the great gallery

I know, I know. No post yesterday. Well, to make a long story short, we drove home from Washington and had an unexpected 3 hour stop in Boise to fix our a/c, putting us home really late. Too late to post. So, today I have one for today and some extras to make up for yesterday.

These are a few sketches I did a few years ago in southern Utah in 9-mile Canyon studying the cave art. These figures come from a series of figures on a wall called the Great Gallery. They stand larger than life size. Majestic. To this day, no one really knows what they mean or even how they were stained on the wall.

encaustic on wood

So, I have been doing a little investigation on google+ these days.  It is basically facebook, but that is where I am so confused.  I know that google is awesome and everything google does is also usually awesome.  SO, the question in my mind is why would they attempt to create a social network to rival facebook unless it is completely better?  I still don't feel like I have found the answer to that question as of yet.  I still wonder if people will actually ever make the switch from facebook to google+...

One feature, however, that I did find somewhat interesting as I was browsing today was the photo albums that I apparently already have on my account.  You see, google is connected to everything I do, including blogger, so all of the photos that I have EVER posted on blogger appear in different albums.  I put ever in all caps for a reason.  I found photos that I remember uploading to posts and then deleting for whatever reason, old bog headers, and other things that I have even removed from my blogs.  I am not quite sure how I feel about this, but I was able to find this little gem that I had completely forgotten:

It is an encaustic painting that I did at BYU.   (I guess there can technically be a debate about whether or not this is a new painting, but since I make the rules, it will function as my painting for today.)  Encaustic paintings are made of wax. 

I painted this with beeswax using melted crayons for the pigment.  It was an interesting process which included working very quickly, a muffin tin, cookie sheet and stove top. 

I painted this for an art history class as an end of the year project.  We were supposed to learn about a technique that early artisans used and recreate it.  This is a technique that was used by the Egyptians to create death masks for burial.  (Not exactly like King, Tut, but more for the common man and middle-upper class...those who couldn't afford gem encrusted caskets...so basically everyone.) 

The neat thing about encaustic, and the reason that the Egyptians used it for this purpose, is that it lasts forever.  So long as the wax is not damaged. 

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So, I know that now, this image will appear twice on my google+ photo album under my art blog section, but this will be the first official time that the image has actually be published on my blog.  I still can't figure out why this image made it on there, but I am glad to have it now!

A day outside with Andy Goldsworthy

Last week we had perfect weather for earth art.  Second grade was finishing a unit on rocks so rather than do the typical-glue-rocks-together-project, we got outside and did something with nature that real artists like Andy Goldsworthy do.  First we looked at some of his work and talked about what makes his designs successful like simple shapes and color, like in these:

 

We split the class into groups of 4-5 and set them loose for about 15-20 min.   This project could not have come with better timing.  The weather was great, the dandilions were all in full bloom, and the students are taking so many end-of-year tests that they needed to get their wiggles out.  Enjoy:

Announcing Today's Featured Artist

Hi everyone,
I really have no idea how many people read/look at my blog. If many people did, I fear that the numbers must be dwindling as I have not posted anything since I created this blog. I originally started this blog so that I could have a place to show my work. Well, I thought that this might also be a good opportunity to tell you all about some artists that I love, both from the past and the contemporary world. A few months ago my sister Joanne asked me, is there even any good, uplifting art anymore--do people even make art that is beautiful these days? Oh yes, Joanne, they do!! I wonder if there are a lot of people out there asking the same questions. So, I thought that I would take this chance to highlight some of the artists and their artwork that are beautiful to me.

The first artist that I want to feature is Gustav Klimt. Although he is not contemporary, he has been on my mind a lot lately and worked in a style that is very popular in contemporary art.

Klimt was born as the son of a gold and silver engraver in a suburb of Vienna. He had a formal art training at the Vienna School of Decorative Arts. In 1882, Klimt opened a studio of his own with his brother Ernst and Franz Matsch, a fellow student. They specialized on executing mural paintings. They were quite successful from the beginning and received commissions from theaters, museums and other public and semi-public institutions.

He often painted figures with realistic looking faces, hands, or limbs, with bodies flattened with intricate patterns. His paintings are full of emotion, passion and deep feelings. One very famous work that is widely popular is The Kiss, (1907-1908) shown below:This work was painted during what is referred to as his "golden plate" phase, as he applied gold leaf to the surface of his paintings to enhance the pattern and texture. Much of his work is of women and incorporates themes of family, relationships, love and passion.

Last semester I worked on a painting based much after the style of Klimt. My assignment was to paint a portrait incorporating pattern, 3-dimensionality, and flatness. I learned that Klimt's patterns are not patterns at all, but rather they are more organic as they are continually changing, never repeating the exact same motive more than once. I painted my friend from Honduras, Ruth Vasques, who is also and art education student at BYU. I will hopefully have an image of my painting soon to post.

If you are interested, you can read more Gustav Klimt him on wikipedia.com.