Reflections

The reflections unit had the main focus the question “Who am I?” Throughout this unit we focused on self reflection and discovering ourselves. Mainly because of the college application process. In English we wrote our personal essay that can be used for college applications. In Digital Media, we made an opinion driven after affects video and created mandalas. And in Design we took street photography related to our essay inspired by the book Citizen.

From this unit I discovered what I value in myself and from others. We fist started this process by finding essence objects. My essence objects were:

  1. My sketchbook 
  2. My laptop 
  3. My phone 
  4. A hoodie 
  5. Headphones
  6. Small notebook
  7. Pens 
  8. Pencils 
  9. Wallet 
  10. Pants with pockets 
  11. Soccer cleats 
  12. Running shoes 
  13. Two dollar bill 
  14. Caricature Pen 
  15. Alligator Piggy Bank 
  16. Nicaraguan bracelets 
  17. Portable Charger
  18. BlackBelt
  19. Video Games – Wii Stuff
  20. Banana 

While at first these objects might be insignificant. It can help people discover their passion, but also weird quirks the might have. Or discover things we valued as kids, but have only realized until later.

Personel Museum Curation

Our personal museum curation project was from our trip to the SF Moma. We collected art that we found a connection too and art that we did not have connection, for the purpose on discovering our values. We then showed our piece to a friend or family member who judged if these pieces represented us accurately.

Just Imagine – Museum Curation

Reflect/tell how the piece answers “Who Am I?” for you. How does each piece represent your core values?

This piece reflected who I am because it represented my creativity and resilience in art. The numerous pencils reminded me of the effort and patience art takes, that only can be developed over the years. The bolt in the middle of the paper also reminded me of a pencil sharpener. Almost if the pencils were being consumed/used up.  

This piece reminded me of myself due to the sword in his left hand. I find that the sword is a world of creativity or imagination this character is in. Since a young kid, I would have a strong imagination and I believe this piece highlights that. 

This piece, although much more abstract represents me. The boxes protruding out of the center remind of layers. This layers can be a representation of my life. Building from a strong base can the next layer be built. Additionally once you take a deeper look at the art and see it from a side perspective do you notice it is 3D. 

Reflect/tell how the piece does NOT answer “Who Am I?” for you. Why didn’t each piece make the cut for you?

This piece does not reflect who I am. While at times I can be clear cut and organized, this piece reminds me of a blank canvas. Someone who is just restarting or does not have much to share. Which are qualities I feel I don’t have. 

This piece does not reflect who I am do the sheer chaos. Compared to the previous piece my life is organized in a manner where I am never in real panic mode. THis piece gives me the sense of being overwhelmed and confused. 

How has your own work as an artist and your own criticism of your artwork influenced your choices about which pieces made your Personal Museum and which pieces didn’t make the cut?

The artwork I create is from my imagination. I like art that is not too conceptual, but also has a hidden message. I believe the imagination part showed with my second piece and the hidden message part showed with my third part. My core values reflected were creativity, imagination, organization, and perseverance. 

Other Reviewer:

Yes, I think these pieces represent Max, because he doesn’t like ornamental pieces, but instead likes pieces with limited number of colors which still express a purpose. I see the link to max’s value of imagination/creativity and see how a blank canvas (piece 4) does not link to any of Max’s values, as its purpose is so hidden or undefined.  

Mandala Section

In Digital Media we created mandalas. This was one of the most relaxing processes. We created the mandalas on Adobe Illustrator. We set up our document to reflect our mandalas multiple times. That we only need to draw a piece of the mandala. I created one black and white mandala laser cut on to gold/black plastic and one color mandala.

Black and White Mandala
Colored Mandala

Mandala Reveal Build Video

ARVE Error: Mode: lazyload not available (ARVE Pro not active?), switching to normal mode

Mandala Reflection Video

ARVE Error: Mode: lazyload not available (ARVE Pro not active?), switching to normal mode

Perspective Piece

This is my perspective piece. In this piece I discuss the use of photo manipulation into art. And discuss in general what art is. After writing this piece I brought it into Adobe Aftereffects. Where I used basic animations, photos and texts to portrait my ideas.

Video

Process

I created my video in Adobe AfterEffects. The main transitions. I used were opacity transitions and position transitions. I then overlayed my audio on top of it

Personel Essay

This is my personal essay. I talk about how I grew as a person through my joinery in soccer and how I a plan to apply my values I found to my art.

I remember kneeling on the cushioned ground with my eyes closed. After a few seconds everyone simultaneously spoke: “Create an Indomitable Spirit to never quit!, Create Momentum & 110% Commitment! and See It, Say It, Do It, to Perfection.” At 5 years old I could barely read fluently, but the  standard practice of recital ingrained these slogans in my head. But what did it mean to develop oneself physically, mentally, and spiritually? Or establish extraordinary character? Or have self discipline? I joined karate wanting to learn kicks, punches, and flips. Developing a strong mindset was only a side product. 

I earned my black belt when I was 10 years old, but it was only later when I began to understand what having character and self-discipline meant. After I received my black belt, my friend convinced me to play club soccer with him. I was quickly overwhelmed. I was slower than everyone, and could not properly kick the ball. Evenso my soccer coach kept me on the team. I believed he saw potential in the work ethic I had learned from Karate and knew I wanted to improve. I always wanted to prove to him that he made the right decision to keep me on the team despite my lack of skill. My coach helped me work on the technical side of soccer and was always very particular with how the game should be played. In fact at won’t point everytime I chose not to use my left foot, my non dominant foot, he made me do 10 pushups before I could return to the game. Eventually through his teachings I began getting better and within the first year of club soccer I moved to the top team.

My soccer coach then recommended that I try out for the Olympic Development Program (ODP) team. I showed up to the try-out uncomfortable and scared. This was at the age where lots of boys began hitting their growth spurts, and other players were heads taller than me, faster and stronger than I imagined. Suddenly it didn’t matter if I tried the hardest. My mindset shifted, and I believed playing at that level was just not for me. I stopped after the first tryout week and did not return. I had never reached a point in my life where I lost so much hope. I went from improving each day to suddenly wanting to quit. 

When I told my club coach that I didn’t follow through with the tryouts he was disappointed. The man I had impressed with my work ethic now looked down on me. I felt ashamed. Had I let him down? Had I let myself down? The next year I tried out again. I remember forcing myself to listen to motivational talks during the one-hour car rides to the fields, in order to muster up the courage to play soccer for 4 hours. I realized that my club coach doesn’t care if I made the team or not. He cared about me not quitting. He wanted to show me what I could accomplish with the mindset I learned from karate. To my surprise, after 3 months of weekly Sunday tryouts, I made the team. I traveled to Oregon in an interstate soccer tournament. I learned that I can always accomplish much more than I think. It’s only impossible once you give up. 

I will still continue applying the discipline, work ethic and passion, I’ve made the core of my values since I was introduced to them in Karate. These core values have been tested during my ODP tryouts and even when I lost hope in them, I learned to return to these values and reapply them with more intensity. Now my interests have shifted towards the arts. I understand my art career will have its own sets of challenges, but I find reassurance in knowing I can always return to my core belief system and overcome any challenge.

Design Projects

Macro Photography

In this project we returned to taking macro photos from junior year. We took macro photos from the neighborhood around freestyle. After we had our photo we used Adobe Photoshop to edit our photos. I chose to do a retro old photo.

Process

Photoshop Document

This is my Photoshop Document. On the bottum right you can see my layers. I use adjustment layers to edit contrast, and color. I also use the brush tool for the red stains. And finally I use an overlay layer to get a crumbled paper texture. I valued learning these techniques in Photoshop and sliding my Photoshop knowledge.

Pastel Project

In this project we learned how to use pastels. I found it fun to work on a physical piece as most of my art is digital.

I found it challenging to blend my colors, but also to draw the individual cactus spikes. The cactus spikes were hard to draw due to how thin they are an dhow easily pastels blend. I value learning a new skill.

Public Service Anouncement

My public service announcement related to my personal essay. I chose to us a really long vertical format. Because my statement was “keep going.”

Process

I digitally illustrated my piece on Photoshop. I value this piece because of the length and size. I made sure to organize my layers throughout this process, that way I can move parts of my painting like the fish fish and tentacles if I want to change the composition.

Artist Statements