Module 1: Still Alive? Still Lives!
Module 1 started with colour wheels, tone scales and values, which has been a big help in my understanding of colour.
We then transitioned that into a random still life painting, not really focusing on anything in particular.
When all that was done, we started focusing on different versions of still lifes, monotone, abstracts and negative space.
The last one is by far my favourite, though the first one is a close second. I like how cohesive it is, while also being contrasted. I sort of carried this into my first resolved painting, where I did tones in different colours.
Module 2: Pictures and Pigments and Portraits, Oh My!
The next thing we did was portraiture, underpainting and skin tones. I had a distinct aversion to human faces, so I was allowed to draw animals and pet portraits, but only if they have three facial focal points. Unlike the following, where I messed up, despite really liking it.
I then switched to doing my cat’s face, in black and white and pure yellow, so that we could understand the values of a face, and how to get it as close to 3D as possible.
We sort of did underpainting and skin tones in the same piece, but basically, the base colour you apply paint onto, ie. brown wood or white paper, can impact how we perceive the paint, so putting something on white can make it appear brighter, or putting something on brown can make it more dull.
The same applies to the following image.
It is absolutely cursed.
I applied a light layer of yellow onto the block, in the tone scale of the face. And then I went over the yellow with skin tone, which made it appear more orange. I sort of took this, as well as inspiration from other artists to get to my resolved work.
Some of my other experiments have gotten lost, and I don’t have any photo’s of them, but we just made a viewfinder (two lengths of cardoard in L shapes) and focused in on specific areas of an image using them, then we painted said aspect of the image in monotones.
Module 3: “It must be Abstract”
We started the Abstract section of the unit with masking excercises. It was interesting to layer different colours, and get sharp edges, which I decided to use in my resolved work.
Then we started doing some more abstract works, which I didn’t really enjoy. I’m not a fan of how they turned out.
My resolved work was inspired by grafitti, pop-art, M.C. Escher and spider-webs. The end result is quite noisy, but still readable, interpretable and interesting.
