Reflection for lesson on 05.09.12

The main assignment for this unit is to create a drawing of what we think of as an icon, using the grid method which involves looking at a printed image and copying out squares, one by one, over to a drawing. As I am a very big fan of Coldplay, I chose to draw the lead singer and guitarist in the band; Chris Martin.

This is how the drawing looked after the lesson on wednesday. I am quite happy with the drawing so far, though in order to finish it, I will really need to speed things up in the two remaining lessons. I have gotten the most important parts drawn, but the shading and details is often what takes the most time.

Salvador Dalí

Salvador Domingo Felipe Jacinto Dalí i Domènech was born on May 11, 1904 in the town Figueres close to the french border in Spain.
Salvador Dalí's father, named Salvador Dalí i Cusí, was a middle-class lawyer, and was very strict with his son. Dalí respected his father, but was quite frightened. The boy's mother however, spoiled him.
The fact that his mother died when he was very young, is probably one of the reasons of his paintings being bizarre and almost frightening.


Already as a small child Dalí had talent, and he got most of his inspiration from a town where the family used to vacate called Cadacez. He painted this when he was 15 years old:

Dalí was in his early 20's when he heard about an artistic movement creating a strange art that was being called surrealism.

Surrealism

Surrealism was an artistic movement that was started by Andre Breton in 1924. It was in a way a response to the first world war, but it was also inspired by the theories of the physicist Sigmund Froid, who believed that everyone had an inner unconscious world where our feelings are captivated, and that the only way to express ourselves was to release these feelings without any form of cencorship. Dalí quickly found out that this was the form of art, perfect for him. He could freely express his emotions, fears and desires, which he, as we all know, had tons of.

As we can see in the painting below, which is one of Dalí's earliest surrealist paintings, he is greatly inspired by Froid's theories, and clearly expresses his anxieties in what looks like the shores of Cadacez. 

Why Salvador rich and famous?

One of the main reasons of Dalí's fame was his attention-seeking nature. He always came with shocking statements that made the media circle around him like flies. The fact that he was this famous led to his paintings being worth quite a lot of money, with some of his paintings being sold for over a million dollars. Another thing that made Salvador attractive to the media, was that he wasn't just a painter. He also made a movie, sculptures, jewelry, furniture/household items, and clothing. He even starred in this commercial for the french chocolate "Lanvin". In the commercial he says in french: "I am crazy about lanvin chocolate"

Was Salvador Dalí a great artist?

Yes, I think Salvador Dalí was a great artist because he created strange, bizarre, almost scary artwork that in a way makes us able to look inside his mind, but most of all, he creates art that many people (including me) likes to look at.

Phenakistoscopes

This unit we have been looking at phenakistoscopes. These phenakistoscopes are propably the earliest form of animation. They are made on a paper disc, and are used by facing a mirror, seeing through the shutters which are small gaps on the side of the phenakistoscope, and spinning it. It will then, if made correctly, look like the image is moving.


These are my phenakistoscopes:

Color essay

Color


Color is defined as the quality of an object or substance with respect to light reflected by the object. When using color in paintings it is useful to think about how the colors can be combined and/or modified to create effects like shadows and depth.

The painting above was created using complimentary colors. Complimentary colors are colors that "balance" each other out. Complimentary colors often contrast each other. As you can see in the painting, the colors used are blue and orange. These colors are complimentary colors because they are, when thinking about the color wheel, opposite of each other. 

The painting is created by someone operating as "Steve" and i found it on a website called driver-art.co.uk.

The painting you see here, I have created myself, and I created it using analogous colors. For those who can't see it, the painting is supposed to look like a field at sunset, and is obviously created using different orange-like colors. Analogous colors are colors that are next to or very close to each other on the color wheel. The effects of analogous colors are said to be soothing, which I think is correct when looking at my own painting and other paintings using analogous colors.

Tone

For my tone analysis I chose this photo. As you can see the painting displays an orange on a blue surface. The orange is lit from the left. I can see this because the colors get a lighter and lighter tone towards the left and the orange casts a shadow towards the right. The shadow is exactly the same color as the surface, but it is painted in a darker tone. This shadow is probably the main reason that the painting is viewed as an image with depth. Another important reason for this is that is that the orange has a light tone on the left that gets gradually darker towards the right. Both of these effects are forms of shadow.

This is the painting after the lesson at wednesday the 7th of december. I have now made some improvements to the background and the table. I've also given the lamp its color and added some shadow to the ball. I am keeping in mind that i have to take the largest and darkest areas first and then the smaller and lighter ones. All I am missing now is finishing the shadow on the ball and modify the table and background colors because i think the grey-tones look to similar.

We are doing a grey tone picture in art class and this is my painting on November, 30. Even though it is not done you can see that it is starting to take shape. When we had a feedback session in class i got the following comments:

What does the painting look like?

Youssef: It looks like a room and a table.

Oakley: It looks like a lamp with a light beam.

What do you like about the painting?

Oakley: I like that the lamp stands out from the rest of the picture.

(me: I am actually supposed to paint the lamp darker than its surroundings to make it look like it is in front of the other objects. This was only a coincidence.)

What could be improved in the painting?

Jon Sondre: Maybe a visible beam from the lamp?

Questions

Mr. Roman: What greys are you going to use on the lamp?

Answer: I am going to use a bit darker grey on the lamp than on the table and background.