So I'm starting this blog with two puns right off the bat. The first is on the blog title itself and the other is the title of the piece I'm going to show. If anyone has a comment or violent reaction about that, I'm very free to talk to about it.
The process of putting this blog up is like stepping into a different dimension. I'm intimidated yet excited. Intimidated because all the artists I admire maintain an art blog on this platform that relies heavily on their own ability to market themselves. In Tumblr, people can do the sharing and advertising for you through the easy action of
reblogging. That's why I thought that to be able to tract audience through a blogspot would require quality content and I didn't think I had any works worthy of that attention.
On the other hand, I'm excited.
I'm excited because taking this step means that I'm drawing more and that I now have more confidence to show my work.
I'll start with my Art 124B Final.
I'm a Graphic Design major but as part of my pre-requisites, I had to take the Art 124 classes.
Our final was an expressive self-portait that we're supposed to work from a mirror. We were required to do a full scale value pass and a color render.
This is how it turned out:
I chose the expression out of instinct. It's kind of funny when I dug up some self-portraits I did years ago and realized that I used the same expression in all of it.
(Take a look at this one, for example.)
The title was a courtesy of my Twitter buddy,
APreludeToMore. I found it very appropriate.
What's interesting is that when people saw this drawing, they said that it's beaming with energy just like me in-person. It's really striking to hear that somehow, my personality does show in my preferences whether I do it consciously or not.
Talking to peers helped me a lot too. My friend and classmate
Tyler Magleby, who also did a good job on his self-portrait, told me that he put his graphite version beside his other sheet of paper and made marks to make sure that he draws on the same area. Sounds like an obvious thing to do, but I couldn't have come up with that myself. Because of that advice, it became easier for me to place my drawing for my colored version.
I presented it in class and received very helpful critiques. At first, I thought that leaving the cheeks white would work fine but the more I look at it, the more I wished I filled it in with some color for a smooth transition. However, just like my friend
Mike Nassar said, I should just use my brain while drawing and shut it off after. So instead of working on this more, I'm planning on just creating a whole new piece and learn from that.
It might seem pretentious to be comfortable in drawing self-portraits but I have decided that I'll do more of these. As of now, I'm more confident in drawing myself. At least, if I mess it up, no one's going to be offended. Hahaha. The process might involve: 1) feeling insecure about certain features of myself that could use a little miracle and 2) self-loathing for the discontent of my skill level. However, at the same time, I feel like I'm learning more about myself.
Anyways, I've put up this blog because I'm expecting myself to be artistically active this summer. I've stopped drawing for two years entirely and have been struggling to rediscover my passion since that hiatus.
There's a lot more things I want to say but I haven't had my morning coffee
(and my god, it's 11:35 A.M. already) and my thoughts haven't sorted themselves. I guess this is my cue to step away from Dorian
(my Mac) and pick up my sketchbook instead.
