art 300: composition

This second main assignment for my 2-dimensional design course had very SPECIFIC instructions for creating 5” x 7” Bristol paper panels. One geometric shape touching all four sides of the paper, one biomorphic shape touching all four sides of the paper, one biomorphic-geometric shape touching all sides of the paper and then variations of two shapes on the panel touching each other, not touching each other, overlapping each other, touching ALL or SOME edges of the panel, and so on. And we had to submit thumbnail sketches, and I was at an utter loss. And so I went back and read directions and studied examples. Oh! Funny but after I drew and painted my panels, I finally got feedback, like my thumbnails were all wrong and that I needed to read directions.

 

And got feedback that these halfway done shapes were looking good and don't forget to paint two coats of white on some of them...

I was most flummoxed on how I was going to compose the four panels of my geometric shapes. And I played around and liked some of the geometric "surprise" like when a white edge lined up with another white edge to form other geometric shapes. OH! That's why the instructor was so specific with shapes touching edges, and I felt like I was finally understanding ground--fore and back--while moving around panels and playing with composition.

It was so fun to paint and think about final shapes while working on this second main assignment that I went ahead and glued down 4 panels to a large sheet of Bristol paper which I then trimmed down. I've still got to touch up with more paint these panels and then photograph them again to adjust orientation and crop and see what lighting photographs best, but they're pretty much done. I was gonna try to use all 4 different geometric shapes, but chose the negatives of one of them because I loved how the white and black lined up with other panels.

On my biomorphic shapes, I ended up painting another 2 panels of the overlapping shapes, and so I've 2 extra panels to play with on the next main assignment. But I kept imagining flotsam and jetsam from a floating kelp forest on a Martian planet.

And I ended up painting the orange biomorphic and geometric variations with purple, which I later realized were the same colors as the Fed Ex logo...but I like it and think it will go well with the red and white and black in another composition which I know will be next but in a radial manner.

Just like with building a house, you never end up with perfect squares, and you jimmy construction, I had to do the same with these compositions and tried to hide lines where panels joined up with more gouache. I am hoping the photo app will hide the joint lines more.