First Painting in 3 years

Finally Got Time to paint.

Building a Website

Making a website for my class at EMU using Dreamweaver was very difficult, more difficult than I thought it was going to be. In this website I focused the attention on artists who have touched my life and inspired me to do what I love. Through this assignment I learned to honor the artists that give me the  inspiration to keep going through the struggles of being an artist. I also learned that through hard work and passion comes great achievement.  Here is my Inspirational Artists website. http://people.emich.edu/agivens3/index.html

Looking for Inspiration

I was looking for inspiration, something that always inspires me is looking up Jerry Uelsmann and Maggie Taylor's work both of them have a unique style that is their own. They both do surrealism and photo montages in a different way, and also use different media. There work is amazing! www.maggietaylor.com/
www.uelsmann.com/

Creating Highlights and Shading with Color

When using highlights and shading to light with colors, take for example the color yellow as the light source. It is useful to use a cool color (like dark blue) as the shadow color. Using the cool and warm colors in the image makes the image more vibrant and flowing. I learned this technique from painting. Also, don't be limited by just using the opposite color on the color wheel, you can also use proximal colors. For example, yellow has the light and purple as the shadow.

 

Cave Drawing Photo Montage

For this image I plan on incorporating a person into a cave drawing. For this I had to shoot photos of rock textures and also had to shoot a studio portrait shot. For inspiration I looked up cave drawings on "google" and from there I sketched out my idea. Here are some images that helped my idea come to life.

Drawings

At the beginning stage of creating my surrealist image, I first draw my ideas onto a piece of paper. Getting my ideas out of my head and on to paper is a very important step in my creative process. This helps me to conceptualize my ideas in a different media. This step helps to open your mind to different ways to express your ideas. For me this stage helps me with the composition and the perceptive of the image. Also looking at your drawing upside down helps you look at the elements in the image. Here are some of my sketches that help me start off my vision.

Stairway to Heaven

For this image I wanted to express a peaceful environment that is inspired by the cross. I looked up others "stairway to heaven" on google/images. Here are some of the images that made my vision more clear and inspired me to continue with this theme.