Sustained Investigation 1

Artist Statement

This is the first of four pieces in my sustained investigation where I am focusing on a cutout of the interior of my home that holds a lot of childhood memories to me, and I am exploring how I can use this same subject with different processes, mediums, and materials. For this first piece, I was trying to achieve a realistic feel of what it was like to be a kid looking up at these shelves filled with my parents books of their hobbies, interests, and essentially their lives. I chose to draw this piece in the perspective of a child and a point of view I often had when I was younger as well using one point perspective. I chose this specific part of the interior of my house as my subject because it holds many different patterns, colors, and textures, and the position of all the elements allows me to split the paper into four quarters, each containing a main part of the subject and therefore creating balance.

My first step in creating this piece was to take a photograph of the subject as a reference to use when adding the details like book titles and overall positioning. I then began sketching with different perspectives, and finally settling on a one point perspective as though looking up into the distance. Next, I roughly sketched in the rest of the photo in perspective to get a feel of how it would all come together, and whether or not I wanted to shift any dimensions to create more balance. When I moved to my final paper, I chose to use a full size poster board so that when you look at it up close, it is almost like you are actually looking up at a scale bookshelf. A technique I learned to use throughout this process was to smudge the first layer of pen to build up a darker background for the shadows. My first step on this paper was to add a border and then sketch out the rough lines of all the major components in my piece. I took some more time during this process to experiment with the perspective and shift any lines that did not look right. I next went over everything in black pen, and then randomly began cross hatching and sketching in shadows. There was no real process to this, I essentially tried a different way of cross hatching in each shelf. The next step to this piece was to add details to the books, which took the most time out of the entire drawing.

I definitely experimented with the process of this piece as I am very comfortable with. using pen, however I generally use pointillism rather than cross hatching, so I was able to practice my technique. My project also evolved from my original idea, which was to do a boring, straight on realistic drawing, so actually adding the feeling I have when I look at and remember the memories this specific subject holds. For my next sustained investigation, I would like to use more interesting elements of my subject, like the checkerboard or a specific book title. I would also like to play around more with different mediums and experiment with color, to really broaden my sustained investigation and force me to try out different materials and the different textures they bring.