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Taylor Coleman

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Studio Plan Draft

 

Memories are funny in the way that you want to share them but you need to share them with the right people. I know I’ve been in situations where I’ve told someone a memory and they just didn’t find it as funny or meaningful. You know, one of those you-had-to-be-there moments. In my work, I’m looking to invite the viewer into my memories visually.

Throughout the spring semester, I will be creating one digital memory drawing based on place and memory. These memories will be based on my relationship that I keep very private and focus on memories that are candid and quiet yet meaningful. They are not memories that would normally be shared but rather unspoken memories that define the relationship. I will upload four in progress drawings per week as well as the final drawing. I will also include feelings, colors and objects associated with these candid moments. I will log these feelings for more accurate portrayals. This log will be the basis of my research for the summer studio session. I will be looking for feedback from my peers and asking myself which five digital paintings are the most successful in terms of colors, feelings and portrayal of a memory.

Eventually over the summer I will choose five of my digital memory paintings to use as inspiration for five large paintings. Originally, my plan for the summer show is to hang the paintings horizontally with the smaller digital painting underneath each painting. These paintings were going to be abstract representations of those memories using only the colors, shapes and feelings that I had logged and used in my digital painting. Now, I have decided to use my digital paintings as sketches and recreate them on a larger scale as oil paintings. I am hoping to finish one painting per week. That means I will have five paintings in total to hang for the summer show.

There are a few mentor artists that I have chosen for inspiration. Fredrick Church was an American Hudson River landscape painter that worked with Thomas Cole in his house. Church created paintings that were very realistic but also emotionally engaging. He took a systematic approach to his paintings, sometimes returning to the landscape over the course of a few years. I really liked the way that he used light and mist in his paintings. They’re very captivating. I’m not sure if I could create paintings like these. He took his time with his paintings, which is one thing that I can not do at this time. His paintings made me feel like traveling to the specific place but it didn’t make me feel like I was there or that I could feel the emotion. That is what I am trying to portray in my digital paintings. I am trying to invite the viewer into a memory in a non-intrusive way, almost like they were walking by. His paintings were also inspiring in the way that they captured light and created space in his paintings. To me its as if he was inviting me into his own memories.

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I’ve been moving along with my research in my sketchbook. I have spring break coming up next week and just spent the last weekend by myself in Massachusetts painting and journaling. Its a very different experience when you are alone. Recently, I painted at a friends house and she asked “How do you do that?!” when she watched me paint. I responded with “I don’t know! It’s almost as if my brain shuts off because you’re here.” Other people distract me, they occupy my thoughts unintentionally. I can still paint, but I was painting from an image. So this was different. When I’m painting something new or from my imagination, I can’t talk to anyone. They can’t be around because I can’t separate the thoughts. They can’t be organized. Kind of like when I try to do math in my mind. It gets jumbled up and I get flustered. That’s one thing I’ve noticed since spending the weekend by myself. When creating my own paintings, I need to be alone. When recreating an image, I can still focus when other are near me or talking to me because I see it, I don’t need to visualize it. I’ve also been very stressed out lately, which got me in a painting funk. I didn’t want to create anything. But the temperature is rising and I just need to be outside!!!

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For my second visualization, I created a web of words that are related to my research topic of Place and my literature review information. The five big ideas within my literature review are memories, environment, the classroom, interdisciplinary value and place-based education. When dealing with place, these five words are closely related to how students can perform better within their classroom and community. I have been learning a lot about place-based education and how understanding the students community and  personal memories can lead to students that are more engaged and interested in the work they are doing. I kept the same format as my first visualization, placing the big ideas in their own colored blotches of paint and the words that are associated with them within the blotches. They are also specifically placed. Some words are in the middle of blotches while others are closer. I did this because, based on my research, I feel that they work together to further my research.

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This is one of my favorite memories. Alex and I went on vacation to Disney World after graduation. While we were there, I got an email that at 5pm I would receive my score report for one of my certification exams. I was worrying about it for hours. He made me an ice cream sundae while I worried and then I found out I passed! We decided we should celebrate, but it started raining! So we made the best of it and danced to our favorite songs all night!

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I chose Frederic Church as my second mentor artist. Church was an American Hudson River landscape painter that worked with Thomas Cole in his house. Church created paintings that were very realistic but also emotionally engaging. He took a systematic approach to his paintings, sometimes returning to the landscape over the course of a few years.

I really liked the way that he used light and mist in his paintings. They’re very captivating. I’m not sure if I could create paintings like these. He took his time with his paintings, which is one thing that I can not do at this time.

His paintings made me feel like traveling to the specific place but it didn’t make me feel like I was there or that I could feel the emotion. That is what I am trying to portray in my digital paintings. I am trying to invite the viewer into a memory in a non-intrusive way, almost like they were walking by.