I wanted a piece that looked interesting and something different then what I have done before. I was surprised when this sketch came about, I wish I remembered what i was thinking about to lead me to this idea of making my hair out of grass, but the imagery I think is fun and i have some other sketches i'm working on along these same lines.
Like I said, I thought that if I was doing a self portrait I thought it would be important that even the medium was reflected in who I feel I am. My idea is to combined printmaking and painting; printmaking because that's the medium I feel connected with, and painting because it goes along with the class and what my teachers are trying to teach me.
I have started carving on my print now, but as I was talking with a fellow student the other day, I made a realization I thought could help other student artist. Countless times I have heard classmates say (and even more numerous I have said) something along the lines of, "I can't wait to be done with school, then I don't have to do these stupid assignments that I don't want to do," or "I just want to do what I want to do without being told by my teachers." As students we want the freedom of doing what we want and even though we learn things in our classes we take, we still maybe feel restricted because we are "in an oil painting class (or any other class as the situation may be) so I can only oil paint in this class because its a class I have to take for graduation." So my realization was: integrate your work and your style in any and all of your classes your taking.
I bet you were all waiting for some life changing, earth spinning realization, and then you laugh or roll your eyes because of how simple it was, but even though the idea is simple, the idea is don't just do a project because that's what the assignment dictates you have to do, but own the assignment and make it your own.
My plan for this new piece is to print this image as I normally would as a print, but I have also planned to paint the face in oil paints to fill the requirements of my oil painting class. I am excited because i'm now blurring the lines between two fields of art that I always thought were very separate and distinct.
My wife is also taking the oil painting class with me, and she was working on some very similar ideas. My wife is a ceramic major and she was talking about making a pot that she would fired then gesso to paint her conceptual self portrait on, to integrate her passions and assignment in a similar way.
Talking with my fellow artist friend I understand that a lot of art students may feel this way, that they want the freedom to do what they want, but feel that assignments restrict them as artists. This idea of mixing your passions in the various classes you are required to take to obtain your degree should be encouraged and maybe also realized on a personal individual level as well. Maybe this realization hit a more deeper meaning to me then to others reading this because I made it personally, and maybe in the near future it will be more personal to you because you made the realization personal too.
Some benefits I see to integrating your personal style of art in other classes would be a stronger portfolio when applying for scholarships, jobs/careers, and higher art programs.
That was a long winded realization, but in the upcoming posts I'll show you how my finished piece turned out.
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