My Scholastic Portfolio Essay:
Art is life.
I’ve come to adopt this as my philosophy, because it has become my reality this year. With the start of the AP program in summer of 2005, I committed myself to art, making it of the highest of my priorities. I went through a transition this year, from art as a hobby to art as a lifestyle. The more I thought about art and viewed art the more I noticed art in the world around me. It was an awakening of sorts, I began to see color, form, and composition in the same world that before had seemed so drab and ordinary. Messy desks become still lifes, shadows in my room become an abstract composition, and people at the mall turn into subjects for figure studies. I take my sketchbook wherever I go, because more often than not I find myself with a great idea in the most unexpected place. I visit galleries and art shows as much as possible, hopefully to make myself a knowledgeable and well rounded artist. I am compelled by art of all kinds, and I feel that I can truly say it is my passion.
When choosing the pieces I wanted to include in my portfolio, I felt that I had too much of a personal connection to the work to make an unbiased decision on which were the best pieces. The pieces included in this portfolio are the pieces that people who are unfamiliar with my work saw as the most successful. Fortunately, the pieces they selected coordinated with what I had felt were my best. These pieces show the versatility of my work, with the variety of styles and media that I have explored. They show comfort with loose expression, along with discipline in tightly rendered extended studies. I feel that my work shows thought went into the symbolism and story behind the picture, even if it may not be directly apparent to the viewer.
When I think of how I would like people to react to my work, I conclude that all I want people to take with them is themselves. I want everyone who sees my work to feel something when they look at it. I want people to remember a past experience or spark an intriguing thought that follows them through the day. I like to hear as much feedback as possible, every interpretation is valid. Art is personal, so the viewer’s reaction to the work should be on a personal level. If people judging my work are unimpressed, there’s nothing I can do, or would do, to attempt to sway them. I can only hope that when people see my work they see the thought process behind it and respect my form of expression. Because that’s what my art is, expression.
