Amber Remaley- Thesis Paper

Walking into this individual studio course, my expectations were set high for myself. Everyone knows by now that when it comes to art I want, need, and have to be the best, with that being said all my artwork produced in this course had to shine. During this course I also wanted to set a name for myself as an artist by having my own style. Having an style of painting was important to me, since I range from photo realism to pop art. I wanted to start my style, so that when people see my paintings in MoMa and in the art history books they would stay, " Oh, that's an Amber "Remy" Remaley". This semester I actually did accomplish to find my own individual style of painting by painting in a mostly black and white gray scale pop art style. In the past I mostly worked in color, but I found that I prefer to work with black and white tones. I found that working with black and white with just a small amount a color, can go a long way like any other painting.

From the very beginning I was going to work with celebrities as my subject matter, by painting portraits. I wanted to do a series of black and white oil paintings of classic celebrities from the sixties. Marilyn Monroe, Audrey Hepburn, and Elvis Presley were just some of the portraits I was planning to paint. The goal was to complete about a dozen black and white paintings of celebrities in a photo realism style. I wanted them to range from many different sizes and be painted on boards of wood. Some other ideas were to incorporated spray paint and some small 3-D objects. Towards the second project when we had to make a personal belief piece I was using paint plattes in replace of a canvas. The paint platte was another idea I was leaning to instead of the use of wood or a canvas. During the course of starting our final pieces for the show, my celebrity idea was still there to stay, but doing photo realism paintings of celebrities was out of the question. The subject matter that I chosen has been done over so many times that anyone could go to their local Target store and buy a black and white photo realism painting of Marilyn Monroe. To alter my original thought but still have my theme of celebrities, I added a corky twist to the celebrity and did it in a pop art style. Adding to the pop art look I also added some texture to some pieces to make them unique.

The pieces I completed this semester was the black and white self portrait with a color wrist band done with acrylic on a wooden paint platte. Another piece was the personal beliefs project done on a cut out cardboard platte painted gold with collage images and drawings of myself and my great-grandparents, with the beliefs of heaven and there being an after life. The final piece before my pop art celebrities was the Navajo project, which was made out of two pieces of cardboard that I painted an landscape image of a sunset with deer and trees. The last pieces I created was my pop art paintings seven celebrity done with acrylic on canvases that range from 4x4 to 30x40. At this point I feel my artwork has shown some growth and a new style of painting. I am excited to further with working with celebrities that portray them in a humorous way. The main idea with each of the three pieces of works were to stick with the assignment but still add a touch of Amber by using gold leaf or black and white paint. With my final project my main idea was to add a touch of humor by getting a famous image of a famous celebrity that everyone has seen before, but add something funny that would make that image mean so much more. I communicated those ideas through each of my final pieces, so that the corkiness in the painting sticks out but still does not take away for the well known image.

This semester I worked with cardboard, paint plattes, gold leaf, and stencils. With using cardboard not only is it cheap, but it also creates great texture like on my Navajo project which created a ripple pattern. Cardboard also saved me for my personal beliefs project, when there was a snow storm and I was not able to buy a wooden paint platte, I just made one out of extra cardboard laying around. Paint plattes was a nice was to get away from painting on a canvas. Using the platte was cheaper in cost and also gave a nice organic shape instead of a square canvas. With my self portrait, I think with it being painted on the paint platte it made the painting; it also helped support my self portrait by saying I'm an artist. Gold leaf became my best friend during this semester, if something felt missing I just threw a touch of gold leaf in to complete a piece. I feel gold leaf is classic and decorative which is great to use, but can also be over powering at times; so you don't want to add too much. The last thing I tempered with was stencils. I'm a huge fan of Banksy's graffiti work, so I always wanted to try using a stencil. For my 30x40 color Audrey Hepburn painting I actually made my own dotted pattern stencil for the background, by just using a hole puncher on a thick piece of paper. I later purchased a neat stencil book at Dick Blick, which I used on my honey comb piece. Using stencil is a great way to get something down which being time consuming.

Critiques are something I do not dreg but instead take in to improve myself. Without Chris posting a comment to my proposal on blogger, I might have not came up with my final pieces I have now. Chris's comment made me think of a way to do something different with celebrities that has not been really done before, with out him saying that who knows what kind of mess I would of came up with. Many comments about my work whether it's from family, friends, or professor, I listen to and respect their thoughts. Critiques can only make me work hard, that will make me in the end become better.

Andy Warhol, Roy Lichtenstein, and Banksy are all artist I look up to and did research on. The pop art time period between the era of the sixties through eighties is what I consider classic pop art. As for to in this day and age I look at graffiti art and even into music. Many musicians use art in their music videos and CD artwork, like Kayne's West Heartless video or Rihanna's Rude Boy video, which has loads of pop art. With seeing pop art everywhere from TV to t-shirt, it made want to do research it find more information about these famous artists.

Meeting with artists that have been in the business and made a name for them self was exciting to see. Going to their art studios and meeting one on one with them about my artwork was a great experience. I learned that you have to start from the bottom up, and never quit at art because you can make it. Many people think artist are doomed as starving artist and won't go anywhere with their work, but seeing Emil Lukas and how far he came really inspired me. Seeing his piece at Pulse made me realize that will be my piece in Pulse someday. Also seeing their art studios showed me that professional artists have an art studio, and do not paint out of their apartment bedroom like me. Having a studio to work in is not only wonderful to have, but people can come view your work. In the near future I plan on getting my own art studio, it's only right since I am going to become famous.

Oh come on! Not again! Please don't tell me it's another wannabe, " I take an images of a famous celebrities and turn it into pop art"....wait a second....ha that's kind of funny, the Frank Sinatra painting in the center. Quit reading this for a second and take a look! Pretty creative and all, with the contact thing, huh. Hey, who's that on top? Don't tell me that's Bob Marley. See it....? Who would think of placing a D.A.R.E sticker on Bob's guitars, got a say, pretty talented. Is that Marilyn Monroe wearing red converses....wait let me take a look and walk over, sure is. This artist does have skills and creative that can go for miles! Whats this artist's name again?She signs her work Remy, but her name is Amber Remaley. Well Amber, Andy Warhol said "Everyone will be famous for 15 minutes", and it's definitely your turn at fame.