Adeline's Art Portfolio

Adeline Bloom "Apple Orchard"

14” by 10”, colored pencil on paper, 2022

My idea was to draw a nice, peaceful apple orchard with a sunset sky in the background. I came up with this idea because I wanted to draw something that made me think about fall. I thought about an apple tree outside in the country and started drawing it. After I sketched the tree, I added in a fence and some pumpkins. I added some more trees and a field in the background. I started out with inspiration from real life experiences with the tree because I used to have an apple tree and I remembered that. Then I decided to add some more detail and used pieces of other fall scene artworks as references and added some things into mine.

I sketched this idea out on a different paper to practice it. After I had a sketch of it done, I practiced using different color pencils to color everything until I liked how all the colors looked and knew what shades I wanted to use. I got a final paper the size I wanted and sketched it in pencil to have an outline. Then I began using the colored pencils to color it in and erased the pencil lines I had. Once I had all the landscape and things colored in, I began practicing blending the sunset on a different paper. I went from a yellow color to a light orange, darker orange, and then red. I used a tissue to blend all the colors in the sunset together to make it more realistic. After I finished the sunset, I went through and touched up and finalized things I saw that needed more.

I want my audience to think about Fall and going to a peaceful apple orchard while the sun sets. There is nobody around so it is quiet and calm.

It was difficult for me to pick what colors to do for everything. There was a lot of brown and green and I didn’t want the colors to clash. To overcome this, I used different pieces of paper to sketch it out on and tried it with a lot of different color combinations to see which ones looked the best. Another issue I had was that I made the tree trunk and the bottom of the path wrong but I had already colored it in so I couldn’t change it. To fix this I cut off the bottom edge of the paper where the mistake was. If I started over I would change the paper or media I used. Using the white paper with colored pencils left some white marks that were hard to fill in. I also think if I would have used a different media I could’ve made the sunset more blended together and realistic.

This artwork style is realistic. I like how the background looks with the trees, field, and sunset. It makes it unique to me how that I made the sky a sunset instead of just blue. I also like how I added in pumpkins because it added to the fall look I was going for.

Adeline Bloom "Fireworks"

14" by 11", charcoal pencil and chalk pencil on black paper, 2022

My idea was to make a scene of people watching fireworks together, but the people are just black shadows and the fireworks are the only color. I was thinking about different ideas for a combo drawing and the idea of fireworks being the only color in the sky was cool to me. This inspiration came from my life experiences because I was thinking about different things I love that could inspire a project and one of the things I thought about was fireworks. When you’re watching fireworks, the only color you really see and focus on is the fireworks and everybody else is just shadowy and in the background. For the combo drawing, I thought it would be cool to make the fireworks the only color so they would pop out. After I had my idea planned, I looked up different photos of people watching fireworks to use as reference photos and get more inspiration for how to lay it out.

I started by outlining the shadows of the people in charcoal pencil and then I went and filled them in completely with the black. I used a different piece of paper to practice drawing different types of fireworks and plan what colors I liked. Then I drew the fireworks on the project paper with different colors of chalk pencil. I used pinks, blue, red, yellow, green and purple to add a lot of different colors. After I was done coloring, I went through and went back over everything with the pencils to make the color stronger and fill in any spaces there was.

I want my audience to think about when they’re watching fireworks in the summer. The fireworks are the only thing in color which is to show how when you are watching fireworks, the only thing that stands out and you focus on is the fireworks.

It was most difficult for me to draw the people. It was hard to only be able to use black, but make them have detail and look different from each other. I overcame this by looking at more reference photos of real people to see how it would really look. I practiced drawing it and outlined it before I colored it in to see how it would look. If I could start over I would maybe add more color and more fireworks. I would change the blue, purple, and green fireworks because the color of them wasn’t bright enough to stand out against the black.

This art style is realistic. The people I drew make it unique to me, some of the people I drew were a family with a baby which is something that I’ve seen at fireworks before. I like the media I used because it went well on the black paper and had good colors. I also liked using the black paper because it made the color of the fireworks stand out more and was like the night sky.

Adeline Bloom "My Dog"

8” by 8”, pencil on white paper, 2022

My idea for this project was to sketch my dog in black and white. This artwork came from my real life experiences, my dog plays with frisbees and we love to take him on walks. When I was project planning, I was thinking about things I could draw from my life and thought about my dog. I went through my camera roll and found pictures of him. I picked one I liked and used it as a reference photo for my project.

The first thing I did to start my project was find a picture of my dog for a reference photo. I looked at this photo and began to practice sketch my dog. I did this over and over again until I felt like it looked the best I could do and I was comfortable with how to draw it. Once I felt good about drawing the dog, I started on my project and drew the dog again. I started to think about what I could put in the background. My dog likes to play with frisbees, so I started by adding a frisbee in the air that the dog was chasing. Then I added a trail that the dog was walking on instead of him just floating. After I added the trail and frisbee, I thought this was still a little too plain. I added in some tree trunks in the background of the trail to make it more realistic and add more to look at. The tree trunks also added a point of view to the art, because you can’t see the leaves of the tree so the perspective is obviously from low to the ground. To finish my project, I shaded in the dog and frisbees shadow and added some shading by the trees. I then went over some lines to finalize it.

I want this artwork to relate to other people as well as me. When the audience looks at it, they can think about their own experiences with a pet they have had.

The most difficult thing for me was drawing the dog. I struggle more with drawing people and animals, so I don’t do it very often. I overcame this struggle by practing sketching the dog over and over again and trying different techniques. If I could start over, I would add more detail to the dog’s face. I would also maybe change the background and where the dog is.

This art style is realistic. It is unique to my own style because I never usually draw animals. This art work is also in black and white which I don’t do very often. I love how the artwork resembles my dog who is very important to me.