3D to 2D

Cant Beat a Classic 

My 3D to 2D image was inspired by one my personal goals, to work for Vogue. Vogue is one of the most famous design and fashion magazines in the world. The style of all their covers and content is very structured and classical looking. I took my first balsa wood sculpture and turned the image into black and white. I then repeated the photo to create a background for the magazine cover. Because my sculpture is very structured, it tied into the theme for vogue very well. I choose to put Audrey Hepburn on the cover because she was someone who influenced design. 

Fluxus Box

Communicating a Character 

Materials: Foam core, gold spray paint, hot glue, pink fabric 

Dimensions: 15 inches in width, 7.5 inches in height 

Artist Statement:

My Fluxus Box was inspired by the movie Clueless. The movie focuses on the main character Cher, and her struggle of who she really is. My box and the items communicate this idea. The outside of the box is spray painted a gold marble to represent her house that is all marble and the only place she can be herself. I have eight items in the box, the first one is a red rose. The colors red represents passion and desire, which is how Cher portrays herself. But, the inside of the rose is white, to represent how she really is at the core, innocent, which the color white represents. The second item is a cracked glass box. Cher is obsessed with her image and is always looking at herself in the mirror. The cracks represent how her image of herself is flawed, she is not who the presents herself to be. The third item is a shopping bag. In the movie, she constantly goes shopping. The words on the bag represent the reasons she goes shopping all the time, she's depressed, alone, and scared. The forth item is a journal with all the adjectives she's described as and what people say about her. On the inside of the book, its filled with adjectives that actually describe her that people would only know if that read further into her. The fifth item is a glitter jar of tears. In the movie she is on the verge of tears a lot but bottles it up. In the situations where she does cry, she still tries to look glamorous and play it off like nothing is wrong. Th water in the jar represents her tears she's holding in and the glitter represents her still trying to look glamorous even when she's crying. The sixth item is her car key, but the buttons are different. In the movie, Cher's father got her a new jeep but didn't teach her how to drive it. The first time she drove she almost got in a car accident, when she tried to tell her dad she needed help he told her to figure it out. So, the buttons on the keys all say help because thats what she really wanted. The seventh item is a candle that is always lit. People are constantly trying to put her down, but she has such a fierce fire that she keeps going forward and her flame is never blown out. The eighth and final item is a mannequin being choked by pearls. Cher tries several times in the movie to escape her lifestyle and branch out from it, but she cant. She always gets dragged back in, that is why the mannequin is being choked by pearls, they're a symbol of her wealthy lifestyle she wants to escape.

Research:

1) Alan Saret 

https://www.jamescohan.com/artists/alan-saret

2) Gabriel Orozco
https://www.tate.org.uk/context-comment/blogs/gabriel-orozco-and-empty-shoebox

3) Jane Austen

https://www.sparknotes.com/lit/emma/summary/

Balsa Wood Small Sculpture

If a Wood Carver Could Carve Wood

Materials: Sculpture 1, cutting matt, exacto knife, balsa wood, wood glue, metal pins

                 Sculpture 2, cutting Matt, exacto knife, balsa wood, paper, metal pins

Dimensions: Sculpture 1, 2 inches in width, 6 inches in height 

                     Sculpture 2, 6 inches in width, 4 inches in height 

Artist Statement :

Both of my sculptures were inspired by negative space. I looked at a lot of photos from the artist Howard Hersch. All his work was structured but chaotic and played with negative space. I wanted the first sculpture to have very structured forms, so I stuck with rectangles made out of the balsa wood. The form though, was very chaotic and contained a lot of negative space. The second sculpture was inspired by the way paper can fold. As I was toying with ideas for the sculpture, I noticed how paper can fold and make a unique pattern. I then combined that idea with the one of using negative space again. The pattern of the folded paper is used throughout. 

Soap Carvings

 Chipping Away

Materials: two large bars of soap, carving tool set, small plastic animal (fox), banning wheel.

Dimensions: 3 inches in width, 2 inches in height 

Memento

Times to Remember

Materials: grey oven bake clay, green paint 

Dimensions: 1 inch in width, 1.5 inches in height 

Artist Statement:

For my memento project, I choose to use a personal memory. A few years ago my younger sister passed away from cancer. It was a very hard time for my family, especially my mom. She didn't know how to cope with the situation and move forward. My mom and I did something together every day during this time to take her mind off of the tragedy. It was very hard for me to see my mom distraught for so long and all I wanted was for her to get better. One day, we went to a new wine bar that had just opened near my house. It was a very upscale place and I distinctly remember the shape on the wine glasses; it was a wine glass without the stem. The glass it self was also leaving and looked like a piece of art. The waitress we has was wearing a silver dragonfly pin that caught my moms' eye. She complimented it and the waitress told us the story of a dragonfly. A dragonfly is born as an ugly creature, but eventually they shed their skin and become something beautiful. The dragonfly is used a symbol of rebirth. My sister was like a dragonfly, she was sick for so long and didn't look like herself, but when she passes away she was at peace and would be a beautiful angel in heaven. This story touched my mom as well as me. Right after lunch my mom went and got a beautiful tattoo of a dragonfly. This memory is where I got the idea for my memento. The shape of the whole piece was in the shape of the wine glass at the bar. The stems and grass represent my mom's and my emotional growth from that moment on. The green represents the actual color of her tattoo. I kept the dragonfly grey to represent the dark and grey place we were both in. This day is a memory that heavily impacted me and that I will never forget.

Research:

1) Joan Lurie 

https://www.artsy.net/artist/joan-lurie

2) Martin Azua 

https://www.martinazua.com

3) Aaron S. Moran 

https://aaronsmoran.com

On Longing

"Nostalgia can not be sustained without loss" 

The first photo was taken on my fourth birthday, with my mom, dad, and sister. That was a big day for me because I was finally allowed to take dance classes, which is something I had longed to do. The second photo was taken on my 16th birthday, with only my mom and dad. That was also a big year for be because I would finally be able to drive, something I was also longing to do. In the moment of that photo the only thing I could think about was the loss of my sister, she had passed away from cancer a little while after the first photo was taken. The nostalgia of that moment was very strong, I felt the same longing I felt when I was four, expect it was due to the loss of my sister, she was missing from the moment. 

Masking tape shoe

Running to the Degree 

Masking Tape Shoe

Materials: masking tape in various widths, a cutting Matt, exacto knife, banning wheel, and scissors. 

Dimensions: 8.5 inches in width, 4 inches in height. 

"Touch fills our memory with a detailed key as to how we’re shaped. A mirror would mean nothing without touch"

For my first example of touch I painted a friends back without telling her what I was painting. The purpose of this was to show that we memorize what objects feel like and even without seeing the object, we can tell what it is based off of touch. She was able to guess what each object was that I was painting based off of the brush strokes. Even though she was not able to see what I was painting, she could feel it.     

"Touch allows us to find our way in the world in the darkness or in other circumstances where we cant fully use our other senses"

For my second example of touch I blindfolded my friend and made him guess the liquid that was in the cup. I used a coffee cup, wine glass, shot glass, and plastic cup. Naturally, he guessed that the coffee was in the coffee cup, Wine in the wine glass, alcohol in the shot glass, and some sort of juice in the plastic cup. He was able to guess the liquids without seeing because touch guided him. He already knew what a coffee cup felt like, hence he was able to guess coffee. Like the quote stated, "touch can guide us even in the dark"