Mixed Media
"Beauty's Time "
60.96cm by 60.96cm
Crayon, Acrylic, Metal April 5, 2017 Exhibition text "Beauty's Time" is a mixed media pieces made out of Acrylic paint, metal gears, and melted crayons. This work was inspired by both “two dancers on stage” and “Blue Dancers” by Degas. “Beauty's Time" was created to show the mechanical nature of the human form in the classical movement of dance. That with time comes beauty and pure beauty come with time. This mixed media piece was created to inspire people to look at themselves in a positive way instead of negatively. |
Meaning
Everyone has a different definition of beauty. As time goes by the definition of beauty changes as the people defining it changes. Beauty is not just the way something looks but it can also be the mechanical nature of the human form in movement.
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Artist Inspiration
Dega creates a sense of questioning in his paintings through the angle he uses. The angels he gave the painting the look that it was real vs having the dancers looked placed. His painting had the look of a carefully and constructed painting with the feel that it was a casual painting. The painting series was inspired by the ballet section in Mozart’s opera Don Giovanni. The ballet inspired Dega to create many painting like blue dancers and two dancers on stage. Dega was known for his unconventional viewpoints. After changes in his health that affected his style Dega stated to use a lot of pastel colors in as a primary in color medium. Dega enjoyed painting washerwoman and dancers. Even know he did not like using the academic techniques he does use them in his paintings. Édouard Manet was a painter that influenced Dega’s work. His work was also highly influenced by the culture in the area he was loving they also reflected different events that were going on in the world. His health affected the style and outcome and color of his paintings.
"Edgar Degas, Two Dancers on a Stage." The Courtauld Institute of Art. N.p., n.d. Web. 22 Apr. 2017. <http://courtauld.ac.uk/gallery/collection/impressionism-post-impressionism/two-dancers-on-the-stage>. "A&A | Two Dancers on a Stage." A&A | Two Dancers on a Stage. N.p., n.d. Web. 22 Feb. 2017. <http://www.artandarchitecture.org.uk/images/gallery/08d3cfaa.html>. Emil Krén and Daniel Marx. "The Blue Dancers by DEGAS, Edgar." The Blue Dancers by DEGAS, Edgar. N.p., n.d. Web. 23 Feb. 2017. <http://www.wga.hu/html_m/d/degas/5/1890s_04.html>. |
Planning
Experimentation
Process
To start this project I took a discarded canvas and gessoed over it. Then I figured out of background color that would look good showing though some of the gears and through the melted crayons in some spots. Once that color was picked I painted my canvas. I then used a projector to project three pictures of dancers on my canvas. I then took gears and laid them out to see if that was the look I wanted. I then melted crayon onto my canvas and around the outline of the dancers. I let that Dry for a long time before I hot glued the gears on. Through this project I learned some new techniques. I leaned the different methods that could be used to melt crayons. I picked the hot glue gun method because I thought it would be less messy. The hot glue gun did give me an advantage because I got to have some control on where each color when and was about to get it in the small spaces between the out lines. Instead of having a hot glue gun for each color, I used the same one. This helped to create different colors and shades.
Critiques for this project
The students that critique my worked liked my piece. They thought that my connection to the artist resembled in my piece. They liked the way I had multiple dancers in different positions that seemed to all blend into each other through their movement. We talked about my plan for finishing the project and my Weebly done on time. They suggested that I make more than one planning sketch as I might like different elements in each sketched that I make. So while I’m making my finale I can use elements from both sketches. They asked why I picked blue, green and purple to be my color scheme. At first I thought it was just because it went with the inspiration. Then as I thought about it, I used those color because The thought of beauty is not always a positive and happy thought. Also the passing of time could be sad or scary.They also asked how I was going to defining the dancers more than just adding the gears and clocks. That is one thing that I want to change because I don't want the shape to change when I add the clocks and gears. My plan is to take black paint or sharpy and outline the dancers. This is a change that I don't yet know if I want to make to the piece. My plan is to leave it as it is and just lay out the clocks and gears again and see what would look better for the final outcome. They also ask that I clarify the meaning behind my piece as it was not clear. They also suggested that I reheat some of the clumpy parts of the melted crayon and smooth it out so it does not stand out. They also suggested that I clean up the edges of the piece where I missed some spots that did not get any crayon melted on it. They also suggested that I repaint the silhouette with the base color again because some of the crayons dripped into the silhouette.
After my second critique with the professor we had talked about ways to make the figures more of the focus of the piece. The background it great what it is too busy for the story and the meaning behind the piece. She also suggested that I add more gears and clocked to make it look like they are able to be used to overlap them and layer them more. I just need to be careful when doing that so I don't have hot glue strings and clumps. I have taken the things she had suggested into consideration to help improve my piece.
Exam Reflection
Reflection
Some problems that I faced creating this mixed media piece was melting crayon took a lot of time and the crayons dried really quickly. So trying to move the colors around on the canvas had to be fast. My artist inspiration had a lot of small brush strokes of colors. I tried to recreate this using the crayon. I don’t think it was the best creation but it looks like they have similar textures. I learned that the colors would not overlay well if they were not given time to dry. Something I also learned is that hot glue and crayon don’t work together. And it's hard to hot glue something on top of crayon. I was very proud of this project. Somethings that I would change would be the outline of the dancers. I wish I would have made them bigger and had a clearer outline of them under the gears. The size of the dancers compared to the background is not the best. Overall this mixed media has a strong connection to the artist inspiration through the subject matter and the color scheme. When it comes to the technique it was hard because I was using melted crayon instead of paint.
Act Connections
- "Beauty’s Time" was influenced by the inspiration through the subject of the dancers. It was also similar through the colors and the way the crayons look melted in the background resembles the brushstrokes.
- My inspiration, led me to create a mixed media piece that compared the mechanics of time to mechanical beauty of dance. It also led me to pick different mediums thought the short quick brush strokes.
- I learned through my research that using different angles and perspectives can give the painting a more lifelike style. I also learned culture surrounding the painter and the event happening during that time affected the artwork.
- The central theme around “Beauty’s Time” is to always to remember that you beautiful, not everyone is going to fit into the image that people perceive as perfect. Beauty is not just in looks but it shows through actions and thoughts.
- When researching Dega I inferred that the use of different angle and perspectives played a role in giving the painting a realistic look to them. I also inferred that Dega used the brush strokes that he did because it makes the paint easier to layer and blend.