Summer Show 2009

One of my promises I made to myself, regarding my plans for my “time off” (my “last” summer and working back home for a few months) was that I was going to enter some work into the Summer Show at the Art Gallery that I work at. New work, not a print off of something I had done in school or two years ago. And something that could possibly sell.

However, the challenge with creating art that would sell to the audience in my home is pretty… cliche. The things people here like are landscapes of farmer’s fields or still life of plants or fruits. And maybe a lamp made out of antlers (I’m not even kidding. This was actually a piece entered into the show last year). Not a lot of variety, nor is it subject matter that particularly interests me. So to challenge myself, as satiate the goal of making something salable, I wanted to do my own take on those cliched subjects.

I decided to do something I liked to use for some web design. Abstract shapes! Throwing some abstract swooshes or light shapes in the back of a website design isn’t anything new. But I really like doing them… I can do them for hours! They’re kind of relaxing for me. But instead of just having a unintelligible mass of swooshes, I wanted to see if I could use them to resemble something. In a way.

So, to combine the swooshes (do they have a term for them?) and the still life, I tired to do abstract takes on foliage and flowers. The upper one are takes on grass and leaves. The lower one, the one below is a take on flowers.

With this one, the first one is a rose, the second is tulips and the third is a daisy. I wanted them to refer to the subject, yet still be interesting shapes. The look pretty simple, but they took quite some time to do (I’m finicky)… but I enjoyed doing them, and I like how they look! Now I’m kind of reluctant to sell them…