Friday, November 4th, 2011
In Painting Studio, we are vigorously studying the compositional elements that Degas utilizes in his paintings that make them so successful and admirable. We had to do several master copies of his work, and note all the elements with a piece of tracing paper placed over the image.
We've been doing this well over three weeks. Compositional elemetns and design decisions that Degas chooses to use, such as the strong diagonal dividing up the picture plane, the vast expanse of foreground, echoing line and shapes, the contrast of light and dark, and tangents have been drilled repeatedly into our heads.
Other than assignments, the painting in class has been quite interesting and fun. Having not ever painted with oil paints prior to this semester, I struggled mainly with mixing colours. The only painting experience I had was digital painting and a quick color theory lesson freshmen year. But I had classmates more experienced that I that I could ask for pointers. Gradually through the weeks of in-class painting, I have developed my own techniques and palettes. It's interesting that I still use the same muted palette I use for my digital work.
That day the model I painted was this old woman with braided hair and the most awesome purple shades. Though I like where the painting was going, I'll try to do a head shot in the next sitting. I do too many full-body compositions and would like to really detail those nice glasses by doing a head shot. :)
Click to full-view.
In Concepts, I was slightly disappointed with myself, as I had done the assignment wrong. But in any case, the assignment was to utilize a stock image to portray the idea of "lost". Instead, I modified and drew on top of the said image. I had asked for permission from Dicky Chalmers on flickr to use his beautiful photograph of an alleyway in Taiwan, and was excited to illustrate an elaborate scene for "lost." Here are some close-ups and works-in-progresses of the project. Chalmers was so kind enough to allow me to use it for the assignment so I tried to do my best. Despite doing that part of the assignment wrong, I was able to create a really personal illustration so it was not all in vain.
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| Haha, James Jean inspired! |
The second part was to illustrate "lost" with the setting being in our Illustration building. The building itself is, to say the least, very sterile. It's the same studio space or classroom, with the same chairs or easels.
I went all the way up the flight of stairs to the fifth floor and was met with a dead end. It was the most eerie environment. The only thing there was a desk, something that could only be found in the RISD college building up the hill. I defined "lost" in this image as misplacement of an object. This can only work if the viewer knew the setting was the Illustration building however so my depiction faltered in that respect. It was a good experience to paint this type of lighting however. 8)
