Why Do People Make Art?

People make art for many reasons. One way to express feelings is to create art. Some artists show their emotions by using different tones, colors and materials. The artwork can be interpreted by the viewer who sees sadness, excitement, calm or chaos. People also share stories and ideas through their art. Some people like the cave men wished to record events that showed their way of life by painting on cave walls. Artists can inspire and entertain people. Art can motivate people to do something or think of something. Seeing a beautiful panting of vast mountains can motivate you to travel or mountain climb while a photograph of WWII may make you think about loss during wartime. Art also is used as a symbol of religious beliefs. In many churches, you can see stained glass windows, statues, carvings, and painting on ceilings. This art inspires people to think about their religion and to feel its power. Art is also used to decorate places such as homes or offices and make these places more pleasant. Lastly, to some people, creating art is fun.

Reflecting on the 4 Hour Project.

I was the only person to do the still life drawing with the charcoal background. My technique was different than others because I had to draw backwards, using an eraser. I have to make the general shapes of the objects at first and then use a charcoal and chalk make the shapes to look real life like. I also used a lot of shading technique to make the objects 3- Dimensional. I had a hard time with proportions of the objects halfway through, I have to redraw some objects. It was sometimes frustrating. I did not complete it. I was happier with my former work, the one the class did together than this one. Firstly, I did not complete this drawing yet. If I had more time I'll be happier.˙

Reflecting on the 4 Hour Project.

I was the only person to do the still life drawing with the charcoal background. My technique was different than others because I had to draw backwards, using an eraser. I have to make the general shapes of the objects at first and then use a charcoal and chalk make the shapes to look real life like. I also used a lot of shading technique to make the objects 3- Dimensional. I had a hard time with proportions of the objects halfway through, I have to redraw some objects. It was sometimes frustrating. I did not complete it. I was happier with my former work, the one the class did together than this one. Firstly, I did not complete this drawing yet. If I had more time I'll be happier.

The Book Project...progress and planning.

My original plan was to create a simple and short story about a man with a prize show dog. A rival dog owner pays a thug to steal the dog so it wont beat her dog in the big show. I created a sketch of the story in my sketchbook. My first picture went really well and agrees with the rough draft sketch. I faced some challenges like making the rival dog owner 's arm and hand to stick in the right angle. I made a lot of mistakes but eventually I figure out how to make it look correct.

Drawing the Human Figure Inside Out

Today was D.E.A.D. (drop everything and draw) day again, and we were to draw human figure, displaying the proportions of the body. We were not to draw the details, but to draw the figure quickly and make sure the proportions were correctly balanced. I think my figures was okay, of course it not perfect, I think I have some trouble making the head proportional to the body. Maybe a bit more practice would help.

Shades of grey.

The goals of today's drawing was to bring the objects on the table to life. We are supposed to draw them by using a paper with a charcoal dark background and make shapes and shades with a eraser. I find it was quite difficult to draw the transparent bottle and find the right hue of white for the pots. I was not exactly satisfied with my work but I generally did well on it.

1. This painting is called the Nighthawks, it was created by Edward Hopper in 1942. Edward Hopper was born in Nyack, New York, on July 22, 1882. The masterpiece was painted with oil on a canvas.
2. My first impressions of the painting was how it portrayed the shadows in detail. It looked made it look almost like a photograph. I also was impressed with the depth. Nothing was crooked or "off" their position.
3. Edward Hopper was a painter who studied for five years under Robert Henri, a member of the Ashcan School of painters. He doesn't paint the chaos of urban, he paints about urban isolation. He painted the Nighthawks to show the loneliness of life in the city during late nights. A nighthawk is like a night owl to Hopper, he refers it to people who stay up late; like the people in the diner in the painting.
4. He emphasized the diner by contrast; he gave the diner a bright light, compared to the dark and glum outside. I like how the light in the diner flooded out to the street through the window casting specific shadows.

Finding images that are balanced.

Asymmetrical, yet with balance,
the tree balances with the building on the right.



















Radial Symmetrical
















Almost Symmetrical












Symmetrical

Reflecting on Found Objects Sculptures.

The first object that inspired me to make my sculpture the way it is was the bike seat. It looked like some kind of animal's head with the snout pointing down. It reminded me of a cow and a dog. From that I decided to create some kind of creature, and I did not want to create a regular animal so I created a creature with the combination of qualities of a dog and a cow. I made it out of a stereo and parts of a mini bike. I expected my sculpture to be about this size and color. It basically turned out what I was expected with minor changes such as the wheel attached to the top of the tail and the grill at the neck, but it just made the sculpture better in my eye.

I think I did a good job in this term so far, I know I was not a perfect student, my work had not always complete on time, but my work had always exceed the projects' expectations, I had always followed the directions of each projects. I was on time everyday, I was even a bit early on some days. I tried to be creative with my work and to express my feelings about each found objects and picture it in my mind before I do each step. I checked in a rage of A and B, not below C, I think it represent most of my efforts in my last term.

What's in the Sack?

Today was drop everything and draw (DEAD) day. We drew a picture with charcoal of objects in a trash bag.
The goal was to draw it quickly at the beginning and add details at the ending. The difficulty of the project was to draw the clear trash bags. The trick was to draw the object inside the bag first and then use the eraser to make white lines that looks like the reflection of light on the bags. It worked pretty well for me. I focused on the texture and the shading of the objects and the sack itself. I was happy with the results of my work.

Keeping Up To The Changing Still Life.

Keeping up to the changing setting of the still life pose on the table was really difficult and tiring. It is hard to erase every thing and drawing something else in its place over and over. It created a giant smear on the paper which irritated me. The three most difficult thing I had to keep up with the changing still life was erasing a lot over and over when something is taken away or overlap something else, and drawing the object over and over when something is taken away or added in the front of it. Lastly, the most hard thing was to try and keep the objects proportional to the table and drawing it in the right size.

Found object sculpting

Artists find objects that are random and sometimes inspiring and combine it with other random found objects to create a sculpture of something random made of something random.

Reflecting my first critique.

My group liked my work, it was a bit funny. They were polite and said there was not so many things that are wrong with my picture. They said that the love came out in the wrong place from the dog towards the baseball. The love symbol looks like it came out of his butt. I know that was awkward and I should have put the love symbol from else where on the dog. They also misunderstood my symbol of anger, fear, and confutation, and I agree with them, they were not exactly clear.

Ingrid Calame

Ingrid Calame's artworks reminds me of our project with found patterns and shapes in the past week and the paint pouring project. It has a lot of amorphous and colorful shapes overlapping each other. Her arts are abstract; she doesnt draw from memory nor still life; she make her arts from found shapes like we did in the past week. Ingrid Calame was born in the Bronx, New York in 1965. She is an abstract artist with her own unique styles and methods. She started her type of abstract art in the early 1990s. She traces real life shapes such as graffiti or tire skid marks or cracks from specific sites over the country on large rolls of Mylar (a see- through polyester tracing paper). She collects her traces and overlaps them over each other in her studio in Los Angles and adds color to the lines and shapes with a color pencil and paint. Her hard work resulted into beautiful, colorful and abstract masterpieces. She makes her paintings the way because she wanted to "map" the world of art with her found images.
The art work in the upper right corner is my favorite art by her. I like the color and the pattern. It just makes it pleasant to look at it. I could look at it for a long time without getting bored. It also has depth; the pattern was painted in a certain way that it gives some depth into the picture.

Re- visiting observation/description activity

Spencer observed my description of my postcard. I did not finish writing the description, so the project failed miserably. The only thing that were the same in the picture and the postcard were the color. Spencer misunderstood my description of the mountains, he just drew empty green outlined triangles that covered the paper. I think the next time, Ill need more time to describe the picture. I think the time was the key.

Paint Pour Activity

It was fun when Matheus and I poured paints on the paper. We created four paintings. One looked like a lava field cooling and one looks like something of a face, and two were just a beautiful blob of colorful paints. I was a bit nervous when the paint was poured on the wrong places but it turned out okay.

An Artist's Habitat BH

1. What makes someone an artist?
The ability to be creative and express with art, any kind of art, it could be literary like poetry or music, or it could be action like dancing or drama, or it could be on something like painting. An artist just must be creative.

2. What does it mean to be creative?
To think outside the box, to look at a perspective that most people are not looking. To think or do something that is unique and to take risk to express it somehow.

3. Describe at least 3 or 4 things an artist needs to be creative and productive.
An artist must have a source of inspiration to create any sort of art; it could be anything, depending on each person. The source of inspiration will spark the urge to create an art that creates expresses it or creates another inspiration. An artist also must have utensils to create art, it could be anything too it just must be the right ones for the art. An artist also must have space to do the art without any distraction apart from the source of inspiration.

Collaborative Drawings.

The final draft of my picture was much better than the first draft that I drew. It only required some minor changes by myself at the end then it was really good. I like it. The other students had achieved reaching my goal for this picture. They even made the penguin's captions better, and his space suit too. I am happy with the result.

Heart of the Andes