The museum object I picked was in the American wing. It is a french china urn. I was drawn to it because I collect pieces of china and I liked the shape, and I thought it would be interesting to draw. My other objects were rocks I collected from Stonehenge, a fan my best friend gave me from Spain, a little purse from Peru, and a wish bracelet I wore most of high school. I picked these objects because they all mean a lot to me and are apart of my experiences leading up to where I am today. Aside from sentimental reasons, I also thought the shapes would be interesting to draw and would complement the museum object well. Starting off with the contour drawing, I wanted the composition to be well balanced and fluid. I made the urn and the fan the focal point and brought the bracelet wrapping around to give the piece rhythm and repetition. One mistake I wish I could change is the line density on the left side of the fan. If I could change something about that piece of the triptych, I wouldn’t have put so much weight in some areas.
As I continued working on the project over time, I got a lot more comfortable with playing with the composition. In my positive negative illustrator piece, again, I made the urn the focal point. I overlapped and connected objects to create a more interesting object. I balanced the positive and negative spaces by repeating the rocks in areas that were too dark. I varied the sizes of the beads in my bracelet to add depth and movement. I never used illustrator before and definitely got more comfortable using a lot of the tools. The beginning was frustrating, but once I got used to it I really enjoyed working on illustrator. At first, I used the pencil tool and was happier with that result. But, to challenge myself I started over and used the pen tool. It was more difficult, but I’m happy I worked with it.
The final piece was my favorite to work in. I love collaging and playing with texture. I also really liked the shape builder tool. I tried to overlap the objects to create different shapes inside of them to experiment with outside of illustrator. I made the fan more of the focal point in the foreground and placed the objects around it. For materials, I used an illustration magazine I got at the artist book fair. I love illustrations and found some that I thought would add movement to a flat piece. I pasted tracing paper on parts and repeated materials in multiple spots to keep is balanced and cohesive. I strategically put a piece of fabric on the purse to add texture. During the critique, once everything was on the wall and I stepped back, I noticed one small spot that was too dark, so I went back and cut the shape in the center of the urn out and put a lighter shade in.
Overall, I am really happy with this project and enjoyed working in different approaches to the same objects.
