DRY POINT
Into the Deep
Size: 5in x 7in
Medium: Dry point print and gouache watercolor paper
Date: October 27, 2016
EXHIBITION TEXT:
This dry point was made with the intention of expressing longing and exploration. The print features a deep sea diver and his octopus companion, reaching out for something or someone unknown. The pose and set up was heavily inspired by Michelangelo's painting, The Creation of Adam. I also incorporated Roy Lichtenstein's pop art style into my dry point print.The use of cool colors helps emphasize the tranquil mood and gives it a sense of calmness.
This dry point was made with the intention of expressing longing and exploration. The print features a deep sea diver and his octopus companion, reaching out for something or someone unknown. The pose and set up was heavily inspired by Michelangelo's painting, The Creation of Adam. I also incorporated Roy Lichtenstein's pop art style into my dry point print.The use of cool colors helps emphasize the tranquil mood and gives it a sense of calmness.
PLANNING
Artistic Inspiration
When I was assigned this project, I knew I wanted to make it in Roy Lichtenstein's style. I just really love the use of bold lines and drawing simplistic features. I was deeply inspired by Lichtenstein's Drowning Girl. Working by hand, Lichtenstein painstakingly imitated the mechanized process of commercial printing. First he transferred a sketch onto a canvas with the help of a projector. He then drew in black outlines and filled them with primary colors or with circles, simulating the Ben-day dots used in the mechanical reproduction of images. Explaining the appeal of comic books, Lichtenstein said, “I was very excited about, and interested in, the highly emotional content yet detached, impersonal handling of love, hate, war, etc. in these cartoon images." I'm also interested in highly emotional content so it's no surprise that I wanted to imitate Roy Lichtenstein's artwork. As for the deep sea diver idea, I was inspired by Terry Fan's Deep Sea Garden digital art. It was so pretty and I just had to redraw it!
When I was assigned this project, I knew I wanted to make it in Roy Lichtenstein's style. I just really love the use of bold lines and drawing simplistic features. I was deeply inspired by Lichtenstein's Drowning Girl. Working by hand, Lichtenstein painstakingly imitated the mechanized process of commercial printing. First he transferred a sketch onto a canvas with the help of a projector. He then drew in black outlines and filled them with primary colors or with circles, simulating the Ben-day dots used in the mechanical reproduction of images. Explaining the appeal of comic books, Lichtenstein said, “I was very excited about, and interested in, the highly emotional content yet detached, impersonal handling of love, hate, war, etc. in these cartoon images." I'm also interested in highly emotional content so it's no surprise that I wanted to imitate Roy Lichtenstein's artwork. As for the deep sea diver idea, I was inspired by Terry Fan's Deep Sea Garden digital art. It was so pretty and I just had to redraw it!
PLANNING SKETCHES
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"Roy Lichtenstein." The Art Story Modern Art Insight. Accessed October 23, 2016. Fan,Terry. Deep Sea Garden. In this sketch, I wanted to draw something that had to do with politics. A certain Republican candidate inspired me to draw this. It features a person who seems to be talking non stop but is blindfolded. I wanted this to imply that the person possesses an arrogant nature who talks about many things without necessarily seeing them as how they really are. In this sketch, I drew a person who's at a podium but can't speak out, despite the microphone being in front of him. This sketch was inspired by my previous sketch that had blindfolded man talking into the microphone. I liked the way this sketch portrayed it's meaning. People in this world see so many things yet no one speaks up due to an inability or just plain fear. This sketch features a deep sea diver and his cute octopus companion. I really enjoy the look of deep sea divers. It gives off such a beautiful aesthetic and provides enough details for a well-done dry point. |
EXPERIMENTATION
For experimentation, I made multiple prints with varying degrees of ink on the plate before printing. throughout my experimentations, I noticed that by completely clearing the surface of the plate of ink before printing, I was able to create a grungy texture over the print that made it looked weathered and worn.However, that was not the look I was going for. I wanted a clean image so I had to make sure that surface was completely wiped clean before printing.I also experimented on the amount of wiping I had to do. I needed to wipe off excess ink from my plate, so as not to have a really dark final print, but I also needed to be careful in not removing too much ink, otherwise I'd be left with a very faint final image.After I acquired a great final print, I then began to experiment with gouache paints. Gouache is a type of paint that can be very opaque or very transparent depending on how much water you add. It was pretty fun testing different color palettes to see which would suit my final piece the best.
PROCESS
While the watercolor paper was soaking, I coated my print panel with a thin layer of the oil-based ink using a palette knife. I made sure that the ink was seeping into the deep lines I had carved onto my dry point panel. Using the scraps of paper I had ripped in the beginning, I gently rubbed the ink into the grooves I carved out and cleaned out the uncarved spaces as best as I could to ensure a clean final print. |
After my watercolor paper was done soaking, I patted the soaked watercolor paper dry with a rag, set it between a folded piece of newspaper, and put my print panel facedown onto the watercolor paper. I then folded the newsprint over the top and set it under the slab of EZcut on the roller and ran it through once. The finished print was then set on a drying rack to dry. |
REFLECTION
Meaning of Work
Overall, I'm very pleased with my work. The final piece came out clean and neat. The printing process was quite tedious but I'm proud to have learned such a new skill. I don't really think I was successful in expressing longing in my dry point though. I thought that through the use of cool colors, I could further emphasize the emotions expressed in my work. However, I just don't feel like that was enough. I think I should've added very vague facial expressions to the deep sea diver to fully express that feeling of longing. My artwork was supposed to be a self-reflection of the emotions I'm currently going through. When you really think about it, the ocean is really big. By volume, the ocean makes up 90 percent of the planet's living space- the largest space in our universe known to be inhabited by living organisms. The size of an individual human is nothing compared to the vastness of earth's oceans. I see myself as that lone deep sea diver, lost in the vastness of the ocean I call life. There are times when the world scares me.
Compare & Contrast
Similarities:
Similarities:
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ACT RESPONSES
Clearly explain how you are able to identify the cause-effect relationships between your inspiration and its effect upon your artwork:
The pose from the Creation of Adam painting done by Michelangelo and the deep sea diver from Terry Fan's "Deep Sea Garden" poster directly inspired the pose and subject of my piece and influenced my choice of using cool colors.
What is the overall approach (pov) the author (from research) has regarding the topic of your inspiration?
The author's perspectives are all either of admiration or simply just personal opinions on the artwork.
What kind of generalizations and conclusions have you discovered about people, ideas, cultures, etc. while you researched your inspiration?
I generalized that usage of colors in art can heavily influence the certain moods an artist wants its viewers to feel.
What was the central idea or theme around your inspirational research?
The central theme around my inspirational research was the feeling of longing, which was represented through my block print's subject's posture. His outreaching hand was an idea that originally came from Michelangelo in his painting, Creation of Adam.
What kind of inferences did you make while reading your research?
I inferred through my research that Roy Lichtenstein's artwork defined the premise of pop art through parody.
The pose from the Creation of Adam painting done by Michelangelo and the deep sea diver from Terry Fan's "Deep Sea Garden" poster directly inspired the pose and subject of my piece and influenced my choice of using cool colors.
What is the overall approach (pov) the author (from research) has regarding the topic of your inspiration?
The author's perspectives are all either of admiration or simply just personal opinions on the artwork.
What kind of generalizations and conclusions have you discovered about people, ideas, cultures, etc. while you researched your inspiration?
I generalized that usage of colors in art can heavily influence the certain moods an artist wants its viewers to feel.
What was the central idea or theme around your inspirational research?
The central theme around my inspirational research was the feeling of longing, which was represented through my block print's subject's posture. His outreaching hand was an idea that originally came from Michelangelo in his painting, Creation of Adam.
What kind of inferences did you make while reading your research?
I inferred through my research that Roy Lichtenstein's artwork defined the premise of pop art through parody.
Bibliograpghy:
"Roy Lichtenstein." The Art Story Modern Art Insight. Accessed October 23, 2016.
http://www.theartstory.org/artist-lichtenstein-roy.htm.
Fan,Terry. Deep Sea Garden.
https://society6.com/igo2cairo/prints
http://www.theartstory.org/artist-lichtenstein-roy.htm.
Fan,Terry. Deep Sea Garden.
https://society6.com/igo2cairo/prints