Block Print |
Title: Hope
Size: 29 cm x 23 cm Medium: Block Print Completion: September 2022 EXHIBITION TEXT
My block print "hope" represents the helpless young girl who is trapped by her mother. This artwork aimed to capture the feelings of the small girl who became ill after eating an apple that her mother had given her. Hope is meant to illustrate how the young child is still ready to fight back despite her illness. Despite having chains around her, the young girl is reaching out with her hands to demonstrate that she is ready to stand up again. She had more energy to stand up and fight back after the flower, she always adored flower when she was a lot younger. Stephan Alcorn, impressionism, and the Disney film Snow White all served as inspiration for the artwork.
|
Inspiration
Artist: Stephan Alcorn
Art movement: Impressionism
Art movement: Impressionism
The artist portrays the equality and power of individuals working together in this painting. It demonstrates our regard for one another, and the author of this piece added a great deal of detail and line work. Because it's a block print, there isn't much color, and he uses lines as his elements. There is also some unity between those two hands. This piece served as my inspiration because it included the hands, which I wanted to include into my own work. I was inspired by his piece since it was neat, precise, and crisp, which is exactly what I wanted to create. I also wanted my piece to be detailed.
|
This impressionist artwork features a variety of textures and a lot of color from the artist. Additionally, the flowers that were painted on this painting gave me ideas for where to position the ones that I had drawn in my own work. The artist behind this work is "Claude Monet" employed a lot of cool colors . The artist used numerous hues and values amid the flowers and trees, and this piece contains a great deal of detail.
|
Stephen Alcorn is an illustrator/author, printmaker, and journalist Stephen Alcorn inspired me because his work is very detailed and he has very great carving techniques. He also experienced and has done many block prints.
The movement in art My idea came from impressionism since I've always liked how this artistic genre frequently painted the same scene or subject in an effort to depict the present. Impressionism is what people observe in the world or in their immediate surroundings. I was motivated by impressionism because I was eating an apple outside and was enthralled by the flowers in my yard. At that point, I started thinking about what I wanted to put in my block print and how I wanted to interpret my piece. I also liked how in impressionism these artists aren't to trying to paint of a reflection in real life, but what an object, atmosphere, and landscape looked like to them, this helped me think of an idea and helped the process of working on this project run smoothly. This helped me come up with an idea and made the process of working on this project go more smoothly. I also loved how in impressionism these artists aren't trying to paint of a reflection in real life, but rather what an object, atmosphere, and environment looked like to them. This movement was very inspiring, it was helpful for me because I got to interpret how the things I'm adding to my work in my own perspective. The meaning behind Claude Monet painting is because through out his childhood days he spent it from moving town to town, but wherever he lived, he planted variety of flowers in his garden. He clarified that flowers gave him an idea/topic to paint and this is exactly how I got my inspiration, I wanted to do something similar where I can look at something and automatically think of a subject/theme to incorporate in my piece.
Planning
Here some examples of my sketch
|
Thinking on what I wanted to do for my piece was the first step in the project. I had a lot of thoughts, and flowers was one of those thoughts. Since I've always found the appearance, aroma, and nature of flowers to be fascinating, flowers were the first element I wanted to include in my artwork. I made the decision to sketch a hand after I realized I could include flowers. I represented a woman's hand and a young girl's hand with the hand I sketched. As I continued to piece the picture together, I couldn't help but think about Snow White since my interpretation and the visual of this piece seemed very similar to this Disney character.
|
The drawing of two hands was the next phase in this procedure. The hands I drew show one hand, an adult hand holding an apple that has been bit into, and the other, a young child being held captive by these chains. I was having trouble drawing the hands, so I kept erasing it because it didn't look good. I don't usually draw hands since I find them tough to do so, so I wasn't really sure how to position them. However, after some thought and a few attempts, I was able to get them to appear the way I wanted them to. Once I was satisfy with how the flowers and hands look I decided to draw the apples which was fairly easy to draw while the chains was were more difficult to draw it only took me up to the second try to get it right.
|
Planning the process of how I wanted the hands to look - I made notes of how I was gonna make the use of drawing the hands by which part I didn't like/won't be adding to my final sketch - I explained why one hand didn't make it to the final parts - During the this planning I wanted to make the hands, chains, and apple more detailed - wanted to add some elements like lines and shapes. - In this picture this is exactly how I wanted to incorporated the hands. - It's exactly how I wanted it to look, in my final drawing it will be more detailed since this only a rough draft sketch - I wanted the hands I'm drawing to represent a young girl hand (the daughter) and an adult hand (the mother) |
Process
Here are the process of my artwork from the beginning to the end
I had trouble deciding on the type of flower to produce while creating this piece since I wasn't sure whether portions I wanted to be black and white or if they would be difficult for me to carve. Later, after doing more research, I came across some flowers online, which gave me ideas for the types of flowers I should sketch and how I could carve the piece. It did took me several tries to get the flowers to look the way I wanted them to. Since they weren't drawn in the way I had envisioned them, the initial try was difficult. I had to make many attempts until I got it right. It was a little hard at first to envision how I wanted to incorporate all my sketches together, but in the end I figured out how I want it to look.
The picture above is how the final sketch looked - as you can see I tried to make it very detailed and complex
I really liked how I drew the hands and flowers, I made use of the art elements such as line, texture, and shapes. |
During the process I didn't like how some parts were empty and I thought it would be really hard to carve some spots so as you can see in the picture above I started to shade more parts so it wouldn't be empty. The image above is how I wanted the final piece to look like
|
I traced onto my block print once I had finished all of my sketching. After all of the tracing was finished, I started arranging where I wanted which parts to have negative spots and how much shading to add since I knew some of the portions would be challenging to carve if the lines were too thin. After finishing all of those, I colored my block print as well, making it simpler for me to cut out the areas where I didn't want it to be black.
|
After completing all of the planning, I began carving, but it was really challenging because some of my shading was challenging to carve. While I was carving, it occasionally passed into areas I didn't want to be cut, but not to the extent that I unintentionally removed too much of those areas. Once that was finished, I began to add ink to my block print. After I finished inking the block print, I started experimenting on some papers to see how the print turned out and whether I needed to do any additional carving or ink additions.
Here is how my carving turned out and as you can see it is a bit messy
- you can also see I colored in some part using a black sharpie this helped me figure out where I need to carve While experimenting, I had many problems where there were to much ink on the block prints to the point where I had to keep washing the ink from time to time. I notice some parts weren't carved enough, which I went to go back and carve some more, but I worried that I would accidentally carve through the other fingers or flower since some shading were too thin and to tiny especially around the finger areas.
|
After a few tries, I finally started printing my completed piece. My final print was made using a block print machine, but I wasn't happy with it because it either looked screwed up or had too much ink. I made several attempts, but it still didn't turn out the way I wanted it to be.
After numerous attempts, I gave up on using the machine and started doing it by hand. The tools needed were a brayer, two white sheets of paper (papers that are specifically used for block printing), and a large sheet of paper (so it doesn't become dirty and get ink all over it). This method tripped me up a few times since there was either less ink or a certain part didn't have ink on it, but after a few tries, I got it where I wanted it to be. I liked how it turned out, so I was happy. Here is how the experiment looked and as you can see there weren't enough ink
|
During the process of working on this project, I wanted to try something complex and detailed, which is where my inspiration comes from, when I saw Stephen Alcorn work they were very detailed yet complex which I really like. He had really great line work, for mine, my line work art isn't that neat because I wanted to represent a young girl trying to get rid of those chains (the chains representing her emotions - how she felt, which she felt broken and depressed).
|
This is how the final artwork called "Hope" turned out. Looking at the final piece I felt like I could have done a better job on carving since in some parts there is too much ink. Especially on the finger nails you can tell it wasn't supposed to have too much ink on it and I felt like with so many trials I messed up the block print I was working with. I had to wash out the ink many times because there were parts where I needed more to be carved and because there was too much ink on the parts where there wasn't supposed to be any ink. I added a lot of detail to the flowers in this piece and also included lines and texture as features. This story behind this artwork is about a young girl who will do anything to fight back after being sick from biting an apple her mother gave her. Even though she is restrained by those chains, she is making every effort to free herself and begin a new life. Because it depicts a dejected girl who is only striving to get well, the line in this piece is mostly broken. The meaning of this story was to represents how sometimes mothers could give us a hard time/hurt our feelings. The weakness of this artwork is that the carving part wasn't as great as some parts could've carved better. |
Reflection
The overall process of working on this project was great, but there were ups and down. Some parts I could have done better was carving, because in some parts there wasn’t enough carving which led so some dark spots around the fingers. There aren’t many colors to choose since it’s block print but I felt I did good on how I wanted to add object, texture, and line into my piece. The planning took me a while to get where I want it to be and the final part of planning left me very satisfied. I wasn't very satisfied with my carving work though I felt some parts wasn't very satisfying especially on how I carved out the flower. Although I wasn't satisfied with my carving the final piece was still satisfying for me and I felt pleased with how it turned out. I thought the final artwork of this block print was decent, but I really like was how I came up with idea and the meaning behind this piece since it kept me motivated to finish this work and it made me pleased with the final.
Critique
|
Similarities:
Although my work isn't deeply inspired by Stephan Alcorn piece there are similar features. Stephan Alcorn and my piece incorporate two hands. Both pieces are also very detailed. My final work represents the word hope and that's what I saw in Stephan piece. Stephan and piece have texture, line, and are Impressionism art is very similar to mine because it captures what's happening in the moment. There are significant similarities between impressionist and block print despite their stark differences in many aspects. With impressionist painting, objects and the environment can be interpreted from the artist's point of view, which is exactly what I did/wanted in my own artwork.
Differences - His piece is has more of the line element compared to mine - We have difference use of shading on which part we want to have white or black - He didn't add many objects, while I incorporated flowers, chains, and apple - The difference between impressionism and my piece is impressionism captures what's happening at the moment it also a painting while mine block print art - In my work it doesn't involves painting and there aren't many colors, impressionism has many different types of color while mine is just black and white. - Impressionism includes elements like value, colors, shape, and etc. - My final includes elements like texture, lines, and space |
Connection to ACT question
Clearly explain how you are able to identify the cause effect relationship between your inspiration and its effect on your artwork?
The art movement impressionism served as my piece's inspiration because it demonstrates how artists can add their own perspectives to what is happening in front of them or around the world while still using other art aspects like lines, texture, and value.
What is the overall approach the author has regarding the topic of your inspiration?
The overall approach the author has regarding of my inspiration is the word "hope". I wanted express the meaning of hope through the story of block print.
What kind of generalizations and conclusions have you discovered about people, ideas, culture, etc. while you researched your inspiration?
When I was looking for inspiration, I discovered that many works of art and ideas for pieces have similar meanings but are perceived differently by the artists. I discovered that art and culture enable individuals to recognize one another's unique talents by bringing them together.
What is the central idea or theme around your inspirational research?
The word "hope" served as the main concept or theme of my inspirational research. As I was doing my research, I came across Stephen Alcorn's piece "the great handshake," which immediately brought to mind the word "hope".
What kind of inferences did you make while reading your research?
I had some inferences of Stephen block print "the great handshake" which was hands, I wanted add a meaning to my work so I decided to express how I want the hands to be position, story behind it and look.
The art movement impressionism served as my piece's inspiration because it demonstrates how artists can add their own perspectives to what is happening in front of them or around the world while still using other art aspects like lines, texture, and value.
What is the overall approach the author has regarding the topic of your inspiration?
The overall approach the author has regarding of my inspiration is the word "hope". I wanted express the meaning of hope through the story of block print.
What kind of generalizations and conclusions have you discovered about people, ideas, culture, etc. while you researched your inspiration?
When I was looking for inspiration, I discovered that many works of art and ideas for pieces have similar meanings but are perceived differently by the artists. I discovered that art and culture enable individuals to recognize one another's unique talents by bringing them together.
What is the central idea or theme around your inspirational research?
The word "hope" served as the main concept or theme of my inspirational research. As I was doing my research, I came across Stephen Alcorn's piece "the great handshake," which immediately brought to mind the word "hope".
What kind of inferences did you make while reading your research?
I had some inferences of Stephen block print "the great handshake" which was hands, I wanted add a meaning to my work so I decided to express how I want the hands to be position, story behind it and look.
Citation
Citation in MLA format
- History.com Editors. “Impressionism.” History.com, A&E Television Networks, 3 Aug. 2017, www.history.com/topics/art-history/impressionism.
- Sotheby's. “Impressionism.” Sothebys.com, Sotheby's, 14 Jan. 2020, www.sothebys.com/en/art-movements/impressionism.
- “Stephen Alcorn.” VCUarts, 16 Aug. 2022, arts.vcu.edu/community/vcuarts-faculty-and-staff/directory/stephen-alcorn/#:~:text=Contact Info&text=Associate Professor Stephen Alcorn is,formative years in Florence, Italy.
- Tate. “Impressionism.” Tate Kids, www.tate.org.uk/kids/explore/what-is/impressionism.