Semester Two:

Foundations of Art Reflection

I’ve always been excited about art class because of the unlimited types of art I could create that reflects who I am as a person, in a medium that I felt comfortable in using. At the start of this year, I wasn’t sure what I would be learning in Foundations, but now I know that I’ve learned so many tips and tricks that I surely won’t forget. The one medium that I will continue to use, would have to be graphite pencils, only because I have done numerous pictures, based on references, using graphite and the grid method, which I didn’t know how to do before.

I know that my work has improved over this year because of how more detailed my artwork is and how much more time I spent on my most recent pieces. Especially during the pixelated portrait images, where I had to take my time on each square individually. My work has also improved with using paint and even markers or colored pencils because I had to learn to be patient and go slow and not rush my work.

The most difficult part of Foundations would have to be the scratchboard, because of my preference with graphite and adding shadows and having the ability to erase, caused me to struggle with scratchboard because I couldn’t erase and I wasn’t comfortable with the tools enough to do the image that I chose, but I didn’t want to start over with another image so I completed that piece, not being too happy with the result.

I am most proud of my mixed media project because of how accurate the dog came out, and since it was with charcoal and graphite, it was with materials that I was comfortable using, I also enjoyed creating it even if I lost my patience towards the end with the grass and it became more scattered and not as full, but overall the mixed media project was my most successful art piece this year.

My work reflects my strengths and weaknesses in art because of which materials I prefer and which ones I don’t like using. My strengths would be in graphite and charcoal. My weaknesses would be in scratchboards and sculptures because I don’t have much practice in either mediums. Another weakness would be in writing my artists statements because most of the time I don’t have a lot of materials to list in the second paragraph making it harder to be more than one sentence.

As a whole, I am incredibly proud of how good my artwork has been this year and I may go back to some of my art and either complete it or fix some parts of it to make it even better.

~Emily Garneau