artschoolawkward-blog

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Humbleness of the Mind, is an installation of work, which represents an intrapersonal study of my life.  I investigate the joys and struggles of processing information as someone with a learning difference by showcasing a visual representation of thought and expressing my non-linear interior monologue.  While the work is a personal study, I am thoughtful of how others will identify with my process in relation to how they learn.  This work is multi-media including Book Arts, painting, and collage.  Earth tones, and gestural qualities which come from the spontaneity of thoughts and physical mark making, are qualities that unify the work as well as the exploration of color and shape.  This work is coupled with an audio track, illuminating and echoing a representation of my self- motivation, insecurities, and perseverance in the pursuit of learning.  The representational paintings represent times in my life where I have developed and grown as a person, mirroring the process of learning I go through when challenged with the stimuli of everyday life.    

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The YA FEEL ME? show is TOMORROW!!!!!!

This photo is of what my studio looked like right before I took everything down to install it in the gallery on Saturday.  

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We had a great time installing our show, Ya Feel Me? all day today.  

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Working on The Place (Ecuador), which is acrylic paint and collage on wood. 

My dad’s family lives mostly in Ecuador, which creates distance between my family and I, which in turn creates a distance between my identity and myself.  This painting connects with this part of me that is filled with longing, self-discovery, and my love of family.  

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Finishing up my mobile and it has been overtaking my studio!  

Mobile featuring acrylic collage paintings on paper and various string

This mobile-like structure, entitled Mind the Brain, represents my brains attempt to create relationships between thoughts, words, and feelings.  The amorphous, irregular shaped collaged and painted blobs represent the stringing together of thoughts in mind, attempting to find clarity.  

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Made my reception book, featuring paper from the Art Index of the 1940′s, as the covers.    

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We install in 9 days! This is so exciting! finishing up pieces, writing, descriptions, and getting work exhibition ready.  

Here is the information about the show that my work (which this blog has been all about), and my classmates, Evan Sullivan, Danielle Franzen, Meghan Ferrero, Ariel Lund, Taylor Anufrom, and Caitlyn Doolittle artwork.  

The reception will be on April 8th, 2015 at Montserrat College of Art's 301 Gallery, from 5-8 pm.  Please join us for this wonderful event!

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Artist Statement

In this work I investigate the joys and struggles of processing written information as someone with a learning difference. I express the non-linear interior monologue that occurs when I clarify information, by showcasing a visual representation of thought coupled with an audio track echoing an honest representation of my self- motivation, insecurities, and perseverance in the pursuit of learning.  By exploring color and shape through various tones, hues, values, and opacities I use gestural qualities in my physical mark making to show the spontaneity of my thoughts and to unify the work. .

While the work is a personal study, my interest is in how others will identify with my personal process in regards to their own unique way of seeing the world.   This work is multi-media and includes book arts, painting, and collage. The kitchen and bedroom paintings represent times in my life where I have grown and places my mind wanders to as I attempt to perceive information through the painting medium.  It is my hope that through this work others will be provided with a glimpse of how I experience the world, come to a deeper understanding of the mind of someone else as well as their own.

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This is what my studio looks like currently, getting very close to the show date and very excited! The reception is April 8th, 5-8pm at the 301 gallery at Montserrat College of Art.  

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My Bedroom,is the second painting I have been working on which represents another place that my mind goes when thinking about how I have become who I am.  This is the bedroom I lived in from ages 10-17, a time in anyones lives when your head is filled with confusion, uncertainty, creativity, and hopefulness.

As with My First Kitchen, I started with Stonehendge, and then moved onto wood panel.    

Acrylic paint and collage on wood panel.   

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In this piece, My First Kitchen, I am connecting with a point in my life where I learned a great deal about myself and what it means to be a young adult.  The thought of this kitchen is soft and beautiful in my mind. This is nostalgic but at the same time is very present.    

I first did one on Stonehenge and then moved onto wood panel for a more earthy, sturdy aesthetic, and to be able to add collage with more ease.    

My First Kitchen is done on wood panel, with acrylic paint and collage (pieces from past paintings and antique paper). 

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I'm making sheer curtains to create more of an environment for the work I have done for my show!

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I have been trying to think of a way to display the stringed forms and arrived at a mobile.  Looking at this chair that was found in the basement of a friend of mine, I realized that through deconstructing it, a mobile suddenly appears.  Through a combination of hemp string, lots of hot glue, and dream catchers, this is starting to come together.  I will keep adding my abstract stringed forms to my new form.  

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Working on the "stringed forms", and realized, they need to occupy space and resemble floating thoughts.  My mentor got me thinking about Gego and her wonderful synapse structures.  I know that I want to create an understanding of connecting thoughts and trying to make sense of my visual language through replicating forms and carrying them through this process of going from confusion to clarity.  

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Bertrand Russell lived in the late 19th century and was a British philosopher, logician, mathematician, historian, writer, social critic and political activist.  He is known for being a founder in analytic philosophy, meaning that he focuses on clarity through the understanding logic, language, and the natural sciences.  In 1950 Russell was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature "in recognition of his varied and significant writings in which he champions humanitarian ideals and freedom of thought".  His open attitude towards learning and education has intrigued me.  However before I bought, “The Selected Papers of Bertrand Russell”, I have never read any of his work, but have stumbled into a wonderful read. 

PROCESS :  I am always starting from a place of confusion and searching for truth and knowledge, and eventually arriving at a level of clarity.  This is my first attempt to go through that journey.   

I started off by reading page 159, which the heading reads, “The Aims of Education”.  I read the page aloud and recorded what was going through my head on Garage Band, trying to bring forth my internal monologue. Then I created a painting mirroring that confusion and the mudding up of too much information.  Then I painted two paintings (the sixe of the first cut into two sheets), which were displaying more understanding of the material.  I proceeded to read the text again and felt as if my mind was buffering the information, as if too much was coming in and only spitting out little nuggets of understanding, which I visually represented through the ripped forms, which I will be stringing all together.  Right now I have created the stages prior to clarity. 

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A little tour of the current state of my studio.  

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Painting on the floor. Created this while thinking about how different I think of my life this semester. It's about transition, transformation, and self growth.