Practicing figures

The professor that I had in Alfred that I was talking about in my last post had us as students doing these "drawing drills" that I absolutely hated at the time, but as time went on, I came to appreciate the fact that she made us do these drills. We would spend two hours of class time multipul times a week standing infront of our easils, and just drawing lines quickly over and over again. Going through dozens of sheets of newsprint. We moved onto cirlcles as well, and also adjusted the pressure of our charchoal on the paper.
As students we found this wastefull and pointless. But by the end of the semester we finally realized the use of these drills. Your body remembers the movement for specific shapes, it was training us to draw straight lines, to draw circles, and teaching us controll of our pencils.
The next unit we moved into figure drawing. We started off by learning the basic atatomy of the human figure. How the bones are connected, how the muscle lays on the bone, how the skin is stretched. Again we didnt see the point we were in an art class, not a Human Bio class! We started doing drills with a live model. We would have to draw the model as a stick figure. In quick 5 second drawings. The modle would change position every 5 seconds. Again we went through so much paper and we saw no point in this. But by the end of this we realized it is really teaching us how the body moves, so we can draw it in poportion. We then moved onto 10 second sketches adding a little more detail, then 20 second scetches. We added muscles onto the body for 10 second. Just with quick strokes. It was a whole new art form. (examples of these pictures are shown below.)
By the end of this semester it really made me confident that I could look at a person a draw their form in porportion accurately.

Drawing negative space.

During my time at Alfred State, I had a professor who was one of my biggest inspirations. She taught me more than any other professor has about life, and about art itself. She really made me start viewing the world in a different way. Still today (2 years later) I find myself doing little habbits she taught our class to do while we were creating art pieces. She truely had corrupted my mind in the best way possible.
One of the most important lessons she taught me was about viewing the world around you. She had all of us go outside (she taught quite a few lessons outside when the weather was nice) and she had us each focus on a brach with leaves and start to draw it. We all drew these branches with leaves, which were very good, but she pointed out how inaccurate the distance between each leaf and twig was in our drawings.
She then told us to look at the branch, and instead of drawing the object itself (the leaf, the branch, the twigs) focus on the negative space between the objects and the size. Do not look at the object itself. This really makes you look at things differently. Like what shapes make up the negative space between objects, and it really helps you with porportions. The image you come out with is not going to look like a normal piece it will look odd, but it is very good practice and it will train your eye to look at every piece of a picture.

14 Day challenge.

I have recently read a book written by Freeman Patterson, who is a well known photographer and he inspired me to challenge myself a little bit. In his books, he has activites you can do that helps you advance in Photography. One of these activties were to take a picture every day for 14 days of an object you wouldn't normally take a picture of. Now looking for objects you wouldn't normally take a picture of is quite interesting and it allows you to view the world differently around you. Some of these objects can be abstract images in the photographs because you are looking more at the shapes and shadows that make them interesting, not of the objects themselves.

Letting real life events inspire your art.

One of the most important things I have been taught over the years is to just look around you for inspiration. The smallest thing can inspire you to come up with the most beautiful pieces of art. Look at a leaf on a sidewalk. The colors, the shapes, the textures, any variable can contribute to inspiring you. Sometimes even a feeling can inspire you.
Just two weeks ago, my grandfather passed away. My family has been grieving in different ways, and my way of grieving has been through my artwork. One thing I have recently been focused on is my photography, and this event has inspired me even more. My mother had received a rose from the spray on his casket, and each of his grandchildren (including me) had recieved a carnation.
After the service we came home, and had our flowers in a vase and I needed to take pictures as memories were flooding my mind of my grandfather. In some of the pictures, I have the flowers laying across a notebook, which is actually my sketchbook/journal filled with these memories, so it has hidden meaning.

The greatest art terms I have been taught over the years.

In elementary and middle school, we all have the art classes where we think what we are being taught really does not come in handy and it is all nonsense. I remember being handed a vocabulary sheet each year, with the same words on it ever since 6th grade. I never thought I would have to really hear those words again, and I figured they were just stupid. But as a college art student, those very words are now in my every day vocabulary. Each time I pick up a pencil, or a camera, or a paint brush, the list of vocabulary words even from 6th grade are running through my mind.
Abstract
Background
Composition
Focal Point
Foreground
Geometric
Landscape
Line
Midground
Modern
Portrait
Like I said, those were just the basic words I was taught at first when I was younger that I still use quite often, and going through the list making sure my pieces have good composition, an good focal point, good in a linear aspect, and other things I have been taught really helps me. I have been taught now that the arts have a language of its own.

Roses throughout the years.

Throughout my years of taking art classes, I have always had an interest in flowers, mostly roses. You can see in the slideshow the progress of my work, and the different styles of art I have shifted too. I started off drawing roses in about fourth grade, and ever since I have been practicing drawing them with different mediums such as pencil, charcoal, paint, colored pencil, and pastels. It is interesting to see how I have progressed drawing the rose itself, and technical drawing skills as well such as shading.

My growing creativity!

      This blog is about my journey of art. Ever since I was a little girl I have always loved doodling and drawing. I have some drawings from kindergarten I will share with you guys, and I have to admit even for then I am quite impressed with my skills from back then. You can actually tell what these little scribbles are! I grew up in a family where my father is a very artistic person, and my sister is as well. I would sit down at the kitchen table and draw with them at this very young age. I would focus on drawing cats and roses mostly. Which oddly enough, roses are in almost every single one of the pieces now that I draw. I guess old habbits never die.