RED

Last Semester I made a project called RED. RED is a 3d graffiti piece, that was meant to place in China Town and blend in with the color that is surrounded. Another reason why I chose China Town was because of the amount of graffiti you can see, from tags to a full a mural.

This project was very fun yet difficult on how I would even make a 2D art, into a physical form and still trying to get the graffiti element. I first, went on pinterest.com  for inspiration and to practice graffiti letters on my own. The images that inspired me were very complicated that I wasn’t sure at first how I would translate it.

It was the first time I ever done lettering design or even try to make graffiti art on my sketchbook. While sketching I was practicing not only lettering but also how colors. I saw many that use complementary color or one color with the change of saturation. I knew I wanted to work with red, but I wasn’t sure if only red would be good or if I should add an accent color

After a few trials and errors, I ended up with my final design. I was really satisfied with my final outcome, to start making it 3D. I was also trying to think of different material to use, I originally wanted to use styrofoam to make the cutting easier for me and to not be as heavy since I was making the letter about 1- 2 foot long.

Our instructor told us that we should be using recycling items for this project and hopefully the majority of our creation, I wanted to work with cardboard since I had a lot to use from moving places, and it was also not heavy. Working with cardboard was the best choice! I didn’t have to spend more money or even hard to make my letters.

After picking my first material, I started tracing the letters I needed,  simply spelling the color red. I really like the fact that I was going into a clear design. At first, I thought the outcome would become too simple but I quickly changed the way I felt about my art because, to me, it stood out and it was my first project that I would display to the public. All of my letters came out with straight lines, to make it easier for myself and have clean work.

For my second material was I chose to use wire. I dreaded using wire because you get many little cuts on your fingertips. The use of wire was to connect the backing of my letters to have that 3D effect. Using wire to connect two pieces of cardboard was a new way to use the material which was interesting since we were not allowed to used glue. In the end, I was really happy it would be the last time that I would ever use wire!

The fun part was coming along with my third choice of material which was this paper that felt like fabric. It was soft and very easy to bend and fold. I even thought of making a whole dress and re-do my entire art concept. So I used mulberry paper, to add more texture to the cardboard, Also layering each sheet over each other was on purpose to mimic the backdrop that I hung the final piece. It would also give a sense that my letter was made out of the background material which was plywood.

For the final part, I went and placed it up at the bord that was a perfect place for my artwork. During this time I was actually scared of leaving my work there, I didn’t want people to seem like I was disrespecting them, but another part of me was like, I tagged their board like other people that have done it. I also thought that if they did not like it, it would be easy for them to pick it up and throw it in the trash! which I wouldn’t have minded. Once I placed it on the board, I saw the shadow drop off my letters showing very clear and making the forms of each letter. When stepping back you can see that it blended it so well, and the more I looked at my work the more I was happy to just leave it there.

This place was really something to me, just for being in an ally way, and it felt so cool. I felt like a true artist by just leaving an art piece somewhere in NYC that maybe one day a person would recognize it I knew my artwork only lasted for a week, which was more days than I expected. A weak later after visiting for the last time is when I noticed it wasn’t there anymore. I was still pretty happy, and it will always be one of my best work  I did with my hands.