Sculpture 1 -- A Walk Around Hyatt Nature Reserve

Film is sculpture. According to our professor. Once you accept this idea and move on, making a film can be lots of fun. Our assignment was to include some artifice or deception in the film. It had to be (exactly) 90 seconds, plus title and closing page. Mine is called "A Walk Around the Hyatt Nature Reserve." I hope you can spot the deception. This was the final sculpture project for the semester.

The film is uploaded to Vimeo. You can watch it here:
http://vimeo.com/26178830

Sculpture 1 -- Full of Life

For this braised, steel wire sculpture, we were to make it site specific and the site needed to be within a five minute walk from the class room. This work represents a space on the BSU campus between the administration building and the liberal arts building containing seven trees. It is called "Full of Life." It is approximately 20 inches wide, 18 inches deep and 14 inches high. The width and height of each tree is relative to the actual trees. The work was sand blasted and painted with a clear coat finish to inhibit rusting. It took a while for me to get used to braising wire, but once I got the hang of it, I really enjoyed it.

Sculpture 1 -- Dice House

This sculpture, completed in plaster, was to represent two distinct ideas, that when combined, created a third idea. The title is "Dice House" and is to comment on the current real estate market. There is also the idea that life is a gamble and there are rewards for taking a chance. Plaster is fun to work with, but you have to be really fast. As it dries, it gets harder and harder to work. The final sculpture is about 4 inches by 4 inches by 4 inches.

Sculpture 1 -- Self Portrait with Fabricator

In this assignment, we were to design a self portrait to be fabricated in wood. We then would turn in our designs and the professor would hand them to another student for fabrication. We were not to speak to the fabricator during fabrication. This self portrait represents six of the houses that I have lived in. The floor plans are in a 1:48 scale and the height of the structure scales to the height of the house. I was very lucky that my design was given to a very, very competent student. The project came out great. The smallest structure is about 4 inches by 4 inches. The largest is about 7 inches by 10 inches. Each little block represent a room in the house.

Painting 1 -- This too shall pass.

This is the final painting of the semester. It is about 24 inches by 32 inches and is oil on canvas. It is the culmination of several weeks of work and is to represent the earthquake, tsunami and nuclear explosion in Japan. This is the most complex and ambitious painting that I have attempted. There are some things that I like about it and I am still letting it soak in. The title is to bring to mind the Buddhist idea that all things -- both good and bad -- are transient and shall pass away.

Painting 1 -- Fukushima Study

This is the fourth study that I did to prepare for the large, complex work on contemporary issues. It is to represent the explosion at the Fukushima nuclear power plant. It is about 9 inches by 12 inches and is oil on paper. I believe that this is the best painting that I did during the semester. Some things that I really like about it are that I used extra medium to make the paint flow more freely. This made the brush strokes much freer and more expressive. I like the way the colored ground (dark blue patterned ground) shows through the image in places. I like the semi-abstraction with a recognizable image. I like the rich colors and interesting diagonals. I wish every painting turned out this good.

Painting 1 -- Japan Tsunami Study 2

This is the third study that I completed as part of preparation for a large complex work on contemporary issues. It is to represent the aftermath of the tsunami in Japan. It is a little larger painting, about 9 inches by 12 inches. It is oil on paper.

Painting 1 -- Japan Tsunami Study 1

This is the second of four studies I did to prepare for a large complex work on contemporary issues. It is to represent the tsunami crashing into Sendai, Japan. It is relatively small, about 6 inches by 9 inches and is oil on paper.

Painting 1 -- Japan Earthquake Study

This is the first of four studies that I did to prepare for a large, complex painting reflecting on contemporary issues. This painting is relatively small, about 6 inches by 9 inches and is to represent tumbled down buildings in Japan after the earthquake.

Painting 1 -- Low Key

This is grisaille, except that you cannot see the colored ground. It has a magenta ground under the black, white and gray. This is relatively small, about 6 inches by 9 inches and is oil on paper. This is the second part of the homework assignment. Both of these were fun to do and really relaxed.

Painting 1 -- High Key

This is almost grisaille, but not quite. There is a little brown added for interest. This is a relatively small painting, about 6 inches by 9 inches. It is oil on paper and was done as a homework assignment.

Painting 1 -- Combined Image

In this very interesting project, we combined a landscape painting with a still life. Our goal was to derive some extra meaning from the combination. The meaning that I was driving at was the place of traditional crafts in the university setting. The craft items were from my Peace Corps days in West Africa. The building is the multi-purpose classroom complex. This is a relatively large 18 inch by 24 inch oil painting on paper.

Painting 1 -- Fabric and Bottle

At one point while I was painting this relatively large 18 inch by 24 inch oil on paper still life, the professor came up to me and said, "Is that really the color you see?" To which I replied, "Yes, of course. Why?" She then called me closer to the front of the class. I had been painting the wrong color all the time. She then calmly said, "You'll have to be more observant if you want to paint realistic images." She is a wonderful teacher. Ah, fabric and bottles. Again.

Drawing 1 -- Pastel Bird

This drawing was a little more "craft like" and consisted of several parts. It was a 20 inch by 20 inch drawing on two contrasting colors of paper. The background consisted of negative images of birds surrounded by colored ground. The colored ground was made of two or more colors of pastel. The main image of the bird was drawn will realistic looking pastel colors and over the top was laid a cut-out line drawing of a bird in a complementary color. Getting the line drawing to stick was the hard part since the pastel had to be sprayed with a fixative first. It was interesting, complicated and fun to do. This was the final drawing project for the semester.

Drawing 1 -- Perceived Color

The goal of this 18 inch by 24 inch pastel still life was to match colors as closely as possible. We worked on this drawing for about two and a half weeks. Each class period, the still life would be set up for us with the rose, glass of water, glove and stick in precisely the same location. The blinds were closed and lamps gave us (just about) consistent shadows. We were to impost one-point perspective on the drawing so that it looked three dimensional. This was easier said than done. One of the hard parts was when things were not lined up correctly (like the post card). This was a great challenge and a lot of fun. I really enjoyed this one.

Drawing 1 -- Dream and Dreamer

This 18 inch by 24 inch charcoal and pastel drawing on colored paper was a lot of fun to work on. It is a structured drawing consisting of several components. We did a portrait of a classmate (the dreamer) using white and black charcoal and one color of pastel. In the rest of the drawing (the dream) we used only the charcoal. For me, the rest of the drawing consisted of a newpaper clipping photo (the boy swimming), a favorite animal (the penguins) and a landscape (Steamship mountain in Arizona). It was fun.

Drawing 1 -- Pen and Ink Self Portrait

Our assignment was to do a self portrait using a quill pen and ink on drafting film. The film does not readily accept ink and beads up. The photograph does not show all the beaded detail but it is very interesting. I found that I absolutely love quill pens. Once I start, I just want to scribble. It is a lot of fun and very liberating. When I do the self portraits I seem to have a really serious look on my face, but most of the time I'm not like that. I'm just having a good time.

Drawing 1 -- Erased Pastel Portrait

For this 18 inch by 24 inch drawing we were to use two colors of pastel. (I chose dark blue and green.) And to create a rich colored ground into which we were to erase the image of one of our fellow students. We then could lightly add a few lines on top of our erased image to enhance it. We spent three (90 minute) class periods on this. During the first period, my erasers were not working at all. I got new erasers for the second period and they were not much better. By the end of that class period I thought, "You are going to fail this class." For the third class period, I tried one more eraser and finally got it to do something. I added my line on top and got something that I was really pleased with. I thought it was the best drawing that I did during the semester and proved to me that sometimes I can draw.

Drawing 1 -- Bust of David

We spent about two weeks drawing the bust of David. This is done in graphite on white Strathmore drawing paper. It is about 9 inches by 12 inches. The other students in the class were very, very good at this and I struggled with it. I can say that I finished it on time and was able to turn it in.

Drawing 1 -- Modified Contour

In modified contour drawing, we do not get to lift the pen from the paper until we are done. Hopefully there aren't too many spots where the ink has spread out. This was my second try on the shoe. There were some other contour drawing that we completed, but they did not photograph well so I won't add them to the blog.

Drawing 1 -- Blind Contour

I really enjoy blind contour drawing. We did several of these in class. This is the one that I like the most.