There's a man putting his hands up in surrender. He is mostly a silhouette except for his eyes and his brain. Above him are the words "I've been thinking too much. Help me". Next to him on both sides are the same words repeating. The background is mostly gray.

The "X" shape of the piece and the upside down of the triangle of the words show movement. The piece goes from top to bottom. Variety is in the craziness of the piece. The proportion of the big words to the small brain shows overwhelmed. The lack of unity shows the craziness.

The quote is a lyric from a Twenty One Pilots song, Ride. The quote is about thinking so much that it overwhelms you. The man in the piece is worried. The words progressively get scarier. The background is scratchy. The brain is the only realistic part of the piece to show that it is the emphasis of the piece.

I like this piece. I could have done better with the background. It's not my best work, but I think it really proves the point. I really like how the brain turned out. Figuring out the placement for everything was hard, but I think I chose the right one.

Free project - Kolesa

Kristen Buckner is the artist that helped inspire me. Her artwork (yin yang dragons above) is what I based the idea of my piece.I used the idea of having two separate "floating" entities representing each side. Also, the bottom right dragon is holding a ball the color of the dot so I thought I would add that.

This piece has a yin yang in the middle. There are two people floating in a circle. One is white and wearing warm-color clothes. He is also holding a black ball or orb. The other is black and wearing cool-color clothes. She is also holding a white ball or orb. The white guy looks happy-go-lucky while the black girl looks distressed or annoyed.

There is balance in this piece. It's split into two equal pieces with the yin yang in the exact middle.There is also movement. The movement of the people synced with the movement of the yin yang takes the eyes in a full circle. Also the variety of the piece keeps making you look at both sides at the opposites of the sides.

The meaning of the piece is the literal representation and the personification of yin and yang. The black part of yin yang represents feminine, sadness, black, calm, softness, negativity. The black girl to the left looks very negative. The white part of yin yang represents masculine, happiness, white, energetic, hardness, positivity. The white guy on the left looks very happy. The contrast of the color of their eyes, mouth, and the orb they hold represents the opposite color that exists in each of the sides.

I like this piece, but I feel I could have done better. I could have added some type of shading. And made the whole piece bigger. Other that that, I think it was a success. It's very simple and I needed to get my point across,. According to other people, I did that part well too.

Visual Narrative project - Kolesa

The piece is a girl talking to her friend while her family menacingly stand in a group and stare at them. There is  a comic book, cartoony, or anime-like vibe.

Emphasis is on the black figures with the lines radiating from them, but there is also a separate emphasis on the two in the foreground with their bright colors contrasting the purple background.

The story of the piece is that the girl is with her friend. But since her family is very overprotective, if she has a boyfriend then they will probably interrogate him like crazy. So she tells her friend to be careful as not to do anything that might bring attention to them as being together.

I like this piece. Well, at least the idea of it. I could have done a better job at the execution part, but I think I did a decent job. I would change the expressions on the people's faces. A more distinguishable angry face on the black figures. Make the girl look at the guy so it was more obvious who she is talking to. Have the guy looked scared or worried, not sad.

Monk Kicking

We had to do a human figure that had a pose, so why not be a dynamic pose. I remembered that the fighting style of monks included very over-the-top poses, so I chose to do my project on that. I wasn't sure which pose to do really, but I eventually picked the basic upward kick. My second "backup" plan was a volleyball player, but at the time the monk was what I wanted to base my project on. I chose colored pencil because I'd already done so many black and white pieces and I wanted to have more of a variation in styles.

The monk in the foreground is off centered because I was planning on making it thin and long, but I decide to fill the whole page instead. The emphasis is clearly on the monk in the foreground from the bright color of his pants in contrast to the bland greens in the background. Proportion is off and the monk's legs look longer than normal. The harmony of all the mountains and their slightly different shades of green is flowy almost. I chose to have the monk shirtless to work on the chest so it wasn't all orange clothes. The cultural reference of the piece is in the monk's clothes and the temple in the background.

I was trying to convey a sense of motion in the piece. The top left corner is where most people start looking, like a book (unless they're drawn to the middle). They go down the leg, see the body, then go down to the foot. The stairs go up to the temple. Then it goes up and around again. It's not the strongest form of movement, but it's there.

I don't like this piece. The proportion of the legs is really throwing the whole thing off. The coloring was rushed. The paper seemed rough so the coloring wan't smooth. The volleyball player is now seeming like it would have been a better option, but I did what I could.