Fall 17 Graduate Drawing/Painting ARTS 6033/6133

Had turkey on Thursday. Someone made these amazing mushrooms with a pecan filling for an appetizer. Besides binge watching The Killing on Netflix and drinking lots of wine I've been reading and painting. I spent the last two days painting my bedroom. I didn't want to be in the studio and with my roommate out for the week is was nice to not be under any pressure. But I didn't get very far. The bedroom reminds me of Van Gogh's bedroom; the perspective and the weird colorful emptiness. Needless to say that didn't get too far away. I don't know what to do now that the semester is over. I have the paintings from the semester to finish. I'm tired of painting rooms. Especially empty ones.

so I have missed a couple of weeks of entries here.  I always approach final critiques time with tons of work and saying to myself that I will not need to go nuts the closer I get to "the day."  however, after my last makeup midterm crit, there were only 2 and a half weeks between that midterm and the final.  so what happened in those 2 and a half weeks?   light. light happened. one of the things about my work is that it is important to me that each of the individual works not "look" like each other physically.  I am not interested in creating 12 or 15 of the same type of paintings.   this turns out to be quite a challenge when it comes to a group of people, specifically, a group of professors in a defense-style, reading of the work.  such a different experience from the outside world when it comes to how much is needed from the artist for the work to be encountered and pondered and looked at and enjoyed when the work is viewed in a gallery or no...

Apocalyptic or Utopian? This was one question brought on in the final critique. I feel like if I am working with the ideas of climate change in art then this question is begging to be addressed. Which way do I lean? There are plenty of successful artists that lean either way. In narratives, I think I am drawn to this idea of the civilization after this; a utopia after the apocalypse, alongside the ruins of this world. So maybe that will take shape in the work. However, I find this to be escapist; which has its merits, no doubt. I don't have an interest in creating narratives, but maybe that would make the work more successful. So I love podcasts, radio, and audio books, and they are great for surface level discussions. I can pretty well list the thesis of an argument from listening to the person sharing their thoughts, but I think I need to get more specific examples of what I am looking for. Anyway, Emma Marris is someone that I need to perform a deep dive on. We seem to sha...

Overview In order to visually expand the space of the Arkansas Union room 515 and create an environment that directly reflects the culture of the University of Arkansas. I propose the following, creating 2 murals by laser etching images of campus onto mirrors. Symbolically showing the culture through the etched illustration but also showing the viewer reflected into the landscape of the mirrors. Mural 1 will span the largest wall of the room and measuring 12 x 4 ft. etched into the surface will be the Old Main building and the landscape of campus. The back of each mirror will be painted black to make the illustration on the front of the building and surrounding landscape prominent.   Mural 2 will measure 5 x 4 ft. and reference the University masque the razorback. Speaking to the large cultural support of the university Budget Item Quantity Price Total Mirror 1...

I picked up two books from the library yesterday, one on Rembrandt's self portraits and one on Eakins. I'm doing research on current transgender theories. I have 5 years of experience reading the material but haven't read anything in the last year. Here's a sample from Gayle Salamon  Assuming a Body  "To understand embodiment are necessarily routed through a bodily ego is not to contend that body and ego are coterminous or selfsame, but to assert that projections of various kinds are required in the construction of both the ego and the body, that the ego is itself a projection, and that difference, distance, and otherness are at the heart of the ego and the body (14)." Besides reading I haven't been in the studio. I'm very much burned out from this semester. I had a visitor in the studio yesterday and didn't feel as I knew my own studio. With the break I'll be back in the space working. Probably start on a new painting to get back into the ...

This is Day 16 of feeling ill. I tried to forge ahead in the studio, because that's what strong, dedicated people do, yes? No, that's what people who are sick for 16 straight days do. So after a weekend NyQuil coma, I plan on getting a fresh start in the morning at 8am. I've got the under-drawing of For Sophia placed, and another scene canvas ready. My to-do list has grown, but I think I have til late March for my thesis exhibit? Over Thanksgiving Break, I'm going to spend time with family --as I know that I have to move further away from everyone come July. I've got Draper in the back of my head, "Get out of here and move forward." And aside from that, I need to study Winesburg, Ohio. The retired English teacher told me that she had a strong feel for the characters but not for their connections with each other. So studying how Anderson does this should help. And I'll be compiling a list of potential schools to apply to along with the materials the...

Shelby Fleming Exploration Previously my work has addressed flaws in anatomy that make us individuals. Disabilities, illness, or complications affect our life style and how we interact with the world around us. This idea of illustrating flaws in anatomy converged with my fascination for Micro Biology. In this, scanned elector microscope images of cellular structures began to enter my work in the form of bone cells or more specifically Osteoporosis. Though anatomy is still predominant in my work, I am approaching it from a new perspective that allows me to expand the breath of my work by exploring new concepts, materials, and how art exists.   A few themes that emerged through this exploration include: childhood phobia, fragility of the individual, genetics, gender roles, grotesque beauty, and “the other.” In the gender role concept, I look to break down stereotypical roles associated with male and female to create an equality. To achieve this, I reverse the role and ...