My artwork is a replica of the moon scene from “The Very Hungry Caterpillar” by Eric Carle. In my artwork, the background is a night blue sky with a few white dots as stars. In the background, there is also a full white moon that is slightly blue in color. On the moon, there are 2 eyes, a nose, and a mouth that is done in blue crayon. Beside it, there is a brown tree trunk that is around 5 cm wide. There are 3 greenish-brown leaf stems; 1 stem is on the right side of the tree trunk, another stem is on the bottom left of the tree trunk and the final stem is going across the moon. There are also 2 greenish-brown leaves; 1 is attached to the bottom left stem, but only a part of it is seen. The other leaf is half greenish brown and the other half is plain green. On the brownish-green side of the leaf, there is the round white caterpillar egg.
The art process is about painting and sketching. Sketching was involved in the art process when I had to sketch the scene on a piece of paper before making the collage. The painting was involved when I had to paint the papers to make the piece for the collage. The artist that influenced my artwork is Eric Carle. I used his collage-making style; I followed a similar process with him. I also used the acrylic techniques that he used, for instance, I used the wet-on-wet technique. The acrylic techniques that I used in my artwork are wet in wet, dry in wet and I used a little blending. The characteristics of the artist’s style that I used in making the parts of the collage. Since Eric Carle did that, I also sketched and painted the collage pieces. The media used in this artwork is sketching paper, pencil, eraser, scissors, paint, paintbrush, pallet, gluestick, and a dark blue crayon.
Analysis and The Process:
The art elements that are included in this artwork are shape, color, and form. The shape is shown when I had to sketch and cut out the shapes for the collage pieces. Color is shown in the whole artwork. There are primary colors and secondary colors such as blue and green. The form is shown in the form of the collage that I chose. I chose to do Eric Carle’s collage form which is sketching the scene, then cutting and pasting the pieces. The art principles in my artwork are unity and proportion. Unity is shown in the leaves as it has the same color (greenish brown). Proportion is shown when the size of the moon is compared to the size of the leaves and trees. The leaves and tree seem larger than the moon because the proportion of it is placed close to our viewpoint.
To make the artwork, I first chose a scene from one of Eric Carle’s books. After that, I sketched the scene on a piece of paper. Then, I observed the color and the acrylic techniques that Eric Carle used in the scene. After that, I painted the same colors and used the acrylic techniques on a piece of paper. I painted either 1 or 2 colors on each piece of paper. Later, I cut out the collage pieces from the painted paper based on the sketch I made earlier. Then, I pasted them on the background paper. Finally, I added decorations such as the little white stars, the moon’s face, and the white caterpillar egg.
Interpretation:
I created this artwork because I wanted to learn more about making a collage in different ways. I got to experience doing that when I tried to replicate Eric Carle’s style of making a collage. I also made this artwork because I wanted to paint an artwork using the acrylic techniques that I learned in this unit. This artwork tells me about a calm scene in the night sky and that there are many wonderful sceneries all over the world. It also tells me that are various ways to create a collage. Not only can we paste pictures on top of each other, but we can also sketch, paint, cut, and paste our own collages. When people see this artwork, I want them to feel relaxed and creative. I want them to feel relaxed because this artwork displays a sense that helps relieve us. This artwork also shows a calm scene which can help us feel relaxed. I want them to feel creative because they could learn many things from this artwork. For instance, they could learn that there are various ways to make a collage.
Reflection and Self-Judgement:
This artwork is successful because my final product is similar to the scene in Eric Carle’s book “The Very Hungry Caterpillar”. It is also successful because I made a collage using the same process as Eric Carle and the acrylic techniques that I learned in this unit. This artwork is also successful because I got to fulfill the task given which is to recreate a scene from any of Eric Carle’s books. In my opinion, the most challenging part to make this artwork is to get a fixed layout. Getting a fixed layout means that I have to adjust the scene to fit my layout, in my case the layout was an A4 paper. Another challenging thing is when I had to get the pieces of the collage. This was hard because I had to accurately sketch and cut the pieces for the A4 layout. Since I changed the layout, I had to try my best to accurately make the pieces. I enjoyed assembling the final collage because I got to paste the pieces and make the decorations. I also enjoyed making the final product because I got to see it come together as a replica of the moon scene from one of Eric Carle’s books.
In my artwork, I could have made it more similar to Eric Carle’s work. I could have used different colors to make the color more similar. I also could have made the textures more similar by adding more layers of paint or by carefully making the paint strokes. I also could have changed the paper layout by making it either in an A3 paper layout or by combining 2 horizontal A4 papers. I also could have been more accurate with the shapes by measuring the actual shape with the painted piece of paper before cutting it out. I can improve my skill by doing more collages using Eric Carle’s style. I could also practice cutting my shapes on a random piece of paper before cutting the actual painted paper. Besides practicing cutting my shapes, I could practice making the decoration too. Finally, I can do more artworks that replicate the scenes from his other books. By doing this, I can practice Eric Carle’s style and I can practice my creativity.