I am going to show you my art process when exploring the theme of fear. I started with a basic spidermap and thought of the most basic connections: movies, Alfred Hitchcock, nightmares, and monsters. I explored a lot of artists such as Zdzisław Beksiński, Sam Bee, and Pieter Bruegel. I recreated their work in different mediums and then drew my own original interpretations. Some common fears I dived into: monsters, space, dead species, weird-looking things that feel slimey, dolls, suffocation, clowns, and the ocean.
INITIAL IDEA:
I have a huge love for drawing portraits, so I drew Alfred Hitchcock using Procreate and stuck it onto the page, along with some common photos I found online related to fears for my moodboard.
The first category I explored were
MONSTERS:
I used new techniques to explore monsters: hot wax on paper, white pen on black paper, toilet paper and recycled paper on canvas, and black paper scratched by a needle. I also painted a background with gouache and collaged a chalk drawing on top.
SPACE:
I drew famous astronauts from real life and movies. This idea was not my favorite but it was still fun to explore and have as part of my process in exploring fear.
DEAD SPECIES, in this case fish:
I bought a dead fish at the supermarket and cut it up so that I have a first-hand reference to explore this concept. I recreated Pieter Bruegel's painting of a fish and thought of famous movies about fish.
where are fish found?
OCEAN
I explored ideas of falling into the sea, took my own photos of various water locations and of boats. The last image was a big oil painting.
SLIMEY CREATURES:
I recreated Sam Bee's work and then created my own interpretation using his ideas (last image).
SUFFOCATION:
I took photos of my friends in cellophane and bubble wrap and drew them in various mediums. Some of the images I drew were also from the Internet. My friend, Lisa, agreed to a photo shoot with over 200 photos I took of her to use as my references. She put tape on her face, plastic wrap, and other materials. Everything was done in safe and careful conditions.
CLOWNS:
I explored various interpretations of the Joker. To experiment, I then painted the Joker on a denim jacket using special acrylic paint for fabric. It was a very fun experience and I got to sell the jacket online later :) Here's a photo of my brother playing his video games in my jacket:
To tie it back to Hitchcock, you might have seen me stick little photos of famous movies on nearly every single of the boards so far. Then, I incorporated photographs that I took of dolls into movie posters (using Photoshop to layer the text on top, I used random keywords that were synonyms of nightmares and phobias) inspired by
HORROR FILMS
My favorite book at the time was Maggie Stiefvater's "The Raven King" which I tied into Hitchcock's "Birds." I drew the main character inside the book I was reading
Mixing movie poster ideas, I created "THE END" with eyes from previous work shown below. I am not particularly proud of this work, but I think it is an interesting mix of things I explored!
