Coursework process photos (Fairy Godmother)

This is part 02 of my coursework progress photos.

This part is on The Fairy Godmother.

I created the basic shape of a cake but cutting the shape out on cardboard and folded it into the cake shape. I used masking tape to tape the whole thing together so it would not fall apart.

I paper-mached the cardboard cake so that it would be easier to paint on and would create a softer look for the cake (without the edges).

I painted the cake a rather plain colour so as to not attract too much attention from what was actually meant to be discovered. I used paper clay to create a 3D/pop-up feel for the chocolate frosting. I had painted on the chocolate frosting, it would not have looked as appealing and as realistic.

The above few are various ways I thought I could have arranged the lizard around/on the cake.

I decided to just place the lizard in the most prominent place so that it would be quite obvious. However, I painted the lizard the same colour as the chocolate frosting to not only make the lizard seem like it is part of the frosting, but also to slightly camouflage it. So there is another irony for you! The bright red strawberry was to distract the audience from noticing the lizard too quickly. Did it work?

I spray-painted a plate and a set of cutlery gold to create a high-class and elegant feel that would suit the classic Fairy Godmother. Also, what refined Fairy Godmother would eat with her hands? This creates an irony when the audience realised that she is using these "refined" cutlery to eat lizards.

I sketched the Fairy Godmother on the plate so as to make her seem like a narcissistic person, a person that only thinks about herself. This seems like a major contrast to the actual Fairy Godmother who seems like a generous person and let Cinderella go to the ball with no conditions what-so-ever (except that she has to return by midnight of course)

I modified the features of the Fairy Godmother to be slight mean and evil, which is of another contrast to the actual Fairy Godmother. I painted her using acrylic colours, trying to create the exact colours of the actual Fairy Godmother. Did I succeed? :D

This was taken before the hands were painted in, but it was the only photo I had of the painted plate.

Above few are different ways I thought of placing colourful rubber lizards around the plate and cutlery.  I chose the last one because I liked how the lizards are not only placed around the cake and the plate but also on the fork and spoon. This not only makes the fork and spoon more like they are part of the ensemble but also makes it as though the Fairy Godmother wants to stab the lizards and spoon them into her mouth. This makes the lizards a less distant part of the work.

I am actually rather proud of this work, especially when someone tells me how they like my Fairy Godmother or how they thought my lizards were interesting. I enjoy when my audience enjoy my work :D It makes me happy when my art is understood and is attractive to the viewers. 

End of part 02 (The Fairy Godmother)

Coursework process photos (Little Mermaid)

This is part 01 of my coursework process photos because I wanted to organize my photos according to each fairy tale character that I worked on (Just like I did in my prep work). Also, I had too many photos to put all of them into one post and I do not really know how to work Picasa (or blogger), to be truthful. =.=

This post is on The Little Mermaid.

This seashell bowl is specially designed for the Little Mermaid.

I stuck seashells of different shapes and sizes onto a wok using blutack, then I smacked clumps of plaster to create the rocky coral feeling. Instead of creating a smooth porcelain-like bowl, I thought creating one that looks like it came from under the sea seems more appropriate for the Little Mermaid.

I painted the seashells a pink/purple colour to bring out the femininity of the Little Mermaid (also because it was similar the seashells that the Little Mermaid was wearing, which were purple in colour). The bowl is painted with various hues of green and blue to create a nice sea  coral colour.

I used one of the smaller seashells and the stick part of a paintbrush and hot glued them together to form the spoon for the Little Mermaid. I wanted the Little Mermaid to have a spoon so that she would seem more refined as she is a princess and all (This seems a bit ironic when she is all refined but still eating a jellyfish, a fellow sea creature).

How they look together :D

I filled aluminum cupcake cups with smooth liquid plaster and stuck a toothpick into each when the plaster was drying. When the plaster dried, I glued 1/2 a 7-inch styrofoam ball onto the toothpick. And TADA my cupcakes were born! One of the plaster filling was corroded by the glue so I had to throw it away though. But luckily, it was my spare one!

These were the base colour of my jellyfish cupcakes. I created a slight gradient because it looked more appealing.

My sketch of the jellyfish pattern on the cupcake. I was really scared I ruined it D:

I used red and a bit of magenta to paint out the pattern of the jellyfish :D I am happy I didnt really ruin it!

As for the other jellyfish, I glued a floral decoration thing (that I am not sure what it is called), that I painted a slight pinkish colour, onto the top of the cupcake. The floral decoration piece looked a bit like a coral and created a similar feel to the actual pattern of the jellyfish. However, I only managed to complete this jellyfish cupcake on the submission date and I hadn't taken a photo of it yet. Sorry!

All in all, I think I enjoyed making these few works especially the seashell bowl and spoon, as they required a variety of materials to work with and was quite a new experience to me :D A lot of people also said they wanted to bring the seashell spoon home which made my heart warm and fuzzy! And many could tell that my cupcakes were cupcakes and my brother knew they were jellyfish patterns so I am really glad I managed to create works that could appeal to my audience.

End of part 01 (The Little Mermaid)

Miss michelle and her art

"Pocketful of Sunshine"

Pen, Coffee, Watercolours on Handmade Envelopes
52.0cm x 21.5cm

Pocketful of Sunshine, a series of illustrations on handmade envelopes, was produced as a visual travelogue, in a response to a volunteer expedition to Borong-Polok Paper Making Unit on the Sikkim Himalayas in India.

"In just 2 weeks, a strange bond was forged between myself (as a volunteer) with the villagers- and it was a warm and indescribable feeling I've never experienced in my life. I came back to the fast paced Singapore feeling recharged, exceptionally happy and missing everyone from Borong.  I imagined myself writing long letters to my new friends, and on hindsight, it felt that it'll require more than a regular sized envelope to capture the smile of the sun for my dear friends with big hearts residing in the humble village. Hence, these odd sized envelopes, with illustrated memories, were made to hold the never ending letters I'd write to these wonderful souls." - Miss Michelle

Absurd Tragedies of Life
A series of Illustrations/Studies for the book, The Scene Unfold
Mixed Media (charcoal, graphite, colour pencil, pyrography, etc.)
2008

"Absurdity strikes yours truly not only in “any street corner”, but also in every corridor and walkway in her very own “cozy” dwelling THEY call a “home”."

"We are all participants in this theatre of the absurd. The constant need to define and explain ourselves for each action taken, the repetitive struggle for impractical goals and naive expectations, is utterly illogical. In this “sense”(does it even make sense anymore?), people, in their absent-mindedness, fail to remember the human condition of individuals. Parents especially, have a tendency to enjoy the engagement with societal pressure in maintaining jobs and other materialistic aspects of life that they tend to overlook emotional and holistic upbringing of their children. They find the need to conform and breed children and correct their behaviour in their own methods, in order for the “micelings” to survive in this ridiculous rat race."

"The Scene Unfold: Absurd Tragedies of Life challenges and mock the effects of the rat race on THEM , as I find that they create this facade to fit into society, for their reputation. As a result, I realised that I have become a product- THEIR “packaged product”. I see the scene unfold in my tragic experiences with THEM and I have accepted and learnt to work my way around in the tragedies of this senseless stage show."

"*THEY/THEIR/THEM refers to parents, in general, Asian parents."

- Miss Michelle

All of the above is taken from www.michywitchy.weebly.com, where you can find more pictures on the above works and more artworks that Miss Michelle have done.

Miss Michelle is our art technician who recently joined in our big ART family this year. She is fun, amazing, outspoken and totally cool :D

But what is most cool about her is her art. Miss Michelle is probably one of the few people I know that actually works with so many different mediums, like pen, watercolour, colour pencil, charcoal, book binding and screen printing and etc etc. Her art has so many different varieties and each one somehow has an interesting story behind it. Having her explain to me some of her artworks or exhibitions she puts up really sparks my interest and makes me really excited for reasons I do not even know! (It also calmed my nerves because I had to do my viva voce that evening!). I never experienced or came in touch with even half of what she has and that made me really excited to even think about trying out new ways and mediums to create art, instead of drawing and painting.

Miss Michelle explained how she met different people during trips to India and such, and how she incorporated what she had seen, what she had done and who she had met into her artworks, like in "Pocketful Of Sunshine". It made me feel that her works are very personal ones, and not just some artwork that I see in art exhibitions and in galleries. I felt that having the artist actually telling us the background story is very personal and sincere and I prefer it instead of going to the gallery and trying to guess what some artwork actually means. Somehow, that way makes the artworks feel very cold and distant and does not touch my heart at all. That is one thing good about Miss Michelle and her works: she explains them in her quirky ways, tells us what she had felt then and that made my heart really warm to see how an artist can be so enthusiastic towards her work :D

Miss Michelle also seems to be very knowledgeable and in touch with the art scene in Singapore. She showed us exhibitions she held, gatherings she organized and even the fleas she participated in. It made me feel as though the Singapore art scene is not so small anymore! She even told us about this gathering where random people can just sit in and do some craft work like knitting or crocheting and how it is like a mini art community, where everybody can learn about different craftwork from others and be exposed to different people who hold an interest towards art. She said the gathering was to raise awareness about craft and how craft is also a form of art.

Miss Michelle has exposed me to different forms of art and craft and has let me experience a very personal introduction to her works. She has inspire me to want to explore and experiment with all types of mediums, try out different ways to create and make art a very simple and personal thing that can liven up my life. I am motivated to make art close to my heart and I thank Miss Michelle for what she has done, even though I think she does not really think much of what she has done.

Many many thanks to Miss Michelle Lim and I just want to dedicate this post to you :D

Make my tummy go GROWL!

Just looking at all these food makes me hungry!

Kim Burke masterfully combines design and art with my favourite thing in the whole wide world: FOOD. Her miniature food sculptures are absolutely incredible. She realistically creates everything from apple pie, to sushi, to cheese wedges from polymer clay. The amazing part is, they all look completely realistic and would be hard to distinguish from real food if it weren't for the giant fingers in the photos. These food sculptures are actually 1/12 of their actual size (approx 1 inch)!! I cannot even imagine how she creates almost the exact colour and texture of the food and made them so detailed they look real and good enough to eat!

Here was what Kim Burke said about making miniature food art:

From a very young age, I’ve been enthralled by miniatures and was delighted at how wonderfully addicting it is to make them. It’s truly remarkable when the delectable textures of food can be reflected on such a tiny scale.

I strive to make each miniature of the highest quality possible with the most realistic details. My inspiration largely comes from scouring cook books and local pastry shops for ideas. Desserts and gourmet food are my favorite to create but I’m open to any challenge to take on!

Kim Burke has been a huge inspiration for me throughout my coursework as her works made me realised how appealing and fun food art can be and how food art can be one of the ways I portrayed my concepts through. Even though I couldn't create such beautiful and realistic food (due to lack of experience with polymer clay and creating food sculptures), I managed to many create my kind of food (desserts) using mainly paper clay, paper mache and a variety of different materials such as newspaper, tennis balls, plaster etc.

Also, I felt that my coursework would not be the same if I had created such realistic food items as my concept was "the irony of fairy tales and nursery rhymes" and somehow my entire project would have lost the feel of a childhood table setting that feels beautiful and magical but still has the touch of childhood immaturity. I felt that my imperfections in my artworks have portrayed the imperfections of childhood and the idea of not even trying to pursue perfection as a child. Also I feel that the imperfections and unrealistic aspect of my food sculptures also represented the imperfections of the fairy tales and nursery rhymes (the gory and sadistic aspect) and how unrealistic they are. Yet, they are a very subtle part of my artwork, just like how children and parents in modern days can overlook the "dark side" of a fairy tale and still enjoy immensely.

I hope my coursework has allowed it viewers to enjoy as much as they had enjoyed fairy tales and nursery rhymes when they were young.

All in all, I have to thanks Kim Burke for being a great artist and inspiration and her art has motivated me to do food art and has made me push until the very end :D GREAT THANKS TO KIM BURKE, THE FANTASTIC CHEF/ARTIST!!