End-of-year Reflection

  My two years of creative arts have been very fun. Im looking forward to next year as well! this year i confronted a lot of mediums that i used to despise, such as acrylic paint and clay. Ive learned that i should try everything at least once, and try to have a positive attitude towards anything that comes into my life. I am going to take this lesson with me for the rest of my life, and try to stay as open minded as i can possibly be. Next year in art i am going to try to be even more adventurous in my artistic endeavors. 

   Plus, my book is coming along well and i'm excited to work on it over the summer!

Time Capsule

Since the beginning of the school year, Ms Kiick has been preparing us for a time capsule project, and it has finally come around! The box itself was to represent ourselves, at this time in our lives, to the fullest. As this past year has been a particularly spiritual adventure, i wanted to keep my box simple but powerful, using a lot of violet(color of Amethyst, enlightenment, and the highest-vibrating color in our visible color-spectrum) and eyes!

Only i know what lies inside the box! Mystical forest treasures and strange codes! But what if someone else discovered my treasure box in the next twenty years? 

                 The Last Crystal

      The year is 2034. Sometime in the middle of the year 2025, a mass economic and environmental collapse ocurred worldwide. The people of today's world refer to this as "the Crash". The world's population was sliced in half, due to nuclear warfare and extreme levels of radioactivity. The United States has become a barnaric wasteland, and a battleground for he who tries to re-conquer the land. People have reverted back to a kind of primal state, but they are barely surviving in an unnatural, destroyed world. 

    There are very few forests left, almost all of America was industrialized and urbanized before the Crash occurred. The air in our atmosphere has been brown since 2020. I am currently wearing  a very old gas-mask from the 1990's, this is one of my key elements of survival. 

    I found some plant seeds and have stolen plants from various stores in order to begin my garden. The soil outside is too radioactive to plant anything in, so my garden is inside a greenhouse. I dont think i could have lived without coming across this home i am in. It's in a very rural area in New Jersey. Whoever lived here before me was probably a zombie-apocolypse prepper, as i have found: 

 -a gas mask 

 -2 years worth of food in a hidden room

 -countless amount of unused batteries

  -4 automatic guns, a good supply of bullets

   -this green house with seeds, fresh soil in bags, and large barrels of water.

   -hatchets and hammers and instruments-of-protection galore

   -The Anarchist Cookbook

   -several books on surviving the apocalypse, zombie apocalypse, and economic crisis

    -approximately 30 lighters scattered about the house 

   This guy had it all, and i am extremely grateful to have found this amazing little place for myself, away from most of the craziness of the cities. The nearest possible humans are on the other sideof the surprisingly large forest that this house is hidden in, about 7 miles away. 

    Today i have observed my plant seeds have grown to a decent size. I have planted tomatoes, strawberries, an apple tree, basil, ginger, and potatoes.

    As i looked over my plant progress, i noticed something i hadn't noticed before peeking out from under the soil in the one unused planter spot. I reached into the dirt and pulled up a puzzling fossil: a light-feeling box, kept together with packing tape. The drawings were wearing away, but it was still distinguishable that the patterns were of eyes. The eyes looked wise and calm. 

   I got a knife and ripped off the packing tape. What i found inside made my heart skip a beat. 

    Phone numbers, addresses, drawings, a broke-in-half blue egg, a tooth of some sort, and a piece of quartz crystal. 

   The items were so organic, so natural and... Relieving, i suppose. In a world where barely anything organic is still alive and present, something about these items in this strange box felt sacred to me. I hadn't been so overwhelmed with emotion in months, i was caught off guard with feelings of joy, nostalgia, and human connection. This was me connecting with whoever left the box here, seeing what was important to them. It was the first real connective feeling i had felt in years. The crystal was beautiful. It had to be one of the last crystals in existence. (in 2030, the earth lost all it's precious gems and crystals to an experimental energy solution, but it did not work and all the crystals were smashed and incinerated, they are very rare now.) 

    I cherish this box now, especially the Quartz. I charge the small crystal in the sunlight and think of it as a good luck charm. The things i found in this box give me hope for our planet and humanity, something that i almost lost. 

   

Dream World

I have spent my life falling in and out of sleep; in and out of this real world and my dream world. Sometimes my dreams seem so realistic that i question what realm i'm in.

    For some reason all of my dreams seem to be set in the same few places: a strange underground world that is accessed to through a locker/elevator, a small run-down house, in a car usually with someone i know in person, or in a forest, all at night time. 

  The worst part about having an over-active imagination, is sleep. My mind runs rampant in the night, and can run into some of my darkest memories and wildest fears. This is where i lose control, and nightmares happen. They are still set in the same places, but more darkly-lit and erie looking. Just the mood of the places in my nightmares is stressfull and scary. Sometimes my nightmares have been so bad that i cant sleep, and cry. 

   Lately i have been trying to master the art if lucid dreaming, in order to gain control of my sleep and mood again. I have been having less nightmares lately and getting better and more rejuvenating sleep. I hope to one day go deeper into my dream world and see what my mind really has to offer creatively.

  

Fortune Cookie Inspired Collage

Materials used: Sharpie, pen, acrylic paint, watercolor, colored tissue paper

   We were given 10 fortune cookies, and had to use our fortunes to create a collage! Most of my fortunes had to do with staying calm, being patient, and being comfortable. Also, one of the "Speak Chinese" words was "house", and that's what gave me the house idea.

   A home should be a comfortable, safe place. With this piece I wanted to express how much I love my own home, it's my only true sanctuary from the world. The second I get home after a long day and put my bag down, I feel a calm settle over me. In my house, I can truly focus on the positive: my patience, my genuine happiness, my comfort. I hope that everyone has a true home that they can depend on for comfort and safety, regardless if it's an actual house or not!

Pop Art Print

Materials used: Sharpie and acrylic paint, rubber stamp

     To me, the word "pop" doesn't only mean "popular", but also "exciting" and "bright". This project was simple but fun, and I got to take advantage of BIC and Sharpie's old and new colors! I wanted something vibrant and fun, but also strange with "off" elements in it. I didn't want just a happy rainbow mess. The stamp of the eyeball I made was to represent the Third Eye, a spiritual concept of an all-seeing, all-conscious eye that lies within all of us. If you would like to learn more about the idea of the Third Eye, check out this great and clear explanation HERE 

Celebrity Artx3 Collage

               Materials used: sharpie, acrylic paint, gesso, pen, magazine cut outs and glue

    When I think of celebrities and the "glamorous life" that they appear to live, I think of scandal, ruined lives, unstable people and drugs. Fame screws people up tremendously, and if a person is in the spotlight, the entire world sees their mistakes. It's hard to live a comfortable, stable life, when a person is always on the move and using up every bit of their energy to entertain. I sympathize with those who can handle this lifestyle.

The Blue Collection

All the creative arts classes brought in blue objects and put them all in a big pile to create a big blue collection.Blue was the color chosen by the votes of the students.

I love this picture because it shows American culture in today's world; painkiller meds, shaving razors because of our obsession with hairless bodies, everything probably made in China, food with nutrition information all over. It's a strange, artificial world were living in,but it's definitely colorful.