End of the Year

Hello all!
I thought since my school year finally ended and I'm officially a college sophomore (??) I would show you some of the work I've done this year!
I'm trying to post things I don't think I've posted before, so hopefully I'm right about this and you're not totally bored by this post.

Drawing 1: 

Figure Drawings: 

These are some of my favourite figure drawings I've done this year--all ink washes. Ranging from 3 to 10 minutes. 

Room Drawing:

This was a homework assignment I did for two point perspective again in ink wash, but with pencil on top. 

Diagrammatic Discomfort: 

This was my final!! It's a drawing of Zach with pieces zoomed in like a science textbook diagram. It was originally supposed to be zooming in to show his discomfort, but it didn't totally turn out emphasizing his discomfort like I wanted. Nevertheless I still really liked the piece. One of the ideas behind this piece was drawing his body with value, but making his shirt and pants only showing form through pattern to accentuate his cool and interesting fashion sense. 

2D: 

"The Stitch that Unravels Fear's Caul":

For this piece my class was told to read a speech by Toni Morison and choose a quote to interpret. I chose "The stitch that unravels fear's caul", so I looked up "caul" (which is what covers the fetus, and what is used to wrap sausages), and it's actually really pretty, so I chose to make this cut out. The faces are stitched together from iconic fear images (Munch's The Scream, Home Alone, and Hitchcock's Psycho)

Open or Closed?:

This piece was an assignement focused on using the "relief" paper cutting technique. I'm actually really proud of how it turned out, since I figured out how to cut these flowers out all on my own. The idea behind it was to show two different things one with the paper beneath and one with the paper on top. I chose to show two different sides of my personality: on the one hand I'm very open and you can see by the clothes I wear that I'm very bright and bubbly, but on the other hand there are certain things that I would not share with everyone, or anyone, and those things are written underneath the pink paper. Here's an excerpt from my reflection: "The flowers represent who I show on the outside. In a literal sense they show how I dress: colourful, flowery, glittery, bright. These things make people believe I am very flowery and open (open, like the flowers on this piece are). Underneath however, I have used words (as I would in my journal), to describe all the things I don’t feel comfortable talking about yet with people. These are the things I would only talk about with those who are very close to me, and perhaps not even to them in some cases. For this reason, the flowers only allow tiny peeks of what is underneath; showing the darker side of me, which I do not let show to most."

Style:

Our final project was to make a multimedia book about our social identity. Here's an excerpt from my reflection: 

 "I think my style is a huge part of my social identity. Because it is the first thing people see when they look at you, they can immediately judge your personality and shopping skills. Style has always been a big part of who I am—I won Best Dressed in high school and that has always been my ~thing~. This is important to me because I like having that be my thing, it is what I pride myself in, so it’s really strange to come to a new place where no one knows that that is my thing. Also, I have wanted to be a fashion designer since I was 11, but since taking the first class in a fashion design major, I’m starting to worry it is not for me. Sewing is incredibly frustrating, and I don’t feel the same excitement or rush when sewing that I do when doing other artwork.But, making outfits and talking about fashion and shopping and thinking about clothes is something I do absolutely love. It’s hard to accept that I may have to give up on what I’ve wanted to do since I was 11 because I hate sewing. I created this book to be like the progression of sewing something. The first page is like the pattern, with a swatch of fabric that you will be using, the second is when you pin the pattern onto the muslin, the next two pages are muslin, and the last is with the final fabric."

3D:

Moss Shower Slippers:

Our first project in this 3D class was to make a pair of shoes. I decided I wanted take inspiration from a pair of shoes I'd seen before that had dried moss, and expand on that. I decided to build shoes out of live moss. The idea was that these are shoes you would put on after a shower--and your wet feet and the water dripping off of you would water the shoes! (I don't think this would really work..it's more just for the concept)

Secrets:

These boxes hold a similar premise to my "Open or Closed?" piece; these boxes each represent a secret I keep from people. Each box nestled inside the next like a babushka doll shows a deeper and deeper secret. The last box hold scrolls that say things I try to keep secret even from myself; most of these are blank (things I keep so hidden from myself that I cannot even write them down), but some say things like "I might not succeed", or "nothing happens when you die", which are fears I have that I try to keep from myself and resist thinking about at all costs.  

From my reflection on these boxes: 

"I slipped them inside of each other, like Russian “babushka” dolls to show them “hiding” inside the next. This shows how far you have to go to get these deepest secrets out. You have to struggle through each of the many layers to get to my deepest, darkest, rawest self."

Textiles:

 Woven History:

This project was to explore out family/cultural history through weaving. I made this bright and bold piece, because me and my whole family are very bright, loud, and eccentric. 

Excerpts from my write-up:

"The thing I personally connect with most with my Italian heritage is my curly hair. So, toward the “end” (really what I weaved first, but is at the bottom of the hanging weaving), there are what looks like thin black yarn weaved in. This is actually my real hair. Additionally, I connect with Italian foods, so I chose the yellow warps because they reminded me of angel hair pasta. That way the whole thing is woven through the foods that I so enjoy.
 I also looked at all my dad’s family's artwork, especially the women, since they’re the ones I most connect with, then I looked at my own. A common motif between all of our artwork was flowers. My aunts design patterns and sell them together, and a large number of the patterns they create have flowers in them. I went to my grandparent’s house and looked through my grandma’s sketchbook, and wouldn’t you know it; flowers, everywhere. So I looked around my own room, and of course, I also found flowers in tons of my own work!  To keep with the cultural heritage idea as well, I bought the national flower of each of the places I'm from. Hungary is the tulips (both a stem and flower were included), Italy is the white lily, and Slovakia is the rose."

 Printed & Dyed Fabrics:

This was a simple project for my textiles class about learning techniques. We dyed our fabric first (the one on the right is obviously the dyed one), and then we made a block to print with and chose/mixed pigment to print with. I'm honestly in love with my print and the colours together!! You can't see it that well, but the reddish colour on the left is this blood orange-pink colour that I so love! (Lmao every time I say blood orange I think of this Project Runway moment) I think I'm gonna make that one into a t-shirt sort of thing like this sort of, but maybe with a pocket??

Tool belt of Feminine Stereotypes: 

This was my textiles final; the prompt was "Body Armor". I began this project thinking about how textiles is often traditionally women’s work. I thought I would juxtapose this idea with some armor that would be traditionally worn by men, so I decided to do construction worker garb. This would be even more perfect for my concept, as construction workers are often guilty of demeaning women by cat calling and harassing them on the streets. I thought it would be ironic to use the “armor” of someone who usually demeans women, worn on a woman. 

The tool belt is full of feminine stereotypes to further my point. There is a sponge: women have to clean. A spatula: women have to cook. A makeup brush and lipstick: paradox of makeup (men like the ~natural look~, but not too natural). Razor: because women have to be hairless (in fact, even in shaving commercials, women are shown shaving a hairless leg, because hair on women is that disgusting). A diary that says "boys boys boys boys": because not only do women only talk about love life, they are also all straight. Lastly, and I think most important and often ignored, Tampons: because women are stereotyped as all having ovaries and thus periods. This stereotype is extremely trans exclusive, and you gotta support your sisters, not just your cis-ters. 

I knitted, crocheted, and did some basket weaving in this project, and I'm super happy with the result! I wanna make some knee pads like these, but in another colour to wear around! Comment below if you would wear knee pads like this to start a new #trend and maybe I'll upload them to my shop! 

Hope you all had or are having a lovely end to your year!! 

xo

Maya