More than meets the eye

So I know I have a lot of catching up to do, but I also figure I'll take it one blog at a time.

Hosepipe

Either way, the next artist I want to look at is another pretty famous one Julian Beever. Though I have never really mastered chalk as a medium, he certainly has. He has also gotten using a fixed viewpoint down to an art (haha, get it?) But seriously, His works are incredible and I could not do a blog about 50 artists and not have him in there. A European, he has traveled around and even used his art to pay for his trips.

White Water Rafting

Apparently he first started doing the fixed-viewpoint drawings that he is so famous for, when he drew a swimming pool in a street in Brussels. After doing this drawing, he played around with other variations of it, eventually realizing how much depth and height he could portray by using the right proportions and perspective.

I love, love, love the trompe l'oeil style of art! One of the things I strive for in my art is trying to make the piece I'm working on look as life-like as possible. Haha! Trompe l'eoil means "trick of the eye," and I guess sometimes you have to even use tricks to make the art seem that life-like.

Julian Beever's work inspires me and challenges me. It  challenges me to think outside of the box. A challenge, which I hope will stick with me as I continue exploring the life of being an artist, and understanding what that means.

-Maria

By the way, the site where I found the info about him is http://www.julianbeever.net/index.php?option=com_phocagallery&view=category&id=2&Itemid=8

Feeding the Fish

Blood and Guts and Water, Oh My!

Folds

Alright, so the plan was to post on Wednesdays or Thursdays, but life happened last week and that plan failed, so here's post #2 finally. So last time I did my favorite deceased artist, and this week I'll do one of my favorite living artists: Adriana Varejão. I ran across her work when I was doing a report on an artist for an art class in high school, and I am still a big fan. 

She is a Brazilian artist. Her work is said to be basically a commentary on the history of Brazil as well as the art making experience. The two types of her art that I am most familiar with are the ones that have blood and guts, and the ones that deal with water. To be honest, the blood and guts are portrayed terribly well, and I respect her ability and message shown in those pieces, but the work that made her one of my favorite artists is her skill at portraying water. Of course her pieces are not solely based on water; they convey other messages. But for a long time I have been fascinated by water portrayed in art-- how the refraction of the light is captured, and how the depth, along with the changing shades of the blues and greens of the water are portrayed-- and she has been able to do it very well. For that reason she is my post #2, and I hope you enjoy her work as much as I do!

O Hungaro

Here are some of the links I referred to for info about her and to see more photos of her works :)

www.brooklynmuseum.org/eascfa/feminist_art_base/gallery/adriana_varejao.php
www.guardian.co.uk/artanddesign/2011/sep/15/artist-adriana-varejao
www.lehmannmaupin.com/#/artists/adriana-varejo/
www.adrianavarejao.net/site#/eng/museums_and_collections

    

O Voyeur

-Maria

Well, here it goes!

So it wasn't until this year that I started blogging, and now it seems like there'll be A LOT of blogs in my future. At least 50! So here goes nothin'!

Well for starters, my name is Maria and I'm gonna be a senior next year at Christopher Newport University (crazy, right?!). I'm a studio art major, with a minor in Spanish, and I'm pursuing the MAT program, so whenever I tell people that, their typical response is that I'm going to teach art to Spanish kids. It's a possibility, but anything could happen and I don't know what my future holds, though I'm excited (and slightly impatient) to find out.

Anywho, in regards to art, I rather like it. a lot. Both my mom and my aunt (her sister) are very artistically talented, and I remember wanting to reach their level of talent since I was very young. Between then and now I've had a lot of growing and growing pains as an artist, but it's all been worth it. I have had to learn hard lessons such as sometimes I just need to do something in regards to art, rather than waste a huge chunk of time trying to figure out the perfect thing to do. When I first came to CNU and took 2D and 3D design, I had this pompous "I'm an artist and already know all there is to know" mindset, which was quickly set aright. I know that there is still plenty more to learn and grow in as an artist, and I have a hunch that a lot of that will take place this year. Bring it on.

The Problem We All Live With

In regards to my ideas for senior sem, I have a few which you will see very soon, but for now I would like to look at one of my all time favorite artists, whose work I have loved since I was young: Norman Rockwell. I love stories. If someone has a good story to tell, then I am all ears. Norman Rockwell was able to express a story in a one-frame piece of work. It wasn't a comic strip or a movie, but by using the facial expressions and body language and context of his paintings, he was able to tell fantastic stories. Some were serious, some were comical. No one could accuse his art of having the purpose of simply being an exercise, rather his art communicated his ideas and told stories that united the viewers together.

The Girl With Black Eye

He said "Without thinking too much about it in specific terms, I was showing the America I knew and observed to others who might not have noticed" (nrm.org). That is exactly what he did; that was the story he told. He used the American culture and even the facial expressions and current events that we were familiar with, to express a story that was perfectly understood, without the need for words.

I appreciate that ability to communicate without words, and will certainly strive for it in my art, with Rockwell's work as an inspiration and example.


http://www.nrm.org

-Maria