This is the last day in our 30 Day Creative Challenge!
A big public THANK YOU to those artists who posted your sketches to Instagram or to Padlet. While the posting type people are wooting amidst their social media glitter and confetti, I’ll pass a word of quiet appreciation to the unknown number of you who responded to the challenges privately, without posting. You’re part of this. For those of you who did the challenges in your head and then, for whatever reason, moved on with your day without lifting a pen, I feel you, but really, do this one. Just this one. One. Pull out that scrap of paper and a pen. If you do this one today, you win.
Composition is a game, an optical illusion. Even though the square weighs nothing, gravity is implied. There is a tension of gravity vertically, as well as with the edges of the rectangle itself. Notice how a square that is centered and level within the rectangle is static. It’s stable. If you tilt the square it gets a less comfortable energy. It seems to want to move. If the corner of the square approaches any of the edges of the rectangle, those edges “activate” and kind of start to itch while the edges on the far side of the rectangle seem to deactivate. The closer the square gets to the edge of the rectangle, the more it itches. When it overlaps, the tension resolves. The square might also seem to weigh different amounts when it is higher, lower, left or right on the rectangle. Try it! Make a black square and put it on a piece of white typing paper to see for yourself.
Our final challenge is a composition challenge, with an inspiration from Kazimir Malevich. You can have one black square of any size, and you can put it anywhere you want to on your compositional rectangle, which is any dimension you choose. How big is it? Where do you put it? How do you make it? What are the materials you use? What do you think are the most interesting compositions?
Share your black square composition on Instagram with these tags: #30sal, #blacksquare
Welcome to Day 2 of the 30SAL Challenge! To learn more about the 30SAL Challenge, click here. Today’s 30SAL Challenge is a creative idea from Seattle Artist League instructor Charity Baker. First, tone a piece of paper as dark as you can with soft willow charcoal. You might find that paper with some tooth or …
I hosted our first online session yesterday! Part of the class was in the studio with me, watching the slide lecture on a big projector screen, part of the class was online, watching my computer screen-share from home. It worked great! The class was active, we had an age range of 32-78, and people worked …
People are posting their creative challenges online! You can find them by using the hashtag #salchallenge. You can also find some videos of people pretending to shake salt into their mouths. That’s a different kind of challenge. We don’t judge. I found some interesting drawings posted by marisa_vitiello. Love this wondering line-shape motif! Nice little composition, …
Lendy and I have been trading drawing images lately. She sent me these by Ginny Grayson. Lendy and I often share artworks with each other, some of them end up in V. Notes. We’ve been sharing drawings especially because we both love them so much, and they are underrepresented in galleries and museums. People often …
Day 30: Black Square #30SAL
This is the last day in our 30 Day Creative Challenge!
A big public THANK YOU to those artists who posted your sketches to Instagram or to Padlet. While the posting type people are wooting amidst their social media glitter and confetti, I’ll pass a word of quiet appreciation to the unknown number of you who responded to the challenges privately, without posting. You’re part of this. For those of you who did the challenges in your head and then, for whatever reason, moved on with your day without lifting a pen, I feel you, but really, do this one. Just this one. One. Pull out that scrap of paper and a pen. If you do this one today, you win.
Composition is a game, an optical illusion. Even though the square weighs nothing, gravity is implied. There is a tension of gravity vertically, as well as with the edges of the rectangle itself. Notice how a square that is centered and level within the rectangle is static. It’s stable. If you tilt the square it gets a less comfortable energy. It seems to want to move. If the corner of the square approaches any of the edges of the rectangle, those edges “activate” and kind of start to itch while the edges on the far side of the rectangle seem to deactivate. The closer the square gets to the edge of the rectangle, the more it itches. When it overlaps, the tension resolves. The square might also seem to weigh different amounts when it is higher, lower, left or right on the rectangle. Try it! Make a black square and put it on a piece of white typing paper to see for yourself.
Our final challenge is a composition challenge, with an inspiration from Kazimir Malevich. You can have one black square of any size, and you can put it anywhere you want to on your compositional rectangle, which is any dimension you choose. How big is it? Where do you put it? How do you make it? What are the materials you use? What do you think are the most interesting compositions?
Share your black square composition on Instagram with these tags: #30sal, #blacksquare
Or post to this Padlet.
I’ll publish my favorites soon.
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Day 2: Walk the Line #30SAL
Welcome to Day 2 of the 30SAL Challenge! To learn more about the 30SAL Challenge, click here. Today’s 30SAL Challenge is a creative idea from Seattle Artist League instructor Charity Baker. First, tone a piece of paper as dark as you can with soft willow charcoal. You might find that paper with some tooth or …
Effects of Light: Carlos San Millan’s Demos
I hosted our first online session yesterday! Part of the class was in the studio with me, watching the slide lecture on a big projector screen, part of the class was online, watching my computer screen-share from home. It worked great! The class was active, we had an age range of 32-78, and people worked …
SAL Challenge Pics
People are posting their creative challenges online! You can find them by using the hashtag #salchallenge. You can also find some videos of people pretending to shake salt into their mouths. That’s a different kind of challenge. We don’t judge. I found some interesting drawings posted by marisa_vitiello. Love this wondering line-shape motif! Nice little composition, …
Ginny Grayson’s drawings
Lendy and I have been trading drawing images lately. She sent me these by Ginny Grayson. Lendy and I often share artworks with each other, some of them end up in V. Notes. We’ve been sharing drawings especially because we both love them so much, and they are underrepresented in galleries and museums. People often …