Something to Wait For
Still Life
Charcoal on Newsprint
45.5 x 30 cm
September 10th, 2020
Still Life
Charcoal on Newsprint
45.5 x 30 cm
September 10th, 2020
Exhibition
The artwork, titled "Something to Wait For" is to refer to one of the many things people may experience in a daily life. The things we wait for can be as simple as a meal. Oftentimes the things we do become repetitive, and less interesting but sometimes adding even a little something new can turns out to make a big difference. Even the idea of change can be something worth waiting for.
Inspiration
My artist inspiration for the Still Life drawing was Maya Kopitseva. They influenced my focus of impressionism, and how the shading and flow of color can give the impression of the point of focus beginning to blend in with the rest of the background. Her work is not designed in way that you'll be able to tell it is a realistic object, but to give the impression that the object is something familiar to the viewer. The art did not necessarily have to look pretty to get the impression of the scene within the viewers mind, and how it can be looked in that specific view. Her work is relatively distorted, yet recognizable as things we would be able to see in our daily lives. Her backgrounds often contained a consistent color or background that you would be able to see through the entire piece, and I attempted to do so with a vintage gray background.
Planning
Around this text are my three planning sketches. My overall goal of these were to experiment when I should variate between the vine and concentrated charcoals. The objects used varied to try and get used to both round and rectangular objects, as well as to try and replicate objects at different angles. My initial plan was to have a still life that was extremely dark using compressed charcoal to outline the shape of the objects, with vine charcoal being most of the shading in the picture. This idea was eventually scrapped as I struggled to ascertain when I should have used concentrated charcoal in my work.
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Process
After the planning phase I had decided to attempt a drawing that would only really rely on concentrated charcoal as an outline. Using the charcoal for any other sort of purpose seemed to stand out much more than I intended it to, as well as virtually impossible to remove compared to the vine charcoal. I had begun the artwork by drawing the most basic form of the objects I had selected (a bowl, a spoon, a glass cup, and a small bag of spices). The outlines were crude, but they did represent the objects well enough that I could start smoothing them out.
The second picture is the result of smoothing out the shape of some of the items such as the bowl's circle shape, the cup's cylinder shape, and the bag and its contents including more details. After the objects were relatively close to my liking, I had used the concentrated charcoal in order to keep the outlines as I continued to work with the vine charcoal. The bag was essentially the hardest part of the process due to the bag being transparent and having a lot of wrinkles. The wrinkles were excessively difficult to represent without the bag losing most of it's transparent appearance, so some wrinkles were omitted from the artwork. The third picture was the result of shading in areas of the artwork where shadows were present, as well as the darker colors representing some of the colors of objects like the spices. The artwork started to go a little downhill here in terms of shading, as I wanted to try and represent the light coming up from above and a little to the right. the shading began taking up most of the artwork as I had erased charcoal and replaced more shapes or shades in order to look better. The amount of shading had continued to build up to the point where it had started to take over most of the artwork; not at all what I initially intended it to be. The last photo, and the finished product, was the result of me attempting to work with what I had created. Since the shading from the previous example had begun to take up most of the artwork, I had the idea of trying to turn it into a darker, vintage piece, using the gray colors to create a dull yet distinctive atmosphere where the objects resided. I had experimented with adding more shading into the work to make the background more darker, and making some of the previous shadows even darker to make them distinctive from the rest of the background. The result was not at all what I intended, but I believe it turned out decently considering the buildup of charcoal that was being created out of changing too much of the piece at once. I managed to create something different from my original design, and make it something still relating to my inspiration and my focus. |
Critique
Unlike "Something to Wait For", Maya's work was often vibrant and full of color, with backgrounds that included patterns varying from flowers to symbols on a cloth. Her work often depicted fruit or vegetables, followed by a drink, and were consistently similar to one another. Her work uses darker variants of previously used colors in order to create shadows, similar to what I attempted to do, but to a more organized extent. Her work shares similar movement of colors in order to make the objects look smooth, but her work was able to efficiently depict transparent glass, while my work struggled to shade and color the glass of the cup, as well as the patterns along the glass.
Experimentation
As shown with my planning stage, I often experimented with the use of compressed charcoal in order to determine when was the best time to use it. The charcoal was to dark to use for the shading I intended to use, but that was also a benefit as it meant I would be able to use it to outline my objects. Vine charcoal was also used to see how flexible it was, and how long I could erase it until it began to last. In the end, I still ended up erasing too much of the vine charcoal, but it was definitely something I attempted to note before working on the final.
Reflections
In general this project was a great learning point. I was able to note some of the differences between compressed and vine charcoals, as well as when to use them. I also attempted to use vine charcoal to sketch the shadows, and used movement in order to make the shadows look smooth and clear.
Connection to the ACT
- 1) Clearly explain and describe how you are able to identify the cause-effect relationships between your inspiration and its effect upon your artwork.
- I am able to identify the relationship between Maya's work and my work through compare and contrast. Her work is similar to mine in the sense that it relies on colors and shades for it's backgrounds as well as giving the impression that the object is something familiar to the viewer.
2) What is the overall approach (point of view) the author (from your research) has regarding the topic of your inspiration? - Maya's work had attempted to use the varying patterns and colors of her work to give the impression of something being a familiar object. Her works often included fruits and glass, or at the very least, items that looked very similar to those objects.
3) What kind of generalizations and conclusions have you discovered about people, ideas, cultures, etc. while you researched your inspiration? - Artwork does not generally have to look pretty, but its message can be spread in a variety of ways. Maya's work in particular uses patterns and variation of color in order to imply the perspective of a scene.
4) What was the central idea or theme around your inspirational research? - I wanted artwork that was partially abstract, but can be viewed in separate ways to be something important to the viewer. The slightly distorted shapes of Maya's work brings the attention of viewers unto it and to her perspective.
5) What kind of inferences (conclusions reached on the basis of evidence and reasoning) did you make while reading your research? - I came to the conclusion that reflection is essential before the process of creating artwork. If planning and experimentation phases had been skipped, I would of been missing critical knowledge that could of damaged my work even more (such as shading or unrecognizable shapes).