Artwork: Illustration
Exhibition Text
This piece was inspired by the artists Elyse Dodge. She aims to breakdown natural landscapes into their most basic form that still show the beauty of nature in a new light. Dodge values the importance of color, light, and shape. These are the ideas that I tried to in cooperate into my piece. The piece I created aims to challenge the traditional view of nature by using shape and color to explore the idea of beauty.
Inspiration
Elyse Dodge, ¨Minarets¨, 24 in x 48 in.
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Elyse Dodge, ¨ Ayers Rock¨, 36 in x 36 in.
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The subject of Dodge´s works is nature. The aim of her work is to showcase the natural beauty of landscapes. Dodge does this by breaking landscapes into their most basic forms. These forms often are basic geometric shapes such as triangles that vary in size. The size of these shapes creates a sense of movement throughout the piece. Often the shapes that appear in the foreground are larger compared to the smaller shapes in the background. The varying size of shapes creates an accurate perspective.
Her pieces are created by searching for inspiration(her works often include a mountain form of some kind), breaking the landscape into simple shapes, completing a mock-up digitally, and finally transferring the image onto a canvas.
Dodge explains that she sees the world in color, light, and shapes. These three elements are in turn reflected throughout her published works.. These elements create a sense of continuous texture throughout her works.
Through her work her hopes to inspire people to look at nature with a new viewpoint. She hopes they will view landscapes by not simply viewing them, but by the shapes and hues that landscapes are composed of.
Her pieces are created by searching for inspiration(her works often include a mountain form of some kind), breaking the landscape into simple shapes, completing a mock-up digitally, and finally transferring the image onto a canvas.
Dodge explains that she sees the world in color, light, and shapes. These three elements are in turn reflected throughout her published works.. These elements create a sense of continuous texture throughout her works.
Through her work her hopes to inspire people to look at nature with a new viewpoint. She hopes they will view landscapes by not simply viewing them, but by the shapes and hues that landscapes are composed of.
Planning
In my first sketch I mainly focused on getting an idea of how I was going to incorporate aspects from both pieces of my inspiration. I believe this sketch achieved my goal. However I did not really like this sketch because the proportions of the mountain and land are off, as well the triangles are the same size in both the mountain and land. This caused the land and mountain to look like one land mass, which I did not want.
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My second sketch was mainly inspired by ¨Minarets¨. This sketch depicts a close up of a mountain. With this sketch I wanted to create some kind of perspective, to do this I made the triangles at the base of the mountain larger and the triangles closer to the top smaller. Once I completed this sketch I was happy with how it turned out however it did not relate to both pieces of my inspiration. I kept this in mind when I started on my third sketch.
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The last sketch includes both a mountain and land. Again like my second sketch I had the larger triangles towards the bottom of the piece and the smaller triangles towards the top. As well I liked that there was enough room for me to complete a gradient in the sky compared to my second sketch.
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After all three of my sketches were completed I decided that I was going to use the third sketch to move forward with the project.
Experimentation
Process
I decided that when coloring this piece it made the most sense for me to start at the bottom of the piece and work my way up. I began this process by taking a ruler and breaking the land up into larger sized triangles. Then I began to color, during this step I tried to avoid putting the same color next to each other. I did this by painting with one color before moving onto another color. Once all the triangles were filled in I outlined thieving with a black sharpie to eliminate any pencil lines.
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The next part I colored was the mountain. Again I used the ruler to break the mountain into smaller sections, compared to the land I wanted the mountain to appear further away. I then used the same technique to apply color as I did with the land. Again I traced over the triangles with a sharpie to get rid of all the pencil lines.
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Reflection
This project I believe turned out pretty well. The only thing I really struggled with for this project was completing the sky. In the final piece it looks like a gradient however I would have liked for it to be more clean. Making and coloring the triangles was the tidiest part of this project. However I found that the extra time I spent on them really shows, when looking at the piece you are able to tell each triangle apart and there are none of the same colors next to each other. I do think that the tracing of each triangle was not necessary needed. This step in the end did not add or subtract anything from the final piece, but it made the triangles more defined. If I were to do this again I would probably not add the sharpie simply because it doesn't add anything to the piece. A positive of using the sharpie was that it hide any pencil lines that were heavily visible.
Looking at my piece compared to my inspiration I believe I was able to successfully utilize Dodge´s key elements. As well I believe I was able to successfully in cooperate elements from both ¨Minartes¨ and ¨Ayers Rock¨. By using elements from both pieces my project has a high contrast color palette that ties into the sky very well.
Looking at my piece compared to my inspiration I believe I was able to successfully utilize Dodge´s key elements. As well I believe I was able to successfully in cooperate elements from both ¨Minartes¨ and ¨Ayers Rock¨. By using elements from both pieces my project has a high contrast color palette that ties into the sky very well.
Compare and Contrast
¨Minarets¨ v Untitled
Similarities:
- Both pieces include a mountain form of some sort.
- The mountain forms color scheme are composed of cool colors.
- The sky is created by a multi color gradient.
Differences:
- Untitled includes land compared to ¨Minarets¨ which is a close up of a mountain form.
¨Ayers Rock¨ v Untitled
Similarities:
- Both pieces include a mountain form of some sort.
- Both pieces feature land, both of which are made up of similar color schemes.
- The sky is created by a multi color gradient.
Differences:
- The mountain form in Untitled is made up of cool colors compared to ¨Ayers Rock¨ which is composed of warm tones.
- The land in ¨Ayers Rock¨ features rock forms compared to Untitled in which the land appears to be more flat.
Similarities:
- Both pieces include a mountain form of some sort.
- The mountain forms color scheme are composed of cool colors.
- The sky is created by a multi color gradient.
Differences:
- Untitled includes land compared to ¨Minarets¨ which is a close up of a mountain form.
¨Ayers Rock¨ v Untitled
Similarities:
- Both pieces include a mountain form of some sort.
- Both pieces feature land, both of which are made up of similar color schemes.
- The sky is created by a multi color gradient.
Differences:
- The mountain form in Untitled is made up of cool colors compared to ¨Ayers Rock¨ which is composed of warm tones.
- The land in ¨Ayers Rock¨ features rock forms compared to Untitled in which the land appears to be more flat.
ACT Response
Clearly explain how you are able to identify the cause effect relationship between your inspiration and its effect on your artwork?
The connection between my inspiration and my piece can be seen through my use of shapes and color. By emulating a similar color palette as well as shapes allows my piece to showcase nature in its rawest form.
What is the overall approach the author has regarding the topic of your inspiration?
Dodge aims to paint the world in a simplistic way that shows the natural beauty of the world. She focuses her work on light, shape, and color.
What kind of generalizations and conclusions have you discovered about people, ideas, culture, etc. while you researched your inspiration?
I am now able to conclude that there are a multitude of ways to depict beauty, elements such as color and shape are influential in the overall physical look of a piece.
What is the central idea or theme around your inspirational research?.
When looking for inspiration I knew I wanted to do a piece that was more geometrically structured. Dodge´s work accomplishes this while having depth behind it.
What kind of inferences did you make while reading your research?
After reading about Dodge´s work I was able to infer the importance of the principles and elements of art. She utilizes these in a way which creates highly captivating and meaningful works.
The connection between my inspiration and my piece can be seen through my use of shapes and color. By emulating a similar color palette as well as shapes allows my piece to showcase nature in its rawest form.
What is the overall approach the author has regarding the topic of your inspiration?
Dodge aims to paint the world in a simplistic way that shows the natural beauty of the world. She focuses her work on light, shape, and color.
What kind of generalizations and conclusions have you discovered about people, ideas, culture, etc. while you researched your inspiration?
I am now able to conclude that there are a multitude of ways to depict beauty, elements such as color and shape are influential in the overall physical look of a piece.
What is the central idea or theme around your inspirational research?.
When looking for inspiration I knew I wanted to do a piece that was more geometrically structured. Dodge´s work accomplishes this while having depth behind it.
What kind of inferences did you make while reading your research?
After reading about Dodge´s work I was able to infer the importance of the principles and elements of art. She utilizes these in a way which creates highly captivating and meaningful works.
Bibliography
“Elyse Dodge.” GALLERY, elysecreative.myportfolio.com/gallery.