Title: Hive
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Inspiration
It is obvious that one of my largest influences for this work was Bernini's self portrait. I chose to incorporate many aspects from this work such as the color scheme and composition because I found his work to be a sufficient amount of complex amount of details and techniques I wanted to perfect. One of the main aspects I was looking to emulate in my work was the pose and texture on collar.
Angles and textures have always been something I have struggled with in my work so when I looked at Bernini's work I saw an opportunity to improve upon my techniques. Although I took most of my inspiration from Bernini I also took inspiration from Caravaggio's Bacchus. Looking at his work I very much enjoyed the way he painted the flush on his round cheeks. In my work I wanted to incorporate those warmer softer hues.
Angles and textures have always been something I have struggled with in my work so when I looked at Bernini's work I saw an opportunity to improve upon my techniques. Although I took most of my inspiration from Bernini I also took inspiration from Caravaggio's Bacchus. Looking at his work I very much enjoyed the way he painted the flush on his round cheeks. In my work I wanted to incorporate those warmer softer hues.
Process
For this first sketch I just drew the pose I was intending on emulating. This gave a better understanding of what way his body was facing and what way I would have to face.
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For this second sketch I played around with the idea of just posing head on. In the end I ended up forgoing this because I knew I was only thinking about it as an option to avoid the angel I have trouble executing and I needed practice. Despite disregarding this sketch's pose I did take the collar concept for it.
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In this last sketch I am facing in the same direction and manner as Bernini in his self-portrait. This sketch was done quickly while I looked on in the mirror. At first I had an idea of possible painting the whole portrait without another reference other than a mirror but while drawing this sketch I gave up due to my frustration with my own movements.
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To start off this painting the first thing I did was prep the wood with gesso. At first the wood absorbed the gesso in a very unique way that caused very unpleasant textures in the wood, so to counteract this I merely applied multiple layers of the material. After the gesso was dry with acrylic paint I painted down a base coat of a brown color of where I was planning on drawing myself. This was done in order to both test how the wood would react to actual paint and to get a base coat. Eventually when it dried I figured it was too dark and painted over it.
After the acrylic paint dried I began to free-hand draw my portrait onto the wood. This was done with pencil and took a devastatingly long time. I was unfamiliar with this angle of and it made me be caution too caution to the point where I didn't know where to start. After I was done with drawing myself I began to paint the face and background. I started with the face and painted over the acrylic base and pencil sketch in oil paints. I applied these oil paints in various layers. First I would apply a base coat, then warm hues to the skin, blues, and shadows. In order to replicate Caravaggio's flush cheeks I payed extra attention to the warm hues in the skin and spent the most time on them. Despite this I feel this warmness is absent in the final work because there were too many greens and blues being highlighted by the green background.
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After both the face and solid background were painted I focused on the collar. Inspired by Elizabethan collars in part and bee-hives on another my biggest regret was not planning the collar out in full detail before starting on the work. When I began to work on the collar I once again sketched the design on but this time with no reference and began painting after I was ratifies with the drawing. For this particular portion of the painting I painted it just as i did the face but also particularly focused on having a good balance between warm and cool hues. This was important to the distinction of hive from fabric and because I believed this balance was the key in Bernini's portrait to having the fabric look like worn soft linen and not bright bleached
After the painting was complete and dry I began to hollow out the holes to make the bottom of the collar look more like a hive. This was done because my horrible hand drawn hexagons needed to be covered up somehow. To carve into the wood I used both a wood carving set first to hollow out an outline and a Dremel tool to finish the job. Carving into these tiny areas required a steady hand and much patients. After this I sculpted the small bees with oven bake clay. To sculpt them I simply made a tear drop shape with my fingers and two balls. Using a finger and a toothpick I smoothed the parts into each other before baking them for less than 5 minutes in my oven, Once they were done baking I painted them using acrylic and attached tissue wings to them. Finally, when they were dry I used industrial strength glue to glue them onto the painting. Their placement was of course strategically done to put the most decent looking ones where the most horrible holes and hexagons were located.
Experimentation
Much of this project was me experiment within my comfort zone. From the horribly executed pose to the sculpting and carving these were all aspects I at one point wanted to venture out into but never had the time. In this piece wanted to try new mediums but have the reassurance that I could still produce something presentable at the end. Af first sculpting and carving were hard and tedious aspects I would struggle with but gradually I became quicker. Throughout the process of creating this piece I felt it not finished until I came up with the next medium to try onto it. In the end I learned a lot about experimenting in a way Im comfortable in and about mediums such as wood and oven bake clay.
reflection
Although I enjoyed experimenting in this piece I hate everything about it. From the painting to the sculpting this whole piece was a disaster. Despite me trying my hardest and having a reference on hand this painting somehow doesn't really resemble me. Along with this I find it incredibly off in a weird way and I hope to one day fix it or dispose of it. The sculpted bees on this are probably the only redeeming quality of the piece and even then I wouldn't hesitate to throw all of them in the trash of my carving and hexagons weren't so horrible. I guess ultimately this project taught me that experimentation will be ugly but its not so much about creating something beautiful on the first time but the experience of working with a new medium.
Act Questions
1) Clearly explain how you are able to identify the cause-effect relationships between your inspiration and its effect upon your work?
The cause of my inspiration was my lack of skill and admiration of both the composition and color schemes in Caravaggio's and Bernini's work.
2) What is the overall approach(point of view) the author (from your research) has regarding the topic of your inspiration?
The research I read was very focused on investigating how each used hues to create such the composition and the hues in the works. Because of this my research involved primary observing the artist paintings and reading techniques of those who have attempted to replicate their works. Mainly, there blogs just stated colors in their pallets and nothing more.
3) What kind of generalizations and conclusions have you discovered about people, ideas, cultures, etc. while you researched your inspiration?
From my research I was able to come to the conclusion that the more effort and aspect one adds to a piece the more they should try to add to the central message.
4) What was the central idea or theme around your inspirational research?
The central idea for my research was understanding the ways in which I could convert aspects that I had not worked with into something of my own,
5) What kind of inferences (conclusions reached on the basis of evidence and reasoning) did you make while reading your research?
While conducting research I came to the conclusion that although I myself could not replicate the tutorials I came across they were in fact completable for someone with experiance.
The cause of my inspiration was my lack of skill and admiration of both the composition and color schemes in Caravaggio's and Bernini's work.
2) What is the overall approach(point of view) the author (from your research) has regarding the topic of your inspiration?
The research I read was very focused on investigating how each used hues to create such the composition and the hues in the works. Because of this my research involved primary observing the artist paintings and reading techniques of those who have attempted to replicate their works. Mainly, there blogs just stated colors in their pallets and nothing more.
3) What kind of generalizations and conclusions have you discovered about people, ideas, cultures, etc. while you researched your inspiration?
From my research I was able to come to the conclusion that the more effort and aspect one adds to a piece the more they should try to add to the central message.
4) What was the central idea or theme around your inspirational research?
The central idea for my research was understanding the ways in which I could convert aspects that I had not worked with into something of my own,
5) What kind of inferences (conclusions reached on the basis of evidence and reasoning) did you make while reading your research?
While conducting research I came to the conclusion that although I myself could not replicate the tutorials I came across they were in fact completable for someone with experiance.
Citations
“Bacchus.” Artble, 19 July 2017, www.artble.com/artists/caravaggio/paintings/bacchus.
Bernini. “ Self-Portrait as a Young Man.” NGV, 21 Sept. 2018, www.ngv.vic.gov.au.
“Caravaggio and his paintings.” Caravaggio: Biography and 100 Famous Paintings, www.caravaggio.org/.
Photography
This photography project was largely inspired by my inability to travel as much as I wanted this summer. Normally as summer starts so would my travels but this year I had an imense amount of responsibilities that kept me in Milwaukee. This project is my way of coping with having to stay here and attempting to fall in love with the city. Many of these photos focus on light sources as a subject and the color they produce on buildings as I find that to be the most compelling part of the city. Other than these there does exist some pictures of what I wish Milwaukee could be for me.