GE Drawing Assignment
Charles Burchfield was my inspiration and below are some of his pieces for reference.
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GE Assignment Writing
Charles Burchfield is an amazing artist. He lived from 1893 through 1967. Within this time, he made countless pieces of art that are still being sold today. He mostly painting with watercolors, but he sketched as well. Most of his paintings are mystical nature scenes, but his earlier work was city scenes. There is so much to be said about how amazing his art is.
One thing that should be noted is that in some of his paintings, he adds bright colors, specifically yellow, around the outlines of objects. This immediately draws the attention to those objects and then eye travels around to the rest of the painting. This also adds a mystical feeling to his paintings. He uses a lot of dark colors and then adds in light which brings a lighter, happier feeling to the piece. This is very different from most paintings because he has both dark and light aspects. His paintings have different feelings in different parts because of the contrast between the light and dark.
Looking at Burchfield’s work, you can tell how thoughtful he is. His paintings are thoughtful, and he puts a lot of effort into his work. He has a love for nature and all aspects of it. He doesn’t specifically paint one thing in nature, he paints all aspects. Something that is important to notice is that he draws both nature and buildings.
His brush strokes are very flowy. They aren’t exact but still have a nice flow. They give the painting a nice flowy look. When he is painting nature, it gives a sense of movement, so you can see how things really look in nature. This also allows the viewer’s eye to move around the painting because there is so much movement. This shows more in his later work. In some of his nature paintings, some aspects are even childish and playful. Sometimes he gives his paintings a sense of mystery and sometimes they are even dark or scary.
In his earlier work he paints buildings and towns. These paintings are drastically different from his later work. This work is more stark realism. Burchfield’s buildings that he paints are worn and beaten down. These paintings are dark and mysterious. It gives a feeling of loneliness and dread. When painting buildings, his brushstrokes are more defined and there isn’t as much movement. These paintings, in contrast to the others, are not playful. Most of them are very realistic.
What is amazing about his work is that his paintings are all so different. His nature paintings can be playful and bright. They have a sense of movement and are very flowy. The eye can easily move around the painting because of the movement and the halos around some of the objects. His earlier work is almost the complete opposite. Its stark realism and there is little to no movement. These paintings give the feeling of being lonely and isolated. There isn’t any playful feelings or light happier feelings. His brush strokes are much more concise. His work is amazing and incredibly thoughtful.
https://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/25/arts/design/25burchfield.html
https://www.britannica.com/biography/Charles-Burchfield
https://www.burchfieldpenney.org/collection/charles-e-burchfield/
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GE Assignment Research
1. Van Gogh
2. John James Audubon- His work is very interesting to me because I usually draw realistic animals. His work is very similar. He bases his art on animals, mostly birds, in their natural habitats. It shows animals doing their natural habits in nature. The detail is amazing and he didn’t ;eave anything out. The paintings are made of neutral colors. Nature isn’t documented near enough, so I really love his work because we take advantage of all of the beautiful plants and animals.
3. Charles Burchfield- I love his work. His paintings are almost whimsical and remind me of a fairy tale world. His paintings give off different feelings. Some are dark and give off the feeling that it is night or mysterious. Others are bright and give off the feeling that it is day time, sunset, and sunrise. They give off feelings of happiness or even hope. His work is amazing and beautiful.
4. Unica Zurn
5. Charles Gaines
6. Yayoi Kusama- His art is all very bright. He uses patterns inside of his work to fill it in. I have always wanted to paint something similar to this. I love all of the bright colors. Some of them are a little trippy. I also found that he changes the colors of his dots based on if he wants that part of his painting to be light or dark. He also changes the size of the dots to make the painting lighter or darker.
7. Quentin Blake