< PreviousJOURNAL 210 211 JOURNAL Painting, Drawing and Mixed Media | Prof. Rossana Pinero PDM 270 Intermediate Painting PDM PIA KRISTINA KARLSSON Maybe because of the times that we are facing...in this work I wanted to create a positive and bright picture of a future. A young woman in a car on the road somewhere. Alone but free. You don’t know where she is coming from and not where she is going. It shows a time when I was young, a period after the war when prosperity increased. The late 50s and early 60s when the youth culture was born. A time when adolescence became an accepted step between being a child and an adult. It was the American dream, Jack Kerouac, James Dean, Brigitte Bardot, Rock n Roll, Mc Donald’s, big cars, and a new fashion. Everyone had a positive future belief, even me. For my project, sources of inspiration were the American artist Edward Hopper. His paintings showing realistic depictions of loneliness but to me it does not mean hopelessness. Hopper often painted lonely women who dream away. The environments are empty and quiet and the light plays a major role in them. His pictures make me wonder what has the person been up to? What does the person think of and what will be the next step? I don’t think it matters if an image is abstract or figurative. It must say something to get the viewer to think based on their own knowledge, experience and feelings. I want my paintings to be simple but still say something. I want them to be bright with a lot of colors. In my painting I try to show something of myself. Often by myself but never alone. Never still always on the way to new goals and always with a positive attitude. Like the woman in my painting I can do whatever I want. I am free. I have been in Florence all throughout this covid-19 crisis, I have continued to paint and create and this has set my mind and myself free! JOURNAL 212 213 JOURNAL Earlier in the semester, I did a research project on the artist Lukaz Wodynski. His art was harsh, bruised and bloody, people screaming in despair, bodies twisting in mud and pigment, faces composed of thick paint like some primal expression of tragedy. But what struck me about his work was not this focus on existentialism. In fact, it was just the opposite. Even as Wodynski tried to explain the horrors of the human psyche, and the basal fear that he sees as a driving force, he could not avoid also capturing the hope and interconnectedness that we rely on to keep going. This hope, this need to reach out in times of fear to find someone, anyone, to go through our darkest moments is what has inspired my latest work. With the spread of coronavirus and the major shift of daily life to a contemporary quarantine and a future more uncertain than ever, hope was what I needed. When I paint, my entire being goes into the conception. To paint sadness is to embody it. To paint loneliness is to crave in every brushstroke the comfort of another person. To enhance the emotional quality of the work I push myself to dive further into its point of inception. This has led me to get lost in my head, depressed and isolated, disgusted with my work, unable to separate catharsis from spiraling. Going into this painting, the last thing I wanted to do was put myself in a position to dwell on the darkest parts of my mind when instead I could accept the situation as a new opportunity, a new chance for growth. So instead I focused on hope. An arm outstretched, extended into an unknown. The patchwork of colors on the arm simultaneously playful and bruising, the background soft and unknowable, were a way for me to explore what hope in this moment looked like for me. And this painting marks the beginning of that exploration. Painting, Drawing and Mixed Media | Prof. Rossana Pinero PDM 270 Intermediate Painting PDM SOPHIA STRENAJOURNAL 214 215 JOURNAL My art inspiration is always from principles in my life. I believe that people will live happily and qualitatively if we have our own moral rules and understand things around us, especially people. As a Buddhist, I have been taught to believe in logic and rational. Things will happen based on our own actions. Throughout my paintings, I have chosen the subject matter that conveys messages to make people think and realize something. My works featured here are related to the reflection of personalities in each essential element: Water, Fire, Air, and Earth. From ancient Greek mythology, people believe that the four elements are the foundations of life and its spirituality and it also explains human behavior. People will contain all four elements but one of them will be the predominant personality. Each element has both strengths and weaknesses, and when one is over or underactive, you feel the imbalance in your life. Painting, Drawing and Mixed Media | Prof. Rossana Pinero PDM 270 Intermediate Painting PDM SIRIWAN MINK KITTITHUMKULJOURNAL 216 217 JOURNAL Painting, Drawing and Mixed Media | Prof. Martin Figura PDM 340 Advanced Drawing I: Observation and Interpretation Physically Here, pencil and acrylic, 35x50cm I think isolation is important for an artist or any person. It helps you clear your mind; you can have a little talk with yourself, your feelings, ideas, process, etc., but what happens when isolation becomes an obligation? Most of our ideas come at unexpected times, shower, dinner with friends, walk in the park etc., creative individuals find that the environment provides them with the context for creativity. After having that “Aha moment “we isolate ourselves and time and space to grow and develop our idea. When we are forced to isolate ourselves and try to find creativity with only one perspective, you will only have a small picture of reality. What we instead need is a broad picture of the work to be done. I do think the environments you frequent affect your ideas to thrive. We should immerse ourselves in the environments, communities, and spaces where you can be inspired the most. We increase our creative ability by learning from others by collaborating and sharing. If you surround yourself by artists your creativity and capacity to create new things will defiantly grow. What is affecting us right now is not the isolation but the thinking we HAVE to be isolated because there is a virus outside making people sick. When we focus our attention and energy on that, we block any source of creativity that could have come. This is from my personal experience. If isolation expresses pain and fear of being (forced to be) alone, loneliness expresses the “glory of being alone” precisely because it unfolds new possibilities of connecting with ourselves and with others. Consequently, the challenge is to turn our isolation into a shared solitude. How? Thinking, dreaming, reading, writing and presenting our thoughts to others. This exchange is the only thing that can provide a sufficient counterbalance to our melancholy and prevent us from falling into depression.All over the world we share the same fears and the same threats, but also the same hope: to be able to start again after the coronavirus, and to behave and act in a much more responsible and caring way. PDM ANA LUCIA CARDENASJOURNAL 218 219 JOURNAL PHO This social isolation period has prompted new ways of living, new ways of thinking and new ways of creating. The world is no longer at our fingertips, but we can create a new word through our fingertips. I would be lying if I said I feel more motivated or inspired to create during this isolation. People are what fuel my interests and drive me to create. Social interactions are at the core of my work. During this time, I am finally alone in my head, that I must find a new way to persevere in my work. Isolation calls for self-reflection. What am I doing? What do I want to be doing? These questions have led me to self-betterment in the last few weeks. Though it has not been easy. The struggle of not only finding physical space to work, but in finding something I want to work on, has been ongoing. It seems as though there is all the time in the world, but with bare minimum motivation. It feels like a sick irony. With that, I have still continued to create to the best of my abilities, despite my lack luster toward creation in general. The individual, as well as the world, needs creativity now more than ever. It is during this time that we notice all of the things we had been previously missing. For me, it is alone time. It is working through my thoughts before allowing the opinions of others to influence them. This has led to personal and intimate sketches and journaling that I had not produced before isolation. I have learned that creativity does not come without a push and a desire to create. It is through this realization that I am coming to terms with the way the world changes. I am coming to terms with the fact that creativity is a difficult but necessary part of everyone’s lives. Painting, Drawing and Mixed Media | Prof. Martin Figura PDM 340 Advanced Drawing I: Observation and Interpretation Grown older, oil pastel, 23x32cm ELIZABETH ACIERNONext >