Artist Statements
Title: Me
My artwork is a self-portrait. I took this picture of myself a few weeks ago and decided to use it for my self-portrait. The title of my work is “Me”. Some elements and principles that are obvious in my work is texture. I can see texture throughout my work because of the jacket I am wearing, you can tell that it is a piece of clothing by the shading I used. Also, my hair shows texture because you can tell that it is hair and not a bunch of lines. Another element would be value, where the light hits the piece you can see that the shading is lighter to show that there is light there. Where there is shadow, the shading is darker to show that there is a shadow there. I would say there is movement in my piece because everything flows together to create one piece, everything goes well together.
The media my artwork is made from is pencil. To create my artwork I used pencils, blending tools, kneaded erasers, pencil top erasers, and paper. Some techniques I used were shading lightly and mapping lightly.
I drew a self-portrait because I think self-love is important. Being able to analyze every detail about your face is a great way to create self-confidence and to help you realize how unique you really are!
My goals as an artist is to improve during every project. Every time I do a pencil drawing, my goal in the end is to make it as realistic as possible. I am very happy about how much I have grown since last years portrait drawing. I have learned so many different techniques, and I notice a difference in every piece I draw! Quarantine helped me grow as an artist because I was able to focus on art and critique myself and figure out what I was doing wrong and fix it. This project did help me reach my goal because it shows my growth since last year. It truly is the best feeling being able to look at you work and be proud of yourself!
While creating this artwork, I learned how to draw teeth better, I learned how to make hair look more realistic, the importance of lips and how they’re shaped, and how to create smooth value and balance. The final piece is what I imagined, and I am very pleased with it. This piece will influence my future artworks by putting the skills I learned during this project to use in the projects to come. This project only inspired me to want to practice more!
Title: Taylor Swift
My artwork consists of a canvas with Taylor Swift’s sheet music to a song from every album of hers. There is cut out letter from a magazine that spell out “Taylor Swift”, there is also a picture of Taylor Swift in the middle of the canvas. This project’s subject matter is mixed media. The title of my work is “Taylor Swift”. Elements or principles that are obvious in my work is color, space, texture, value, contrast, emphasis, movement, pattern, rhythm, and unity.
To create my artwork, I used word document to insert pictures from google of her sheet music. I made a collage of all her songs, printed the paper off, soaked it in water, then placed it on the canvas. I then drew a picture of Taylor in pencil. I then cut it out, placed it on the canvas over the sheet music background. I went through magazines and found letters to spell out “Taylor Swift”. I lastly coated my piece in mod podge.
Taylor Swift inspired my project; I have been listening to all her songs recently and thought she would be a great inspiration for my piece. My artwork expresses how much an artist can change through the years of their career, and how much of an impact music artist have on our culture. My artwork expresses serious and mysterious emotions.
My goal as an artist is to improve in every piece, and to learn from my mistakes and let those mistakes help me improve my skill in the next project. This piece did help me reach my goal because it helped me get out of my comfort zone, but also include what I am comfortable with.
During this piece I learned the importance of focal points and movement. The final piece is what I imagined, and I am very pleased with how it turned out. This piece will influence my future artworks by making me familiar with creating a focal point so that the viewers eyes will focus on the most important part of my piece.
Title: Charlie
My artwork is a picture of my dog, Charlie. In my piece you can see his brown hair, and yellow eyes. He is laying on the grass with the sky in the back. The title of my work is “Charlie”. Elements and principles that are in my piece are line, color, texture, value, contrast, emphasis, movement, rhythm and unity.
My artwork is made from acrylic paint. For my piece I used a canvas, paint, and brushes. While doing my piece I created the background first. I also made sure I painted the dark values first, then put the lighter values on top.
My dog inspired my artwork because I took a picture of him back in September, and I thought it was a good picture, so I decided to create it. My artwork expresses calmness and relaxation.
My goals as an artist is to always improve. In this piece, my goal was to improve from last years piece. This piece did help me reach my goal because I can see my growth in this piece compared to last year’s piece.
While creating this piece I learned that if you want to focus on a certain thing in the piece, blur everything around it by blending it with the background. The final piece is what I imagined; I am very pleased with it. I also am excited that my piece looks exactly like my dog. I’m proud that I resembled him very well. This piece will influence my other artworks by making me more comfortable with painting so that I can create more acrylic pieces.
Title: Yellow Country Singer
My artwork is a picture of Morgan Wallen as a Simpsons cartoon character. The title of my artwork is “Yellow Country Singer”. Elements and principles of art that are in my piece are shape, line, color, balance, emphasis, movement, pattern, rhythm, and unity.
I created this piece with pencil, sharpie, and watercolor. I started off by finding a Simpsons character that looked like Morgan Wallen. I then made tweaks to the character that made the character look like Morgan, like adding his microphone and flannel, etc. I then drew the final character on another piece of paper and then traced it with sharpie. I finally painted it and traced it with sharpie again to give it a crisp cartoon look.
Morgan Wallen inspired my work because I love listening to his music, he is my favorite country singer. I have been wanting to do a project inspired by him for a while and this project was perfect for him. My artwork shows humor and brings attention to his music and country music in general. I tried to make this project to where when people looked at it, they laughed.
My goals as an artist is to learn different things and go out of my comfort zone. I also want to improve in different medias and styles to test my artistic ability. This piece did help me reach my goal because it was out of my comfort zone and fun to do.
While creating this piece I learned that not all art has to be serious and classic. Art can be expressed in different ways. Art can also be funny and is still able to show your artistic ability. I also learned that it is good to go out of your comfort zone. This piece isn’t what I imagined because I changed my mind so many times, but in a good way it’s not what I imagined. I am very pleased with this piece though. It will influence my future artworks by helping me understand it is good to go out of your comfort zone.
Title: Chick-fil-a
My artwork is a mini sculpture of a Chick-fil-a box of nuggets. The title of my piece is “Chick-fil-a”. Elements and principles that are obvious in my work would be, texture to create contrast, form, value to create contrast, shape, line, and color.
My artwork is made form cardboard, air dry clay, paint, sharpie, and hot glue. While creating my artwork I faced a lot of obstacles. I learned that if you leave airdry clay sitting out, it will harden. I also learned that it’s hard to get paint to stick to slippery surfaces.
Chick-fil-a inspired my work. That is one of my favorite places to eat and I thought it would be a good idea to put that into art. My artwork shows happiness because food makes me happy!
My goals as an artist is to learn new things and always improve every time, I do a project. This piece did help me reach my goal because when I finished, I felt proud of my piece. I learned things along the way because of all the obstacles I faced with this project.
Overall, I am happy with my project and I think it turned out cool. The final piece is what I imagined. It isn’t perfect, but I’m still happy with it. This piece will influence future artworks because I learned from my mistakes so that I can improve in future projects.
Title: Butterfly
My artwork is a butterfly with different colors. The title of my piece is “Butterfly”. This piece is inspired by printmaking. Elements and principles that are most obvious in my work are shape, line, color, texture, balance, movement, pattern, rhythm, and unity.
To create my artwork I used Styrofoam, acrylic paint, and paper. I carved a picture of a butterfly into the Styrofoam, then I painted over the Styrofoam and printed the image on a piece of paper. There were a lot of obstacles in the way like, not being able to get a good print, the butterfly being too detailed to be able to trace neatly, and the paint building up in the Styrofoam making the lines less defined. Even after all these obstacles, I am pleased with the final piece and I learned a lot from the mistakes I made. It was also a cool technique to try out.
My favorite insect is a butterfly, so I thought I would make one. my artwork is far from perfect because of all the mistakes I made along the way, and the print didn’t come out perfect. But it just shows that your artwork doesn’t have to be perfect to be beautiful. My butterfly is also asymmetrical, but the piece is beautiful. My artwork shows happiness, beauty, and uniqueness.
My goals as an artist is to try new things and learn from my mistakes. This piece did help me reach my goal because I learned a new technique that I am interested in trying again someday. I made a lot of mistakes and had to redo the process repeatedly, but in the end, I am pleased with the results.
In creating this artwork, I learned that it’s okay to make mistakes if you learn from them. The final piece is what I imagined. I was expecting the process to be easier than it turned out to be. This piece will influence future artworks because I will understand that the more mistakes, the better the piece will turn out!
Title: Anxiety
In my artwork, you see a girl walking down a dark road leading her to negative words and darkness. This represents the metaphor “Anxiety is walking down a dark and scary alley without knowing what is waiting for you”. People struggle with anxiety everyday and it is very hard and confusing, so I wanted to bring attention to it and base my project off anxiety. Some elements or principles I have in my work would be color, value, movement, pattern, and unity.
The media my artwork is made from is watercolor, sharpie, color pencil, and crayon. Techniques I used in my project were blending and adding different values so the colors wouldn’t clash with each other. I first mapped out everything, then I painted the background with watercolor, I wrote the words, drew the trees, then I colored the road, finally I colored the girl.
Anxiety inspired my artwork. My work expresses a social/personal issue because a lot of people deal with anxiety every day, and I tried to make my piece express that the best it could. My artwork shows sadness and loneliness.
My goal as an artist is to always improve each time, I create a piece. I don’t feel as if this piece helped me reach my goal because its not to its full potential. I don’t think I spent enough time on it because I couldn’t get into the piece.
From creating this artwork, I learned that perspective is important. I also got somewhat of an idea on how to use colored pencils. The final piece is what I imagined because I knew I was going to be using materials I wasn’t common with using. This piece will influence my future artwork because it will only make me want to grow as an artist.