This is a Scary Self-Portrait

I've always been fascinated with the idea of a tortured artist. I have never been one until this project. I like to use art as a way to escape my problems and trials, a way to forget the world that I live in. For this project, we had to do a cubism piece. I decided to do a self portrait inspired by Picasso's later cubism works and by African tribal masks. I channeled all of my hate, sadness, loneliness, and creepiness into this piece, and this is what I came up with:

My class did not respond well to this piece. But what do you expect from a bunch of Mormon's who try their best to make the best of any situation? There were several comments about how dark it is and how creepy the red eye is. All my teacher had to say about it was that it had fantastic technical skill. I guess that is a good thing, but I was expecting so much more out of everyone. Through this piece, I realized a lot about myself. It turns out that I really like making people feel uncomfortable with my art. I enjoyed seeing my classmates squirm when they looked at this piece, and I liked it when my teacher stammered until all he could say was that I used great technical skill. Maybe that is why artist do the things that they do, not because they are tortured artists, but because they enjoy torturing the viewer. 

P.S. This is made with charcoal and chalk pastel on Stonehenge paper.

This is a Guitar

These are six views of my guitar. It's pretty boring, actually. But I got a 100% on this project, so I guess its all good.

This is a Tronie

Hello all you lovely people of the internet (name that YouTube video series). For one of my drawing projects, we had to reinvent the classic Tronie. What is a Tronie you ask? It is an old school renaissance portrait.

Here is an example of what is arguably the most famous Tronie, Vermeer's "Girl with a Pearl Earring"

Notice the three-quarter view profile and contrast between the figure and the background. 

Now here is my contemporary take on the classic Tronie:

And for your enjoyment, I included the selfies I took as reference for this picture:

These are Drawing Projects

Hello to the people out there who read this blog (which is probably closer to one than two). I've been in a drawing class this semester, and I haven't posted any of my works because I didn't want to post them until they were finished. What I have learned this semester is that they will never be finished. Art works are always a work in progress, and they always have something that could be added or improved. I'm satisfied with some of my works this semester, and although none of them are perfect, they come pretty dang close.

This is a blind contour collage. I drew all of the elements in this collage without looking at my paper as I was drawing, then collaged them together. I like the composition of this piece, but the "cloud of ideas" part of the drawing was lost when I took the picture because the drawings aren't bold. If I was to continue working on this piece, I would make the elements other than the girl at the bottom more bold

This is a still life. It is a line drawing, so no value here. I had to use lines to show the contours of the objects as well as the shadows. 

This is a drawn collage. I cut out all the images from magazines, collaged them, and then drew the collage in gray scale. This is my favorite piece so far. 

This is an isometric design. I drew a grid that was based on 30 degree triangles, and then drew these shapes on the grid. The result is that all these shapes seem to be in a three-dimensional space. I used bold colors to make it fun and kind of trippy looking. 

More projects to come, I can guarantee it.