The Wave of GCE

For the third action project in If These Walls could talk for Elective Term, we had to create and install a mural in our new space. All of the action projects in this class have been leading up to this moment. The other two were simply preparation for the installation of the mural. This unit did not have an internal or external because we needed all of the time to create these murals. We had to use the image that we had created in the previous project and blow it up to scale so it would fit on our set wall in the new space. There were a lot of challenges my group faced starting with not being able to get into the space when we originally thought we would be able too. This caused us to change our entire idea. We originally wanted to paint directly on the wall but with this setback, we had to paint on paper then eventually wheat paste it onto the wall. I am very pound of how our paintings turned out and I know they will look very good once they are put up onto the wall.


Our mural is titled “The Wave”. The mural is a huge wave crashing into a boat. The wave represents traditional high schools and the boat represents GCE and how we are overcoming the conventional high school's’ mission and style of teaching. For this mural, we decided to use acrylic paint, soft gel glossy medium, stencil, and spray paint. Our space is right in the entrance, there are four panels on the wall that we have to fill with our image. Since we couldn’t get into the space right away, we had to cut and trim sixteen pieces of butcher paper and then tape them together in three groups of four. To get the image onto the paper we had split our image into sixteen equal parts and traced the image onto the paper. We then painted the image with the colors we created so it could be hung on the wall. Our color scheme mimics the ocean. We used blues, greens, and whites for the main part and then we used gold spray paint for the boat. We mixed all of those colors together to create the perfect color for the sky, the wave, and the foam of the wave. I think this mural will transform the space because our main goal was to show how GCE is as a community and how we are overcoming the way traditional high schools run. We have decided to put our mural right in the entrance so it’s the first thing everyone will see when they walk into the space everyday. I think that the mural will enhance the space by giving it a sense of community. The boat in the image is representing us as a school and how we are overcoming the traditional way of teaching. I think that it will give an essence of nature with the way the skylight works with the water and the lighting will reflect off the colors to make the room seem brighter. I feel like this mural will make a very big impact on the students because it will let everyone see let everyone see that even though we are still a small school, we are making a huge impact.

The roles that I claimed were documentarian, director of operations, artistic director, and mule. Each person in my group had a different role every day. My favorite role was either documentarian or the director of operations. I was good at documenting because I really enjoy taking pictures and my phone also lets me take time lapse videos which will be a very cool addition to the resulting video. I didn’t really enjoy being a mule because the point of that job is getting what everyone needs but I was always so focused on the mural so I would be too busy to drop what I was doing to go get something. If I could change anything about the process it would be having more time in the space. Once we found out that we wouldn’t be able to get into the space, it was a major setback which caused us to have to change how we will create the mural. Instead of painting directly on the surface, we had to paint on large panels of paper which we will wheatpaste onto the designated wall space. I feel like the mural won’t look exactly how my group had envisioned it to look because we originally thought it would be painted directly on the wall rather than painted onto paper which was pasted to the wall. Even though it’s set back, we worked through it and I think that it will still look good. Our mural has still not been put up due to problems in the space but we are hoping it will be up soon.

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

The Wave

During this first unit of If These Walls Could Talk, we talked about murals in pre- history and the renaissance time period. For the Renaissance, we looked at multiple artists and pieces they created and how they contributed to the new era. For pre- history, we looked at the way cave painters created movement in different ways and how complex the art was even though it came from over 30,000 years ago. For the first Action Project in the If These Walls Could Talk, we had to research a neighborhood in Chicago and create a mural highlighting some of the needs that community faces. This mural would potentially be displayed in the neighborhood. I really like the way that my drawing came out. I feel like it really got the point I was trying to make across and I think my drawing are really nice.

Artist's Statement

MF

11/2015

The Wave 11” x 14”

Marker on paper

Uptown has always been a place full of culture. With its many ethnic restaurants and shops, there is always something new to try. While they do have multiple ethnic restaurants, they also have many chain stores/restaurants which is good for the majority if they just want to go to well known places. Since Uptown is one of the most known neighborhoods in Chicago, there is a serious sanitation problem. People will come and instead of throwing their trash away in the many garbage cans there are, they choose to throw their trash on the streets and in the parks. This is causing a lot of problems because it is becoming so dirty and unpleasant that people are beginning to move away. The people in the neighborhood have been trying to organize monthly garbage clean ups which never seem to work. It never seems to work because once they are finished, more garbage just suddenly appears like it fell from the sky.

MF. Mural Sketch. 2015

For my scene, I’ve sketched the outline of uptown with a large “garbage” wave falling all over the neighborhood. On the side you can see a sign that says “you are now leaving uptown” with people running away. My sketch is under the category of revolt. This is because the people in uptown are sick of all the garbage around the neighborhood and want to get rid of it. I chose the uptown neighborhood. The need of my community is sanitation. Since 2014, the people of uptown have been organizing garbage clean up days but nothing seems to be changing. The trash cans are still overflowing and people chose to just throw their garbage on the streets. My sketch references the garbage because you can see in the wave that there is a coke can and a starbucks cup flying towards the ground. I specifically chose those two products because there are a lot of starbucks’ around the uptown area and also there are a lot of convenient stores.

I decided to incorporate the Greek style by using a lot of greens and blues. Also the style of the wave kind of relates to the way the Greek painted things: very exaggerated. People have been moving away from the uptown area so I drew people running away from the garbage wave. Some people say that soon enough the entire world will be underneath garbage which is one of the main reasons why I created this. By just throwing things away in the proper places, we can help save the earth.

Once complete, this mural will be on the walls all around uptown. It will be used to show the people of uptown and the people who just come to uptown to visit that the cleanliness and the future of uptown depends on them and how they chose to keep up the neighborhood. Hopefully people will realize that by just throwing away some trash in a garbage can, they can make a huge impact.