The final product of my efforts: Project 1 -- Digital Collage

Over the course of the past few weeks I've been composing this digital collage, mostly blindly and aimlessly. I wasn't exactly sure where I was going when I started, I just kind of started. This led me down a bunch of different paths--most with dead ends. What started as just trying to make a pretty image with my foils eventually grew to a hilly landscape, which quickly turned morbid as I decided to compose the foreground out of bones and introduce vicious semi-solar predators.

Take a look if you dare; here is my final digital collage.

a shout out to my favorite illustrator

So.. I decided to pay homage to one of the other leading lady influences in my life. I figured I'd already utilized appropriation once, I suppose another time wouldn't hurt. So who better than my absolute favorite illustrator, Hannah K. Lee. I don't think she's ever made a single thing that hasn't ended up printed out and referenced in my sketchbooks. I may be obsessed.

I needed a face (well two faces) so I decided to take advantage of this awesome little set of faces that Hannah made. They got pixelated when I blew them up to the size I needed, so I traced over them. I guess I'm a filthy, filthy thief.

Please take some time to check out Hannah K. Lee's personal website. She's wonderfully insightful and hilarious as an illustrator.

a shout out to one of my favorite artists

I discovered Valeriya Volkova through somewhat unconventional means: her art was shared on Reddit, where I saw it over the summer of 2013. Since then, I've constantly referenced her in my research and I love watching her release new pieces. I use her art for the wallpaper on my cellphone just so it's always with me and quick to access. I was hesitant to use any appropriation in my collage at first, but my composition has begun calling for a house, and nobody makes houses cooler than Valeriya's.

This cityscape of hers is the source of the house I decided to use in my digital collage.

To see more of her work, please visit her website, Valtastic.

scanning part 4 // put your whole body into it

"cassidy, I think you are forgetting something," says my brain. "I forget a lot of things," I reply, "and it's mostly your fault."

We argue for a while but eventually settle on remembering the anatomy book I made of myself last fall. "That could be interesting to work with!" says my intuition, and my brain and myself both agree.

I had cut up some spare prints of my bones and muscles at a certain point in time to make a collage in my sketchbook, and I had some of those clipped pieces intact still, which I scanned in for a total of 12 new objects -- or are they textures?

It seems pretty awful to just refer to my body parts as objects.

scanning part 3 // relief printmaking

"hey cassidy," says my brain, "do you remember that one time you made art?"

thank you for reminding me, brain! If you hadn't, I might never have had the good idea to start scanning some old pieces of linocut prints I made in past semesters. I like these as objects and as textures.. I'll find something to do with them.

scanning part two // tape

today I attempted to scan some tape clusters i've been accumulating for months, excited still by the success i found in scanning cellophane, and found some, uh, different results. NOT NECESSARILY BAD but I guess the tape had an inherent disadvantage to the cellophane just because it lacked the shininess that was so gaudy and exciting.

now, with all of that said, i really really like the shapes of these scans. I was searching initially for more texture when I though to scan these tape clusters, but i think they'd make nice little trees or something.

like this, this could be a happy little tree. but this one looks a little angry.

the great texture and object hunt

Photography is a thing that some people use and I guess that I am one of those people. In attempting to find THE MOST FANTASTIC TEXTURES AND OBJECTS IN THE WORLD through the search for the "remnants of our culture" I took a few photographs of objects and textures that I thought interesting. I'm not sure if I will be able to incorporate any of them into my collage or not but we'll see--as of right now I guess theoretically anything and everything is fair game.

This slightly wet sink drain. 

A cliche view of some vinyl record covers.  

What about the pattern on my pillowcases?

And the way a rolled up spool of thread for books looks.   

And an abused studio wall.

I would be lying if I said I didn't have a little fun imagining this series of photos of a salt and pepper shaker set was a little narrative and dramatic: one, two, and three.

"the remains of our culture" and an exercise in exploring the concept

Throwaway culture: we waste; we find excitement in the new, we forget about the old UNTIL it is "vintage" or "nostalgic"--and once more hip to care about.

In search of the remnants of our culture I find myself distracted by the same issues as everyone else but, because I like to be difficult, I tack on a slight of rebellious self-separation and realize that there aren't too terribly many lost facets of our culture I tend to concern myself with. I am a selfish being, I am self-involved and I am lonely, and for this I find that I enjoy remnants of past versions of myself much more than things left behind as hints of others.