Extended Blind Contour

"A Helping Hand"

Oil pastel and Sharpie on Bristol Board 

9" x 12"

To begin my artwork I knew that I had to extend the Sharpie drawings. For this piece of art, I really wanted to provide more meaning than realism. I wanted to show several main ideas to make the abstract art stand out. Firstly, with my artwork, I wanted to tell people that while going through many world conflicts, issues, and events, there is still one particular person out of everyone who is there to help. Lastly, another main idea/message I wanted to have visible in my artwork is that some people through restraint take risks to help for good, and in the end receive a punishment. 

To create my artwork, I first made several blind contour drawings. There were three drawings placed separately on the page, which were prompted by the teacher. These drawings used Sharpie. For this project, we were instructed to extend/change these drawings, but I really wanted to keep one of them completely visible. The drawing I kept easily visible was the hand. It plays a major part in the project providing a message to people who look at the final product. After we did the three blind contour drawings, I sketched out my additional plans for the extension using a graphite pencil. Next, I used Cray-Pas Oil Pastels to add color, detail, and abstract art elements. I started by building up a nest with two eagles/birds. These take part in one of the core ideas I built upon. After this, I colored in the hands- but also with handcuffs. Lastly, I added the background. Every smaller drawing I added, provided more meaning to the final piece.  After adding several drawings, and the background, the final piece was created. 

To make my final work I went through several processes,  brainstormed, and took part in many decisions leading to creation. Firstly, I really wanted to make my artwork abstract. I usually do realism, and doing more abstract art is a challenge to me. With the first graded project, I felt that this was a great opportunity to challenge myself and reflect upon my finished artwork. There were two main ideas I wanted my artwork to show, and I decided that more of an abstract style of art would help bring out these ideas the best. In the beginning, it took me a while to transform two out of the three blind contour drawings. I had absolutely no idea what to transform both the water bottle and portrait into. I knew that keeping the hand would make the artwork shine because it would allow the overall artwork more creativity and diversity. This is because the artwork has abstract elements. In my opinion, all of our creativity and ideas that take place inside our brains begin abstract.  I was able to make the portrait minorly visible. I transformed the portrait into the two birds, who are shown to be hurt. The band-aid on the bird is one of the eyes, and it added to my overall idea. It took me a long time to decide what to draw in the background. I ended up doing an 18-wheeler on fire, a gravestone, a car crash, a home on fire, and an investigation site. I chose these specific ideas because they help shape the two messages, and also resemble conflict, and show events/catastrophes and problems. Additionally, I added the handcuffs on the hands to bring out the idea of punishment and restraint. Finally, I decided to make both the hand and the nest with birds the centerpiece of my artwork because it carries out the main message in my work. During creation, I faced several problems. One of these problems was that I had too much pastel layered down, and I wasn't able to bring out the full color of the fires that I wanted to be very visible. I think that I really enjoyed this project, because it allows for a lot of thought to be put into art, and also gives the artist full creativity. I also enjoyed bringing multiple messages and implementing them in the drawings using an abstract style.