Work outside of class

Heres some of my favorite works from the past year, that I've done outside of class!

Between, is the piece I am most proud of. I spent 4 months working on it and finished over spring break of 2022. I wanted to create a piece about the on going battle in the art community of realisim vs abstract or stylized art. This is a debate that has always bothered me, because I believe that all forms of art are beautiful and valid. I showed this through my work by choosing a classical subject ( the skeleton) and combining it with an abstract background. I really wanted to emphasize how I believe contrasting things can work in harmony and make something beautiful. This last May," Between" was published in MCA's teen blog, and it is one of my proudest achievements.

"Float", was a piece I completed over the summer. One song that I was listneing to a lot during the time was "Funeral" by Phoebe Bridgers. My favorite lyric in the song is " I have this dream where I'm screaming underwater." I love this line so much because it gives me such a clear vision every time I hear it. A couple of weeks earlier, I went to the aquarium and took some videos of the jellyfish. I loved the way they moved and kept rewatching it.

"Float"'s meaning is about how music is a powerful tool and how a lot of times, humans turn toward it to process things that they are gong through. I find a lot of comofrt in music and it ahs helped me get through hard times but I also think that a lot of time music reopens a wound and makes someone drown bakc nto those emotions that they were trying to heal from.

The actual process of the painting was a challenge for me. This was the first time I had ever really tried to paint a person with accurate skin tones. I spent two weeks on the faces and absolutely hated it, so I completely restarted. I'm so glad that I decided to persevere through this piece though because I love the outcome of it.

This past Spring, I was a part of Teens For Social Justice, a program that was ran through Jeffco. We would meet weekly and discuss social justice issues we saw at our schools and talked about activism. At the end of it, we made a project, which ended up being a zine featuring LGBTQ+ youth. I made this art piece for it.

I sketched and painted the piece first on posterboard with gouche. After, i went in with colored pencil, to add more depth and color. To add it to the zine, I imported an image into Procreate and traced around the illustration for a clean background, then signed it.

Being a part of this group was such a fun experience and one of my favorite memories from this year.

This is my most recent piece, that I completed over Thanksgiving break. I wanted to explore the ideas of rebirth from loss and how it changes a person. I chose to use white lillies and storks becuase they symbolize this. I really enjoy the way the compositon turned out.

This was my first painting of the past summer. During the summer, I'm outside all day working on artwork. I wanted to create an etheral like landscape with this piece. I did this through the use of color and shape with the my brushstrokes. In fact, my brushstrokes on the sky, house , and rocks were inspired by Vangough. I love the way the whole piece turned out, but the house and shore are my favorite parts. Although this piece doesn't have a meaning, I enjoy doing landscapes every once in a while to get my creativity flowing.