Strokes of discrimination

Society can be cruel to those who differ from the social norms. An example of this would be the unfair treatment between whites and blacks, gays and lesbians, racism towards colored people, prejudice towards certain groups, you name it. This is what our community is like sadly. We have made small steps in history to now in creating a more accepting environment for everyone to feel safe.

For the next two paintings I created, I used the idea of segregation from the novel The Bean Trees by Barbara Kingsolver and as for the second painting I connected the social justice issue of sexual and gender identities to portray the actions of those against LGBTQ communities.

For the picture below, I used duck tape to assure there will be less paint seeping through the bottom to create paint marks in the white lines. This technique I used was not used in the book but I know from personal experience that masking tape isn't the best to work with when trying to create paintings with geometric shapes. 

 

Taping design process 

Painting and color choice process

For the choice of colors, I decided to stick with three simple and dark colors that hold special and deep meanings behind them. Black is a dark shade; we often interpret this color and connect it to sorrow, death, mystery, and grief. The color red is bold and vibrant. Right away we often think either simple things in life that are red or cynically to connect with blood, power, romance, and excitement. Finally purple is a subtle more calming shade that often sparks a more calming and civilized state of mind. Often connects to the scent and calming look of lavender. Sometimes the shade could be seen as a state of frustration and confusion. When I chose these three colors, I wanted to assure that there is a subtle side of how the painting appears in the end.  According to the book "The Painter's Eye Learning to Look at Contemporary American Art" , "The colors speak of moods-a precise arrangement of sounds...Bands of color unfolding like a melody."  (Greenberg and Jordan 49). This meaning, every color has a purpose in art. 

Roads of Segregation 

I named this painting "Roads of Segregation" because of the dividing lines and the different colors represent the sad and heart breaking idea of inequity between white and black people. The three colors have a deep meaning of depressing memories and I wanted to connect this to the novel The Bean Trees during the 1980s. Segregation was introduced in the novel The Bean Trees when Taylor was driving across the border to get Estevan and Esperanza safe to the Orthodox Church. "We must have been getting closer to the heart of the Cherokee Nation, whatever or wherever it was, because as we drove east we saw fewer and fewer white people." (Kingsolver 215).
To interpret this painting all at once, the lines represent the roads that segregate the differences of others mostly connected to racial indifference's for a communities' culture. Each color is a separate county but the colors code for the hatred of each group and the absence of acceptance of one another to become one whole county.

For my sixth painting, I decided to link the interpretation with the criticism against same-sex marriage and LGBTQ communities. I personally find this topic very unnecessary for people to disapprove and complain about. Our country was made for the point of having freedom yet some believe those of the LGBTQ community should be punished and harassed for whom they are. Since this topic is still pretty new, I figured I should depict how I feel towards our society and how gays and lesbians are treated.

Process of painting

Pictured on the left is the process of how I started my painting. For the visual effects, I was inspired from my book. I took part of the visual from a painting names Fez I. I slight messed up since I didn't think too much on the design, but I used duck tape to assure that paint would not go through masking tape and leave unwanted marks. I used the colors Crimson and Black instead of Forest Green and Lime Yellow because each color has a meaning and I wanted the colors to depict our society. The visual is not as noticeable in my painting because the lines do not meet in the center and I made a slight mistake of the color per line.

Frank Stella, Fez I, 1964 

As I read the book, I came across the Target with Four faces painting and my ideas instantly came to mind of finding the perfect representation of gay and lesbians. Seeing the target I thought of it as a way of being prey for hate groups against LGBTQ followers.
So after seeing that, I decided to make a target with seven rings to have each round represent the colors of the rainbow in support of each individual subsection for LGBTQ. So for the final painting, it came out to be a mixture of Fez I and Target with Four Faces. I wanted to emphasize this painting by showing fear and inequity of human beings and the book helped me describe this feeling in my paint by accenting highlighted features.

" A target can be found at a rifle range as well as in a shooting gallery." (Greenberg and Jordan 62)

Jasper Johns, Target w/ Four Faces,1955

That line from the book made me think of the final outcome of the painting by adding emphasis and bits of ridges to express the negative twist the painting portrays towards hating gays and lesbians.

I named my final painting "Target of Reality" because this is how I see our community treating others of LGBTQ members. The firsts positive movement of accepting those in the community was when some states in the U/S allowed same-sex marriage. This law was significant and helpful to others to feel free about expressing themselves without feeling ashamed. Not all states have approved this law. This has affected teens and adults who get bullied doe their sexuality based on pressure from the community, cultural beliefs, and family. Personally I don't judge others because I don't see what they are doing is a sin. To create the dramatic effect, I used an arrow to show that the Crimson and Black lines are people in society who attack and harass those who are different from the social norm. Four years later has not changed much and leading causes of depression and suicide is from the stereotypes, jokes, and assumptions humans make and hurt others mentally.

Target of Reality

To the left is the final painting. Crimson or Red showing the blood and wars that people fight through when bullied or being harassed. The color also shows dominance, meaning it can be interpreted as a way of peer pressure from other people. Black meaning death shows the sorrow and upsetting time period we have come to today for not accepting others for who they are.






Greenberg, Jan, and Sandra Jordan. The Painter's Eye: Learning to Look at Contemporary American Art. New York: Delacorte, 1991. Print

Although my fifth painting wasn't inspired from the book, I am going to try and move away from social justice issue topics to other topics that are not as intense and heavy on the mind to connect more with how to book sees art as a part of our daily lives.

If the only hint I gave for these two paintings were "society", how would you have interpreted the paintings? Is "Target of Reality" a pretty simple interpretation?

Leave a comment down below on what topics you think I should focus on next! :)

Digging deeper into Art

A piece of art can be interpreted in various ways. The less details shown, the harder one must think to make an understanding of what the artist was trying to show through the use of shapes, color, point of view, and how it could connect to either one's life or the community.

In these two paintings, I wanted to design a look that connected to the novel "The Bean Trees" By Barbara Kingsolver. One of my paintings was inspired by a painting from the book "The Painter's Eye Learning to Look at Contemporary American Art" By Jan Greenberg and Sandra Jordan. The other painting was a moral I understood from reading one of the chapters of The Bean Trees.

Andy Warhol, Campbell's Soup Can, 1964 silk screen canvas

My third painting I created to connect to The Bean Trees is a can of Dole Mixed Fruits. I was inspired by a simple painting of Campbell's Tomato Soup I found in The Painter's Eye Learning to Look at Contemporary American Art. 








When I first came across this painting, my first thought was "WHY?" Before reading the meaning behind why Andy Warhol painted this, I tried think of a reason of why a can of soup was important. My first intention of this painting was connected with hunger or poverty. The access to a can of tomato soup in a grocery store is highly obtainable, considering most are at most $1.00 each. Yet this wasn't how he interpreted his painting.

Why is this image so famous?
Warhol wanted people to be drawn to the fact that a big can of soup is displayed on a museum wall. As people analyze the painting, not much would come to our minds thinking of how this is significant. His reasoning for this was that, "...the shape of the can, solid and compact, pleasingly proportioned, the color of the label, the crisp contrast of red and white." (Greenberg and Jordan 81) all these attributes would change the point of view of someone walking down the soup aisle of a grocery store. He believed that the precise painting of a can and the use of basic details depicted how "our daily life are glorified by art." (Greenberg and Jordan 81). His last line of this paragraph I feel really ties in the whole understanding of why I painted.

After reading his interpretation of Tomato soup, I set my mind to find a meaningful representation of an issue in society to connect with a can of perishable foods. While I tried to think of connecting food to The Bean Trees, I didn't want the representation to be simple and straightforward like vegetables to relate with Turtle. I thought of the book as a whole of how the government is unreasonable towards immigrants like Estevan and Esperanza. After a hard 2 minutes of thinking, I came up with the idea of canned Dole Mixed Fruits. Warhol's last line was, "And that, in the end, is what it's all about." (Greenberg and Jordan 81) helped me realize that the idea of painting a can of fruit wasn't crazy. Having people realize that art is surrounding us helps them analyze objects more in depth to try and answer questions of how to solve problems in our society.

The DOLE reality

Why fruits you ask?

Fruits, so many different types grown in various ways. All of them taste different, some sweet some sour. I saw a can of mixed fruits important because everyone of the fruits no matter what flavor is sealed in a can. I saw this as a government full of diverse personalities and ethnic backgrounds. The topic of stereotypes and prejudice against certain racial groups are very crucial and important to me. I painted a can of Dole Mixed Fruits because I saw this as an opportunity to show that the government in the 1980s was unfair. The government not accepting "illegals" in the country made me very angry as I read the novel. The reason for Estevan and Esperanza being in the US is to find a safe hiding place to stay away from interrogations in the Guatemalan government. Having the government kick people out when they are in danger shows how cruel white people are towards people of color. The painting I created I wanted to show people that this is how our government, schools, communities, and neighborhoods should be like in order for there to be no harm towards one another. Art shows the DOLE reality of how our society is like.

For the color choices of this painting, I did not put much thought into the color of the fruits because many of the fruits on the main label are fairly similar in color; I mainly painted, red, yellow, orange, and a blackberry to show somewhat of a diverse community. My painting skill have not perfected much yet but some techniques I believe I could have done to make the can look more compact and slick would be adding tapes on the sides to have a smoother and straighter line to express the cylinder shape.

Process of Stippling definition 

Night Blooming Cereus 

The painting on the left is a part of my process of making the night blooming cereus.

For the stippling effect, I used the back of a new pencil to assure that the stamp of the flat rounded eraser would be noticeable to show texture and depth in the flower.

The shape of the flower doesn't have sharp edges because I wanted to show the soft and fragile appearance of how special it was to show the moral of appreciating what you have at the moment it’s there. 

I used the colors lavender, magenta, vibrant orange, red, forest green, light green, yellow, and jade green. I mixed these colors together to create a vibrant flower to capture the beauty of a night blooming cereus. After painting the flower, I didn’t want to leave the background blank so I used 3 different shades of green to represent the types of vegetables and importance of wisteria vines brought up in the novel. The choice of colors I used to create the painting are very vibrant because I wanted to show depth and the flow of emotions that was going on when Edna had shown everyone the flower. How I interpreted this scene was since the flower only blooms one night a year and the fragrance disappears when you cut the flower petals, the meaning behind this was to cherish what you have now even if there’s a possibility of you losing it. This applied to Taylor and Turtle’s relationship if Taylor had lost Turtle to the state orphanage for custody. 

*I originally made this painting for the art project of making a new cover for the novel, but I figured making a painting would show much more detail and meaning when one is analyzing my art.*

Although the book did not say anything about stippling effect for acrylic paint, the idea of stippling is simply shown in the front cover and in one of the paintings of visual effects. The stippling is not as clearly represented in this photo but, the dots are gradually darker as they go from left to right. The effect shows by giving off more detail and provides a strong structure of a realistic photo of a subject. 

Greenberg, Jan, and Sandra Jordan. The Painter's Eye: Learning to Look at Contemporary American Art. New York: Delacorte, 1991. Print. 

Overall, I feel like the interpretations I am making from my art are quite confusing but understandable after reading the text and taking apart each piece to analyze how I'm truly thinking. For my next paintings I will try to incorporate a part of modern society to assure that others can relate to the art or comment to help me improve my artistic view. 

Do you have any suggestions of what painting techniques I should try to improve the visual effects of my artwork?  

If the only clue I gave about my paintings were "The Bean Trees", how would you have interpreted the artwork? Especially my painting of the canned fruits! 

Leave a comment down below! (:

Artwork with meaningful interpretations

What is artwork with meaning behind it? In other words, what type of art is counted as meaningful instead of just copying a simple animated cartoon character from a show?


This last summer I was really interested in painting with acrylics but I'm not exactly the most artistic student you'll ever find. I painted very simple paintings that you could probably find online or I copied sea animals and scenery that I thought were pleasing to the eye. Over the summer I used painting as a stress reliever, I would paint all evening until the sun went down. Now as I look back, there were no true feelings or meanings I could pull from the artwork, all of them were straightforward with no depth or details included.


What's the point of art if there is no emotion behind it?
Every good artist should have a meaning or interpretation of some sort that can help others understand the painter's life or to connect within society. This question motivated me into becoming a better artist, I want to build a better foundation on how to use certain colors, symbols, and canvases to bring art to life by connecting it with society. That's why I decided to read The Painter's Eye Learning to Look at Contemporary American Art by Jan Greenberg and Sandra Jordan.

Summer Artwork

For my first blog post I decided to connect my painting with the most recent novel we just finished, "The Bean Trees" By Barbara Kingsolver.

I want my paintings to connect with the social justice issue presented through the book in a creative way. For the first painting I created to connect with the book was a painting of different types of cooked eggs.

EGGs-planation of Family 

Now why eggs? How does food have anything to do with social justice issues?












Think of it this way:
Eggs can be cooked in multiple ways, soft boiled, over boiled, over easy, hard boiled, sunny side up, over hard, over easy and much more. All eggs can be cooked in either way the person prefers. How i saw this was everyone in society is different but accepts all as one group or family. I connected this with all the characters of The Bean Trees. Taylor, Turtle, Esperanza, Mattie, Lou Ann, and Estevan. Six different characters with all different backgrounds are picked out of the same tree and all of them come together as a family (one whole egg).

As I flipped through the book, I came across a picture of hot dogs. There are five hot dogs lined up in a row painted on a canvas showing immense detail on small differences of each individual. Such as, the slight difference in sizes, the dollops of mustard, the markings and shading of the bun.

Wayne Thiebaud, Five Hot Dogs, 1961 Oil Canvas 

Now this picture may seem silly, one may ponder about how hot dogs are so significant. Thiebaud intended to make a twist in pictures of food, traditionally we would see pictures of a bowl of fruit or a vase of flowers, maybe even a baguette if one wished to paint such beauty. Simply these hot dogs reminded him of how he saw America. "Picnic, baseball, beach, campfire, circus, cheap, easy-to-eat, easy-to-cook, American. So hot dogs are cheap and mass-produced; you can afford one even when you're broke. But you usually eat them when you're having a good time." (Greenberg and Jordan, 40). Something so simple and accessible in an American's daily life style can bring happiness and good memories. When I first glanced at the photo I thought it was quite pointless without reading the text. After reading the interpretation, it helped me get a decent foundation on what I see and think of symbolically.

Fishing for acceptance 

 Throughout the whole novel there was only one reference to fishing mentioned...how is that even important?

Fish always get baited by a simple worm and get caught up with the tricks of us sly human beings. But what about humans? What do we fall for? Who baits us? 

Well society does, especially the embodiment of women. This social justice issue was a big role in The Bean Trees. Lou Ann was a big part of wanting to be the perfect house wife, with a great body, cleaning the house, caring for Dwayne Ray and Angel. But what does she get back? Negativity and shame from her ex-husband. She worries and feeds into trying to fit the perfect role of women in the 1980s. The hooks I painted to symbolize society and role models made for commercializing while the fish represent the women who try to loose weight (the hotel owner who is hoping to be a future mother) or fit in the role of what everyone expects. I did my best to use as little colors as I can to show that 'the fish' are all looking to be the same thing, no diversity, all baited into the hook and it makes them so called 'normal' when there should be women of all sizes being accepted, and recognized for all their efforts put in to the family. 

In this painting, I made sure that only two colors (aqua green and dusty blue) would dominate over the whole canvas. I did this because I wanted to emphasize the true meaning of how women are all similar if they followed society's rules. I wanted to mimic the outlined idea of using less colors and similar continuous patterns because, "By limiting his color and repeating the red shapes, Francis manipulates the way we look at the parts of this painting, as well as the way we read it as a whole." (Greenberg and Jordan, 64). After seeing the picture of Sam Francis's Big Red, I got my idea of connecting animals to humans as to how Barbara Kingsolver connected vegetables to people in Turtle's perspective. 

Sam Francis's Big Red 1953 Oil Canvas

Overall, I feel the most difficult part of painting on canvases was using different types of paints. I used oil paint on my egg piece and I found that it was much harder to work with because the drying  process was much longer than acrylic paints. I was inspired by some of the artwork inside the book and found a way to make the interpretation fit with my beliefs. Using the book The Painter's Eye Learning to Look at Contemporary American Art, I was able to understand the use of detail for color choice, symbolism, shapes, and connect them to how I see and interpret the environment around me. I was also able to comprehend the meanings behind the painting. By reading some of the background information of the examples given above, I decided to challenge myself in thinking more critically by trying to connect paintings to what we learned in class, how I see society, my beliefs, and other symbols that I can connect with nature.

Greenberg, Jan, and Sandra Jordan. The Painter's Eye: Learning to Look at Contemporary American Art. New York: Delacorte, 1991. Print.

What other social justice issues did you find important from the Novel "The Bean Trees" that I should express through my future paintings?

If the only clue I gave about my paintings were "The Bean Trees", how would you have interpreted the artwork? 

What did you envision? Leave a comment down below! (: