3D design 

I think my artwork shows a lot of my strengths and weaknesses just by being MY art. I think that in every piece of art that I do there will be parts of it that are good, and parts of it that maybe didn't go so well. This shows how I learn things and what learning strategies work and don't work for me. For example, when I did my last sustained investigation, I think my idea was very strong, but I think I could have played around with what I could have done to make the execution better. I often feel that I just want to get stuff done, especially at the end of the year, it’s more about if I can make it stay in the picture and fake it until I make it. That is definitely something that is shown about me as a learner in my art., I notice it because things look good in the picture, but as soon as I take it home it falls apart, or maybe doesn’t serve the purpose it was meant to. This is something I struggle with in general too, not just in art. I think I work so hard to make it perfect, that when it falls apart I don’t have the energy to figure out what’s wrong and how to fix it.  

I remember the very first sgraffito tile I made. It is on this page, it is the little hexagon with the bumpy hexagons carved out and the chunky vines. I hated it, especially once I saw everyone else’s and how talented everyone was with all their designs. Mine was boring and not well executed. It was true that I didn’t have much time, but I thought that I definitely could have made mine better.So I decided to try again. I wanted to redeem myself, so I did another sgraffito tile in foundations, but I chose sgraffito on my first sustained investigation project as well. I was proud of it, I still have my little pot in my room. I improved so much, I learned that I really needed to sketch out my design, and that I needed to mentally prepare what I wanted to do before that tool touched the clay. I learned that I like the clay to be on the dry side before I even started carving.  

 The most challenging project for me was probably the clay animal, for which I sculpted a turtle. I had never worked with clay for real before. Only with the clay in my backyard when it rained. I didn’t know the sculpture had to be hollow, so that whole concept really tipped my brain on its side. I just couldn’t fathom how to make something so intricate hollow. Just how did that even work? Eventually once I started I got it down and it made sense, but for a class or so I wasn't sure what was happening and I was just kind of following along with Ms. Medsker even though that wasn’t really what I was supposed to do since I was doing a different animal than her.  

I am most proud of my sustained investigation number two. I think it really shows a lot of emotion. I think the shape and positioning of the feature gives it a strong emotion which I enhanced even more through adding dramatic color to. I think this piece also shows how far I have come with clay. As I described in the previous paragraph, when I started out with clay it was incomprehensible, but by that point I really began to understand all the little things I could do and all the little ways I could manipulate the clay to do exactly what I wanted. 

Some of my goals for my future in the genre of art are to push myself artistically. I feel like this is sort of the point of art class, but I want to explore new mediums and keep pushing myself to improve and make things the best that they can be. I also want to try to work on the usefulness of my art, especially 3D wise. On my sustained investigation number two, I am now realizing that the tilt of the head doesn’t really work since all the water just drips down the back so I want to keep pushing myself to make things that have a purpose and work for that purpose. I also want to start finding my style, I just feel like I do a wide variety of art, but it doesn’t really have a specific style which can be good, but it can also be not so good. It’s nice to be able to walk into a gallery and immediately be able to tell that a piece of work is a certain person. So I want to start finding my artistic voice.