actual self by painting her in the ideal female model of the Italian Renassance:  pale skin and blonde hair for purity, expensive fabric and jewelry for social stautus and wealth, and modern hairstyle. Lucky her.

Anyways, that was not the trinket for today, but just consider that an extra tidbit. Here is the back panels and the trinket for Thursday:

This picture is showing the paintings without their frame, but they are placed right behind the portraits in the same over-the-top frame.

The duke and his chariot pulled by white horses are on the left, while the duchess and her carriage pulled by unicorns are on the right. Now...for today's trinket:

FACT:  Unicorns can only be tamed by virgins.

I bet you were not expecting that one! As it turns out, you can learn something everyday.

As you go about your weekend, try to learn some random useless fact. It will do you good. Laugh a little! Oh and remember...it's the random reasons.

P.S.:  Expect an art post tomorrow!

A Trinket for Thursday

Hello everyone. Before I get into today's trinket, I do need to apologize to those of you who might have noticed that there was no trinket last Thursday. I am sincerely sorry. The only excuse I have was that I was busy with projects and was getting sick. Anyhoo, today I have a trinket and am also pleased to announce that I will have one if not more artwork posts in the coming days.

Today's trinket is more or less selfish, it is an announcement and most likely has nothing to do with any of my readers. I have been incredibly unfocused today due to the fact that today, September 22, is exactly 10 days since my Momentum Art Show submission was due, 12 days since I submitted my art, and is the day that the artists are supposed to be notified as to whether their submissions were accepted or....rejected. I have found myself checking their website for the selected artist list and excessively checking my email for my personal message. Since I started typing this post (with my email open, of course) I have received two emails, both of which made a little "ding" when they got to my inbox. Each time made my heart rate speed up a little bit. One was the Recipe of the Day from allrecipes.com and the other was a list of art which will be on my Italian Renaissance quiz next Tuesday. I deleted the recipe and saved the study material.

If you haven't noticed, I am stressing out hardcore. I promised myself I would not get my hopes up, but knowing that I am supposed to find out this news before 5pm today is KILLING me! I will update you all with results.

So, there you go, today's trinket is the reason for my stress and lack of attention today. Regardless of the outcome, I am proud of myself for putting myself and my work out there to be judged. As you go about the rest of your day, don't hide your talent. People will either appreciate or they won't, but as long as you are happy with it, that is all that matters. Oh and, as always, it's the random reasons.

Stress and Deflation

Hello everyone! Hope you all have had wonderful weekends and are ready for the new week to start! I have been working on my two studio projects this weekend, and they are both finished! I am slightly impressed seeing how I did not have to stay up into the early morning hours to have such an accomplishment as two finished projects. Anyways...here they are.

Project 1: Foam Carving. Class:  3D Fundamentals.
Goal:  To create a relief carving out of insulation foam which has a background, middle ground, and foreground. Use an abstract square from a personal photo to a 12x12 inch panel.

I used a photo that I took when CJ and I had a picnic at the lake.

Then I chose this 1.5x1.5 inch square to carve:

It was a lot of work and it definitely took me out of my comfort zone, but towards the end I started to really enjoy it. I am looking forward to getting this piece framed and placed on the mantle.We had to paint the carving in one color, so I chose a pea green. It is going for a more contemporary natural look.

Project 2:  Contour Line Inflatable Object Drawing. Class:  Drawing 2

Goal:  To create a charcoal drawing using vine charcoal and an eraser. The erasure should cause a sense of progression or history, and the object must be drawn from either deflation to inflation or vice versa.

This project and I went round and round. I hated it. I procrastinated to the extreme, but in the end, I love it. It has a meaning and I believe that it can definitely be seen.

Here is an up close view of the final piece. It shows the sense of history that the drawing has due to the repeated drawing and erasing.





This is the finished project. I drew my inflatable pool ring from inflation to deflation. In the beginning the object was simple, but towards the end it became more and more complicated. The final drawing is darker than the rest and was not erased like its 100 predecessors. The title is Stress, and it represents a big ball of stress. It also can be seen as: 1. Stress causes you to feel deflated. 2. Stress takes over. 3. This project stressed me tot he core. As you can see, the ball has completely taken over most of the page. It covers the border and the whole ball cannot be seen. It is complicated and confusing.

Critiques are tomorrow! Wish me luck! As you go about your week, don't let stress take over your life. Take a breath and relax...it ALWAYS turns out ok. And, as always....its the random reasons.



A Trinket for Thursday

Today's trinket is coming from a video we watched in one of my art classes and it's influence on my Drawing 2 project 2 that I am working on. You can read about it in the post, Let Me Just Erase That. Anyways, this video is a drawing animation done by William Kentridge of South Africa. His videos are all done on paper with charcoal. He only uses about 20-30 sheets of paper per animation because he uses erasure to add a sense of history and progression to each scene. Look him up and watch more of his videos, they are pretty fantastic. Here is Automatic Writing:

Hope you enjoyed that! It is really neat to watch and to know that all he uses is paper, charcoal, and a video camera. As you go about your day, try to find something wonderful that is accomplished with surprisingly simple tools. What you find might shock you. And as, always...its the random reasons.