April:
 
Yours truly with the goods @ my exhibition. A proud moment! And a rare one: I’m not covered in charcoal smears.

The swan piece (far right) was something I finished during the semester while working independently with a professor. If you remember a few posts back, I was doing some wing sketches in preparation for the piece. Back then, the idea was in its very beginning stages. I wasn’t exactly sure which direction I was going; I just knew I loved wings. As I talked about it more with my professor, we started talking about the story of Swan Lake. Although the idea of doing Swan Lake-inspired work excited me, I was afraid that it might seem kitschy as Black Swan was running its course in theaters around the same time. Yes, I’ll be the first to admit that I love Black Swan, but I didn’t want to make fan art. My prof just assured me that with Swan Lake being such a classic story, it shouldn’t be an issue… so I went with it. I’m glad he gave me that encouragement because I ended up making a diptych I’m in love with. Sure, there are a lot of things I would change about them, but they’re the first big pieces I did with little instruction or influence. Although I really wanted to finish both in time for my exhibition, time only allowed for one, which is the white swan piece you see in the exhibition. After the chaos of Curio passed, I was able to focus on my black swan. I’ll cut to the chase… here’s the Swan Lake diptych. :)

 
“Odette” and “Odile” 2011, charcoal and pastel on paper.

During the process of these two, and through out my overall drawing program experience, I definitely learned a lot about my overall drawing style. In “Odette”, I ended up incorporating some of the abstract elements I had been influenced to do from certain professors. Although not an original fan of abstraction at the beginning, it became something that I would regularly use in my art. As I progressed into “Odile”, the urge to do a complete narrative scene took over. With my life-long  interest in illustration, comics and animation, those are what come more natural to me and will be something I’m going to try to do more of in my post-grad life. Like a lot of illustrators, movies from Disney or Don Bluth were obvious inspirations growing up, and I won’t deny my fantasy of working in that environment someday.

Post-grad life has been pretty close to what I’ve expected. No, I haven’t found that dream job yet, but my full-time job right now is searching for it, even if it does include the common dream job of Disney/Pixar. In addition to that, I’ve also taken up the hobby of cake decoration. I haven’t taken any formal classes yet; just self teaching, and it’s been interesting. That’s a post for later though, so stay tuned… I mean, if you like that sort of thing.

Well, as I wrap up my rambling, I’ll leave you with two photos of a moment I’ve worked/struggled/waited forever for:

I did it!

Curio! April 11-15
Gallery 100 @ Arizona State University, southeast corner of Mill and University south of Chili’s in Tempe, AZ.
Opening reception tonight! 4/12 6-8pm
Gallery hours:
Mon-Thur: noon – 5 p.m.
Fri: noon – 3 p.m

Right now in my independent study, I am working on some new pieces that I’m hoping to include in my exhibition. It’s going to be a diptych, and I couldn’t be more excited to work on it. I don’t want to tell you my idea yet because I’m great at jinxing. But here’s a little sketch! ;)

Wings are something I’ve always loved. Not sure why, I just think they’re beautiful. The wing is just a small part of my concept though. The hard part is thinking of other imagery to go with my idea but it’s coming along.

Painting II is going well… we’re doing a cubist still life, inspired by Picasso’s work. I’m really not a huge fan of cubism, but I enjoyed the project anyway. It was awkward getting back into painting again after a year off. I really do think I prefer oil paint over acrylic though… guess I won’t know until I try acrylic again. I kind of wish I could just do paintings of chocolate truffles again, like my trompe l’oeil from my last painting class. Maybe I just want an excuse to buy fancy chocolate. Our next project is going to be more of an abstract expressionist piece about one single object or gadget. I chose a violin, because it’s another thing I’ve always thought was beautiful. I don’t play (everyone always asks) but I kinda wish I did. I played the trumpet back in the day.

Switching topics. Black Swan. Have you seen it? I saw it back in December when it first came out in a small overcrowded theater. Its been on my mind ever since. I’ll be honest, it wasn’t one of those movies that made me walk out in complete awe. Might have been the theater experience, but at the same time, sometimes it takes a few times for me to realize how in love with something I am. It had it’s awkward, creepy moments (after all, it is a thriller) but overall, it was a beautifully done movie. I love Natalie Portman. She’s one of my favorite actresses, and she (and Mila Kunis) did an impeccable job training for the movie. I read that that the only time Natalie had a body double was during the extended pointe (tippy toe) scenes. I can’t imagine training for just a few months to pull off the skills and movement of a professional ballerina. The story of swan lake just added to the appeal. The white swan/black swan complex is fascinating and beautiful, which brings me to mention they did an amazing job on the makeup and costumes in the movie. To sum it up, I’ve been wanting to see it again but I haven’t found the time. Hopefully soon… otherwise I believe the DVD/Bluray will be out in March. Of course I’d love nothing more than to see the actual ballet. If only Ballet AZ was running it right now.

balletaz.org

letterpress from bellafigura.com

I’ll also be taking my senior exhibition class to prepare for my gallery show with a group of other classmates. Each group of seniors gets a week to display their work in a gallery just off campus, and they get an opening reception complete with refreshments and everyone they can invite. You know I’ll tell you when that is. ;) I’ll also be doing an independent study, where I work directly with a professor over the course of the semester to produce work. It’s a little nerveracking because the motivation and drive is all on me, but I hope to make the best of it. Finally, I’ll be continuing life drawing and painting II. I think my anxiety levels just went up typing all this. JK… It’s going to be a wonderfully challenging final semester.

Oh and one more thing… just wanted to share this blog I accidentally stumbled upon a few months ago. The author, a graphic designer and jewelry designer, has similar taste to mine so it’s been really inspiring to me. Check out Elephantine

Just don’t forget about my blog ;D Have a wonderful week.

This is my very basic watercolor monotype. It’s basically made by painting with watercolors on a plexi glass plate, letting it dry, adding damp paper on top of it, running in through the press, and ideally the image transfers into the paper. In my case I used watercolor crayons, which work just as well but give a different look.

These, except the orange print, are what you call lino cuts. You take a piece of linoleum and carve your design into it. Then you roll paint over the top of it (so ink only remains on the surface that was not carved away.) Then you set it on your paper, run it through the press, and there you go. I really liked this project. In my case, I made my colored backgrounds first, then used black ink on all my linoleum designs.

The orange print was made with something called a pronto plate, which is like a sheet of paper-thin polyester. You draw your design on the sheet using a permanent marker. You wet the sheet with water, and then roll oil-based black ink across the sheet with a roller brush. Ideally, the ink will only build up where the permanent marker was drawn, and the water will repel the ink everywhere else. You then take your pronto plate, add the paper, run it through the press, and yeah. :) Like I mentioned earlier, I made my colored background on the paper before hand.

Our most recent project was dry point and I loved how it turned out. Looking forward to showing you that one once it’s graded!

For any of my artist friends who have the opportunity to take a printmaking class, I highly recommend it. Especially for the drawing majors… it’s a great way to make beautiful, long lasting work that won’t smudge or wipe off as charcoal tends to do.

Well, that’s all for now… Have a great week. xo

This is Sparkle. She’s a jazz musician, and also my best friend of 14 years! She makes for a great subject.

Burton Barr Library in Downtown Phoenix

Cute family @ Westgate

xo Stacee

This weekend I had the opportunity to do my first cake decorating project for a large party. I had done decorating before, you know, for friends and family, but nothing for a big event. As I did it, it made me realize how much I like being a part of party planning. It also heightened my love for cake decorating of course, and even though it wasn’t anywhere near professional-grade decorating, it really made me want to follow up with some classes to really learn from the pros. From there… I’ll decide if I want to work at a bakery someday, or just continue for the people in my life. :)

I wish I had some updated photos to show you, but the latest ones are being graded at the moment. ;) Lately I’ve been working on our portraiture assignment which i’ve been having fun with. I’ll def. show you when I’m done, but for now here’s a photo taken by my classmate, Bill.

Oh, I wonder who that is…

Here are a few more prints I made this week… they weren’t as much about content as much as they were about becoming accustomed to a manual 35mm.

What you are looking at is my first products of real-deal, 35 mm film photography developing and darkroom printing. It’s pretty surreal to me; I never thought I’d actually make my own prints.

I still have some contrast tweaking to do with these, in addition to getting the dust off the negative from the first print if any of you professionals noticed that. ;) It’s been a challenging few weeks so far, but I’m enjoying it. I’ll keep you updated!

That’s pretty much it for now, just wanted to touch base! Before I leave, I wanted to show you my completed Metamorphosis series as a whole that I finally got the motivation to pin up and photograph. I’ll put the individuals photos up in my portfolio link. Enjoy! Talk to you soon. xo