along the hall's wall.

I have actually noticed a lot of things this week that inspire me, I'm not quite sure why so many at once! However, I noticed something prett obvious within the school that always inspires me and just makes me happy - this is the art display case. I think this just inspires me so much because I know these people who created this art and with art you get to show a little piece, or a lot, of yourself! I always stop and look in the case, even if the art hasn't changed for weeks. I like to see if I can guess who made what, and I like to see if any are similar to what I would do and if they aren't then they still in some way always make me think up new ideas in my head. As I have said in previous blogs, art is all around us. This time maybe a little more literally because it is actually in the art hallway, but in the end I love it. I love when i catch others looking into the display and when I hear others discussing pieces within it.

I can show you the world.

When I was looking for an artist for this particular blog, I wanted to find a photographer because I think that photography is probably my favorite medium overall. I saw a lot of photographers that I liked but nobody really stood out or spoke to me at the moment. I began just clicking on several links and names and trying to find whatever I could, and I clicked on a random name reading Andrew Moore. Sometimes I feel like artists have crazy or bizarre names (haha), so I wasn't expecting a whole lot out of Andrew Moore... but I soon found out I loved his work. It is awesome-his photos have so much color and every one of them tells a different story. He has been so many places such as Vietnam, Bosnia, Cuba, Russia, New York, Abu Dhabi, and more. I want to travel, I want to see more of the world, and when looking at his photos I felt like I had already seen so much more of it. The thing about Moore's photographs that I really love is that he makes the most run-down places, places that most people would fin dirty, old, and ugly, so beautiful. He makes them look like some of the most beautiful places on earth. Moore is also so great at using lighting to the picture's advantage, I want to learn to do this! I looked through everyone one of his pictures twice, some more than that-and that is a lot. I suggest looking up Andrew Moore, I think he is very inspirational and so talented. I hope he inspires you as much as he does me, with his pictures you get to see a little more of the world and how beautiful it is!

http://www.andrewlmoore.com/

Ready... Set... Design.

When I grow up... well, I guess it all begins next year. Next year i will be attending UIC and majoring in graphic design, possible double majoring in graphic design and industrial design and minoring in business. This will take four years of college and really takes the skills of creativity and what not. The sad thing is, is I am not sure exactly what i want to BE. All i know is i want it to relate to those topics. I really am considering going into advertisement and I think that is where I will end up, and I am very excited about it! However, one day I really want to own my own store, manage my own business.
Now, if we are talking what I want to be aside from what I am going to do, then I REALLY want to be a famous fashion photographer. How awesome would that be? I would definitely go to school for this to learn more than what i know about photography since i know almost nothing. I would love this career, it would be just like the ones featured on America's Next Top Model, ahhh! It would be so perfect. I would travel everywhere, see all of the latest fashions, it would be so inspirational and fun! But... it seems crazy and more of a dream:) But who knows what the future really holds!

Inspired by the Kooks

So many things seem to really inspire me. There's nature, big cities, coffee shops, colors, people, and so much more. In our last blags about what inspired us a read a couple that mentioned music. Music has always been a part of my life and it is something i am really interested and involved in, so in round two of what inspires me I think i would say that music is something so inspirational to me. Personally, i like a lot of kinds of music but my favorite two are indie and jazz. I could write a lot about music as a whole but I decided to write about one specific group I love to listen to and i couldn't even decide! There is Jason Mraz, Maroon 5, Regina Spektor, Dave Matthews Band, Michael Buble, Wolfmother, Ingrid Michaelson, Matt Hires, and the list only goes on and on... so i finally decided upon the Kooks.
If you have never heard the Kooks... LISTEN TO THEM! They are wonderful. A lot of times when i sit down to do art i listen to my iPod and I seem to listen to them a lot. I think there is a lot of reasons why this is so. One is just the feel of the music, it makes me happy. The songs are catchy and very artistic, it's not like the music you always hear on the radio. Another thing is really just their lyrics, they're so creative. I think that is something important and something that really is important in music with vocals! Not only is the wording beautiful, but so are the meanings behind. What girl doesn't like a good song about love or about how beautiful she is?! Plus, the lead singer has a wonderful voice:)
The little things like this seem to really motivate me and inspire me, they make me happy and art as well makes me happy so it only makes sense:)'

"Safety pins holding up the things
That make you mine
About your hair, you needn't care,
You look beautiful all the time."
-The Kooks

Facebook's Self Portraits

This article is so amusing to me. I love that it discussed how within the past 5 years people have made the self portrait so popular, filling hard drives and facebook pages and being updated all of the time. Although i love that more and more people are picking up their cameras and creating more art, i think that there are some downsides to this new phenomena. Because we are in control of the camera as we take pictures of ourselves, and as the article said we know our bodies and our poses and what expression we look best in, i think that we lose some of the natural beauty in these photos. If you look at numerous profile pictures of teenage girls, you will notice so many similarities. I feel like not many of these self portraits are very original or unique. The portriats show the best of pictures of these people, because after taking so many you really train yourself to take these pictures, which is why they all seem to be somewhat similar. I miss seeing natural beauty but i don't think this is only because of facbook's crazy amounts of self portraits, so i guess i can't blame it all on this! I think it is our society and it's values today. But that is a whole other topic:) Even though i don't care too much for the non-original self portraits today, i must restate that i really do like that more people are enjoying one of my favorite things, the camera:)

What Inspires Me?

There are so many things that inspire me. Everywhere i go whether it is in a classroom or traveling on vacation, i look around and constantly think "that would be an awesome picture" or "i love those colors" or something along those lines. If i had to choose one thing that really inspires me i would say probably big ctities. Something about cityscapes really inspire me so much; i love the tall buildings, the kind of worn and faded colors, i love all of the shopping and fashion. I think it is amazing to think that we built and created and designed all of it, and it is so beautiful. Another thing about the cities is all of the people. The people alone are so inspirational because of diversity and personality. I like to people watch, haha. I think it is so fascinating to see how people interact and react and even just to notice how they dress and look. In the city there are also the big billboards and signs with advertsiements which alone are art. Personally, my favorite general topic i like to create in art always seems to be nature, so I think it is kind of cool that what really inspires me  is almost kind of the opposite of that.

2010 art portfolio

I think that for art portfolio, the easiest thing to include will really be photography, simply because it's a 'faster' medium to use, but i don't want that to be why it is included, i think for me it will be easy because it is my favorite to use. Something more difficult for me personally will be actual drawings with pen and pastels and things like that. I think i just work a lot better with paint and photography and just mixing mediums as well. When reading the list i don't know if anything really surprised me, but I was just a little overwhelmed. I really just hope that I do well in this class and become a better artist as the year goes on.

Once my portfolio is finished, I'm not exactly sure what i want to do with it, but as of now i am looking into double majoring in graphic design and industrial design and minoring in business. I definitely want to include a lot of photography just because i enjoy it so much, but i also would like to make sure to kind of include a variety of ideas and mediums to show i can work with different things. I really want to work with cyanotypes and my pinhole camera, and i also want to explore the pen and ink idea more. I definitely want to try to involve art in my career, but if not i know I'll always continue to do it in the future. If i do use it for college, I've been looking into Columbia and UIC, and I am leaning towards UIC so I'm really excited to see what happens. :)