ART460 Log Book #1

This semester, I am auditing the ART460 Advanced Independent Studio. It is both exciting and intimidating. We started out as a class by creating a group syllabus(exciting!) and individual statements of purpose (intimidating).

It’s been a long time since I’ve completed a finished piece, and longer still than I’ve done a statement of purpose. The whole concept of the class relies on time management, self discipline and a healthy amount of comradery. The first huge hurdle was just that: finding a common time to meet. In the end, we split into two groups for common studio time and meeting once a week together for critique.

So.

My statement of purpose is probably the most ambitious in terms of technique. Of course, in all my technological knowledge, I decided to create a digital immersive experience. At least, that is the goal.

I have recently been heavily influenced by illustration and animation. Specifically the likes of Dedouze and Worthikids. Dedouze is a black-french artist who primarily works in Blender. He has such a beautiful use of color and motion that I definitley was to capture in my work.

Tram by Dedouze, 2020

I also am choosing him as inspiration because of his use of Blender, a 2D and 3D art program. This program, in theory, will be what takes my work to the next level. Which brings me to my vision: taking a piece I would normally paint, creating it in Blender, and allowing audience members to interact with it in a 3D space on their phones. Simple stuff.

Idea number two is the use a projector to fill a room– maybe half of one depending on the end of semester show– with an animated piece created in Blender. Simpler stuff. Still ambitious, but much more doable.

To be honest, I didn’t think I would even need a studio space. But Nell (rightfully)insisted on everyone getting and using their own space on the third floor. On Sunday I was able to formally set things up. It was clear once I got the sense of the place that I was going to get a lot of use out of it after all. I think this semester, I’ll ease back into things with a full Acrylic painting or two.

This first piece could potentially live in The CDVL. I’ve been thinking of doing this for a while, ever since *someone* took the Jordan Casteel charcoal piece from our room. (Yes, I’m bitter) And we do have two printed canvasses rendered useless otherwise because of a typo.

I’m excited because there is a good amount of wall space to test my very ambitious final piece idea. Also, I can experiment with things like projecting over objects hung onto the wall as suggested by a fellow classmate, Eliza. She mentioned artist Tony Oursler and his use of sculpture and projector to make these, frankly, weird and creepy experiences.

But, his work does get the job done. This kind of all encompassing, enthralling, and weird stuff is exactly the direction I want to go.

Even though I have the end in mind, I still have a few questions to answer first. Number one being, how can I have a better time picking out color? It took me way too long to decide on the neon pink background on the canvas. So long in fact that this was all I had to show during group critique.

Now, I want to be clear in that I don’t feel bad about taking forever to pick a color. I just feel I could be better at it. That’s one of my semester goals, in fact. As far as timeline, I feel good. This feels doable. I’m excited to start creating digitally in Blender, which will happen by March I hope. After that it’s going to involve getting a projector in the room, refining animation, and a lot of experimenting and feedback via my studio mates.