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The Whole Shabang
Allison Pitt
My art is a combination of my two favorite things; painting and food. I use my paintings to communicate my relationship with food. Over time, my love for food has transformed into a disgusting obsession. This is shown in my work, as I display all of my favorite foods and drinks, in a manner that is unsettling. This reflects my feelings after a binge of food or my ever changing relationship with the foods that I love. I also discuss the image of my own body, and how I see myself in my own head. Like in my head, the images in my art are distorted and contain pushed perspectives that don't always make sense. I use this as an outlet for my feelings, whether I am craving pizza, or feeling guilty for my indulgence. While I use painting to manage my own relationship with food, I find that others find comfort in images of food, as I do.
I use primarily oil and acrylic paint to make my artwork. I am drawn to the paint because of the fluidity and interaction between shades. I like taking my own reference pictures, so that I can capture the exact motion or placement that I have in my head of specific subjects. I use these images and my imagination to invent a composition that pushes perspective. This reflects my in and out relationship with the foods. I like additions of things that don’t make sense or confuse the viewer with the sizes of different objects and creating some flatness on a dimensional plane. I enjoy this as an art to keep my mind creative and my artwork very intentional. Overall, I intend to use these concepts and my personal relationship to food in my artwork for myself. But I also want others to find something in my paintings, whether it be just a love for that food or sharing a similar feeling as I do.
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The Whole Shabang
Allison Pitt
My art is a combination of my two favorite things; painting and food. I use my paintings to communicate my relationship with food. Over time, my love for food has transformed into a disgusting obsession. This is shown in my work, as I display all of my favorite foods and drinks, in a manner that is unsettling. This reflects my feelings after a binge of food or my ever changing relationship with the foods that I love. I also discuss the image of my own body, and how I see myself in my own head. Like in my head, the images in my art are distorted and contain pushed perspectives that don't always make sense. I use this as an outlet for my feelings, whether I am craving pizza, or feeling guilty for my indulgence. While I use painting to manage my own relationship with food, I find that others find comfort in images of food, as I do.
I use primarily oil and acrylic paint to make my artwork. I am drawn to the paint because of the fluidity and interaction between shades. I like taking my own reference pictures, so that I can capture the exact motion or placement that I have in my head of specific subjects. I use these images and my imagination to invent a composition that pushes perspective. This reflects my in and out relationship with the foods. I like additions of things that don’t make sense or confuse the viewer with the sizes of different objects and creating some flatness on a dimensional plane. I enjoy this as an art to keep my mind creative and my artwork very intentional. Overall, I intend to use these concepts and my personal relationship to food in my artwork for myself. But I also want others to find something in my paintings, whether it be just a love for that food or sharing a similar feeling as I do.
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Unprecedented
Drey Reed and Drey Reed
My goal as a designer is to draw the audience’s eye, making it clear what information is most important. I make my designs visually pleasing through the overall layout and use of color combinations. Recently I have discovered an interest in character design. I aim to improve diversity seen in tv, comics, and video games. Which is why I have decided to focus on designing a more diverse character, in this case one that is based off myself, half white and half black. I designed this character with the intent of him being in an animated tv show, which is why I chose a flat shading style. The color of the clothes was intended to work well with the skin tone but also to contrast the warm colors from his fire abilities. The cool green of the shirt as well as the dark pants and shoes both contrast the bright flames throughout the illustrations. Both the scale of these illustrations and the thick outlines on the character brings the piece to life a bit, adding an energy to the piece that would otherwise be missing. I feel it is much more impactful to see these near life size, rather than on a small poster you could just hold in your hands. I feel my biggest inspiration for my character designs would be Bryan Konietzko. He was the art director for Avatar the Last Airbender, a tv show I grew up watching. Even now, I like not just the show, but the art style. While many cartoons tend to greatly simplify the human figure or take liberties with the proportions, the style in this show is much more realistic as far as cartoons are concerned. The characters are rather simple in terms of line work but still have interesting designs and tend to be very memorable. These are some of the qualities I focused on bringing into my own design.
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Unprecedented: BA/BS Senior Exhibition Fall 2020
Samantha Tudor
Cryptids are heavily based on oral legends and strange occurrences. Some of these legends are based on good versus evil like the Wendigo, an evil spirit that possesses someone who commits cannibalism, and some are based on happenings that cannot be explained like the Chupacabra.
I have been fascinated by the appearance and lore of cryptids and how these stories are created. That fascination has begun to seep into my work. I am also interested in the evidence, real or fabricated, that is provided for these creatures as I create my own cryptids and compile relatable evidence to support my claims.
My works often start with a mysterious dream or a sketch made from an inkblot. Inkblots are a form of projective test, a test that uses ambiguous stimuli to activate the subconscious mind. I use inkblots because it draws on the underlying issues that I face. I create cryptids that embody my subconscious mind because I find that it engages more people in a meaningful way.
As humans, we are obsessed with information and the truth. However, people also like to be amazed whether or not what they are looking at is real or fake. My work plays on that fine line through the stories, articles, and other documents created in support to develop credibility. The large-scale sculptures of these beings encountered on my journeys act as documentation of and tribute to their existence.
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Strange Fruit
Tia Whitaker
As a young child, I was always interested in history. I found it fascinating how big or small events, directly or indirectly, affected the life that I am now living in today. Although my hometown was small, the history of it was enormous. Trips to the city museum fueled my love for history and the desire to learn even more about myself, my town, and my country. Being a person of color, I was aware of the adversity that my people have faced. Knowing the turbulent history that African Americans have faced in this country has always inspired me to create imagery that celebrated black people and educated others who are not aware of these atrocities.
My theme, Strange Fruit, was a term used to describe African Americans hanging from trees during the early 1900s. It was also a song sung by the late Billie Holiday, whose lyrics were the inspiration for my work. While creating prints for this exhibition, I considered all the things that I have absorbed, both from my personal life and my educational experience. I wanted to combine my love for art with my passion for history. As a child, I was aware of moments in history such as slavery, segregation, and discrimination; but that was as far as my knowledge went during that time. As an adult, I can dig deep and learn about the hidden moments kept from me to preserve my innocence. My goal is to take this newfound knowledge and use it to educate others. I have chosen to depict this theme to represent my feelings about this history and how many, including myself, have been shaped by it.
My style is heavily influenced by the work of fellow African American artists, Kehinde Wiley and Kara Walker. I enjoy the way their detail-packed scenes beautifully depict people of color while also providing some history for the viewer to take away. These unsung moments in history require a tremendous amount of detail and attention. The main form of printmaking I use, lithography, reflects this idea because it allows me to create detail-packed scenes while fulfilling my desire for realism through the heavy use of line and the ability to create a full range of value. My lithographs use a strong value scale that invites the viewer to examine the intense details. I use landscapes and still-life's as the primary objects in my compositions and then add smaller figurative elements that symbolize black obsessions. Lithography allows me to draw highly detailed images that are primarily black and white, adding formal contrast and movement to the composition. By combining these elements, I invite the viewer to take a closer look, examining the use of detail to discover the work's true content.
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Our Rainbow and Butterfly World in Progress
Emma Wilson
I have always been an artist ever since I was a child. My mom was one of my influences to become an artist because she always made arts and crafts with me. My aunt, Janet Wilson, is a very skilled self-taught painter and was also a large influence on my artistic life. I thoroughly enjoy the art of photography. I often capture photographs in black and white. “When you photograph people in color, you photograph their clothes. But when you photograph people in black and white, you photograph their souls.” -Ted Grant
Tara Chisholm once quoted, “Photography is the beauty of life captured.” With photography, a moment can be captured that you might not ever get back again in your lifetime. My photography is very sentimental because it’s mostly about family. I enjoy creating work that is personal to me and relevant to my life. Family is so important to me and so is being able to create work about my troubled past life experiences as well as happier present times. My past work focuses on the concept of the happiness that family brings and my current work is centered on the dark moments that I experienced as a child.
My work featured in my exhibition focuses on my family and I overcoming the impact of the experience we had with an abusive man living with us for part of my childhood. We had a house fire in 2007 which was actually a blessing in disguise because it allowed us to kick the abuser out of the house for good. The abuser always told us that we would never live in a rainbow and butterfly world, so we have now created our butterfly and rainbow world.
Look who won. -
The Whole Shabang
yiyang Xie
Entertainment is an element that is relatively lacking in this metropolis. Especially for those who work hard at work. So, I decided to make two greeting cards. In one year of life, everyone must be looking forward to the holidays. The most important meaning of the festival to us is that it is totally immersed without thinking about its meaning. Humans invented the program for carnival, noise, gift-giving and laughter. Let yourself pull away from the busy, like a buffer zone, these are usually lacking. Only festivals can immerse everyone in this atmosphere and create the illusion of loneliness being eliminated. My two greeting cards represent the most important holiday in the two relationships. One is Christmas with family and the other is Valentine's Day with love.
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The Whole Shabang
yiyang Xie
I always want my works can deliver a positive and relax feeling to my audiences. I usually use the computer as my work tool. The form of my works is graphic design. I like using computer work and create my work. Using a computer, I can try different positions and combinations for my work also it is easy to change.
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Scattered: Shelby Adams
Shelby Adams
Currently, I am focusing on the aesthetic nature of my artwork and how its appearance aids to its use. My work tends to lean towards the more organic/imperfect side of crafting: whether it be in my ceramic work or metalsmithing, I enjoy the small variations in form that create a true sense of the handmade. I further this sense of hand-craftedness by exposing the materials themselves, such as leaving metal to patina over time or leaving the clay exposed while glazing. The strong sense of materiality within my work, along with their organic sense of form, creates very naturalistic objects that emphasizes the materials themselves. I’m interested in the minimalism that these choices can evoke and how these aesthetic leanings affect the functionality of each piece. Recently, I’ve begun to incorporate shapes that are not simply round. I began by forming bowls and cups with my hands, giving them a sense of an abstract, bodily shape. I’ve pulled these forms into my recent metalwork, as well, implementing them into earrings, pins, and patterns.
Influences for my work include Chris Staley, Tom Kemp, Mary Giles, and Peter Pincus. I draw inspiration in the forms, color, texture, and materiality that each of these artists implement into their own work and experiment with ways to reinvent it into my own.
- Shelby Adams
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FINALLY.
Tiffany Day
Tiffany Day
Trash has become part of our everyday scenery. Check the Highways. Litter Breeds Litter. The physical effects on nature made through human intervention, drives me to document the aftereffects of what those interactions cause. Whether it be forgotten buildings in the middle of the woods, or plastic bags caught on broken tree branches, I capture images of the environment in disrepair. Through exploring ideas such as human interaction with nature, I hope that my work heightens my viewers’ awareness of the global climate crisis as they move through nature every day. I pay attention to everyday evidence of this environmental crisis in my work in hopes that it helps others notice it around them.
Through capturing images of abandoned buildings the viewer sees the consumption and disposal of resources made available to humans. This creates an idea of a consumer society which leads to the disposal of consumable products and trash. I am passionate about protecting the environment through recycling and educating others to do the same. Photography acts as an important way to record and to mourn the careless destruction of our world. The camera is a way to highlight the idea of destruction by capturing images overlooked by society on a daily basis. I walk through nature noticing every piece of trash left behind and can find a beautifully tragic image in the midst of these walks. I play with the scale of my images to find the most impactful effect desired. I want the images to feel not only large due to the importance of the topic but also small due to the lack of widespread determination to enact change in the issues at hand. What started out as a technical accident turned into a compositional choice to put the main object in the middle or almost in the middle of the composition to highlight the desired concept.
Much like another favorite photographer, Ansel Adams, I am constantly inspired by nature. Adams’ landscape & nature photography is beautifully inspiring, with all of the textures incorporated and the rich black values. Before I even realized it, I was photographing nature with similar ideas as Adams. Adams writes, “I cannot change the optical realities, but only manage them in relation to themselves and the format.” Like Adams, I formulate images through a photographer's eye to depict the realities of issues that threaten Earth’s future. I utilize natural forms such as trees, rocks, and water yet emphasize the harmfulness of manmade interventions.
Benjamin Von Wong sparked my interest in using photography to raise awareness for important environmental issues. Much of his elaborate photography is centered around environmental issues. The first image I ever saw of his was an image that depicted a mermaid lying lifeless on top of an ocean of plastic bottles. Seeing this image struck a chord in me, because the artist beautifully captured a very serious, ugly, issue in our world. I use my admiration for Von Wong’s work to inspire me to create photography that sheds light on issues that invoke passionate determination in myself and others.
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FINALLY.
Larry Eakels and Larry C. Eakels III
I have always liked to create things and make interesting pieces of artwork. Making work in the design field has been very delightful and engaging for me. Learning about how people react to imagery even when its digital or print has been one of the biggest things, I have learned from becoming an artist and focusing in graphic design. I chose to do graphic design because of my experiences with past classes and pieces that bring joy to me. As well as, the aesthetic you can achieve doing design work. Being able to create sleek, clean, and simple designs to fit the modern style is very pleasing and catches my attention and others. Seeing or knowing that my viewers of my work can understand it and also get a vibe of interest into the pieces gives me a satisfactory feeling which I enjoy.
Most of the work is made digitally, but always starts from sketches with a pencil and paper. Easiest way to make many different ideas for a topic is starting from paper and pencil then you can scan your desired pieces to the computer and go from there. Being able to make multiple revisions digitally is one of my favorite things about design and also the use of technology is amazing of all the beautiful things you could create digitally. Along with digital design I can also do print design as well which is another reason why being a designer you can do many things that can do physically and digitally.
Currently, my work has been inspired by advertisement and my poster design class. Experimenting with layers and colors to create diverse and complex posters that are also very clean and concise. Being able to continue this aesthetic in my current work brings me joy and hopefully viewers of my work can appreciate and see what I see with my work.
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FINALLY. BA/BS Senior Exhibition
Emily Glowicki
My most recent work delves into the relationship of sculptural form and ceramic tradition and how we perceive amorphous beings that exhibit resonance of the recognizable. I’m interested in where we draw the line between form and function in ceramics and how we can explore both possibilities through the creation of ambiguous three-dimensional representation of these ideas.
My work addresses these ideas through both sculptural vessels and nonobjective forms that leave the realm of the vessel completely. This exploration of form and fluidity started with single word: torpid. Torpid, according to the dictionary, is an adjective to describe slow, sluggish, languid movement, and the first thing that came to mind when thinking of this word is the 1958 American science fiction-horror movie “The Blob”. The first work in this series is Torpid, which is my response to the slow moving, vaguely ominous amorphous being and an investigation into representing the essence of torpidity in a rigid sculptural object. Over the last year, the series has progressed from the representation of languid movement to an investigation of our perceptions of objects and their apparent function, or lack of. After spending time attempting to marry the formal aspects of the blob with traditional ceramic profiles, my more recent blob forms leave the world of the vessel altogether, but still imply a relationship to ceramic tradition as well as the historical and archeological significance of pottery with references to blue willow china patterns and surfaces inspired by geological occurrences.
Pieces from this series often evoke a sense of whimsy and mystery and intend to inspire curiosity and questioning from the viewer. Two individuals that directly influence my current work are mixed-media sculpture artists Dan Lam and Alexandra Searle. Dan Lam is an artist who works primarily in polyurethane and resin to create psychedelic, other-worldly drip and blob sculptures dominated by vibrant hues and uncontrollable form to create a sense of unpredictable entertainment and whimsy while simultaneously shrouded in an unnerving sense of the unknown. Alexandra Searle creates installations dominated with concrete and medical materials to draw attention to the relationship between soft and rigid objects in a formal setting in relation to the human body and health. Works from these artists inspire me to explore new ways to represent malleability and flow in my work.
Ceramics has remained my preferred media as this series has progressed; However, during research and continuous production of works, an interest in installation has arisen in me and the blob series will continue to morph just as the blob itself does.
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Scattered
Casey Johnson
My art comprises one unifying idea: the body. We are our bodies, and with these bodies we experience life, death, and countless emotions. With my drawings and other work I embrace these experiences and depict stark symbols relating to the body.
I explore traditional symbols of play—such as toys and games—as well as images tied to life and death. The body is more than just a thing that can live and die. With our bodies, we feel emotions and interact; with these ideas in mind, I compose pieces related to color and our capacity for connection and interaction. In this sense, these drawings are not simply about the body; they are about life, movement, emotion, and death.
In my other work, I also explore the concept of body and bodily experiences; my photography, for example, emphasizes the lifelike and organic qualities of what is essentially lifeless, such as animal remains and city scenes. My prints explore subjects of dreams and the arcane. And my sculptural works explore the boundaries between organic and inorganic substances. In this sense, all of my work encompasses the ideas of the body in some way.
Casey Johnson
2019
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Scattered
Justin Malik
When designing my art I like to keep in mind specifically the audience’s reaction when viewing my work. Think of this as the ‘user experience’. If you are using an app on your phone and you quickly realize that the user interface is really bad and you can’t figure out what you’re supposed to do, that is the exact kind of frustration I want to eliminate when people see my work. Keeping that in mind with the fact that I draw a lot of inspiration from the minimalism movement, this is how I develop my designs to a point that makes it pleasing to the eye and easy to understand.
One particular piece of art that always comes to my mind when I think of inspirations is a painting called Composition with Red Blue and Yellow by Piet Mondrian. I love the simplicity of this piece. It’s literally just one big square that is divided up into smaller colored squares and rectangles separated by thick black lines. I find it very aesthetically pleasing to look at and it is what I hope to achieve with my own art.
For this work in particular I made vector illustrations the instruments of the four families of a symphonic orchestra. The thing I love so much about vector illustration is how simple and clean it is. This is the core of what minimalism is to me; taking an object or a subject thing or a thing and reduce it down to as basic as it can be. But even with all that simplification it is still possible to know exactly what that ‘thing’ actually is. And as a nod back to user experience I added in a little secret for the people who look close enough at these pieces.
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Scattered
Mattie McArthur
Artist Statement
I use photography as a way to capture the world around me. I take pictures to draw attention to the things the naked eye may easily overlook. These small details allow us to see the world in new ways. My goal as a photographer is to make photographs that the viewer can engage with. My work can be viewed as a portal into an unseen world, that opens the eyes of the blind metaphorically and gives the viewer a new form of seeing, that they may never see the world the same again. The environment has so much beauty to offer, and it is a shame to walk around blindly not taking it all in.
My subject choice of nature comes from my livelihood. Most of my life has been spent interacting with the outdoors. I have a personal and emotional connection with the land. I take great joy in capturing these special details that raised me. I want to preserve these memories, as well as share them with all who will see. It is important that we give attention to who we are and where we come from.
I am inspired by the beams of light casted by the sun, as well as the shadows formed by the interaction of nature with itself. Color has become something that I use strongly in my work. It portrays the rich details and beauty in each form of nature whether this be a decaying leaf or the flowing stream. We do not see in black and white, and I think when capturing the exquisiteness of nature, it is important to bring to life the beauty that is radiating and contrasting so boldly with one another.
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Scattered
Sarah McCann
I have been dealing with loneliness my whole life. I was given up for adoption at birth and brought from Paraguay to the United States. I feel a kind of loneliness for someone I have never met: my birth mother. In grade school I didn’t have many friends who would spend time with me outside of class. My brother was usually busy with homework and my mother and father were busy with work, leaving me a lot of time spent on my own.
My main emphasis in college has been drawing. I wanted to refine my skills that I’ve been developing since I was a kid, so it made sense to focus there. The most influential experience though was being able to draw the figure from a model. I had been drawing character and caricatures of people for a long time, but I didn’t really understand the human anatomy. Being able to draw from life has changed my understanding of what the body can do and what kind of poses are possible and now my figures are more expressive.
I didn’t think that my work had any kind of theme or concept behind it. I have realized though that everything I do, from my personal work drawing television characters to everything I have made in college that I have made has been a tool. Either a tool for me to deal with my loneliness and anxiety, or as a tool that has use for others. My work serves a purpose; that is to improve the world it’s in.
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Scattered
Siany Riegger
What viewers should be able to see in my artwork revolves around the concepts of the sublime and of nature in general. This is done by utilizing the theme of predator and prey relationships to portray the sublime. One side of this work involves the predator and prey relationships with animals, particularly birds. This is where I am inspired by wildlife, which makes me curious about the idea of nature presented in my work. By using the theme of “survival of the fittest” in my artwork, it can bridge the gap between horror and nature to create the sublime. For these works, I tend to work mostly with oil paints on canvas.
The other side of my work involving the sublime engages in conversation about Catholicism, and the nature of demons in this sect of religious faith. It is an interesting concept because the way evil is interpreted in theism is not as widely accepted as the good in theistic faiths. This is a new addition to the current sublime concept, which forces how to gauge predator and prey relations along with different topics revolving around religious culture today. The way this happens is by forming a satire of how demons are portrayed within the Catholic sect of Christianity and how they are portrayed in media. This is a way of satirizing this theme through real life means, and from widely accepted portrayals in media. For artworks like this I use painting materials and drawing materials to conceptualize my work.
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FINALLY.
jade simpson
I create graphic design pieces with the goal of inciting a feeling in the viewers. I have found through the years that creating a well developed color pallet is a major part of my process as an artist. This is because color can help enhance the specific emotion or idea that I am pushing for. I enjoy designing a variety of posters over subjects from music to commentary on social issues. The reason I choose the topics of mental health awareness, suicide awareness, gender roles, domestic violence, drug abuse, and other similar topics is because I want people to stop avoiding them. I want to inspire a change in the world and get people to start talking about them on a larger scale. I want to put the very real problems of society in their face and make them want to change their behaviors and attitudes. If not I hope to at least compel them to bring awareness to others. The less heavy pieces that I creat I want to awaken the fun that is sparked in Children. A feeling where the stresses of life are the farthest thing from the veiwers mind. Just breathe and have have. Be happy. This work is generally inspired by graphic artists that use vibrant and wild color theories, funky patterns, and interesting methods of creation. Artists such as Jessica Walsh, Stefan Sagmeister, and Milton Glaser.
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FINALLY.
Nova Tabor
Horror has always been something that has fascinated and intrigued me. Love for horror and horror imagery is something that was given to me by my older brother. I can remember being six years old, and sitting next to the arm of the couch, positioned perfectly so that I could see the TV, but my brother would not spot me unless he physically leaned over. Horror, especially the campy and sometimes silly fare offered by the slashers of the 80's, is psychologically fascinating. The movies allow viewers to surrender their control, and allow themselves to be scared and vulnerable, in an environment where they know they are safe. The visuals and backgrounds from certain movies stick with people for years, if not decades. When I began making my poster I wanted to honor these movies that shaped my childhood, by using their image and tone in a way that was distinctly mine. I also wanted to create my own fictional movie, to see if I could capture the same essence in a new way, that still fit in with the classic films. These posters are my love letter to the genre of horror, a genre that I feel is often misunderstood. They also utilize my passion for graphic design. The posters while reminiscent of the originals, utilize my distinct style of illustration and layout, to create works that are unsettling and scary but also fun and not to serious, much like the classic movies they were based upon.
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Scattered BS/BA Group Exhibiton
Rebekah Thuline
One thing fascinating about being an artist is how we perceive the world through a creative lens, finding beauty and importance in even the most practical objects. As humans, we live in a fast-paced world and it’s easy to overlook everyday scenarios, as well as people, places and things. Every so often I get a chance to pause and look at a moment, an object or a genre scene and just enjoy it for a second and admire how the light and composition play off each other. To step out of my busy mind, to ponder over what I’m looking at before I slip back into whatever I was doing before.
My goal with my art is to share a moment with the viewer. To highlight the importance of even the smallest things, their roles in life, and how to be grateful with what we have now with something such as a glass jar, a fleeting moment, or nature. Out of all I paint, nature is where I tend to lean the most towards because of the significance it has in our life. Everything we have in some way leads back to nature. I enjoy experimenting with light and color to draw attention towards the subject and create an atmosphere from natural lighting to dramatic lamp lighting.
I look to Vincent Van Gogh and Janine Antoni for inspiration in style and meaning. Van Gogh had a way of expressing his ideas through his use of color, lighting and perceiving through a different lens to bring attention to an unseen world full of fleeting moments that grasp attention. Janine Antoni takes something ordinary like an everyday task and transforms it into an art form somehow for her sculptures and performances. We are told that life is short and should never waste it, but, we should also remember to live in the moment and try to be happy with what life has given us now.
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Finally.
Ana Wahlers and Ana Wahlers
Art depicting normal, everyday events are uninspiring because there is nothing to invoke a note- worthy emotion. When I create a picture, the scenes I make either come directly from dreams or are an attempt at imitating the atmosphere in them. Most of my dreams are similar and have a nearly identical emotion, but I don’t have a name for that emotion. I have two goals when making art. The first is for the feeling from my dreams to echo when I look at the picture. Since dreams are often forgotten and the emotions in them become distant, I need something to look at that gives off the same emotion. This way I can ‘study’ whatever it is I’m feeling. The second is for others to get a similar, if not identical, emotion so that they can describe it and possibly give me a name for it. I like to bring things that can only exist in the human mind into these unassuming scenes. For example, in Looking Down you are seeing through the eyes of someone exiting a room on the upper level, looking down over the catwalk, and gazing at a dark living area. At first glance it looks to be a scene of a house at night. The only thing out of place are the four figures around the coffee table. A green hue changes the entire scene that adds to the uncanny scene. These pictures are usually dark and desaturated, and while I try to stay true to the image in my head, I also make sure the image is balanced and has emphasis on the source of the emotion. The piece Desolate is not from a dream, but an attempt to mimic them. In this case the scene is set in a vague setting outside. Like the previous piece, it’s monochromatic and the figures are mostly silhouettes. However, the focus of the image is much more obvious. The giant crow on the electric pole is more in your face than what I’ve typically made.
I’ve been trying to figure out how to improve my style and found an artist named Bobby Chiu. I like his particular style conceptually and visually. I wanted to learn the skill of being able to turn something that is obviously imaginary into a believable creature. Recognizable traits are necessary for our brain to see as real. It’s not really the fact that he draws monsters that catches my eye, but rather how he makes them convincing. Using the program Photoshop really helped me loosen up and stop restricting myself with outlines. I’ve grown more comfortable with only having a sketch and jumping right into the colors and shading. This also allowed me to be more liberal with colors which only taught me more about them. For example, I’m more likely to use blue when painting a tree because I take the environment into consideration. Because things are easier to move, I can play around with balance and even see how different the value of something is when I change the colors to grayscale.
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Colliding Spaces
Hailey Church
As a figurative painter, I use my art to tell a story and evoke a feeling of seclusion vs. inclusion with my viewers. I use semi-anonymous figures to drive the feeling of relatability - whether that feeling is coming from a witness or a victim, is up to the viewer.
Tending to work with oil paint and loving its fluidity, the work I produce is about self-healing and growth through struggles. My work is inspired by the toughness instilled in me at a young age and the idea that, in order to help others, I must be able to help myself first. I produce my artwork to make others feel that they are relatable and I use my art to promote self-love, self-help and an appreciation of the vulnerability and effort it takes to be honest about mental health issues and what it takes to find help.
Stylistically, I approach these unwelcoming themes by using soft lines and textures, bright, yet harsh colors, realism, and careful value shifts to accurately depict form, mass and space. Color is an important tool of mine, and oil paint allows me to use that to the full potential. The subject matter within this body of work is more specific than some of my previous works, however it is still open enough to allow the viewer to see it as whoever they wish it to be. I chose this concept in order to convey to my audience that it’s okay to not be okay, and that they are never alone in that, no matter how much it feels that way.
As many other artists are, I am influenced heavily by contemporary artists. Katie Geary and Mary Woronov are two artists that inspire and influence my work heavily, as they are painters who focus on realism, value, color, and the effects of mental health. I am often drawn to paintings or painters who focus on things like line, the figure, color, and value shifts. I make new works based on my own current state and find inspirations from those who surround me and the ways in which they handle their own struggles.
-Hailey Church, 2018
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Colliding Spaces
Nancy Craven
Figurative work is what drives my art to convey and evoke emotion. The figures become derivatives of nature using organic lines, whether they are a naturalistic depiction or an abstraction.
My preferred mediums are woodworking and drawing. Many of my wood projects focus on form and are constructed of smooth, flowing lines with open spaces. My form-focused works are often modeled after things such as nature, the figure or music, and target a specific emotion or idea. Some of my works incorporate drawing and work in conjunction with a wood so that a specific concept can be conveyed. In an interest to mix my interest in drawing and woodworking, I began exploring and experimenting with pyrography, or the art of wood burning. This technique gave my drawings more depth and emotion than the simple pen contour drawings I had made before.
The subject matter I most often use in my drawings consists of hands. The concept behind this is that hands are a strong indicator of feeling, whether it be calm, tense, open, closed, etcetera. hands can be an important source of information, whether it’s interpreting an emotion or conveying an idea. I became interested in this concept in my teens, during a time in which conveying how I felt or thought through words was very difficult. I became enamored with hands and how communication can occur through gesture alone.
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Personal Touch
Kelsey Crawford
The importance of people and their roles in society are of great interest to me. Within our society the idea that certain individuals are held higher than others is the most interesting of others, usually based off of the privileges they have such as money, class, respect from others that not everyone gets. The ideas of our current societal norms paired with expectations are fascinating to me and how we as humans begin to react to them is something I enjoy including in my work. I am a designer, an innovator, artist and creator of things. I focus on the digital world of creating but 3 dimensional beings have always been something that will grab my eye. Using these ideas with geometry and dynamism is what I find when looking to create.
I use photography to start the creations of my digital illustrations. This imagery, creating a focal point and then accompanying it with geometric shapes is something that feels natural to me. Along with these ideas, I like to create pattern with textures and shapes, this helping the central theme. The use of positive and negative space shows through as well when it comes to my work. The shapes geometrically are simplistic but the composition is not as it could be said to be busy and chaotic. For example my work consists of a central figure or focus such as a person that is surrounded by varieties of shapes and movement.
Influences of the world are present. For me specifically, I draw inspiration from the Art Deco movement, specifically the architect William Van Allan who is best known for his work in the Chrysler Building in Manhattan, NY. The detail, pattern and line curvature as well the pattern and consistency of the design all are something that I find interesting and aesthetically pleasing. Other influence from that time are graphic designers Leo Marfurt and AM Cassandre. Constructivism and it’s use of shapes is also something I find highly intriguing such as the artist El Lissitzsky. As well as drawing inspiration from the past, I also find it in the present of the works by street artist turned graphic designer Shepard Fairey who came to fame by doing the Obama Hope poster as well as painter Kehinde Wiley and his use of color and pattern. These visual inspirations connect to me by their use of color, shapes and pattern. Kehinde Wiley is a painter that visually, the work isn’t compatible in style to the other examples but the use of pattern can be aligned to be similar as the use of pattern in the Art Deco examples. Naturally I am drawn to primary colors, their monochromatic difference within their color and how the colors work when put against one another. How these colors play off each other as well as how strongly they can stand alone is something I think lends itself to the theme of the people I am so interested it in the bigger picture; strong and individual but when put together intense and powerful.
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Personal Touch
Madison Henderson
For me, creating art is a way to escape, a way to free my mind. Being able to design and then build my design with my own two hands is very satisfying and calming. Having the skills to create something that someone can actually use and or wear, I think is an amazing skill to acquire and have.
The work that I produce doesn’t always have a specific meaning or concept behind the creation. I mainly focus on the new skills and techniques that I have learned and put them forward to create something both aesthetically pleasing and functional. In doing this, it is a sort of escape. When I create something i want the viewer to be able to have a connection with it and decide for themselves what it means to them.
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