School Work

With the progression of classes, our first assignments have come to an end.I have several pictures of the work I've been doing in all my classes, including Painting, Digital Sketchbook, and Jewelry/Metals.

Painting has so far been my most productive class, we've already done many projects. One of our first ones was to introduce us to oils using only scales of black and white, working from a paper still life tacked to the wall. We were asked to make one "active" painting, and one more blended one. Below is my paper still life, and below even that you can see my section of the room, where my two paper still lives were posted as well as small monochrome studies of scissors were started. Those scissors have since been turned into color studies, but I have not finished them and plan on altering them soon, so I will post those finished versions later.

Since then, we have progressed onto dual colored still lives and then landscapes. Below is my still life, mostly finished, with minor errors I will fix before midterms. After the still lives were done, we progressed into full color, and were asked to bring in two things. One landscape painting, something to copy. My Master copy (by an unknown artist) progression is below, the under painting started here in mostly greens or mixes of greens. I am rather fond of it so far, and the print is on the wall next to it.

Our other landscape was to take a photo and paint it in a sort of colorful fauvist style. Though I haven't taken pictures yet, I have begun a painting based on a photo of mine from several years ago, and am attempting to turn this swamp into a colorful painting:

Besides painting, I have gone from my first tiny cuts in metal to a nicely formed piece based on our assignment "Symmetry and Synergy." Though there are parts that still bother me, for my first ever cut, filed, sanded, and riveted piece - I am happy.

And last but not least, our first project in Digital Sketchbook is finished. We were asked to "map" our past, present, and future. With past being childhood memories, present being school and college, and the future being a metaphor, here were the maps I created. Sorry the photo is so small, but this is what they became - all of them needed to incorporate scans of our own hands. My favorite concept was the past, "Home Is Where The Heart Is", but my favorite executed piece is the future piece (left vague because I can barely think about next week, the future as a thing is a very unknown feeling, black and white gaped space to me). The present ended up being kind of a collage with a mapped joke (the Skidmore Bubble), but I liked them all in general.

And with that, these are my most recent works up to date. More to come in the next weeks. Cheers all, hope the fall is going well!

Just Shoes?

Probably not - these are more than shoes.

Their wearability is questionable. Their design is out of the ordinary. Their materials are unique. And some of them are just outright cool. Though I'm sure every one of these pairs of shoes is not readily available to the public, but for now we can feast our lovely eyes on their photos and envy the models that wore them down the runway.

And then, there's the ridiculous.

Just wanted to share the interest. If you're a shoe person like me, it's pretty awesome. So enjoy!

Tattoos are Art

Though not "traditional," most appreciators consider tattooing art. After all, the 'artists' are the ones who are tattooing the very ink on peoples skin, and helping those of us who can't draw design what we want on our bodies.

To connect the concepts of fine art and body art even more, I stumbled upon this unique tattooing style online and wanted to share with you all. In New York City, there might just be a place you can go to get some brush strokes on your skin - and these are no oils, they'll be there permanently.

Artist Amanda Wachob has been both painting and inking for several years, an artist in both fronts. Working at Daredevil Tattoo, she has a style notably different than a lot of the "stereotypical tattoos" out there. For a few examples;

Awesome, am I right or am I right?

Design and Focus

With classes starting, I have been working on a few projects already, or well, the designs for them.

In Digital Sketchbooking, a class that's troublesome to explain, we each have a blog of "places" to keep up. Deciding to customize my own, I came out with my own title and custom header. Check it out!

In Jewelry, we've been working on cutting / sawing our first pieces of metal. Our first assignment of the semester, though not due for a while, is a complicated feat. Called "Symmetry and Synergy," the goal is to make a two-layered piece, almost meant to be a pendant or medallion. With 2 inches as the largest size, this is my design, thus far. Let's see if it's realistic at all!

Cheers, hope to update soon with more. Hope all is well with the rest of you :]

Fashion 09.08.10

What I wore around today (added the leggings when it got colder this evening). My hair seems to look like crap every morning I wake up here, and with such early classes, waking up earlier to shower only seems more difficult (hence the night showers). However, if I keep this up, I'll be wearing a hat or a bandana every day, and I don't really want that. So, though this was not my original plan for today, I liked the simplicity.

DIY - The Results

In the past week, I've managed to finish a few of my project.

First up was my steampunk gun, which I finally finished one out of three. Several others are sitting around half-glued and in need of other parts, but I was able to find a part I originally intended to use two years ago. Never gluing the pieces, they stayed around my house until this summer, and I was able to put my first gun into motion. Changing up one of my designs, I incorporated my discovered parts with part of my third design (as seen in an old entry). The result was as such:

After I finished this, I soon enough finished my jackets! Though I only have photos of one of them, they both look fantastic. Without a sewing machine, I had to take it to the tailor, but thankfully I had it all pinned and he was able to sew it for me. Next time I do a jacket, hopefully I'll have a machine. Here is the grey one, which I have taken to school with me:

Cheers!

The PEN Story

One of my underwater photos is so cleverly titled "Her Morning Elegance" after one of my favorite songs. Today, a visitor to my photos on DeviantArt commented and said how much he loved the song. After sharing our common love of the stop motion video, he sent me a recommended song and video on youtube - a stop motion of a man's life. So incredible!