Foundations of Art
Freshman year of 2021-2022 with Ms. Medsker!
Art has always been one of those subjects that has an impact on us all. We use art in so many different ways and each of those ways is unique. My family has always wanted me to draw more because they felt like I was really talented. My parents wanted me to join Foundations of Art because art is a big thing in my family and creativity is one of those things that my parents thought I really had. To some extent, my parents were right, during this year I was able to express my creativity in art form by creating some good works of art that I feel proud of creating.
Out of all the artworks that I've made this year, I absolutely just loved my sgraffito design. That was definitely the best piece of art that I made this year and I was very satisfied with the way it turned out. This is part of the reason why I joined Foundations of Art so I could complete it to get into ceramics which I am really good at because I like working with my hands. This project's outcome is the result of how well I am with being hands-on to carve and create beautiful pieces of artwork. However, it took me a few tries to make this piece the way I wanted it to look. It first started by breaking my first design when I dropped it on the floor and then the next time I carved the mouth too small. Finally, I decided to trace it and it came out beautifully. This project really showed me how well I was able to make a good piece of art using trial and error. I created a striped bass because I have such a love for nature and how wild it is. The patterns on a striped bass are very detailed and show how pretty some parts of nature truly are.
The most challenging projects for me this year were the painting projects. I struggled with these projects mentally because I have not been used to painting and this was sort of new for me. Time was also a big struggle for me because I tend to work at a very slow pace and this was hard for me because I had very little time to work on it, and that stressed me out. I also felt under pressure because I had to have multiple sections complete before each class period so I felt very on edge from that -- because I felt rushed. I also had other work that I needed to get done that was very important so I felt like I did not have enough time to complete this project and get my other important work done. I was also so used to being able to erase my work if I got an error on it that I didn't like. This was hard because I had to start over multiple times on separate pieces of paper to try to make the projects better. Another issue was not having enough paint, this was an issue because I constantly had to go to the art room to refill my paint and that took time away from finishing the projects. I also made many messes on both myself and the area where I worked, so it was a pain to have to clean up my messes each time I worked. What this project taught me was how to work with material that I am not used to and how to learn from my mistakes as a result of doing something that was difficult for me.
This year was quite challenging for me, and though I did complain a lot about how hard art is, I also managed to learn some important techniques that I hope will stay with me for the rest of my life. These techniques include interpreting making sense of my art and explaining how I was able to create each of my pieces. Another technique was experimenting with new materials to make new pieces of art. These materials include using charcoal, oil pastels, and wire. By experimenting with these materials we could eventually find out which material we really enjoyed using. Other techniques include making 3D and 2D dimensional shapes in our work which comes in handy, later on for people who are interested in construction. I can tell now that my strengths now are sculpting clay and drawing. During this year the only project that I was really interested in was sgraffito and making clay. So I had to wait a year till we did that project, but once we did it, it was all worthwhile. When I saw that I did very well on the sgraffito it prompted me more to want to take ceramics.
Looking back at the beginning of the year to now, I definitely feel that my art, and the way I have approached it, have come a long way. I remember going into art class thinking that this would be a fun experience. But that wasn't the case for the first few months, I felt stressed. During the first half of the year, I remember texting my dad telling him that it was hard. But as I got older, and got more control over the way I approached my work, I began to adjust to art and enjoy it more. This prompted me to want to do better in the class which made my grades go up. It can only get better because not only did my art skills improve, but my overall skills as a student did too.