The Disparate Apology

(that ended up being the title of the comic I wrote for Elements/Drawing)

HERE IS THE ENTIRE THING!

 

  

And that's the end of it :D

Till next time~!

Comic Time

So for some reason I decided to do another joint final between Drawing and Elements.

The problem? It is a 10 page comic... which is way more work that I thought. Seriously, comic makers have gained so much respect in my eyes. (I forgot how much work it was, especially since the last one I did was only 6 pages and the script was already written for me.)

Anyways, here are the first few pages~! 

page 1

page 2

page 3

page 4

page 5

page 6

page 7

   So much work, so much still left to do. @__@

Next time I update this, it will be either this completed, or a few prints that I need to document.

Till next time~

-Ben

Tortured: The Drawings

So I just realized I never put up the final drawings that I did for the Tortured Series. 

Here we go~!

First Impression!

Second Impression!

Third Impression!

Fourth Impression!

Fifth and Final Impression!

The Singular Experience~!

The Five after transport and hung on a wall.

The Singular after transport and being hung.

Well, That's all for now, keep an eye open for the next post~! 

so long~

-Ben

Burning A Path.

So today I set fire to close to 5,000 matches at once. It was fun. This was for a joint project, for Drawing and Elements of Visual Thinking. All in all, I wish the video had turned out better, but I couldn't change fate. I'll edit that soon and post it after. Until then, here are the photos  of it completed!

The full thing. It's 186 inches by 60 inches. So roughly 15.5 feet by 5 feet. It's a lot larger than most of the work I have produced in general.

Starting section! I used a mass of 15 match folders together to make the starting square thing.

The early middle.

The late middle.

The end.

There is a story behind this drawing, but it is extremely long. So here is the abbreviated version: This represents the path in life that I have currently tread. It includes all major events, such as moves, sports, and clubs, as well as schooling, art, and very influential people. It starts with my birth, and ends with me at school at MICA.

Well, that's all for now~! 

Ta ta,

-Ben

Tortured: A Singular Experience

This is the second part of my Performance Drawing assignment. It should be on youtube as well, but it is taking forever to upload and not appearing, so we shall see if I ever get to replace it with the one from there. 

till next time~!

-Ben

Tortured: A Performance Drawing

FINALLY!!!!!!! This took forever to edit, but I managed to produce something in the end. SWEET!!!!!

Till next time~

-Ben

Finished up that drawing

Here it is~!!!!

Added a center mark, shit was fun and cool and the like. I really enjoy doing this kind of work.

Besides that, I've been looking around for another project (to find different colors around us and to take them and turn it into art, so basically another ready-made project, but  truer version), and I ended up in a really cool place under a bridge near our school. It was basically a trash dump/hobo paradise. Anyways I brought some really cool shit back to my studio!

I found 9 knives, and a rusty pair of scissors, and 11 boxes of matches, yes each of those things in those boxes is a match set, each of the boxes contained around 50 sets. So I have approximately 8,250 individual matches... Sweet. I also found that little mini locker which had a bunch of change sleeves (the kind where banks keep their quarters and nickles) There is a lot more down there, and  might go back and get some more things, but I really need to sanitize EVERYTHING @__@ I'm going to get really sick pretty soon. Eeeewwwww~ DX

Well, that's all for tonight,

Ta ta~

-Ben

Drawing Process

**My drawing projects just took a 180 and are now sculpture cross overs. Ooops. Regardless, I still ended up with a piece that is the complete opposite from the norm, and I might stick with it for awhile to see how it plays out**

This project was to create a finished piece based on doodles that you do. Something I doodle a lot are hands, and this was one of the first things that popped into my head. I really wanted to work with plaster last semester in Sculptural Forms, but I never did so I decided to do it here. Originally I was going to have a cascade of hands flowing out of the wall, but things didn't work out, my opinions changed, and all of the various art induced decisions that I made lead this to be further and further away from a piece coming from the wall, and turned into a piece going to the wall.

 Here we go~!

The entire installation as seen by my class.

When it comes to the hands that I plastered, there are three types of hands. The first are fully rendered hands, which I cast, and then brushed charcoal onto so the hands them selves would be fully rendered (there are three of these). The next type is the cast hand, where I just simply cast a hand and let it be (there are six of these). The last type of hands are the destroyed hands. These were cut off of my hand while being cast without being allowed to dry fully, and I did not patch them up, so they appear broken and dismantled. The remaining four are this way. All of them combined represent my growth as an artist technically through stages. From being barely able to draw hands, to slightly understanding how they work, and finally to mastery of that form. This piece reads vertically in that direction as well as horizontally. While horizontally, the viewer goes into the wall, going from the physical world where you have the objects (the hands) to the marks that are made (the charcoal dust print) then the ideal final form (my hand prints on the wall). This dual growth adds another layer to the engagement plane, taking it to a metaphysical level along side physical and personal.

 

Different angle.

The bottom two thirds, the lower sections is a pile of hands, covered in Charcoal.

Hand prints at the top. Symbolized the ideal when it came to drawing hands.

With this, I had the hands piled up in the exact same way as the actual pile, but I proceeded to blow the charcoal away, to create this negative space-esque drawing.

This is the pile of hands, each one was plastered by myself, and are of either my hands, or a few friends who let me plaster theirs. This is how the other section looked before I blew all of the charcoal off.

Different angle and better lighting.

After critique, I did not know how I would carry the installation home. so I cut off the two areas that I like the most, and knocked the charcoal dust off. Then rolled it up and brought it home to the studios. When I unrolled it again to pin to the wall to flatten it, this is what it looked like, and I am really happy with it. I might do one last impression, and try to seal some of the darker black charcoal marks onto it so there is a wider range of value, but who knows how it will turn out. I will post a picture once I am fully finished. (Hopefully in better lighting than this @_@)

The drawing that it turned into

Well, that's all for tonight~!

Ta ta~

-Ben

Some Pastels

So I earlier I posted up some pastel projects that I was doing for drawing; however, I never posted the results. Here they are~! (All three are self portraits in some respect, if not of my physically, then at least of me mentally)

This first piece was about defending others from an outside aggression. I wanted to have the viewer be looking up at the figure while seemingly being protected by another figure in the foreground. Done in warm reds as an indication to the general overtones and connotations those colors carry, namely anger and power and such. Pretty straight forward over all.

The second piece is about being totally isolated and alone. Using blues which have the connotation of being saddening and mellowing colours. This was more based on my internal anxiety towards how things were going between me an a certain person, and how I did not know how to interact with them so I shut them out. Which, when looking back, was a terrible idea. But hey, I was going under some emotional distress, but that will be hit upon in the next image. Besides that, the person in a box is a pretty standard composition; however, I had to convince my teacher that this was in fact a drawing and not a sculpture with a drawing inside. Luckily, she liked my explanation and accepted it as such.

The third and final piece of this pastel series is a much more personal image, and was not really a response to the assignment, but I turned it in anyways, and my teacher liked it. This was another piece about protection; yet unlike the one above, this deals with internal protection. Namely protecting those that are close to my heart and are extremely dear to me. Besides my family, my friends are the most important people in the world, and recently I lost one. No, not to death, but because of my own emotions regarding the girl. I left her a spot inside my chest, but I decided to not show her. (Originally, I was going to her her silhouette in the background as if it was leaving, but I didn't like how that looked within the composition) My eyes are closed so I don't have to see the world around me turning to a haze and fuzz and what not, with all of its chaotic misfortune. The arms are crossed over the chest cavity to try and keep the remaining people still inside so I don't lose anymore.

 Anyways, I did a lot of internal reflecting with this series, and I have discovered a little more about myself than I knew. I am afraid of loss, and most importantly, afraid of losing anyone close, and letting time go on. I will try and try to keep things the status quo, but so far that hasn't done any good to me.

Well, that's enough for emotional moping, next time I will post with something cheerier! 

(I mean it >.<)

till then, ta ta~

-Ben

Pasel Adventure

NEW SEMESTER = NEW MATERIALS! 

At least for drawing. We are using pastels for the opening project, and what most important is that this means colour! No more simple graphite and charcoal studies, no more still lives, it's concept and illustration time!

The first project is three part assignment. Well, actually two, but I'm pulling a third one out because I got super motivated for it.

This is going to be a self portrait, lets hope I can finish it in time!

RED: the color of aggression and violence, being confronted by purple, the colour representing protection

On a side note, I finally got around to making breakfast for my roommates, a wonderful plate of BACON!!!!!! We ate it along side our cereal. (It also made our room smell fantastic)

Such sizzling goodness. MMMMMMMMMMM!

That's it for now!
Ta~

So, so busy.

Sorry it's been so long since I last posted... almost a full month.

I've been really really swamped, so this is probably going to be a really long post.

Anyways, I'm no longer a complete freshman at MICA. I've sucessfully completed my first semester, with a GPA of 3.4 which puts me on the Dean's List! YAYYYYY

My finals were basically comprised of: a creation of totally brand new pieces, interviews, self evaluations, and no sleep. One would think that with all the time I put into my finals I would have documentation of them right? Wrong. I only have documentation of my drawing final, which I find  really strange.

MY Drawing Final!!!

My Drawing final was to use four sheets of large paper and create a piece based on "Changes." I chose to do changes in myself, using two extremes. How I was freshman year of high school and freshman year of college. These two self portraits were supposed to reflect a short summary of who I was at those times. (High school on the left, college on the right) The hands represented my main activities of each of these periods, High school being stage crew, and college is without a doubt art. the third pair I included was more a normal pose which I tend to rest my hands when thinking. The next part of the drawing is the multiple whit oil pastel gestures of myself in my various "art poses" or how I tend to stand when I'm working. And coming from the center weave is a line of red string that ends with a dangling figure, a representation of myself, completely lost and at the mercy of whatever comes. (normally a waft of air that makes him sway) There are also words scribbled onto two sides, the left has the message "work" repeated over and over because I used to be a complete work-aholic (I might still be) and the right has the word "crazy" repeated because I am probably going to drive myself crazy one way or another. And that is a really humbling/scary thought. 

Here are some close ups on it. So you can see details!

Top half, sorry that it's so yellow comparatively, That's just how the studio lights work. Always.

Bottom half, you can see the relation between the figure and the paper more clearly, as well as the random stitching I have holding tow of the large sheets together. Also, you can look at the hands.

my little dangler. I think he's the most rad part of the piece, even though it's probably the most unrelated part. I just wanted to have him dangle!

BESIDES FINALS.

I am home  for winter break!!!! While that is normally a good thing, for me it isn't. I have so much emotional stuff to deal with at home that I'm not really able to cope with, which I force myself to try and ignore. It's really a bad system, and partially why I am going crazy. However, I have been trying to think about those drak, dark thoughts which keep me up at night shivering and dying inside to myself. IF you actually are reading this, then congrats you know a part of me you didn't know before~!

Aside from that, is the main holiday of the season! HANUKKAH!!!! lol jk, I'm suppossed to be Jewish, but in all reality, I could care less. However, we do get to meet our friends from around the country who come visit in the spirit of the other great(ish) holiday, Christmas. (AH THAT'S TODAY!) and in that spirit, I accepted a comission from a family friend that had recently started playing...Dungeons and Dragons.

Here is her half elf/half human ninja, Lathraea.

I had fun with this, even though I feel like a complete lame ass for doing it... even more so because I knew what she was talking about when she was describing how she plays. As an often watcher of MICA'a Guild, I know most of the part of D&D, and I guess I finally should get around to joining a game... or should I keep my dignity intact and leave? 

AHH NAAAAHHHHHH those kids are awesome, and I love Warhammer 40k, I'm a bigger nerd than some RP-ers.

Well, that's it for now, I'll upload some figure drawings and other fun works of mine later. At least I finally have the time!

till next time~!

~Ben