I believe that my Edward Hopper painting from our artist emulation project was my most successful piece. I was really able to spend a lot of time on it and therefore I had more time to refine and revise my work. In this project I was able to explore my use of color and texture. I used contrasting colors and texture in order to draw the viewers eye around the whole painting. Also details contrasted nicely with the very vague painting. I think that I was able to successfully achieve my goal of creating a quiet, peaceful scene just like Hopper did in Early Sunday Morning. The smooth colors help to relax the whole feel of the painting which is exactly what I was working for.
The most challenging project of the year for me was our final landscape project. I find that I have a harder time trying to represent realistically which is why I lean more towards the abstract or even half-abstract. My final work only somewhat resembles my early sketches. My early sketches were fairly detailed and specific, but when I got to the painting, I found the paint hard to control which led to me using less detail. The whole final work wound up pretty abstract but I was still able to go back to using strong colors and textures as good contrast. Also, the composition wound up a little more "cookie cutter" than I would have liked but I was able to work on that and try to make it less predictable once I had the basics down.
I think that the formal strength I worked on this year the most was balance. This goes for every aspect of my work. Whether it was color, texture, composition or light, I felt that I was always able to find a fairly good balance between what elements were working well.
As a technical strength, I believe that my painting has come a long way. I have painted for most of the year, especially with oil based paints and therefore I have had virtually A whole year to hone in on my skills. I would still like to master details better though. That was the one thing I had trouble with all year while I was painting. SOme works could have been a little better if I could have added detail. That is what I would really like to work on next year.
Lastly, as a conceptual strength, I believe that I have learned what my favorite style of work is. I like to let my imagination go and while I do try to keep some realism and some basic aspects of realism, I really like to work abstractly. This will help me a lot going forward because now I know what I do well and also what I can look forward to working on next year!
