The Grand Finale

My last year of attending Haddon Township High School has been the most memorable, for both good and bad reasons.  There is always drama, but the good moments this year cancelled out any bad mood I was in.  I was able to reconnect with old friends and meet new people.  This year our class also has never been closer.  I am glad I get to graduate with the class of 2014.  Never was their a dull moment inside or outside of school.  Our class has little to no problems with each other; we all get along well with each other.

However, I need to plan ahead for what is to come after I graduate.  Now my mind is fixed on college and a career path.  Everything has changed in a matter of days, and it has been somewhat overwhelming.  I am gradually becoming more independent and responsible.  Before I move forward in becoming more self-reliant, I have to get through graduation.  I will have to say goodbye to high school and begin my journey into the world of college.  This moment will change my life and shape me as an adult for the future, and what a better way to end this school year with my very own art book!

Preparing for the Future

For me, remembering things has never been very easy.  I inherited this trait from my father, as we both struggle with remembering the simplest of tasks.  I have often been in a situation where my friends will talk about our childhood memories from the past, and I usually have no idea what they are talking about.
Creating this time capsule in art class will be able to recall the memories I have had from this year and the years before.  In it I have put many items in my time capsule, all of them being very small and light, but also containing memories that I can remember.  They create a timeline across my entire high school career.  Each item  holds meaning to me in both good and bad ways.

Hopefully, when I open the box in the future, the items will spark something in my mind.  This should be able to give me the recollection of the memories I wish to remember from my four years of attending high school.  As the decoration on the outside of my box gives off the mood of this years moments and represents the vibe of it all, the inside contents will hold a deeper meaning to me and will be kept private.

I am excited to see what I achieve in the next four years, and finally open up my time capsule.  The moments in the box will all replay in my mind as I go through each item.  All these memories can be shared and I can tell the old stories to new people, or retell them to those who were there.  This project is not only amusing presently, but it will also stick with me for years to come.  Creating the box will leave me with good memories for when I graduate from Haddon Township High School.

Chances

As I grow older my curiosity lingers towards greater lengths than ever.  Currently, I have found myself wondering more and more about my grandmothers journey from the country of Ireland to the United States of America.  It was here that she met the love of her life and started a family with him.  However, it took a lot for my grandmother to give my grandfather a chance.

He was a bartender when she traveled here.  One day she sat on a stool and asked for a drink, but she got more than a drink.  Pick up lines that a "player" would use filled her ears.  She was anything but interested in him, but he was determined to see her more than to once.  The next move he made was to ask for her number.  Her brogue was strong, so she figured that if she spoke fast and with the thickest accent she had, then he would be unable to understand the seven numbers that came out of her mouth.

My grandmother felt successful that she finally got rid of the man, until she received a phone call.  After her hard work on trying to get rid of him, he bounced back to ask her out.  She would decline or have someone say she was not home, but he would only call again.  The cycle was never ending and the only way to stop it was to agree to go out with the guy.  After a month of this she hesitantly accepted his offer.

It was that date that made my grandmother realize she could give my grandfather a chance.  The date went better than she expected.  He was charming, charismatic, and a real gentleman; later becoming the love of her life.  They got married, moved in together, and had two girls.  Their kids went on to have four children in total.  This was all made possible because she finally agreed to go out with the bartender that hit on her.

Fortune Cookies

In class we picked out six fortune cookies and were told to incorporate them into a piece of artwork. The only fortune I can remember was the one that said, "wise men learn more from fools than the wise".  I tried to think of a way show it, but the only thing that I could think of was Elvis Presley's song "Can't Help Falling In Love".  This gave me the idea to put this song into my art.  It helped me come up with more ideas and I was able to create something that represented my thoughts on the six fortunes I received.  In the end, this is what it looked like:

Art x 3

In Art x 3 we had to start, enhance, and end a work of art; however, instead of one piece of art, we had three separate ones.  I started out using transfers to get a background for the second person to work with.  They gave a good start to the piece, and I hope that it helped inspire the person who received my piece after me.

My First Contribution

My Second Contribution

What I Received

I received the piece on the left, and turned it into the piece on the right.  After I finished, it turned out as the picture below.  We all went for something different, but the person after me was able to take both of our ideas and create a finished product.

What I Received

The First Part

The next piece I received looked like the picture I provided on the right.  Before I received it, it looked like the picture on the left.  I was the third person to have this artwork, so it was going to be my finished piece.  When I was done covering, layering, and adding it turned out looking like the picture below.

Pop Print

Andy Warhol was known for his pop prints.  He portrayed the famous Marilyn Monroe with many different color schemes.  I have showed this picture before in my blog post titled Hats, Hats, Hats! However, this picture has more color schemes of Marilyn:

This type of pop art inspired us to make our own.  We picked an item from our pile of blue, and we had to carve it into a linoleum block using linoleum cutters.  My choice was a little blue button.  When I drew it out, I thought it looked simple, yet charming.  I wanted to make it look more  pop-like, so I decided to add some background to it.  This is what it looked like after I inked it and pressed it on the paper:

After I printed a few of my buttons in black, I tried to put color into it by mixing paints together.  I also used a colored paper to make the colors all tie in to one complete piece of artwork.  Instead of just printing it one, I printed it many times in many different ways on the same paper.  Doing this many times gave me a wide selection of pieces that I could make my final piece.  Out of all of the pieces I made this one was my favorite: 

A Blue Paradise

Portia Munson has inspired our class to create a pile of blue items.  Students brought two blue items to contribute towards the pile on the table in the center of the room.  Compared to Portia Munson's, our pile was not as substantial.  In the pictures below you can see the difference.

Portia Munson

Our Creative Arts Class

However, it is easy to wonder what all of these items are.  Some might just say that there is a hat, pillow, and a phone case.  What these items can really be expressed as are memories.  Each item on the table is its own moment in time.  Everyone might not be able to connect a memory to a specific item on the table, but the student who brought it in, most likely, can.  These are pieces of us, whether big or small, and even if we sometimes forget they will always be there.  This is what I see when I look at this table:  memories piled together.