For the Studio Habit of Mind: Stretch and Explore, I feel that the Robert Longo project and the water color project were the two pieces that best showed my stretching and exploring process. For the Robert Longo piece I felt that I really stretched an explored, as I chose color instead of charcoal, which was completely new and different for me, and I had to test out new strategies along the way to get the outcome I wanted. I was also the least confident about the Longo piece because it was unfamiliar territory for me, and so I feel like I really had to explore and trust my own abilities in order to get the piece to turn out the way it did. The water color piece showed my stretching and exploring because I took the face from another sketched contour and put it into the umbrella, just to add some interest into the design, and I think that exploration turned out to be really cool in the piece. I also explored new water color techniques that I wasn't familiar with, such as the crayon resist, and I feel like that technique alone really brought some cool designs into my work, especially in the skirt of the model.
For the Gif Animation project, my original idea, was stemmed from the Cat in the Hat opening scenes, in a sense that it was going to be raining, and a figure was going to be leaping over rain puddles, and spinning in the rain, with the umbrella having a circular movement in the process. As the GIF moved into the final draft, it ended up being a person with an umbrella taking a few steps and then twirling in the rain. If I had to make the GIF on my own, with more time, I think I would take a direction of a sunrise and the change of background with the movement of the sun rising. Although that would require multiple backgrounds, and very precise movements of the objects, I feel like I could complete the challenge and task due to the skills I acquired through this group GIF animation.
The projects that taught me the most were the GIF animation project, the Robert Longo piece, and the Silk Scarf. The GIF animation was stepping into a zone I haven't directly worked with. I have previous experience in Photoshop from many years ago, but I never did a GIF project. I was unfamiliar with the process but I grasped it rather quickly and began to really like the outcome. I also learned with the GIF animation project, that I am truly an independent worker, and I need to work on showing others how to do something, rather than doing it all for them, so that I don't end up doing someone else's work load. The Robert Longo piece taught me that I can think outside the box and that I can be very successful with my art if I put in the effort. I realized after the fact, that I could've made the piece a little more precise and interesting and it really taught me to think out my color options before putting them onto paper. I also learned how to make values with colored pencils by doing the project, which leaves me with skills I can use in future works. The silk scarf project also taught me the most because I have never dealt with fabric painting. I was completely foreign to the art medium and I learned how to handle the dye and the gutta, and I also learned how to troubleshoot the issues I came across, and it felt like a great feat when I would figure out how to fix a mistake. The scarf really led me to problem solve often and trust my own abilities.
The art work I am most proud of would have to be the silk scarf. I really wasn't confident after the silk practice, so I was very weary when making the scarf. I had a lot of mistakes that I had to figure out how to fix myself, and I fixed almost every single mistake and that makes me very proud of myself after the silk hoop practice, when I was unsure how to fix certain areas. Aside from being able to fix my mistakes, I also feel like my creativity really took off with the gutta. I feel like I didn't limit myself and I didn't doubt myself as much as I usually do. I wasn't comfortable with the medium, but I grew comfortable with it eventually as I began to experiment with the colors and gutta.
In 2nd semester of drawing and painting, I hope to improve on my confidence in myself and my abilities. I hope to take more time to do my work and do it more meticulously, and without added stress or frustration from my own critiques. My goal for second semester is to achieve a perfect grade on an art piece, and to be more confident in my artistic abilities.