​Anjali Phadke's P​ortfolio

During the beginning of the year, we wrote a paragraph or so about our creative confidence level. I stated that my creative confidence level was an 8, specifically because of my confidence. Throughout the years in Art, I have always doubted myself. I had to make sure that everything was perfect, and fix every small little detail. Since we have started new skills in art this year, my skill set has gotten better. Because of these skill sets and the many activities we have done throughout the year, my confidence has consistently increased. This year, my greatest growth has been all about my creative confidence. I learned new skills, failed at many activities, tried harder at those activities, and had some success. This success led to the increasing of my creative confidence level. If you took snapshots of my work in Art on the first day of school to now, there would be a significant difference. At the beginning of the year, I hadn’t taken art since 6th grade and I felt as if everyone was better than me. I gave myself an 8, but only because I thought I was creative.

 

Throughout the activities that we have done like gesture drawing, I learned that it takes practice. Even if you fail the first time you try, you always succeed even if it’s a small victory. In Gesture Drawing, the drawings are supposed to be done fast. You don’t usually look at the paper at all, and you focus on the subject. Usually when you partake in Gesture Drawing, the actual rapid movement of the pencil lasts anywhere from about 30 seconds to 2 minutes. Because this happens so fast, the complete drawings looks like it shows movement. Throughout this first skill, I felt as if my drawings weren’t good enough. But then, I learned the deeper meaning of the skill. Gesture Drawing isn’t meant to be perfect or neat, it’s meant to show movement and it captures only the basic form. I felt better than but not as confident as I could be. If you look at the drawings that we did for the Living Lens project, my creative confidence and my skills have significantly improved.

 

The Living Lens project was in partnership with the Wave Foundation at the Newport Aquarium. The goal of this project was to create a specific curriculum materials (books, coloring pages, etc.) based on “Next Generation Science Standards.” Specifically in 9th grade, our goal was to create illustrations for one of the curriculum materials. My group had a book, so we had to create multiple colorful illustrations that matched with the text on the book. Basically, the 10th graders were writing about a specific animal (our period’s animal was a shark ray) and we were the illustrators. We started this project by learning many concepts like Gesture Drawing, Blind Contour Line Drawing, Modified Contour Drawing, learning to use gouache and many others! Throughout third quarter, we created a storyboard of the illustrations first, then we created books (using printer paper and just sketching the pictures from the storyboard), then we created our illustrations for the final book. There was special paper that we

 

Using the skills that I learned at the beginning of the year, I found that I didn’t have to be perfect in my drawings. I could do basic shapes and contours, and I found that if I didn’t worry so much about the actual drawing, the shark ray turns out perfect, at least in my opinion. I have realized that this confidence, has been through a lot of classes. For example, In Chinese at the beginning of the year, I felt lost. I felt like everything was going too fast and if I tried to slow down, then my grades would suffer. Throughout the year, I have felt more and more confident with learning new words and practicing my characters. I have learned that this skill, this confidence, goes for all of my classes.

 

Like a lot of kids out there, I am not that confident with my art. But through the activities that we have done in Art, I have achieved the growth of my creative confidence level increasing. One of the first skills we learned in this class, was Gesture Drawing. Again, Gesture Drawing captures the movement of the subject quickly or the essential/basic form of the subject/object. This was the first drawing lesson we had, and although my cc level wasn’t that much higher, I still felt a lot better. After Gesture Drawing, we learned the skill of Blind Contour Line drawing. BCL drawing is really self-explanatory. First of all, you don’t look at your paper at all, hence the Blind. Contouring is the curve or the plain of a piece. For example, if you were to draw a hand, the contour would be the curves of the hand. This skill requires concentration. Going slow is the way to go. You look at the subject. You take in all the little details. You concentrate and make sure that you go slowly. You want your eye to follow the movement of the pencil. The main point of this is to draw based on where your eye moves, not based on how your brain thinks it should be drawn. After a lot of practice, your eyes and the pencil you are drawing with will usually match up. After you start, make sure that the details are there. The drawing doesn’t have to be perfect, but it will get there eventually. At first, I wasn’t that good with the skill. But, like all the other skills, I practiced and practiced, and I finally had confidence in the skill. After this skill, we learned about the variation of Blind Contour, which is Modified Contour. MC is basically the same thing as BC except, you are allowed to look at your paper once in a while. You mostly have to look at the paper most of the time, but you can still look at the paper to make sure you aren’t messing up. Although you can look at the paper, that doesn’t really mean you can look at the paper the whole time you are drawing. The main difference is that you can stop your pencil from going away from the paper. Besides that, there isn’t much of a point to really look at the paper.

 

To a normal high school student, art is a place where you have fun drawing and you are done with the class. But at DRSS, all of our classes are meaningful. Each class has a purpose, and that purpose will help us out later in life. For example, Modified Contour Drawing, really helped us in our Living Lens Project. When you use MC, you start off in one spot, like BC drawing. You mostly look at the subject, again taking in all the details, and going faster than BC usually goes. During the Living Lens project, we were able to draw shark rays for our project. Because of Modified Contour Line drawing, we could do that with ease. Now, we didn’t really use Gesture Drawing or Blind Contour Line Drawing in our products, but there were still very important to learn. When we drew our shark rays, MC helped us concentrate on the actual picture instead of on the paper. So, our pencils were following our eyes. Since it was Modified Contour Line Drawing, we were allowed to look at our papers, so this helped us greatly in making sure we had all the details. Without these skills, I wouldn’t have been able to draw my shark ray as well. Without drawing my shark rays well, I wouldn’t have the same creative confidence level I do now. So, these skills have really helped me achieve what I wanted to achieve.

 

My first artifact is my Blind Contour Line practice drawing. The first time I drew my hand, I was focusing too much on the actual shape. I wasn’t getting in any details that made the contour line drawing well. I didn’t really go slow either. I was so nervous and I just wanted to look at my paper. Since I had that instinct that said “LOOK AT THE PAPER,” I finished as fast as I could just to get the thing over with. The second part of the first artifact is the second Blind Contour Line drawing of my hand. This time, I really tried to go slow. I went as slow as I could, drawing my lines by following my eyes. I tried to focus on every little detail, which in retrospect, may not be that good. But, in my artifact, I really tried to make this hand drawing more detailed. Now, it may not be as pretty as my first drawing, but in my eyes, I did way better the second time than I did the first time. For the first part of my artifact, the basic shape of a hand is there without much detail. To me, this was sort of a fail because Blind Contour Line Drawing is supposed to be messy! What I mean by this is that the details included in the drawing are supposed to be all over the place because it shows that the drawer really paid attention to detail when they drew with their eyes. Here is some information on Blind Contour Drawing. In some pictures that we saw in class, there was line weight included. Some places were darker than others. That could be for emphasis (usually to the part the artist wants you to see the most). One fact of BC Drawing is that it is one continuous line. There is no jumping or skipping to a new line. You never really pick up your pencil. When we talk about contour, we learned that it was the curve or plain of a line. Included in a BC drawing may be, ridges, wrinkles, shadows, valleys, highlights, inside edges, and outside edges.  One of the most important parts of it is to increase the power of concentration. You don’t have to focus on other things if you are partaking in this skill.

 

My second artifact is my notes about gouache. There were two aspects to our note taking. One part was actually taking notes and the other part was experimenting with gouache. There were many different techniques we used. Although there is no before and after for the artifact, there is a before and after for my confidence. We had two different types of notes. One was the actual writing about gouache and the other was using gouache to look at technique. At first, I was okay with writing the notes because I was used to writing, I was comfortable with it. When my teacher told us that we could actually use gouache, I was a little excited and a little scared that I would mess everything up. So, I took my time when I was partaking in the notes. I made sure that I would go slowly and not try to look at other peoples’ papers. I did this mostly because I didn’t want to be jealous and lose my confidence. I didn’t want to lose it when I was looking at really pretty colors! After I finished using all the techniques (and even creating a cool octopus looking figure) my teacher hung a few pictures up and mine was one of them! My creative confidence soared because I knew I did well!  Regarding the notes, here are some things you may not know about gouache. First of all, it is pronounced gwash Gouache is similar to watercolor, but water color is transparent and gouache can be transparent and opaque (you can see the paper behind it or you can’t see the paper behind it.) There is more pigment in gouache. Pigment is the coloring matter in the tube. For example, if I drew with two pencils and one drew darker than the other, then I could assume that the darker pencil was softer, so there was more pigment on the page.  It dries to a different value. Lighter colors on the paper may turn darker and darker colors on the paper may turn lighter. Gouache is used for posters, illustrations, comics, and other design work. We could also use washes, where we add water and the gouache is kind of opaque. There was some value where we could add water as the colors would turn a little lighter. We also experimented with using outside sources like rubber alcohol or salt that could add effects to the gouache. The rubbing alcohol was like a drop of food coloring into water, but here it was the opposite. There was a clear liquid into a colored medium. As I dropped the rubbing alcohol into the paint, the drop kind of pushed the paint out of the way, so it looked like there was a bubble in the middle of the paint swatch

 

My blind contour line drawing artifact is a part of my growth because it really shows that I worked harder the second time that I did the first time. As you can see, the second drawing may not look as pretty as the first drawing. But, I was more proud with my second drawing because I really took the time to add those details in during the whole process. I learned, that in art, taking your time really helps make the piece a masterpiece. In this drawing, I continued to learn that same ordeal that I had been forcing myself to learn. Because of this Drawing, I learned all about detail, and that detail really gave me confidence in future endeavors. I knew that I could excel in the later quarters of art because I learned the main ideas that are crucial. Take your time, add in details, and don’t force yourself to do anything. If you can’t enjoy it, (like an effect you don’t want to do) them don’t force yourself to keep doing it. My second artifact is a part of my growth because it shows my confidence. If you see my experimentation with the skill, there are colors and drawings and techniques all over the page. That wouldn’t have happened if I hadn’t gained all the knowledge and skill I learned in previous classes. I tried new things, I tried new colors, and I tried new techniques all because my creative confidence was strong. My teacher even put a few of ours up as an example, and mine got put up there! So, you can see why this is growth.

 

From the time I gave myself an 8 to now, there have been tons of things that I learned, and this will help me in later life. One way this will help me, is my confidence level. This confidence that I have achieved doesn’t just stay in Art. It goes for all my classes. With my Blind Contour Line drawing, all I had to do was concentrate and make sure I was taking in all my surroundings. This will help me in my future endeavors because if I am not as confident, and if I really need to do my best, I will think about Art. I will think about concentrating and detail and taking in my surroundings. Although Doctors don’t really have that much time to concentrate, they will take in their surroundings (information about the patient) and concentrate in the procedures they may be doing. Now, I am not at a 10 yet. I don’t think I will ever be at a 10. There will always be a doubt in the back of my mind telling me that I am doing something wrong. But with practice, I will learn to ignore that voice, because my drawings and my art, are not based on what other people say. They are based on what I think. So, I still have a lot to work on, but I am truly glad I am in this class, because I really got to enjoy having this confidence with me.