This is my independent project! I had chosen to make clay faces for stuffed animals. My teacher was very concerned when I told him my idea. I told him to trust the process. Each face represents a different emotion. The concept behind this assignment was the masking of emotions in society. The mask is the face itself while the eyes are the true emotion. The green sheep, however, is peace. The eyes are closed because when you make peace with your emotions and yourself, you have nothing to hide. Each face as a different nose style and lip shape except for the pink and blue bunny. I intended for them to be twins.
Artist Statement
My specific style as an artist is very soft. There are soft lines and pastel colours. Every art piece feels dreamy. My art style is influenced by companies such as Sanrio, which has a very soft, smooth aesthetic. Characters such as Pusheen, Cinnamorol, MyMelody and Pompompurin inspire most of my work. They all have soft colours and bold but pastel linework. They also have small, cute faces. The way I achieve this style is by using solid colours. I will get a pastel colour and use it, however, there is hardly any shading. With that being said, on my independent project, "Masks" I had to shade some parts of it to give it more depth and realism. Even though it was a sculpture, I treated it as though it was a canvas and applied shading in corners and around edges. I did this by dry brushing the paint onto the areas, then blended by dry brushing the area with the base colour. I realized while making this series that I create some of my best work when working with 3D mediums. I visualize ideas in 3 dimensions in my head, and I find it very hard to translate them onto paper or canvas. When I have all those different angles to work from, I can easily make a series. Sculpting the noses was my favourite part as I was able to sculpt all different sizes and shapes or noses. I believe that all types of noses deserve to be loved and celebrated. Not one person should have to feel like their nose isn’t good enough or not worthy of love. If I could change one thing about this specific series, I would choose bigger plushies. The faces did not have enough room for the detail I had wanted to add. If I had chosen bigger plushies, I would have been able to add more intricate details. During the creation of this series, I realized how much I enjoyed sculpting. I knew I wanted to do sculpting for my independent project since I had first heard about it. I was pleasantly surprised at how much I enjoyed doing it, however. I want my artwork to remind everyone that we are all still children. We can still enjoy the warm embrace of soft designs and can still love to play with shapes.