Author: Grace

Maus Reflection Post

Tracing helped me to view the concepts that we have been talking about in class. There was something different about actually tracing the pages as opposed to observing them passively. Going through the process of shading and sketching made me notice which parts of the process took the most time, and which panels were more detailed as opposed to the ones that seemed to take less time to trace.

I chose the pages that I did because I wanted to highlight the details in either body language and background or facial expression. I chose to trace p. 109 from Volume I and p. 25 from Volume II. After having read the books and having thought about which aspects stuck with me I chose pages that I thought best illustrated the concepts that I wanted to talk about. I chose to talk about:

Idea #1: Facial Expression

Idea #2: Character Design

Idea#3:  Page Layout

What’s in my Bag

  • a roll of tape with no dispenser that I “accidentally” took home from work
  • a pen, two pencils, a mechanical pencil and a blue highlighter
  • tiny notebook that’s too small to actually use and too cute to leave at home
  • laptop (feat. stickers of david bowie and a pig with balloons)
  • a piece of paper with instructions for mailing a package (and a lipstick stain because I needed something to clean up my makeup with)
  • sunglasses
  • Snickers wrapper
  • a wallet with a Chicago transit card and a Blick’s preferred customer card in it
  • a card for Emory Counseling Services
  • Part of a tea bag with an inspirational quote on it (not kept for the quote as much as it was kept because I love tea)

Triptych

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I based this on an actual conversation I had with someone in high school. I was the character that was “above ego”. I enjoy poking fun at people who take themselves too seriously, because I was always a kid who took things too seriously and a lot of my sense of humor has developed from learning to make fun of myself for it.

In terms of art style- I wanted it to be kind of quirky and simplistic looking with a few bold colors. I wanted The last panel in this triptych to be a larger panel, because I wanted the two characters to appear smaller, and less significant. I thought this would serve to accentuate the humor.

Why Comics? (In-Class Writing)

Art Spiegelman talks about the “secret language of comics” and how they create illusions with formal elements. This can be seen in the very first chapters of his second volume of Maus. The first volume is a straightforward narrative. The only surreal element that is tied in is the comic that Art wrote when he was younger. However, in the beginning of this second volume he starts the very first chapter with a visual metaphor for his depression. He shows himself and other characters wearing masks of the animals that he has been drawing. And he shows himself regressing into childhood as he is asked to take on more responsibility and spearhead efforts to commercialize his father’s story.

This sequence, especially the masks, is very powerful and very hard to imagine in a medium without some visual component. Spiegelman does not explain the masks, and we are left to wonder what they could mean within the visual vocabulary of the book. It would be harder to describe this sequence in words without giving away his intention altogether, and as Spiegelman says, he likes comics that can be read “slowly and often”. This sequence especially almost requires a re-read, and so through the medium of comics, he has achieved this aim.

This Book Was Stolen

IMG_7033morning kept isolated,

the sunlight was heavy

and carried

between her sweater and coat.

Following the only other living thing: the bitter wind

visible, immeasurably glad.

There was time, couple of hours, a few minutes to feed her.

I used a page from the short story “Lie Down with Lions”. I used lead pencils to create a blackout poem and then I went over it with a set of childrens’ Crayola brush pens from CVS and water to get a soft watercolor-like effect. I then created a collage with famous stolen paintings and the old illustrations from the book itself.

In looking at the words I saw singular images and word combinations that I liked and I started to pair them together. “morning kept isolated” was one of my favorites that jumped out at me immediately. The next one was the idea of carrying sunlight underneath a coat, and the ending image of someone eating time and letting the minutes and hours feed her. I didn’t set out to write this poem based on personal experience, but by letting the words on the page jump out at me in no particular sequence I think I captured a mood that feels familiar. The final product is something that emerged out of a little homesickness, and the fact that I was missing Lake Michigan and the feeling of eating lunch on the beach in the middle of January with friends. Everything looks dead in Chicago in the winter, the only thing that makes the whole scene come alive is the movement of frigid January air.  Surreal or abstract art always evokes a feeling in me more than it does a complex message, but it has the potential to be equally powerful.

Sunday Sketch

I love vintage telephones almost as much as I hate drawing them. I challenged myself to try to draw one in this assignment, by drawing a kind of pop art inspired woman whose phone was half drawing and half earbud.

incorporating a three dimensional object into a drawing was most challenging in terms of mapping out the proportions of the drawing in relation to the object. I was in awe of how many different ways Christoph Niemann found to incorporate objects into his sketches. It takes a very specific way of looking at the world that involves a lot of the training that artists go through to learn about depth and shadow and perspective. Some of the most impressive of his drawings were the ones that had to have been drawn with forced perspective and an object that pops out of the page (like the tank drawn with a tube of paper towels. I would have loved to try one of these, but the technical skill involved was a little more than I could manage. sk3

Literacy Narrative

In writing my Literacy Narrative I first tried to trace a story line through my experience with writing. As I made my way through chronologically I came naturally to some kind of conclusion about what role writing has played in my life at different times. The image I chose to be featured on the site is an old picture of me, I hadn’t learned to read yet, but I had developed a habit of memorizing the words to my favorite books and reciting them as I pretended to read.

 

Avatar

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I have always loved drawing faces and studying people’s profiles. And I like the way a page clutters up so quickly when I do this as an exercise. For my avatar I chose to make something that seemed a little crowded and collaged-looking. I used the free trial of photo shop to add in text and a photo of myself, but my intention was to make it look like a physical scrapbook page or a piece of  a journal.

The drawings were done in my sketchbook with brush pens and watercolor and scanned and edited in Photoshop later.

My art style is usually a little messy or hectic looking and I wanted to make an avatar that reflected that, because the more I embrace that about my drawings, the more I like the end product.

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