Eternal Revelation of SolaceReflectionPhotograph edited to exhibit a ‘grittiness’ beauty - similar to how I picture solace. The perspective creates an infinite ending to the coastline. The image is intended to express a situation in which one discovers something that exhibits solace, bringing comfort in a time of grief. A revelation is made that this solace can extend into eternity if one remains positive and calm, so that no matter the outcome of any attempt at success, peace will be found. Perhaps the deeper meaning of this piece presents an unprovable, simultaneously pessimistic and optimistic way of looking at life and achieving one’s dreams. But, I feel that this piece perfectly captures my stance on how you can condition your mind to never give up on a dream and acknowledge possible failure, but still prohibit your doubts from being the cause of your possible failure.
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The Key*this piece was a photograph, without any additional alterations, therefore in-progress photos weren't necessary*Below are additional photos that I took at the lake, on this day, as I searched for the best objects and compositions to use as this slot in my concentration of 15 pieces ReflectionPhotograph of a tree stump that I discovered while taking a walk around a lake. The keyhole-shaped divot in the log and the placement of this feature as the focal point of the image presents the sentiment that ‘the key’ needed to ‘unlock’ (i.e. achieve) a goal is not tangible, instead, the willpower that one possesses is the key to accomplishing one’s dreams. I can apply this to the fearful sentiment in my own dreams by realizing that there is nowhere to search for ‘the key’ to what I wish to do with my life, for I already possess what is needed; I just need to initiate the first step of my intended ‘dreams’ in life, to make them my reality.
Embrace the Nature of Your Own PathIn-Progress PhotosReference Photo of GeeseReflectionThis piece began with a photograph I took on my iPhone at a lake. Separate from the photo I took of the lake, I took a photo of two ducks, and then incorporated the the two ducks into the scenic lake image.
In the piece, a peaceful water scene emerges through the tree branches with conflicting positions, as the viewer peaks into the lighted water from a dull trail. As the perspective is of a person or entity that is currently on a path, stopping momentarily to embrace nature, this piece conveys how I should feel comfort and joy in embracing the decisions I have made and "continuing on the trail" of my life in the direction of which I have decided to embrace and do what I love, while accepting that there will be hardships throughout the journey. Relinquish of Youth, Towards Worldly ResponsibilityIn-Progress PhotosReferencesSketchesReflectionThis piece is a continuation of the 5th piece, but from a wider perspective, as larger landmasses are visible from the perspective of a human, rather than a fairy. The purpose for this continuation is to show how in your childhood, you feel enclosed and safe from "reality". You feel as if you have no real responsibility and can live more carefree and peacefully, focusing on relatively small instances in life, whereas in adulthood, you have to see things from the "bigger picture" and use fear to your advantage to motivate you to take responsibility and plan for your life ahead. In this piece, I specifically include a green, mossy mountain with a waterfall in the background because this mountain resembles the island of Neverland from the Peter Pan movies, which Pixie Hollow is located near. By putting this mountain that resembles part of Pixie Hollow in the background, the piece expresses how you literally can't get your childhood back (because in Neverland, you stay there to never age; to escape adulthood). By the perspective showing such a far distance from not only the pixie hollow tree, but also the Neverland mountain, it's conveying how one is not only physically distant from childhood as time has passed, but also mentally from the more simple, peaceful state of mind that you once had when you saw the world in a much more refined, simpler way.
I began this digital illustrative process by starting with the same reference photo of the lake from my 5th piece. I utilized the same water composition that I had made in my 5th piece as the water for this piece, but I zoomed out slightly. The first thing that I decided to add was the pixie hollow tree, so I used reference photos of a mossy tree trunk to construct this. Since the images I took only showed a part of the tree trunk, I had to layer different details of the masks of the same reference multiple times, to form a complete tree. Next, I took the reference image that I had with the hole in the mossy tree trunk (the "moss fairy house"), and added this detail to the bottom of the tree, to make it feel like it would be the home to fairies. Next, I felt that the continuous water got a bit too repetitive and boring, so I searched through my camera roll and found an image that I had taken at the beach of the water and sand, and added that to the right, bottom corner of this piece. Like for all the other images that I superimposed into this piece, I had to mask and color-correct the foam and sand of this specific reference photo, to make sure that it looked natural and cohesive in the piece. After the tree was done and the shore was added in the corner, I focused on the background, adding a green mountain, a pink mountain, and multiple icy, white mountains. For the pink and green mossy mountains, I used the same moss photos from the tree, for such landforms, changing the colors of the moss to give variation. For the waterfall stream on the green mountain, I cropped out a small portion of the waterfall from a photo I had taken near the mountains, copying this white, waterfall water over and over again to create the elongated waterfall down the mountain. For the white mountains, I used a photo of a white rock I had taken, and color-corrected it to give it a blue-white tint. Lastly, I added some colorful trees to the left side of the background; I used different photos I found in my camera roll of trees and flowers I had taken, rapidly changing the colors to those that were very bright (i.e. neon pink, blue, yellow, purple), and copied these trees multiple times. After the background seemed mostly completed, I noticed that it looked odd because I had yet to add the reflections of the mountains and distant trees in the water. I quickly added such by taking a screenshot of the current version of my final piece, cropping out the section of this screenshot to only include the area of the land that I wanted to reflect, flipping the photo vertically, changing the perspective of the photo in superimpose, and then slightly erasing and making it somewhat transparent to still see the ridges of the water, After completing this piece, I really love how it came together to compliment the 5th piece. I think that I did a great job with these two digital pieces in trying to be out of the box and use new methods for making art. If I could do anything differently, I would add more trees to the background, and even add some pixie dust to the tree! The Guileless Dewdrop StreamIn-Progress PhotosReferencesReflectionI drew inspiration for this piece from an online game that I used to play frequently in elementary school. The game, Pixie Hollow, was a MMORPG surrounding the environment and characters of Disney Fairies. You could "create your own fairy and fly!", as the website used to state, before the game shut down in late 2013. Ever since then, I reminisced on the fun times I got to creatively design my fairy's house and her clothing, and when I got to play my favorite mini game: Bubble Bounce. Over the years, I've daydreamed about playing the game again, or even being immersed in the world as a fairy, so I felt it was right to include this memory and desire in my portfolio. This piece will symbolize not only the obvious explanation of how I daydreamed about the game, but also the experience of missing the simple, positive aspects of early childhood, where perhaps you are in a place like "pixie hollow" and live in a peaceful mindset, with no fear of the real world that you will soon have to face as an adult; childhood, like this game, is not the reality that you are expected to live in as an adult, where you must use your fear to drive responsibility.
Since this piece is digital, the illustrations are based solely on incorporating photographs of different landscapes and objects that I have taken on my camera, into a photoshop-like app on my iPhone, to superimpose all of the objects into one final image. I began this process by using a photo that I took at a lake near my house, and superimposing another image of water that I took to make the water look closer than it is. Next, I changed the color of a photo I had taken of yellow flowers to blue, and superimposed these into the foreground, along with a photo of grass that I had taken up-close. I then added a photo of an interesting tree trunk with moss and a hole to the background (the photo of the lake with the superimposed water). Next, I added a photo of an interesting, thick, twisted tree root that I had taken to give an interesting composition to the area of land beyond the water and flowers in the foreground. At this point, I noticed that the background land structure with the twisted tree root and "moss house" with the hole as the entrance, greatly resembled the bottom of the tree that it depicted in my 6th piece. I had an epiphany; I could correlate this piece metaphorically and illustratively to my 6th piece by making the concept of this 5th piece a closer-up look of the area where fairies live, while the 6th piece will include elements that are of the correct scale from a human's perspective. For my final touches of this piece, I pulled another photo including a tree trunk and moss, to make sure that the land area that had the moss house and twisted root matched with the bottom of the tree for my 6th piece. I also decided to add a few bubbles to hint to the mini game "Bubble Bounce" that I used to play in Pixie Hollow. I did this by blowing bubbles near my garage outside and photographing such bubbles. Next, I chose one of the photos I took of the bubbles and superimposed it into my digital piece. I then superimposed a pink flower that I traced out of a photo that I took of a cluster of pink flowers. I placed a copy of this pink flower inside both of the bubbles that I placed in my piece, to show the concept of the small objects on land that seem useful to fairies, are used to aid fairies in their magical talents and tasks. After completing this piece, if I could do anything differently, perhaps I would illustrate a few fairies. I didn't end up adding fairies though, because I was afraid that I would not be able to illustrate them on my iPhone's small screen, to the level of detail and sophistication of the reference images that are in this piece. I though that if I could not illustrate the fairies well enough, the feeling of this piece would be ruined, so I left the piece how it is, using the bubbles and up-close perspective of the flowers and tree trunk to allude to the idea that fairies would inhabit this place. PrecognitionIn-Progress PhotosSketchReflectionMy inspiration for this piece was from a dream I had in which I was in the car, stopped at an area in a city. The spot in the city that I stopped at was very intricate and there was something about the layout that I had never seen before. A few weeks after having this dream, I was driving with my dad about an hour or two from our house to pick up some ice-skates, and on the way back home we were stopped by bad traffic in a downtown area. At one of the spots where we had to stop due to the slow traffic, as I peered out the window, my view looked strikingly similar to what I had seen in my dream. A year or two have now passed from this incident, and I was reminded of this "deja vu" dream as I began brainstorming for my AP Art Portfolio. So, I knew I wanted to include this dream in my portfolio, as it was one of the only experiences in which I felt like I experienced an image I saw in my dream in a later time in reality.
I began this piece by sketching a city street on my phone, but this first sketch was very 2-D, and needed a more interesting perspective. Since I was not satisfied with this digital sketch, I decided to go to my paper and pencil and sketch a few variations of this city street. I leaned more towards a perspective that was from above (a bird's eye view), and colored one of my sketches to visualize for myself and my teacher. My teacher agreed that this compositional sketch that I chose to color was much better than my original digital sketch, so I used this newer sketch as a reference for my painting. I began painting with red to make the building on the right, then with blue on the left and black for the tar road. I realized I would need the buildings to extend down the road, so I added a third, yellow building in the background for depth. I began to illustrate the traffic lights and crosswalks, but something felt off about their placement. I noticed that I had painted the lights too far up in the sky and at a much bigger scale than they should have been for their placement. So, I decided to paint over this with black, and begin with a different detail. I decided I should first figure out the direction and placement of each lane in the road in account for the curvature of the buildings from the painting's perspective before I begin painting things like lights, signs, cars, and trees. I went in with white paint and used it to "sketch" the placement of each lane, so I had a better reference for where to place other objects. During this sketching process, I began to use other colors to designate different lanes, assuming that I would paint over them in black later on, but when I added more colors, I started to like the multi-colored road. I decided to leave the road lanes with the blue, yellow, red, and green colors, as I thought it gave this piece an unusual style. Now that the lanes were placed, I added in some trees, windows in the buildings, cars, and traffic lights. Before I began to focus on the final touches, I felt that the piece could use some clouds in the sky, as from the painting's perspective, the buildings should logically be at high altitudes, and therefore come in contact with fog/clouds. I continued painting with different pastel colors in irregular shapes, and then moved onto adding the finer details to the objects on the street. I added windows to cars and plants to the outskirts of the buildings in order to make the city feel more colorful and full of life, since I didn't want to actually illustrate any people in this piece. After finishing my painting process, I notice that I could add a few more clouds in the sky, some more fine details to the buildings (that are not irregular lines, but instead more straight), and a better perception of light coming from the outside of the city area. I plan on going back to add these details to completely feel satisfied with this piece. Although it doesn't appear super realistic, I really like the style of this piece, and how I chose to keep the colorful roads in the final version of this piece. Wonderful DisguiseIn-Progress PhotosCaterpillar Compositional SketchesGraphite Sketch #2ReflectionI began this piece gathering inspiration from a reoccurring dream that I used to have when I was younger. In this dream, I was in an environment similar to that of Alice In Wonderland; I was the embodiment of Alice, and as I stood near the tall strands of grass, I was greeted by an intimidating caterpillar, like that of Absolem (the blue caterpillar from Alice In Wonderland). Years later, I still remembered this dream that was so vivid and would repeat night after night when I was around the age of nine. Looking back, I interpret my dream as the situation in which a vulnerable, possibly young person, is pressured into participating in or completing an action that is disguised as something harmless and beneficial in the short term but is secretly dangerous. I interpreted the blue caterpillar as the item or individual that would be taunting someone into doing something harmful. The smoke that the caterpillar exhales alludes to smoking - an example of doing something harmful that falsely conveys a benefit. I have heard many adults recall being peer-pressured into drinking and smoking; my school peers have also participated in the same actions out of fear of "missing out" (i.e. juuling). What are they really missing out on? The short-term benefit of feeling a sense of satisfaction from these types of actions, leads to greater consequences- losing your job, losing your family, becoming depressed, being diagnosed with a disease, and death.
After interpreting what this dream meant to me and how it would relate to reality, I decided that my main focus for the piece would be to illustrate a vivid, happy, somewhat abstract environment with large-scale plants. I also wanted to ensure that I illustrated a blue caterpillar, smoking. I began sketching on my phone, instead of on paper, to try something new. I was able to illustrate a very 2-D, low-detail sketch with large-scale flowers, tree branches, a mushroom, a caterpillar, and a girl approaching the caterpillar. Although my idea of this composition was good in theory, on paper it looked off; it needed more depth and detail, and a more complex perspective. My teachers and classmates agreed with this, and so I began to sketch on paper to visualize differently. My first on-paper sketch had a similar perspective to that of my digital sketches, but I removed the girl from such composition. I removed the girl because I felt that looking at the final painting from the perspective of looking into the environment, rather than observing another figure in the environment, would be more meaningful and allow my audience to develop more freedom in their interpretation of my piece. I also decided that I no longer wanted to include a fence, and opted to only include a small house in the background, to make the colors and structures in my piece make more sense with the environment. After completing my sketches and adjusting what I would choose to include in my piece, I began my piece by laying down gradients of colors in areas of the canvas in which I felt would look best. Next, I painted some faint, messy strands of grass and mountain forms. I then tried to add more color to the sky and the tips of the mountains, and add more variations of green in the foreground. I then felt it was time to add some flowers, a mushroom, and a few other items in greater detail. Continuing to add color and detail, I started to experiment and add flowers and bits of color where I felt it would make the painting look more vivid. Noticing the sky seemed dull although colorful, I added some faint beams of light coming from the sky. While taking a break and observing what I had done so far, I questioned why I decided to add mountains to this piece. Yes, they were pretty and fill up space on the canvas, but what else? Boom! I had an epiphany; I realized that the mountains in this piece symbolized a portion of mountains from the mountain range in my piece #1. My interpretation of this was that these mountains in the foreground of this piece were the other side of a set of mountains that are not visible in my first piece. This correlation symbolizes how when one feels like life is moving too fast and being worried about choosing the wrong decision under pressure (referring to the meaning of piece #1), and sometimes, one can feel confident and excited to continue living with the choice they made, but the truth could be revealed later down the road, revealing that such was the wrong decision. This meaning brings greater significance to my pieces that have been completed so far, and has given me greater motivation to continue my course of action and find a deeper meaning for my future pieces that relate to the ideas of dreams and how they transpire into what people are thinking and dwelling on in reality, and how people's internalized fantasies will dictate their decisions in life, possibly preventing or manifesting the dream. After this further discovery of what my artistic concentration is transpiring into and connecting my pieces, I continued to add more detail to the mountains and soon began to illustrate the caterpillar. I knew beforehand that I wanted the caterpillar to be blue, so I focused on those colors, and added some additional flowers with hues of blue in this process. I also decided to add a branch with the same leaves of the trees/tall flowers in the background, in the foreground; doing so made my foreground correlate more to the environment of the background, and filled up some of the space in the sky. I also feel like this addition of the branch emphasized the caterpillar being the focal point, but it also draws the eye towards the branch itself, alluding to the idea of trying to cover up the true nature and harm of a course of action. After reflecting on this piece and explaining my process, if I could do anything differently, or add anything at this point, I would add more detail to the grass in the foreground, plants found in the grass, the caterpillar, and the pipe that the caterpillar smokes. I plan on adding these revisions soon, and after such, I feel like my piece will be exactly where I want it. Although this painting is not realistic in detail, nor imagery, I appreciate the vivid colors and the mood of the environment. The Conveyance of Musical InstinctIn-Progress Photos
ReflectionI began this painting in a different manner of my first piece, I didn't have a vivid recollection of a dream that I had for inspiration. Instead, I wanted to convey the idea of being passionate about a certain activity, to the point where you have an inner-conflict to decide whether or not pursuing such passion should be your life-long career. I wanted this conflict to be illustrated in a way that was dream-like (as in making the painting feel slightly abstract, with bright colors and unnatural phenomena). I first made a digital sketch on my phone, but then created two more quick sketches on paper to change the composition of the piano. After finishing these simple sketches, I felt stuck as I couldn't figure out what else to plan for this piece, so I just began painting on my canvas.
I started out by applying pink and purple acrylic paint to the canvas in random strokes to experiment with the lighting layout of this piece. I then began to add a curvy, musical staff and began to draw the lines within such staff. Next, I placed a slanted piano on the left side of the canvas, attempting to give the piano depth. With the piano and staff now on the canvas, I began to place irregular lines, transitioning into musical notes in a "path". I soon realized that I needed to take a break to decide where I wanted this "path" to lead, what colors I should add, and what should the foreground and background include. I then resumed by adding pink and yellow highlights/outlines to some of the musical notes and irregular lines, but this felt odd, so spontaneously began painting with blue all over the "open space" on the canvas. This blue paint, now on the canvas, gave me the idea to make the foreground a body of water, and to incorporate elements that would be found in nature. I continued painting in blue, eventually adding a faint shape of a waterfall, and then decided I would add a mountain-like, slanted landform off of the waterfall. I put some pink paints on my brushes and just painted with whatever colors felt right in the moment, until I realized that could specifically use a fan brush and create interesting textures. I began to paint rapidly with this brush, pulling from all colors on the color wheel; this was when I began to enjoy the look and feeling of this piece. I added a second staff above the piano, illustrating it in a way as if the staff lines were vines or the branches of a fictional, overgrown tree. I continued to add all types of colors (i.e. yellows, teal, greens, pinks, whites, reds, blues, purples, browns) with the fan brush, stopping once I felt it was reading to re-paint the color of the staff above the piano to make it stand out more. I concluded my painting process by adding additional branches/staff lines spouting off of the two staffs in the foreground, and added a few faint musical notes in the fashion of tree branches. Now that this piece is done, I am very pleased with how its look evolved. Originally, I though that this would be a very minimalistic yet still meaningful piece. Instead, it became one of an abundance of natural elements and color. Although I am satisfied overall, I plan on revising this piece to add bit more detail (i.e. flowers) to the surface of the piano and some of the staff lines, to accentuate the feeling of this piece. When Should I Get Off?In-Progress PhotosSketchesReflectionI began this painting with inspiration from a dream that I had that made me feel unprotected, confused, anxious, and scared; a dream where I was in a tundra-like biome with many mountains and a dangerous, whitewater rapid river. In my dream, I was floating down the treacherous body of water with a few other people, but all of a sudden I was all alone and had nothing to cling to. I was afraid, feeling like I would never find the end of the river, nor would I find any people or safe spots to escape the water. My surroundings were huge, snowy mountains, therefore I felt an even greater sense of feeling trapped and in danger.
After remembering the imagery of this dream and how I felt, I began to sketch as quickly as possible, as I felt as if the image would escape my mind in a matter of seconds. After putting my sketch down on paper, I further visualized how I would manage to make my dream come to life and convey the same mood as such that I felt while dreaming. I immediately knew that I would want to include many mountains and a river, so I started to paint triangular, 2-D mountains on my canvas, with a river in the middle. I quickly saw that my mountains were not detailed enough, and didn't convey a feeling of being scared and intimidated, so I watched some YouTube videos of people painting mountains, and observed images of whitewater rapids and snowy mountain ranges. By doing this research online, I felt freer to paint my mountains and river with real-life inspiration for how I should depict my dream's landforms. As I continued to paint and tried to use greater detail, I took a break and went to Google Earth on my phone to view Mount Everest in Asia from a bird's eye view. By using Google Earth's 3-D satellite view, I was able to further understand reconstruct the mountains from the perspective that I wished. After repeating my techniques of using small brushes, big brushes, and then white with a palette knife to create my mountains, I moved on to the river and began to add white and blues with a fan brush. After doing this, I reached a point where I felt like I could slow down my painting process and focus on the final details. I communicated with my classmates and teacher and received feedback that I agreed with- to add more value and deep blue to the river, clean up the edges of the mountains, and use a palette knife for more detail on the mountains. I followed this feedback and used these tips to finalize my piece. After finishing my piece, I notice how I only use blues, with a mixture of white and black to make different hues. Usually, I would agree with my feedback in the sense of adding more colors (i.e. some purple, red, and pink) to make my piece more vibrant or abundant in color, but I actually like how my piece is color-wise. I think that only using the blues helps convey the intimidating, drowsy, dangerous setting of this dream. If I could have done anything differently, I would have possibly used oil paint instead of acrylic, because my paint dried very quickly and worked differently from oil paint when trying to use a palette knife to make certain textures. I also think that using oil paint instead of acrylic would have accentuated the anxiety and worry that one would feel if they were in this environment because I could have used the oil paint to make rocky, uneven textures in the mountains. |
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AuthorHi there, I'm Ashley and I love all mediums in which I can express my fascinations and emotions. Whether it be painting, music production, apparel production, 3-D modeling, drawing, or writing, I just adore creativity's endless possibilities. I am currently taking Apparel Production II Honors and AP 3-D Art while I work with music production and 3-D modeling outside of class. ArchivesCategories |