While looking through my camera roll, I came across a picture of my friend at the park looking through a bubble structure on the playground. I thought the bubble created a cool layer as you could see the silhouette of her body looking through and felt it would be a perfect photo to use as reference for my layers project. The materials I used were a single piece of toned letter paper, archival ink pens, and sumi ink. I drew on both sides of the paper so that the ink on the back side could create the illusion of objects in the distance. 

For this week’s research post, I chose to cover Michelangelo Pistoletto. Michelangelo Pistoletto is an Italian artist who is recognized as one of the most influential contemporary artists of his generation as well as a leading figure of the Arte Povera Movement. Pistoletto works with mirrored surfaces such as stainless steel and applies figurative, sculptural, and graphic paintings onto the polished surfaces. The reflective surfaces of his work intend to integrate the viewer and environment into his work, questioning the nature of reality and representation. In the years 1961 and 1962, Pistoletto made his first mirror paintings that reversed the Renaissance perspective by creating an open-up perspective which included the viewer in the work in real-time. These works quickly brought the artist international acclaim and he had solo exhibitions around the world with the most notable institutions being the Guggenheim Museum in New York and the Tate Modern Museum in London.

For this week, I have chosen to research the Dutch artist, Marjolein Burbank. Marjolein’s work moves between textile art and collage art using various materials that can be stitched through. Burbank takes old portraits and paintings and extends the image in an innovative way that deals with issues such as feminism, gender, discrimination, and much more. She would find inspiration from the world around her as well as from her experiences having lived in 26 different countries. Burbank started as a quilter and would make traditional-style quilts as presents for her mom and dad who would ask for only handmade gifts for their birthdays. At the time of her living in Asia, being a traditional quilter no longer satisfied her creative mind as the art there stimulated her to make her own art. She became interested in modern art and began to develop her own style of making fabric art. Marjolein’s big textile portraits took part in exhibitions in Bolivia, Austria, and Thailand.

https://www.instagram.com/marjoleinburbank/?hl=en

For our collage project, I chose to use this neoclassical-style staircase at my friend’s apartment as a reference. I approached this project by breaking down the structure into simple shapes. The staircase was made up of primarily rectangular shapes so I cut various sizes of rectangles using scrap pieces of paper. I used the paper from the side that gets torn from the spiral to act as the decorative parts of the balusters and finished the piece by drawing some details with a black pen.

For this week’s artist, I have chosen the Canadian illustrator and collagist, Manon Gauthier. Gauthier is a Montreal-based artist who has over 25 years of experience in art and creativity as well as communications and philanthropy. I came across her work on Pinterest while looking for inspiration for our upcoming collage project and I was in awe of her playful and childlike collage illustrations. The works of Gauthier are done with the use of gouache, pencils, crayons, and paper collaging to create scenes depicting a youthful sense of wonder. Gauthier’s illustrations have been in dozens of children’s books for Canadian and European publishers. You can find her illustrations in the books, “Elliot” by Julie Pearson, “Good Morning Grumple” by Victoria Allenby, “Wash On” by Michele Marineau, and “All the World a Poem” by Gilles Tibo. Gauthier has received numerous awards for her work and has been nominated for the prestigious Governor General’s Literary Award four times.

For my atmospheric drawing I chose to use a frame from an old video project I did of my little sister as my reference. I referred to the image for the sizing, spacing and objects in the scene, but went off of script and chose a different color scheme. I wanted to achieve a more moody atmosphere and attempted to recreate the kind of weather that happens before it storms. When the sky turns gray, the grass looks yellow, and there’s a cool breeze. 

For this week’s research post, I have chosen the artist Sun Xun. Sun was born in Fuxin, a town once known for its thriving coal industry in China before over mining caused its bankruptcy and closure of many mines. Once he turned 16, he moved away to study at the China Academy of Art in Hangzhou. After seeing how progressive Hangzhou was compared to Fuxin which seemed to be stuck in the past, it left him feeling disoriented and questioning how two places existing at the same time can feel centuries apart. Because of this, Sun became aware of how time affects the rise and fall of powerful forces. Sun reflects this experience in his work by offering an alternative to reality and blurring the lines between fantasy, mythology, history, and reality. Sun Xun’s interest in traditional art forms is shown through his use of highly detailed monochromatic ink paintings and woodcut prints that are used in his animated films. These hand-drawn animations are energetically composed with single frames that range up to five thousand.

https://images.app.goo.gl/HrFMdQpu2Kd12fTC8

https://images.app.goo.gl/6ikN53mc5r3bXSJA7

Hello, I am Savannah Berumen and I am a sophomore majoring in art and minoring in art history. I began my journey with art after graduating high school early and having a lot of free time to explore the different mediums of art. I fell in love with creating and chose to further my education in the art world at the Fashion Institute of Technology before transferring over to St. Edward’s fall of 2022. I have a special interest in sculpting as I have done more projects that involved creating 3D objects and building sets than any other type of art medium. I know that sculpting and installation projects can be tough to execute so I am nervous, but excited for the challenge.