3AaronB



I chose this topic of ending animal cruelty because it seemed everyone was doing happy and positive topics, but I wanted to choose a topic that would be peaceful when it ended. This topic is something you don’t think about when you think of peace, but this was the first thing that came into my head. I thought it would be awesome to make a pinwheel that had a personal connection to me. I think the pinwheel exp resses the topic in a creative way and puts a twist on it. Some problems I encountered were actually making the pinwheel. I made it out of sheet metal, but it wasn’t sturdy enough and it was really flimsy. Another problem was getting the pictures to stick to the metal after they dried because they would fall off. I fixed these problems by making the pinwheel smaller and using better metal. With the pictures I sanded the metal down and used some decoupage like stuff and that seemed to work better than glue and looked better than tape. I thought my pinwheel was very successful it turned out really good for being completely remade in two days. The pictures on the pinwheel are sad, but the cloud scenery and the fur balance them so it works. The hardest thing about the project was making the fur stick to the metal pinwheel. I think everything on my pinwheel works good the only thing that I have a concern with would be the spinning process. I would not change a thing about my pinwheel except for the clouds on the back.

Figurative Painting Reflection Piece My figurative painting is very simplistic and has a very relaxed feel to it, which was one of the reasons why I chose this painting. I really liked the colors around the woman and the couch they were calming. Those dull colors extremely helped the painting because it intensified the red of her dress and the green on the couch. In the beginning of this project I wanted to do abstract figure painting, but while I was looking I found this painting. I chose this one as my project piece because it in way reminded me of this person who took life as a journey, but can still enjoy the simplest things in life and take it how it goes on step at a time. Also it wasn’t all too controlled by lines or anything, the painting was smooth and fluently painted, which that made it unique too. This project was full of problems for me, most I had could solve myself, and others I had to have help for. Some problems I encountered were the gridding process I wanted to make every little shape and line on the dress and pretty much everything else in the background, that I was actually confusing myself when at looked at it. I finally had to be less controlling and get the basic shapes of the painting and worry about the other shapes when I start the oil and pastel process. Another problem I had was the blending the pastel and getting the exact color that I wanted. To figure out this problem I had to be told that I cannot replicate the painting exactly like the artist did, and not even the artist could re-create a piece of their own artwork exactly. This through me off completely and I still tried my hardest to make it as close as possible. I truthfully think that my piece is very successful and it persuades the audience my point of view. I think that it’s successful because it looks extremely close to the original one. Also many people have said it was terrific or beautiful, but there has also been negative views also, though I learned that I shouldn’t let them take over on what I personally thought of my piece. If I had a choice to do this project again the only things I would do differently is I would have regulated my time in the beginning better. This really had a impact on when I started the color phase because it took me so long to do the outlining that I had less time to do the color and details. The last thing would be being more familiar with oil pastels because I had absolutely no idea on how to use them correctly.

The process was really challenging, but using the website Aviary it made it easier and simpler to edit the persons drawing. Pretty much the only tool I used was the painting tool and the different brush sizes and transparency of them. Also the background downloading process and those are the only tools I used in this project.



I truthfully have no idea why I chose this theme, the only thing I wanted was a snow scene, and a bridge of some sort in it. I really like pictures that it's snowing in I think those because they are more calming, and simple-like. I never drew a bridge, and I wanted to get out of my comfort zone, and challenge myself, which I did extremely. To begin with I just wanted a guy standing on the bridge just looking around the scene, but then someone said, that there should be a girl with them, and I made a girl. Then it just became that the two people became a couple on a bridge, which works because it's snowing, it's romantic. There were tons of problems I encountered during this project. The bridge was the most difficult part of painting, it didn't even resemble a bridge. It looked like a mess on the paper. Another problem with this project was the snow color on the ground wouldn't turn out. The color had way to much blue in it, looked like water instead of snow, and had to think of a way to cover it up easily, and nothing would work. The last problem I had was the reflection of the bridge in the water. The first time I painted the reflection, it looked like the bridge fell into the water. The solutions to this project were simple for example, the color of the snow it was just a color mixture with a lot less blue. A new technique called the vanishing point. This helped make the bridge look more dimensional and not so flat. The reflection in the water was fixed by using water colors, this made it not in the face, but noticeable at the same time. The end result of the project in my opinion was a success. The tree in front is one of my favorite aspects in the picture because it's detailed and looks really good. The people also look good not just placed there, but somewhat of interacting with the background. If I could do this over the only thing I would change is the rocks on the bridge, because it was last second and I should have looked at more examples before doing it.

**// Poaching //** The theme for my project is poaching, but leaning more towards African poaching. This is a terrible and depressing issue in my opinion because these animals are being tortured, and slaughtered for their furs and horns. My personal connection with this theme is I was watching TV, and then this commercial came up for the saving animals in Africa from the harsh injustice done to the animals. Then I had to choose a topic for this project, and this was the first idea that I thought of. This project in my opinion represented that this issue should be stopped, and put an end too. This project for art is one of the more depressing projects that we had to do. There weren’t many problems encountered while do it, but one was the making of the figure. The figure was hard to make proportional, the arms would be to short or the legs wouldn’t look right, and the list goes on, but the solution was that I needed to slow down, and ask for help from the teacher with the proportions. The idea of how to make a different, but successful representation of what poaching looks like was probably the hardest decision. I chose to use a metaphor method of showing poaching, the figure is shown as a gigantic monster killing the animals in Africa, and turning Africa into a graveyard of animals. I think my project is successful, and it clearly represents the social issue. The things if I had the chance to fix them they would be more detailing around the cage of the lion. Also I would have probably painted the entire boxes, and better detailing for the African scene. The only thing I would want if we did this project over again would be time, because we didn’t have a lot of time to finish this.