Clara Lieu's Blog, page 17
July 1, 2016
Get Featured on the ART PROF blog by Tweeting and Posting!
Visual artists, art educators and art organizations are eligible to become ART PROF supporters if you have at least 300 followers on Facebook, Instagram, or Twitter! In exchange for posting about ART PROF to your social media sites(s), you’ll get a thumbnail image linked to your website here on our blog. (our blog gets 14k monthly visitors)
In our Supporters section, we have a page for visual artists, a page for art educators, and a page for art organizations. Email us or comment on this post for more details! See below some of the wonderful artists and organizations who have supported us so far with their social media posts.
June 30, 2016
New Reward! ART PROF T-shirts
Get our official T-shirt, featuring a charming design by Art Prof Intern Janice Chun! The T-shirt is 6.1 oz., made of pre-shrunk 100% cotton, has a double-needle stitched neckline, bottom hem and sleeves. Sizes available are S, M, L, XL, XXL. We chose “sand” as the T-shirt color because we are big art nerds and this color reminded us all of newsprint.
Pledge $10: 1 T-shirt
Pledge $30: 3 T-shirts
Estimated delivery: Sept. 2016. Ships only to United States
You can even read about our design process and the T-shirt contest we ran!
One of the advantages when your staff is all art students and emerging artists is that when you want to offer a new T-shirt reward for your Kickstarter campaign, you’ve got tons of in house talent.
Click to view slideshow.
17 T-shirt design sketches from the ART PROF staff
The guidelines were that the design had to be black and white, and had to include the text “Art Prof” somewhere in the design. So five of our staff worked on the sketches you see above and we voted internally to select 4 finalists. We didn’t do a full out critique on each design, but we definitely discussed a few concerns about legibility of the text, or awkward associations in some of the designs.
Here were our 3 finalists!
1st and 3rd designs below are by Intern Janice Chun, 2nd design is by Teaching Assistant Casey Roonan.
Snippets from our staff discussion of the designs:
“It’s hard to choose, because I like so many of the designs as drawings but realistically, I would only wear maybe two of them on a T-shirt.”
“I’m having issues with the gloop flying off the back of Prof Lieu’s head-it reminds me of wax, or blood.”
“I like the design with the paint tube, but I don’t get why the paint tube is cut in half.”
“The paint tube cut in half makes me think of a piece of sliced meat-not exactly the best association to have!”
“Some design have interesting lettering but they aren’t easy to read.”
ART PROF is a free, online educational platform for visual arts for people of all ages to learn visual arts in a vibrant art community. Imagine all of the resources here on our blog, except exponentially bigger, in greater quantity, and in more detail. Help us make ART PROF free and accessible for all! Our Kickstarter campaign ends July 19.
June 29, 2016
ART PROF Prototype Preview #1
Imagine if a page like the one you see below was live, with each image linked to another individual page that was packed with written text, and short format videos featuring content that has been honed over several decades of learning, making, and teaching visual arts. A comprehensive encyclopedia of art supplies to give you important details and recommendations on art supplies you already know about, and to help you discover and get acquainted with new art supplies you never knew existed.
Guess what? This page exists. I was clicking through it this afternoon, but it’s not publicly available-yet.
If our Kickstarter campaign is successful, that means that several pages that like this one, and many more sections of our prototype will become free and accessible to the public. Donate before July 19! (Remember, Kickstarter is an all-or-nothing format. If we do not reach our goal, we will receive no funding.)
ART PROF is a free, online educational platform for visual arts for people of all ages to learn visual arts in a vibrant art community. Imagine all of the resources here on our blog, except exponentially bigger, in greater quantity, and in more detail. Help us make ART PROF free and accessible for all! Donate to our Kickstarter campaign before July 19!
ART PROF Prototype Preview
Imagine if a page like the one you see below was live, with each image linked to another individual page that was packed with written text, and short format videos featuring content that has been honed over several decades of learning, making, and teaching visual arts. A comprehensive encyclopedia of art supplies to give you important details and recommendations on art supplies you already know about, and to help you discover and get acquainted with new art supplies you never knew existed.
Guess what? This page exists. I was clicking through it this afternoon, but it’s not publicly available-yet.
If our Kickstarter campaign is successful, that means that several pages that like this one, and many more sections of our prototype will become free and accessible to the public. Donate before July 19! (Remember, Kickstarter is an all-or-nothing format. If we do not reach our goal, we will receive no funding.)
June 27, 2016
New Drawing Demo this Week
Coming this week! 23 videos, about 1-3 min. each showing a drawing demo from start to finish of how to draw with cross-hatching using charcoal. We’ll cover topics like how to pose and light the model, create compositions through thumbnail sketches, cross-hatching techniques, specific charcoal tools, and more. This demo is a tiny appetizer for you to see what kind of free content we can offer if our ART PROF Kickstarter campaign is successful. We hope this will be the first of many more videos to come!
My partner Thomas Lerra and I were really excited about this demo, despite the fact that the shoot was extremely challenging and we both probably lost a year of our lives that day. We shot the demo using 3 iPhones, which allowed for three different points of view on the demo, as you can see in the photo below. We had no cameraman: just us, Art Prof Intern Olivia Hunter as the production assistant, and Marianna our artist model. The shoot was very challenging, but we saw this experience as a blessing in disguise. Afterwards, we both realized in retrospect that although the shoot itself was tough, we realized that our gigantic experiment had opened up ways that we could potentially stretch our budget further and still produce high quality content.
We want ART PROF to be free for all as long as possible! In addition to our Kickstarter campaign, Tom and I are looking into sponsors, and alternative ways like this one, that will allow us to continue to generate content on as small a budget as possible.
Don’t miss this tutorial, subscribe to the ART PROF Youtube channel today!
We have just announced a Kickstarter campaign for ART PROF: Visual Art Essentials that is running through July 19. ART PROF is a free, online educational platform for visual arts for people of all ages to learn visual arts in a vibrant art community. Imagine all of the resources here on our blog, except exponentially bigger, in greater quantity, and in more detail. Help us make ART PROF free and accessible for all! Watch our 2 min. preview video below, and get more info here.
June 25, 2016
ART PROF T-Shirt Contest! Voting ends Monday, June 27, 11:59pm EST
17 T-shirt design sketches from the ART PROF staff
One of the advantages when your staff is all art students and emerging artists is that when you want to offer a new T-shirt reward for your Kickstarter campaign, you’ve got tons of in house talent.
Now we want YOU to vote and choose our T-shirt design!
Shirts will be $10 each, in many sizes, and we may even offer a tote bag reward!
Our designs are not set in stone, so if you have a suggestion, comment!
You can vote in two ways:
1) Go to our Instagram, find the T-shirt designs, and vote by liking the post.
2) Go to our Facebook page and find the most recent post. Each design has been assigned a reaction. (reactions are randomly assigned-they do not represent our opinions, they are just there for voting purposes) To vote, hover your cursor over the “like” button, select the reaction that is assigned to the design you want to vote for, and then click.
Here are our 3 finalists!
The guidelines were that the design had to be black and white, and had to include the text “Art Prof” somewhere in the design. So five of our staff worked on the sketches you see above and we voted internally to select 4 finalists. We didn’t do a full out critique on each design, but we definitely discussed a few concerns about legibility of the text, or awkward associations in some of the designs. After much discussion, we all eventually agreed that black T-shirts would be better. Black T-shirts are the quintessential artsy clothing, and some of us were traumatized by years of wearing school uniforms that were white, and just a little bit too transparent.
Below is a super quick preview-not by any means the final design!
Snippets from our staff discussion of the designs:
“It’s hard to choose, because I like so many of the designs as drawings but realistically, I would only wear maybe two of them on a T-shirt.”
“I’m having issues with the gloop flying off the back of Prof Lieu’s head-it reminds me of wax, or blood.”
“I like the design with the paint tube, but I don’t get why the paint tube is cut in half.”
“The paint tube cut in half makes me think of a piece of sliced meat-not exactly the best association to have!”
“Some design have interesting lettering but they aren’t easy to read.”
Consider donating to our Kickstarter campaign and help us bring ART PROF: Visual Art Essentials with Clara Lieu to people of all ages who want and need art education, but who have no means of access. Our prototype is finished, so our final step is to raise funds to make ART PROF free for all! Even the smallest donations add up. And if you can’t donate, please share our Kickstarter campaign!
June 23, 2016
ART PROF Teaching Assistant: Annie Irwin
I knew what ART PROF Teaching Assistant Annie Irwin was all about before she even spoke a word to me. On the first day of my RISD freshman drawing class back in the fall of 2011, we reviewed the course materials for about 20 minutes, I gave the students 15 minute break, and then we got started drawing right away with many various kinds of lithographic crayon. One thing I do when I teach drawing is I spend time watching students’ movements as they draw: their movements can often times reveal to me just as much about their skill set as looking at the drawing itself.
Click to view slideshow.
I vividly remember the incredible conviction I saw in Annie’s face that first day of drawing class. Her movements as she drew were sharp and energetic, and she handled the drawing materials with a confidence that I don’t see very often on from a freshman on the first day of class in the fall semester. I could tell immediately how intense and fully engaged she was. Annie had a highly focused gaze on the model, and her assertiveness with her drawing skills was truly incredible.
Annie was truly a force of nature- she’s one of those students who is so amazing that as the professor, I feel like all I have to do is make sure I get out of her way when she takes off like a rocket. Students like Annie make you feel, as the professor, that you don’t have to lift a finger to help them. Below is Annie’s final project from my drawing class, she constructed a diorama which had giant clumps of twine layered like a jungle. She drew her piece by drawing from direction observation of this diorama using charcoal on a 4′ x 4′ sheet of canvas. To this day, her final project still resonates with tremendous expression and emotion combined with a masterful command of the drawing material.
When you find a fabulous TA, you hold onto them for dear life! Annie was my TA for several semesters afterwards, and we managed to squeeze in an independent study somewhere. We caught up one last time on campus before graduation came along in 2015. Let’s hear from Annie about her journey so far:
“I live in California and recently completed a position as a silkscreen apprentice at the Fabric Workshop and Museum. My BFA is from the Rhode Island School of Design in Textiles. I have experience in fashion print design, an award-winning upholstery fabric, an undying love for art, and a bizarre drive to construct and embroider sock animals.
This all started when I was 11 years old. I was sitting at the car wash with my parents and found a magazine in the waiting room. When I came across images of wild paintings and crazy fashion designs, I was hooked and decided to read the article, which talked about the wonders of an art school in Rhode Island. I knew that this was the college for me but, being only 11 years old, I was too young to apply. Instead, I drafted a handwritten letter and made a pathetic attempt at copying Vincent van Gogh’s Portrait of Eugène Boch in acrylic paint and a lame pencil drawing of a horse floating on a blank page. I sent the letter and artwork to the RISD admissions office.
I was nervous and excited when I saw the envelope with RISD’s return address. The letter told me that the best way to assemble a great application was to remain passionate and practice drawing from life every day. This advice stayed with me throughout school and remains with me today. I was lucky to have amazing teachers and a solid art department to help me through the awful time that was high school. I ran into a wall when my art teachers told me that my technique was good but my ideas were not fully developed. That’s when I learned that art-making is equal parts concept and technique; it’s a skill in itself that takes practice and effort.”
Consider donating to our Kickstarter campaign and help us bring ART PROF: Visual Art Essentials with Clara Lieu to people of all ages who want and need art education, but who have no means of access. Our prototype is finished, so our final step is to raise funds to make ART PROF free for all! Even the smallest donations add up. And if you can’t donate, please share our Kickstarter campaign!
ART PROF Teaching Assistant: Yves-Olivier Mandereau
Our ART PROF staff likes to laugh about our initial impressions of each other. Sometimes those first impressions were perfectly accurate, and other times they were totally off. (wait until I do Teaching Assistant Sara Bloem’s profile, for an example of being way off) Yves-Olivier Mandereau, one of the ART PROF Teaching Assistants, was no exception to these extremes. I didn’t know this at the time, but Yves told me later that when he entered my freshman drawing class at RISD back in the fall of 2011, that he was terrified. The majority of his work prior to art school had been in three-dimensional media, and he felt at the time that he really didn’t know a thing about drawing.
Whereas many students would have allowed themselves to be paralyzed by their lack of experience, Yves quickly accepted his limited background in drawing. Despite being out of his element in a drawing class, Yves was extremely tenacious and willing to take on anything. Yves is one of the most determined students I’ve ever had in my classes, he had an iron will and drive that I rarely see in students at that stage in college.
A group critique in my class from 2011. Yves is on the right, in the default state of most RISD freshman. Annie Irwin, another ART PROF Teaching Assistant is on the right in the front.
In group critiques, Yves distinguished himself with his candid, honest comments which were articulate and straightforward. When students enter art school, most of them have very little experience speaking during a group critique, and it can be highly intimidating to talk about your work in front of the entire class. Yves was critical to his class because he helped establish a level of seriousness in our discussions that fostered mutual respect and honesty among his peers.
Yves’ very first homework drawing he did in my freshman drawing class in 2011
Later, Yves was a TA for my RISD Project Open Door class, and we reconnected again a month before he graduated in 2015. I visited his ceramics studio and was surprised to see him making figurative ceramic sculpture(see below)-nothing remotely like anything he was making when he was in my class. Having a background in figurative sculpture myself, it was so great to see how he eventually found his way towards that path. The changes and progression over the course of art school are usually quite dramatic. Five years ago, Yves came into his first art school critique in my class with a drawing of a seed pod. (above) Today, he’s doing an artist residency at Zentrum Fur Keramik in Berlin, Germany. In this residency, Yves is continuing to develop a body of work using figurative casting processes to explore themes of family and mortality. Let’s hear from him about what his journey has been like:
“As a kid I wasn’t sure what I wanted to be when I grew up. I think I didn’t know because no one allowed me to consider a career in the arts. In middle school, I always had the most fun in art class, yet art was never really considered a legitimate pursuit like science and athletics.
I was first exposed to ceramics in an “Art 1” class, where I learned watercolor and acrylic painting. I was hooked but didn’t see any way to deepen my exploration. My art teachers let me stay and work during lunch, but I was essentially on my own. I worked on the pottery wheel but was just making lots of little cups because that’s what I knew how to make.
Click to view slideshow.
The summer after my junior year in high school, I attended the Pre-College Program at RISD, a six-week summer art program for high school students. I saved up all the money I could from busing tables and working for a catering company. The program was beyond anything I could have imagined. The intensity and depth of the classes were addictive. When the program ended, I said to myself, “I don’t want this to end.” That’s when I knew I had to pursue visual art seriously.
Having experienced the value of a quality visual art education, I have committed myself to encouraging and helping others pursue their passion. That’s why I’m here, to help other students experience a broader art education independent of school systems where visual arts aren’t supported.”
Consider donating to our Kickstarter campaign and help us bring ART PROF: Visual Art Essentials with Clara Lieu to people of all ages who want and need art education, but who have no means of access. Our prototype is finished, so our final step is to raise funds to make ART PROF free for all! Even the smallest donations add up. And if you can’t donate, please share our Kickstarter campaign!
Art Prof Legacy #1: Tatiana Florival, Intern
Listen to how I got Intern Tatiana Florival to confess her secret shame from her freshman year in college through a charcoal drawing. See Tatiana’s charcoal drawing below.
Consider donating to our Kickstarter campaign and help us bring ART PROF: Visual Art Essentials with Clara Lieu to people of all ages who want and need art education, but who have no means of access. Our prototype is finished, so our final step is to raise funds to make ART PROF free for all! Even the smallest donations add up. And if you can’t donate, please share our Kickstarter campaign!
June 22, 2016
Portfolio Review Event at Concord Art
RISD Adjunct Professor Clara Lieu reviews drawings by Janet Schwartz
This past Sunday, half of the ART PROF team hosted our first free portfolio review event at the Concord Center for Visual Arts in Concord, MA. We invited artists in the Boston area to sign up for several 15 minute long individual reviews with myself, ART PROF Teaching Assistants Lauryn Welch, Casey Roonan, and Sara Bloem. My colleagues Wendy Seller and Cynthia Katz were reviewers as well. The event lasted four hours, so this gave artists the opportunity to get up to 6 reviews from multiple reviewers. Unless you’re enrolled in a degree program, the opportunity to get feedback on your artwork from several professional artists and professors in one day for free is extremely rare.
Art Prof Teaching Assistant Lauryn Welch speaks to artist Steven Foote about his paintings.
In my career, I’ve been to several portfolio review events, both as an artist and as a reviewer. One aspect I like about this format is that you get individualized attention from a single reviewer, and the room is generally busy enough that no one feels that they are on the spot. We were very pleased with the atmosphere!
Click to view slideshow.
We were impressed by the range of artists who came to our event: we saw large oil paintings, watercolor paintings, pastel drawings, scratch board drawings, perspective drawings, and much more.
We were all pretty wiped out after critiquing for pretty much 4 hours straight, but we were all thrilled with the event. We did registration online, and the day of the event we still had 40% of our slots open. Many people added extra slots the day of the event, which was terrific because those additional slots filled our schedules. The event was busy, and seemed to keep moving the whole time.
We also had a terrific team of assistants: Britt Sodersjerna, Alex Fyock, Jack Carbeck, and Olivia Hunter who did everything from shoot photos and video of the event, helping participants find their schedules, and giving us feedback on how we could improve similar events in the future. Speaking of future events, we are planning two more similar events in mid July in Boston! If you’d like to be notified of these events, sign up for our email list.
Art Prof Teaching Assistant Casey Roonan discusses Monika Hedman’s scratchboard pieces. Monika had a series of 12 scratch board drawings, which incorporated mixed media as well. We were hugely impressed by Monika’s composition skills, a skill that is frequently overlooked or simply not addressed by many artists. She had an enormous range of media in her portfolio: paintings, drawings, mixed media pieces, and a sketchbook packed with images and writing.
Many participants were glowing with a renewed enthusiasm and motivation for their work. We heard some terrific comments both during and after the event through emails.
“You and your team were amazing! I feel blessed to have been part of this day.”
“I found our portfolio review very helpful in fine-tuning the direction with my work.”
“Both portfolio reviewers my husband and I talked to were encouraging and helpful.”
RISD Adjunct Professor Clara Lieu reviews paintings and drawings by Jennifer Behymer.
Afterwards, our team went out for an early dinner, amazed that this was the first time since ART PROF started in 2014 that we had all been together in person. For many of us, it have been many years since we had seen each other, even though we communicate almost everyday online to work on ART PROF. I think this event was important for our team not just in terms of the event, but in terms of finally getting to see each other in person. While we discuss online nitty gritty details like what color the top menu bar in the prototype should be, together in person, we were able to have deeper discussions and talk about the big picture of ART PROF.
I’ve worked with many groups of people in the past, and I have to say this truly is an extraordinary team of people who I not only love working with, but who are super fun. There was plenty of teasing, and reminiscing about the good old days in my freshman drawing class over 6 years ago. And yes, I realize that I’m probably extremely biased because I’m the one who assembled this team, but I’m constantly in awe of how we balance brutal honesty and flexibility at the same time. I love that we are able to have intense, emotional discussions about being artists, but that we can also tease each other mercilessly about the silliest things like the Bachlorette. (sorry, inside joke!)
This team has gone above and beyond my wildest expectations when I first started ART PROF two years ago. I’m still in disbelief that Sara, Lauryn, and Casey were crazy enough to say yes to that email I sent them over a year ago.
Click to view slideshow.
We missed the rest of our team, Annie Irwin, Yves-Olivier Mandereauves-Olivier Mandereau, and Alex Rowe, who live as far away as California, Colorado, and Germany. We hope some day, all of us can be in one place, and that we can devote all of our time towards bringing you a rigorous art education for free, all the time. Help us make ART PROF a reality, and consider a donation to our Kickstarter campaign before it ends on July 19!
