Twenty-five States of Being . . .

in this exercise, the class created 25 state-of-being self-portraits. They looked beyond the surface; felt, and reacted spontaneously. using gesture and instinct, they looked inside themselves in order to explore.

We all live in and out of a string of emotional, psychological, spiritual and physical states. Our day-to-day expressions, or lack thereof, emphasize these states. We wear our lives on our faces. We share and discuss our state of mind and being with our friends and significant others, and all together, the help to shape who we are. These ‘states’ are our self-portraits, and a good artist can pull them out of the surface skin that others see.

To complete the 25 drawings, you will need to work at a relatively quick pace. You will need to be able to suspend judgment and critique, and allow yourself some freedom to work instinctively and expressively.

Experiment with materials and surfaces so that you feel that you are building a broader drawing vocabulary. Collect a variety of materials and media, drawing surfaces and other miscellaneous ‘stuff’. You may want to bring in significant objects or images to serve as source material. Stretch your limits and be experimental.

You might consider the following:

What constitutes a drawing? A self-portrait?

What can be used to create a drawing? What about surfaces, and shapes?

Try varying scale and the amount of time you spend from piece to piece. Perhaps one takes one hour and the other take 1 day.

Consider the issues/course goals you identified in your Personal Assessment as you strategize your approach.

Don’t forget about the list of required drawing media and approaches in the syllabus, review it and try to incorporate some into this activity.

Brainstorm, Brainstorm, Brainstorm.