WEEK FIVE - A

 On Monday I met with Professor Mata over zoom to work through more of my ideas. I have a handful of directions but I am not sure of the medium I want to use. During our meeting, she showed me a photo of a collage piece she made using a mix of mediums and techniques. Her piece uses both digital elements and found objects. We also spoke about me using maps and bringing them into a digital space or then drawing directly on them. 

I enjoy the map idea as I love the visual interest they have from both far away and up close. I am not sure yet if I want to draw on the map directly then or how I will illustrate the portrait.

I was hoping to find physical maps that were slightly aged, but the local craft store I go to isn't open because of COVID so I had to think of another idea. I could do this digitally, but I really want to manipulate the physical paper in some way. I began Googling maps and remembered AAA has maps and wondered if they had anything available to download. I found a search bar and looked for Mississipi maps as Langston Hughes speaks of the Mississipi River in his poem. 

https://www.aaa.com/mapgallery/

I found the two maps and printed them out in full color to use. I think I am going to use the second one (Jackson Ville) as I was able to print it out the largest without losing the resolution. Langston speaks of the rivers being apart of his identity and I want that message to still resonate with this piece. I began to think of other ways of using the paper rather than drawing it and I began to think about cutting into the map and using the negative space to make the image. 

I began researching into portraits using extoc-knives and I found stencil portraits which are used by graffiti artists. I found a video tutorial here on how to make one.

These stenciled outlines are the style I was looking for with making a realistic image but without needed full value. I am going to start by drawing out the stencil image.