Portfolio by Michaella Gumila

How Have I Grown at Freestyle Academy?

Note to Panelists!

MichaellaG–Please click on the post title to view the full post–

  Hi, my name is Michaella Gumila, I’m a senior and this is my first year here at Freestyle Academy. First of all, Thank you very much for taking the time to review and critique my work, it’s much appreciated! I came to Freestyle with a background in traditional fine arts, I took drawing, painting, ceramics, photography and commercial art classes at Mountain View. I came to Freestyle to find more ways to express myself and make art. I organized the posts on this webpage into two categories; Before and After. The posts under before are what I did in the first half of my year at Freestyle and what I presented during our annual Exhibition at the Computer History Museum in February. This includes a book jacket design and a lyrical poem inspired by “Citizen: An American Lyric” by Claudia Rankine. In the second category, After, are my projects during […]

Lyrical Poem

MichaellaG–Before, Please click on the post title to view the full post–

“Anxiety” Emptied eyes stare, reflect tender tension trying to tear through the terror from within, project shadows hanging precariously above vulture carved cheekbones weighted with tired turmoil. And you will glance down at your reddened raw ravaged palms and notice weeds sprouting from underneath your fingernails, their resilient roots pushing pushing, pushing like the voice in your head beckoning you to the edge, spouting reckless irrationalities as promiscuous as the fountain of life.   “Fuck. You fucked up. You fucked up. you fucked up, you piece of shit, you stupid useless piece of shit.” Shut up shut up shut up. Stop. Breath. Now do it again. Breath. Keep breathing breathing breathing. This is what I was meant to do. This is what I’m here for, I’m here for you they’ll say. They’ll keep you alive, if only so you’ll keep pushing the wind out of your lungs faster and faster […]

Orb’s Journey: A Mental Health Exploration Children’s Book

MichaellaG–After, Please click on the post title to view the full post–

This is my Zenith Project. For my largest and final assignment at Freestyle, I wondered, “What do I want my legacy to be at Freestyle?” and, “How do I want to spent these three months?”. I really wanted to do something worthwhile and meaningful as well as fun. So because mental illness is a very important issue to me and I hadn’t seen this done before, I chose to write and illustrate a picture book about mental health directed specifically toward children. This is that children’s book.

Zenith Reflection

MichaellaG–After, Please click on the post title to view the full post–

  Zenith Reflection I chose to write and illustrate a children’s book for my ultimate Freestyle project because of my passion for bettering my small plot of the world. I’ve always felt that trauma and mental illness contribute to many issues that decrease the quality of life  or human experience. How can people care about climate change or poverty or injustice when they don’t care about themselves or other people? I know children are very impressionable; they aren’t tainted by the traumatic experiences a number of adults go through. I thought I could make the most difference by directing my Zenith project toward them.   During my research process, what I really wanted to do was get feedback from those around me in my local community. I wanted reassurance that addressing children, that talking to them about mental health, would make an impact. But it was really difficult to reach […]

Consumer Product

MichaellaG–After, Please click on the post title to view the full post–

  Consumer Product Artist Statement I created a teddy bear as a part of my Zenith project. I imagined my children’s book being sold as a package deal with the teddy bear for the child to hold while their parent reads to them. The teddy bear represents a character from my book, Teddy the blue bear who personifies depression. My inspiration came from a favorite stuffed animal that I personally owned as a kid. If I were to make another stuffed animal in the future, I would invest in higher quality fabric and learn how to sew. With this plushy, I struggled with getting the hot glue to stick and found that a textile with fur or fuzz would have served better to hide mistakes and seams. Despite those inconveniences, this was a very fun and enjoyable process and I really valued it.

Book Jacket

MichaellaG–Before, Please click on the post title to view the full post–

Book Jacket Artist Statement My book jacket presents a short story I wrote about a guy in a very dissociative state that ends up driving to a cliff in the middle of the night. So on my book jacket, I drew a silhouette of a car on a cliff on top of a starry night sky background to symbolize the setting of my book. The lone car silhouette also represents my main character’s isolation and loneliness. I used a dark color scheme to create this solemn but mysterious mood. I think my book jacket is successful at accurately representing my book and giving people who see it and haven’t read my story an accurate impression of what it is about. To create my book jacket, I used Adobe Photoshop, a bit of Adobe Illustrator and InDesign. I came across some struggles, for example, I envisioned my book jacket with a photograph […]