When I began this assignment, I was very confused as to how I was going to achieve the different values of this still life using the tools I chose. The tools I chose gave a very vast variety of textures and I found that very interesting, but it did not give me the exact image I had imagined in my head. Using my tools, it was very hard to make the areas vary from dark to light where they needed it. I have never been very good at art or drawing, so this was really challenging for me. Some of my tools gave the same value whether I changed the pressure on the object. Other tools were a little easier to vary the value, but I had a hard time knowing where to put the lightest spots and the darkest ones. I saw so many amazing projects in class and I was very disappointed in mine. I saw someone else fill in their negative space with a dark value and the table was a lighter value and that made me kinda realize what I wanted to do with my next drawing. Looking at other projects gave me such a better visual of what was expected and how I should revise mine. The shadows that cast off of the light or even other objects looked really good in other projects. Some of the comments I receive, such as the comment on making my two backgrounds contrast more, that made me notice that the two backgrounds are too much alike.
Thanks for your reflection Amanda! This is an incredible second iteration of your drawing and I want to commend you for incorporating frottage into this work- what a great way to use your new skill! I want to push back a bit on a few of the things you say above because I think we spin them into positives instead of maybe walls or road blocks. First, everyone comes to drawing at a different place and sometime not having much experience is an advantage! I want to point to the amazing moment of the lizard sitting on the pitcher in your ink drawing. Whether you intended it or not, there was an amazing moment of camoflauge and invisibility transforming your lizard into a chameleon in your drawing. Discovering this thing like thing is all about the process of drawing — the act of finding by doing. If you approach a drawing from the persepctive of process over product, it does not matter if the result is the exact image you imagined in your head! And more often than not, it can be better than what you imagine, it is just a matter of paying attention and looking closely at what you are drawing along the way. Great job and stay with the process!