Mystery Art Closet

  For the second part of the lecture, we went to the library to find books for our secondary research. This would not only serve as a part of our artist research but also as background research which may be used to support our works (possibly as a bibliography). We were required to borrow at least two books which relate to our project and I had borrowed five books in total, three of which related to children’s book design (and artist) and the remaining of children’s toy design samples. I may visit the library in the future to find more necessary books as needed. For now, I would be prioritising with the illustration part of this project.  

 For today’s lecture, we have visited the Castle Gardens to sketch as a part of our primary research. While it may not directly have a major impact on my work, I observed the patterns and colours of nature as the setting for my children’s story both revolve around the oceanic setting and the forest setting.  Collage of the photos take during the trip  In these photos I have been focusing on the patterns of the objects nearby including the shapes of the leaves, trees and the bricks used in the buildings. I also looked at how there were complimentary colours on the plants, and how similar colours were present in nature. During my sketches I have realised that I could possibly use this shapes in the oceanic setting as well, in a way that corals can replace the shapes of trees and bushes. Otherwise I had attempted simplification on the animals to show the overall composition and texture of the animal while not making it complicated.  Sketches from the trip

 Below is the Major Project Form for this project:  Link to Major Project Plan  The detailed outline of my project can be seen in the plan pro forma including my SMART objectives, motivation and working timescale. Here is an excerpt of my timescale from the plan sheet: ————— Week Three:  Week Four: Initial Research (At least one Primary and Secondary), Material Sourcing, Further Sketching Week Five: [Skills Week] Start working on final pieces, research into the artists mentioned previously Week Six: Continue developing final pieces (ideal if 2D is finished by here), additional research on children’s toys Week Seven: Start finishing up final projects, additional primary research on background presentation Week Eight: Finish up any unfinished work, take photo of the 3D project, do mockups and photoshop as needed Week Nine: Preparation and presentation of final works (website and blog) ————— After this post, I will continue to post my primary researches (majorly materi...

    I have been looking into different materials to research for this project including different types of paper, paints and 3D materials. As I have not gathered materials for the 2D project yet, I will be discussing more into the 3D materials I have access to in this post.  Wood is a common material used in children’s toy that I had access to for this project. While plastic is a common materials as well, I neither do not have access to it nor the ability to shape it in the way I want. Wood has been a ‘natural’ medium that is (mostly) shatter and damage proof, which makes it an ideal materials for children who are prone to dropping objects and getting into accidents.   The current wood blocks are quite small, so I may have to go to the Wood Workshop to gather bigger ones and use this for practice. The wood type of this block is Pine wood, which is quite notorious for its simplicity and problems for carving. Only a select type of pine woods are suitable for ...

  Cover Illustration of ‘ The Hare’s Liver ’, illustrated by Ye Jung Jo   The Hare’s Liver, also known as The Story of the rabbit,  is a traditional Korean fairytale and a type of Aesop’s Fable (stories revolving around animal characters to teach moral to children) which criticises the division between the rich and the poor (between the royalty and the common folk during its time of creation) and how the weak can overcome crisis through wit and wisdom. Below is the overview of this story by KOREA.net (Ministry of Culture): ‘ As the story goes, the Dragon King, the king of the sea, was deathly ill. His subjects suggest that a hare’s liver could cure him, yet none of them are brave enough to venture onto land to get the liver— that is, until the turtle volunteers. Once ashore, the turtle finds a rabbit and persuades him to visit the underwater kingdom, where great riches, beauty, and honor—the turtle claims—await. The rabbit agrees.   Back underwater, in the audience o...

  To start the project, I have had my tutorial to further discuss on what I will be doing in this term. My tutor and I have discussed the contents of my project with the SMART Objective post I have uploaded, which now has minor revisions in phrasing to make my project more clear, and discussed some techniques and materials that I could use in my project.  Link to Sign Off Sheet    As this project will be working around children’s books and toys, it would be important to adjust my art styles to suit a child’s mind. Children tend to have shorter attention span and have to avoid intense stimuli (too bright colours, intense patterns, flashing and such) so a major factor to consider in this project is to create a straightforward and tame work. To do this, I will be researching into illustrators who have worked on children’s books and toy designs, followed by experimentation on which materials will be suitable in context of this project (Korean culture).

  We continued on to create some basic sketches to develop basic studies in relation to what styles we may be using for final projects. As I am planning to create illustrations (and toys) for children, I studied on how to exaggerate expressions and simplification which would be more comprehensible for children. Textures, and by extension the simplification and repetition of patterns, will be another factor to consider to give this project more depth and to incorporate the oceanic theme (wave patterns, light patterns on the surface of water and such) into my illustrations.   I have made quick simplistic portraits of the people nearby, emphasising on basic shapes and structures of the face. This would help me in the character design (renewed character design of an existing children’s book to be more specific), and would also help me integrate different elements to characters including human-like animals or element-based characters. Brining animal characters to life would be...

 I do not believe that every single piece of artwork that an artist creates have to have a ‘world-breaking viewpoint’ or ‘some sinister, unforeseen deeper meaning’ to it, that I believe would make the art world become even further from the general audience, and I still strongly believe that art is still about what we want to see, create and draw. Art is not always about creating a large impact to society; art can start off small, from little doodles you create for your parent or the messy scratches you create to express your feelings. It is about showing who you are, and on the way you will slowly develop your techniques to create an influence over your viewers, starting as making their day a bit brighter. That, I believe is the essential core that I believe in art and is aiming to achieve in my works; I do not want to create one-off dramatic works that fade like fireworks, but to create a strong and stable work, to build a story, that can make the little differences in people. Chi...

Theme: Oceanic S (Specific):  Children’s book concept illustration pieces and 3D figures related to it M (Measurable):  Four illustrations and two 3D figures (children’s toy set) A (Attainable):  8 weeks of work time R (Results-Oriented):  Work with creating and formatting illustrations to industry standards, work fluently in creating 3D works T (Time-Bound):   8 weeks I will be creating four concept illustration pieces and two 3D figures (children’s toy set) in relation to traditional Korean cultures related to the ‘Oceanic’ theme, specifically the Korean children’s story ‘Byeol Ju Bu Jeon’ (Hare’s Liver).  I believed that this project would closely relate to my subject area and myself as not only would I attempt to integrate Korean fairytale into this project, therefore relating to my background, but children’s story is a common tradition and culture in Korea and many other countries, building a type of familiarity between the target market even if they m...

  Like how we were given three themes to work off of in Art Portfolio One, we were again given three themes to develop our ideas. I feel like they are quite similar to the general ‘idea’ of the themes from last term, where it is composed of one abstract theme which is up for interpretation, one art movement or painting style and the last theme being of nature or Earthly themed. The three themes that were given to us were: Spiders from Mars, Renaissance and Oceanic.  Oceanic theme was the first and most attractive theme that had caught my eye; ocean or water-related themes were quite common in Korea, so I had thought that I would be able to integrate parts of my culture into this theme. My initial thought process involved integrating ocean-based mythology into this project, which later developed into integrating oceanic children’s tale (one that I have thought of was ‘별주부전‘ [Byeol-Ju-Bu-Jeon], a story of a oceanic turtle and a rabbit). I had also taken a more direct approach to...

  Welcome back to this blog for Art Portfolio 2 form Term 3 2023, with the progression route towards Graphic Design (Illustration). In this term module, we will be focusing on a more 3D-based projects in contrast to last term.   In this term, I would like to achieve a better formed schedule (time management), which will naturally help me create better researches and results, and to create works that may better suit the professional standards. One major problem I had struggled with in Art Portfolio 1 was my lack of time management; while I was able to finish all my researches and works, I could not help but feel pressured and rushed as I reached the submission date. I also noted that some of my final work, especially my mockups, lacked in quality compared to other outputs so I would have to take extra care to keep the quality consistent to create satisfactory work. One major difference that I would like to make compared to the last term is to show more experimentation with...