Art 1 Final Portfolio

1.    Which project was your favorite or most successful this semester? Please explain.

My favorite and most successful this semester was my landscape portrait.  I think that I used a lot of values and different shades of colors to pull it all together.  I used a lot of texture in my painting like in the grass, I tried to use a lot of highlights to make the texture of it stand out.  I used different shades and tints of blue to make the sky flow together as if it were a galaxy that fades into a sky with a sunset.  I think that since I learned about how to use complementary colors, using the orange as a base coat on my canvas was a good idea because oranges complement, blue, was the main color of my sky and it made my colors richer and to stand out more.  I also think that in doing this project, I've learned what my kind of style of painting is, and that makes me actually really like my project.  I think that I have definitely grown as an artist from this experience because I know how to paint the way that I want, but I have the knowledge and experience to know what and how I want to do it.  Overall, this was my favorite project because I like using acrylic paints anyways, but I learned all of the different ways that you can use brush strokes to pull the whole piece together and make it look original at the same time.  

 2.    Regardless of whether you liked or disliked a project, which one did you learn, grow, or developed the most from? Please explain.

The project that I learned the most from was the contour shoe drawing.  I learned how to draw and not lift up my pen or pencil and still make it look good.  I have also learned that shading after the fact is important as well.  You need to make it look as realistic as possible with shading, and the fact that it flows together from the contour lines.  I feel like this project got me started and gave me the basic ideas of how to actually draw and sketch.  I developed from this because realizations hit me.  I realized that once you get the hang of doing sketching and drawings with different shading techniques and values, that it's pretty simple.  This project basically gave me the right learning experiences to be able to progress forward with my high school art career.  I feel like this project was what got me started in realized that I not only like art, but that I love it!

3.    Choose 1 piece of Art that you used skills and techniques learned from previous projects. Discuss your growth as an artist and how you incorporated these skills and techniques to create the piece.

I used the most skills and techniques from previous projects in my clay tile. 
Since we had to sketch it out first to see the main idea of what we wanted to do with our clay, doing the past drawings and sketches was a big help in discovering what exactly I wanted to do with my sketch, that would eventually transfer to my tile.  From learning how to shade and how to create different values in our Ipad value study project, I learned how to take that and apply it to my sketch, and in the paint that went on after I eventually fired the clay in the kiln.  Since I had been growing in shading and blending colors from past experience in art 1,  it was a lot easier for me to know what I was doing as I was painting and sketching the colors and values of my clay tile and its sketch to go along with it.  I think that I have grown as an artist because of previous projects.  I also think that my growth reflects on this project since we incorporated many of the techniques that we learned this semester.  I think that based on seeing how good everyone else's from last semester were, it motivated me to do as best as I could.  Although I dont think that pottery or using clay is really my thing, I think that the painting portion of it was my strongest part of this project since I used many shades and tones of blue in there.  I liked this project overall because now I can say that I have experience with creating clay pieces. 

4.    Which project do you feel was the least important in learning the concepts taught in this course? Please explain.

I feel that this project was the least important in the concepts taught in this course.  We didn't use drawing, or sculpting, or use of shading.  All we really used was Photoshop, which wasn't really one of our main ideas for Art 1.  I did enjoy it, although not as much as persay, the landscape painting. This included drawing the shapes of the different values of colors onto poster, but I wouldn't really consider this 'drawing'.  Now I know the basic concepts of Photoshop, but that wasn't really what I wanted to get out of art.  I thought it was cool, but I wish we could have drawn out the values by ourselves onto the poster.  I feel that even though it would be more difficult, that it would express who we are as an artist more that just tracing it from a picture.  The one perk of it though was that you could see the different values of color through it because of the fact that we cut out the values with an Exacto-knife.  

5.    Choose a piece of artwork where the subject matter reflects you as an artist. One that you have a personal connection to. Please explain your choice.

I chose the tracing and drawing of values of a car piece.  I think that the subject matter reflects me as an artist because I am a perfectionist.  I want things just how it's supposed to be, which my drawing reflects because I did all of the details of the reflection of the forest in the windshield.  I have a personal connection to it because I chose to do a truck for this project.  I chose a truck because I would like to have a truck one day when I'm older.  I also like the fact that it's an older GMC truck from a long time ago.  I have always liked the 90's, so this is also how this is a personal connection to me.   I also think that this reflects me as an artist because I have found out that my best type of art is drawing/sketching and painting.  Overall, I have really enjoyed this course and it has influenced me to make art more of a part of my daily life.