Overcoming the Wave

For the second unit of If These Walls Could Talk, we learned about revolt murals. We talked about all the different revolt murals that have been created after the Renaissance until now. For the Action Project in this unit, we were put into groups to think of a mural using some of the aspects from the images we all created in the first uni. My group decided to create an image titled “The Wave”. One of the challenges in this project was figuring out how to create an image and deciding a theme and a message. Something I think we did well was listening and deciding on an image and message together. I think that we worked well and we never argued about how the image should look.

Artist Statement:
MF
Overcoming the Wave
12/15
Measurement: 4 in by 5 in
Painting with spray paint and acrylic media

For our scene, we decided to create the japanese wave to symbolize traditional high schools and the ways that they teach and handle their school. We then created a boat that also acts as a banner with four ' of people sitting. The boat and the people in it represents GCE as a whole and how we are working to overcome the traditional education system and to create a new way of learning that we can share. This mural is both a tribute mural and revolt mural. It is a revolt mural because GCE is revolting against that traditional school ways. It is a tribute mural because we are paying tribute to GCE and how we can get past the traditional school ways and create our own unique way of teaching and learning.The final sketch we created compiles the different ideas from the sketches that members of the group created in the first unit of this course. The wave was from my image, the banner was from BKJ’s original image. We liked how the Japanese wave from my image looked, so we conducted research on what it symbolizes and learned that it represents strength and unity.In the beginning, we wanted to have the wave represent GCE , but after further thought, we added the boat and changed the meaning of the wave. For my medium I chose to use stencil and spray paint. I chose this medium because I thought that it would make everything very clean and crisp. The stencil would also keep the lines looking nice and better carry out the image we envisioned. I found that the stenciling would be effective in highlighting a specific part of the image, and not be used for the entire mural. I think the swatches came out looking good, using the stencil made it look very clean and crisp. I think the process of this was difficult because I had to be super precise when I cut the stencil out. The banner on one of my swatches was very intricate so it was very hard to make it look the way I wanted it to look.

For our final media, we decided to use acrylic paint, spray paint, and coarse pumice gel acrylic medium. We thought that the acrylic paint made a really nice texture for the sky and it will blend really well with the other color.

MF, 2015

MF, 2015

MF, 2015