hold on to your butts

my thesis show, drawn by lottery, is scheduled for february 16-20. the reception will most likely be the 17th. consider me officially insane until president's day. my apologies.

monthly blogger

i lied. i'm crap at blogging. but here is the beginnings of a project i've started. a bunch of my friends at cgu are going to make masks, which they will wear when i paint their portraits. this painting is not finished but i want to do more. the next versions will get less literal and hopefully more colorful. it's a halfie- part acrylic and part watercolor. i'm not sure about it, but what else is new.

tangents

i'm guilty of so many detours this semester. supposedly that's what the first year is for- hairbrain ideas that may or (most likely) may not work. i got straight up bored with collaging different elements (representational/ abstract, symbolic/ arbitrary, personal/ universal, funny/ pretty/ ugly) in my hodgepodgey watercolors that i wanted to try to make one iconic image that qualified for all of those things. and i was done done done with heads during this period. so i made these fluid acrylic paintings on 5ft yupo; they're solitary fleshy pods, knubs, grafts, etc. the response i got was mixed. one dude said the claims of my work being whimsical and illustrative must have gotten under my skin because i went from fantasy to cold hard boring facts. like him, most people just yearned for the days of my watercolors, but there were few supporters. now i'm hoping to reconcile my tangents because it's high time i get down to bizness.

school's out for summa

it has come to my attention that i am the world's laziest blogger. not no more. i am going to record all the gorey details of my summer in the studio. most of you have no idea what the heck i've been making this last semester to which i say i'm sorry. i'll try to make it up to you.

this weekend!

if you're in the area, come check it out.

teaser

i was going to add some photos of last semester's work, but alas, i hate most of them. so here is a little something i've been cooking up. not nearly done, but it's something. i took a break from faces and painted this with acrylic on a 5ft roll of yupo.

the latest

my second semester at cgu has started. i'm really hopeful that this semester will be better/ more challenging and yet more rewarding and i'm confident it will be twice as busy. i decided to double-up with classes now so my last semester can be completely dedicated to finishing my show. i also decided to take on a second job; i'm a teaching assistant for sandeep mukherjee's undergrad intro to painting class down at pomona. we had our first official painting day yesterday. i loved it. it's really odd to be instructing others about technique and the elements of art. first, because they listen to me (mind blowing). and second, i myself still have insecurities and questions- that never goes away. the questions and dilemmas just get more complicated and tricky.

with that being said, i'm trying to work some stuff out. hence, no postings of pictures. i've made stuff. but you don't need to see. i will post some new work probably within the week. hold your horses.

just more dumb words

this week i have become an insomniac. it's not that fun. the first time it happened i got on to thinking over the semester's challenges (aka graduate school blackholes). all of them have been redonkulous. i guess i "experimented" as everyone suggested i do. i went through a materials crisis. watercolor on paper, then on panel, on plastic, on handmade paper, on three-dimensional surfaces, then photography, then oils on canvas, then acrylic, then fluid acrylic. so if you were thinking to yourself "what is she doing with her time?" that is my answer. i've struggled and struggled; and i haven't even begun my image/ content crises.

meanwhile i have had some opportunities to do paintings for people i love. i attempted one in acrylic. it was so-so. i actually hated it and then i haphazardly ruined it today. i brought out my watercolor supplies. within seconds i realized that watercolor (on plain old boring paper) is where i belong. all that to be at square one again? yep. i guess that's what grad school is all about. exhausting all your options so you know your direction more clearly. and now i do.

one negative aspect

since i started at cgu i have heard the cliche "throwing the baby out with the bathwater" at least twice a week. one time it hit an all-time high of three in one day!

i'm a traitor

this week, after several critiques, i woke up one morning and decided to give oils another go. why shouldn't i? for some reason, i had a loyalty issue. like i married into the watercolor mob and i was never allowed to look back. i have fought for my watercolor underdog and maybe to my detriment. so i bought some stretchers and today i gessoed my first canvas in almost three years. at first i felt like a cheating jerk. but then i realized that our little "falling out" was silly; i didn't have to choose. oils and i are getting reacquainted and in the meantime i still hang out with watercolors.