Drawing Techniques

Growing up, my sister and I have always loved art. We made dioramas, polymer clay charms, mixed media canvas' etc. But when it came to drawing and coloring, I was always the drawer and she was the colorer and it pretty much still's the same. So when I decided to learn how to watercolor for my senior project, my art teacher suggested I take drawing classes at the Memorial Art Gallery along with my water coloring classes to improve my skills. I always did drawing randomly just for fun. But since I've been taking my classes with Joe Tarantelli at the Creative Workshop, I've learned so many techniques. I signed up for the 5 week Monday classes from 6:30-9:30 pm and the classes are almost coming to an end but I need more! I didn't think drawing involved more than just the use of a basic pencil and paper. I didn't even know that lead pencils came in so many different hardness'.

    Our first drawing exercise was to to draw an image while looking at it upside down. This exercise allows the artist to focus on the relationship of the lines rather than the image as a whole. (lol excuse my messy work space)

We also did blind contour drawings. In this case we used our hands as the object to draw. Without looking at the paper, we drew an outline of our hands and then went in with the details afterwards. This exercise develops hand-eye communication. After that, we practiced while looking at both the paper and our hands.

This is just a page full of random observational drawings I did during one of the past classes. 

Watercolor Practices

Here are random watercolor pieces I've worked on so far prior to taking any classes.

I painted this one while I was still in Morocco during the summer. The learning experience I got from this piece is not to over paint. It's like that cliche saying, "Less is more". Well less is definitely more with water coloring. The thing with watercolor is that the paper is used as the white and light source. If you over paint the painting and leave little to no light source, It'll end up looking dull like you see in the rose painting below. Like for the glass jar, instead of painting white over the areas where white was supposed to be, not painting over the white paper would've made it a lot more realistic if that makes any sense.

I painted this piece in Morocco as well and you can see the similarity in dullness with the rose painting in the hummingbird specifically. I kept going over it with different colors which ended up making it look muddy almost. But as a beginners piece, it doesn't look bad overall.

These are some of the pieces I worked on when I was back in NY. In the piece with the mountains, I was practicing perspective and distance techniques. I realized this was a technique used in drawing as well. Especially when dealing with landscapes, in order to get a distance effect, you paint or draw lighter. As the object is closer to view, it becomes more detailed and/ or darker like you see with the trees in this piece. 

In the beach painting, I was more successful in allowing the white background paper to be the light source for the image.

Finally, one of my most recent pieces I painted of a still life. When I saw this piece on thefrugalcrafter's page, I knew I had to paint it. First, I love tea so much I think I'm addicted. Second, the design on the teacup was just so pretty I couldn't not at least try to paint it.

Finding the Right Class

When I came back to the states after my vacation in Morocco, I started looking into classes that would help me with my watercolor project. I ended up finding a beginners class at the Creative Workshop at the Memorial Art Gallery. This class consists of 10 Thursdays and it's taught by Cynthia Iannaccone. With the help from Mrs. Elisa, I ended up getting a scholarship for this class which ended up covering all the fees for signing up. A big load off my shoulders! I've been to a couple classes so far and I'm liking the new techniques I'm learning. Here are a few of the pieces I've worked on so far.

To get really nice texture from watercolor, a very cool technique includes the use of salt. You can see how it turned out on the lower half of the paper above. To get this texture, I started off by painting on dry paper.While the paint was still wet, I sprinkled the salt on top. When my paper was completely dry, I wiped the salt away. On the piece above it, I used a splatter technique. After I finished painting the base which I started out on wet paper, I waited for it to dry a little. The reason for this was so the colors I added on top wouldn't bleed or blend into the background. There are a couple of ways to achieve the splatter affect. I've used the toothbrush method in the past with other paints and the splatter comes out much more fine but this time, Cynthia showed us how to do it using a paint brush. We used a tapping motion on the brush while it was above the paper by a few inches. The results were pretty nice.


We created collages from other pieces we made. This technique is great to use on colorful abstract pieces you don't necessarily love or if you just feel like it. I didn't love mine, especially the orange/yellow/red piece, but you can see how the pieces were transformed after putting them into a collage. The orange/red/yellow piece was painted on wet paper and the purple/blue/green was on dry. I also used different methods of painting for each one. For the top half, I used almost a dripping method where I just let the tip of the brush loaded with paint touch the wet paper. It was kind of an uncontrolled method where I just let the paint do its own thing. For the bottom half, I painted each stroke randomly using a dry brush. I got some texture on the orange and green from the salt.

BEFORE:

(Wet on Wet)

(Dry on Dry)

AFTER:

Trying Something New

After following a couple tutorials, I decided it was time I created a piece with no tutorial. I wanted to see what my capabilities were and hopefully an improvement throughout the year. I chose to paint the view from the window at my aunt's house in Morocco. I lightly sketched most of it before going in with the watercolor just so I can have an outline. Morocco is a really colorful country. Colorful clothing, buildings, food, interior design; they love their colors.

There's an actual city in Morocco that's all blue. It's called Chefchaouen.

So not surprisingly, the school that was recently built in front of my aunt's house is also colorful. On each side of the school, it's painted a different color. The side that happened to be facing my aunt's house is red and purple. 

A change in perspective

Summer 2016, my sister and I visited Morocco. My Mom's side of the family is Moroccan, so it was sooo awesome seeing them all. On our way there, I was being typical me and taking pictures of the scenery and what not. Except this time, I was viewing my photos different than normal. Everything I took a picture of became "something I can water color".

*back story*

At School Without Walls, we have a class called Extended class. This class is pretty much like a home room and each class goes by topic. This year, for example, I'm in Mariana's extended class and our topic is Drama/Theater. I chose to be in this class 1. because Mariana was the extended class teacher <3 and 2. not because I enjoy acting because I don't at all, but because I'm interested in what happens behind the scenes like with the back drop and special effects. So not surprisingly, I was in Mariana's extended class in 10th grade as well. In my sophomore year, I believe our class topic was Villains. But one of the topics we discussed/went over was analyzing film. I enjoyed it so much. I don't know if it was only that interesting because Mar taught it to us (she can make the most boringest book sound like the best book in the world lol) or if it really was that interesting, Anyways, point of the story is for a good while after that class, anytime I'd be watching a film, I'd catch my self analyzing it. I actually still have a prezi presentation from that class that you can check out if you're interested. 

https://prezi.com/gksl7fkyekih/untitled-prezi/

Back to original story:
So my perspective on scenery and pictures began to change. And it reminded me of the time when I started looking at films through a different lens as well. Before I went to Morocco, my amazing art teacher, Mrs. Elisa, bought me a travel friendly watercoloring palette and pad so I can experiment on my own before the classes started in the fall (so sweet of her <3). When I got to Morocco, I wasn't prepared yet to start painting just by looking at the view, so I actually found this Youtuber that goes by the name "thefrugalcrafter" and I began following her tutorials. Here are a few of my first pieces.

(I painted this piece sometime in July and it was my first time experimenting with watercolor)

Why Watercoloring?

My junior year of high school was coming to an end and I still haven't chosen a senior project topic. My sister was just finishing up was hers which was jewelry making. It was a late night and I was at the Memorial Art Gallery with my sister and our art teacher, Mrs. Elisa. I was there to take photographs of some of my sister's pieces. I was looking through the Memorial Art Gallery's catalog when Mrs. Elisa suggests I do water coloring. At first, I was like noo thank you. I seen some of the work done by water color artist and I felt there was no way I would be able to do that. I'd be disappointed in my pieces, everyone else would be disappointed in pieces and it would all be one big mess. But water coloring began to fit the requirements to a senior project the more I thought about it. It was something I've never worked with, there were many community experts in the Rochester area, I was into art, so I could maybe start liking it and finally I was afraid of failing at it so that meant I was challenging myself by picking it. So Mrs. Elisa tells me, "you'll never know if you're good at it or if you'll love it unless you try". So I was like, thats it, this is what I'm doing. In a matter of seconds, I went from having absolutely no clue on what to do, to having this idea that had the potential of being great. God had answered my prayers <3. . .

Choosing a Topic

So, throughout my high school years up to the summer before my senior year, "senior project" was something I always thought about often; whether it was learning what not to do from the upperclassmen or just thinking about what I wanted to do for mine. The most difficult component to choosing a senior project was finding two community experts that would help me with my journey and be there for me from start to finish. I thought about many topics I wanted to do and one that really stood out to me was molecular gastronomy. Molecular gastronomy, according to Wikipedia, is "a subdiscipline of food science that seeks to investigate the physical and chemical transformation of ingredients that occur in cooking."

 
I wanted to choose this topic sooo badly. I just thought the process of making these foods was sooo interesting and the results where sooo gorgeous. I still do lol... but. I. couldn't. do. it. Why? because there was NOONE in the Rochester community that specialized in this art. I tried involving molecular gastronomy in different topics but it always went back to cooking and I didn't want to just cook. So I was back to square one again. My Junior year was coming to an end and I had no clue on what to do for my senior project.

Senior Year is Finally Here!

Hi Everyone,

My name is Nasreen Jaff and I'm a senior at School Without Walls High School. I was born in Chicago but I've lived most of my life in Rochester. I love sushi and persian cats and the color purple. For my senior project this year, I will learn how to water color and the different techniques that come with this beautiful art.