Lee

Concentration 3: __**Ambition**__: Due at the beginning of class, Thursday, April 7th.

In the final quarter you will be focusing primarily of making sure everything gets done. This quarter may be your last chance to really push your understannding of your project. You now know what you are doing and have developed some expertise in materials, techniques, and ideas. What are you attempting that is more ambitious than anything else you have completed thus far? Is it more intricate, larger scale, more images, deeper idea, etc. How have you pushed your project beyond its current state? I became even more aware of time (because I had so little of it) during this phase. The clock has been ticking closer and closer to zero, and it forced me to rush a little during this segment. In a way, that helped me because time itself was literally incorporated into the pieces. I made the spray paint, my main medium for this quarter, pieces look very rushed on purpose. Spray paint itself creates an element of chaos. I contrasted that with the rigid and orderly stencils of the numbers (an obvious representation/allusion to time/clocks). I think this worked very well with my style and overall theme of my concentration. To answer the prompt, I think the spray paint focused pieces were much more ambitious than anything I've attempted so far solely because spray paint is so much harder to control. Although it is more difficult to control, you can also work faster, so I was able to work on a larger scale during this quarter. Overall, I think I continued on my methodical yet also incredibly disorganized, chaotic theme and am well on my way to finishing on TIME.

Concentration 2: __**Evolution**__:

How has your project evolved from its beginning stages? What did you change deliberately? What has changed naturally as you got a better understanding of what you are trying to accomplish?

Since the beginning of my project, my central idea hasn't changed drastically but the way I've executed that idea has. At the beginning, I hadn't planned how I would execute my ideas out as thoroughly as I thought. The depth of my ideas weren't planned completely. My idea is just so incredibly complex and has so many different facets that I don't think I was prepared to go quite that deep into my pieces. During my "generation" feedback it was suggested that I start more pieces this time around to explore my ideas. In that aspect I have started four pieces, none of them completed (several are close), but all of them have a specific plan to execute my ideas deeply, thoroughly, and aesthetically. All this has been done deliberately. Some things have happened naturally as well; I'm exploring more mediums such as paint and spray paint. I'm excited about what this will convey to the audience. I've also started pieces that incorporate an actual clock and actual sand and I believe those pieces will be very unique in their appearance from the others. This approach got me thinking what else I could use to convey my ideas; a real clock was always an idea, but what else? I plan on using a digital clock, possibly an hourglass in some way, real clock gears, and possibly a hamster cage (weird, right?). I hope throughout the rest of this process I can work quicker and more efficiently.

Concentration #1: "Generation"

Generating something is different from creating it out of thin air. It implies that something needs to be built up over time in order to reach a certain level. How have you gone about generating this project ? What has proved challenging about your materials/ idea/ sources that you had not anticipated? What have you learned that you will take with you into the second Quarter?

The "generation" of this project has started slowly. I really like my idea, but i was hard to just begin to put my plans into action. The way I envisioned this starting was a lot simpler than it turned out being. I started with the idea of the "struggle" between chaos and order that exists within time (among other things). I don't think I realized at the beginning, though, that I would have to make my pieces a lot more complicated and in depth than my original plans. In each of the two pieces I have started, I had my idea but it wasn't fully generated. So after I had put my original plans on paper, I had to go back and edit it. And edit it again, and again. I would hit roadblocks where I didn't know what to do to make the piece more thorough or more complete or more detailed. I unintentionally started with the "chaos" portion first (I guess that's only natural). Then I add the "order" portion. The challenge, I've found, is making those two pieces work together in a fluid, flawless way while still maintaining a strong composition at the same time. I think the first two pieces have ended up being pretty successful, but the lesson I have learned is to try to integrate both the chaos and the order at the same time, not split them up. I liked the materials I've been using (ripped paper, pencil, colored pencil to make it look rushed), but if I could do something different I would choose a better surface to work on. Maybe a larger one, too. I will continue using pieces of my sketchbook pages/hurried doodles to create the chaos portions; I like the idea and dynamic of those pieces. I have learned a lot and hopefully my project will continue to evolve during the "evolution" phase.