Art Class

After a near meltdown in the Fall semester, I decided to take a sanity class in the Spring. I took Basic painting. I never really put much thought into my current skill level, what I wanted to learn or hoped to get out of taking a class and all that bit. I have been casually painting since I was old enough to talk my mom into buying me paint. I usually painted cartoons on my bedroom wall and started to make my own makeshift canvases when I was 18 or 19. I was pretty excited to learn an actual skill and begin to hash out the "right" way to do a few things.

Against my better judgement, because these were class assignments and I didn't think them out of my brain, I will post a few things that I did in class.

The tree looking one is a color study that we had to do. I actually spent a lot of time on it because I couldn't use green paint. This idea came to me in a daydream of slices of bacon sitting on grass. Halfway through its fruition, however, I abandoned the bacon idea and went for this weird Christmas tree farm look.

This is my first ever attempt at a still life. I love how rich the colors are but I must admit that I don't like painting still life much.I had fun experimenting on this one though. Sorry for the shiny reflection... these images are via camera phone so they have a bit of glare to them.

Another still life. This one actually got into the Student art show but I spazzed out on the deadline and blew it for myself. I scheduled the time off of work, had the painting in my car, ready to go, and then as I arrive to the school parking lot one hour before the end of the last hour of deadline day, I realized it didn't have a hanging wire on it. It also had unfinished sides...which is not typical of my style, I always finish the sides but for some reason left these unpainted entirely. So, I got super bummed at my irresponsibility, then went home, made a pot roast, and eventually got over it two hours later. (That is a bright yellow box in the front there, not a stick of butter)

Final still life. Yellow and Purple. I liked this one mostly because of the lemon in the broken cup. I liked painting it for some reason and left it until last to add the details to. The only thing that I would change is the top right. I swear that I am not making excuses but it was really flat... and difficult to exaggerate. Although, I was able to pick my own composition... there was more to the set up so I could have jsut as easily moved my perspective down about 3 inches and gotten a more interesting upper half.