Planting Around

I got my Then & Now self-portrait back! However the sad news is A Hero of Sustainable Agriculture (portrait of Prof. K) is lost. I'm so sad that I can't send it as a gift to Prof. K. I also found my Hotel Red texture collage, but it initially had a black border and it looks as somebody has ripped and took the border away.

I was going to watch The Avengers with a friend, but she stood me up and watched Packers football game instead, so I went to the movie alone.

Except watching movie and doing some homework readings, I was planting flowers around this afternoon. Everyone passed by seemed to appreciate the pretty flowers. I also bought two varieties of chili pepper plants and young plants of 5 kinds of herb (thyme, rosemary, mint, cilantro, and basil). I planted the herbs outdoor and kept the chili indoor. I've heard the herbs are perennial: they die in the winter but the roots would survive into the next year. I hope they grow strong and more and more so I'd have a large supply of chili peppers and fresh herbs for my kitchen!

Done with Chemistry? Almost

I think I probably don't have time to continue to update my spring break travel notes at least until this Friday. I was so stressed last night that I lost my sleep except a few naps. Now I have to write some more lab reports and prepare for the chemistry exam on Friday.

Last evening was my last Chemistry 344 lab. We'll be done for this class after its final exam next Tuesday. (Very fortunately, it means I can go to the Shpongle concert on 10th of May. Simonnnn! :DDDDDD)

So by the end of this semester I'll be done with my college chemistry requirement. Chemistry is hard, but I'm actually feeling kind of sad. I'll say good-bye to chemistry ... and hello to physics! (D:) Nevertheless, I think I'd still prefer to take more advanced biology classes than advanced chemistry.

The few upcoming weeks would be rough. At least I've got a few things that make me glad: the yummy food I cook for myself (even if they make me fatter), a TA (the art TA) who cares a lot about me and always wants to cheer me up, more friends around campus whom I'm probably too busy to meet before the semester ends, and all the molecule characters I've created.

The Very Colorful Insect Phylogeny

Ta-dah!

Phylogeny shows the genetic relationship between different taxonomic groups. In this one the insects on the right are more "advanced" (more evolutionarily derived). Isn't it just great to appreciate the diversity and beauty of insects?

Left to right:
(bottom) Thysanura, Odonata, Ephemeroptera, Orthoptera, Dermptera, Blattodea, Hemiptera, Neuroptera, Coleoptera, Hymenoptera, Lepidoptera, Diptera
(top-left) Carabidae, Staphylinidae, Scarabaeidae, Curculionidae, Chrysomelidae
(top-right) Culicidae, Asilidae, Bombyliidae, Calliphoridae, Tachinidae

PS. Emphemeroptera is actually a bit more primitive than Odonata, but I accidentally switched their place. Later I found it probably looks better compositionally as it now.

Brainstorming for Prof. K's Portrait

I'm still getting idea for my big art project - a portrait of Prof. K.

My art teacher Nic asked me what I've come up with, I said I had no idea. Some things I can associate with Prof. K. are greenhouses, vegetables, and owls.

"You created a whole comic of characters. You have new ideas every week, but now you're telling me you have no ideas?" Nic said, "Come on, just put your professor into the comic! Give him some psychedelic costumes or what ... Maybe Ecstasy fell in love with the professor and turned his life upside-down. They began raving all day with owls in the greenhouse, and the sunflowers were all dancing to the beats ..."

I couldn't do anything else but crying "Oh my God!" and laughing out loud. Oh Nic, thanks for the smart-ass WTF suggestion ...

Prof. K. told me that one of his most concerned issues is the patenting and monopolization of improved crops, world hunger, and the health of children. Maybe I should depict him in a weird costume, having numerous owls and directing the owls to steal precious patented seeds from agricultural company tycoons and giving them to the poor farmers in third world countries so they could feed their children ...

P. S. Prof. N. of my environmental studies class asked, "Have you used natural pesticides?" No reply. The first thing came to my mind was chili water. Prof. N. counted her finger and said, "Nicotine ... cocaine ... caffeine." There were giggles in the lecture hall, but Prof. N. remained serious (because she wasn't kidding). "Those things exist in nature to protect the plants, not to give you a buzz," she smiled. Well, that's fair and true for those plant alkaloids. Coffee? Maybe, but imagine someone spraying plants with cocaine ... LOL

The 7th Page WIP ...

The 7th page of my comic should be soon to come out.
I didn't know how to draw and I drew freaking random stuff. *facepalm*

I'm glad that it seems like I draw my characters faster now. Fooling around and doodling do help!

For my art class, we'll be doing a portrait of someone with mythic twist and must combine the person with 3 different organisms. Initially I thought about Prof. Young but today I wrote an e-mail asking Prof. Kloppenburg if he's willing to be the subject of my project. I admire those two professors it's hard to choose! But it might be a good idea to do something other than insects this time ...

Color Theory & Insects - WIP

The purpose of this assignment was to make our own 12 colors - 3 primary, 3 secondary, and 6 tertiary colors. We were allowed to cut the paper and arrangement them into a traditional color wheel or any way we wanted ... so I made a bunch of insects! (I always make things more complicated.) I just love insects too much!

Texture Project

"When you look for style, you find death. When you look for life, you find style."
My art teacher said this to encourage me (regarding my comic) and he heard it from someone else.

Alphaville

My weekend wasn't very productive. I felt so sleepy and still do. At least I finished my texture project for Art 102! Woohoo!
I'll post it when I have a good photo of it. (Maybe the art teacher will help me. He's a photographer.)

I've been listening to Alphaville (the German band that sang Forever Young). They're super 80's. I like their songs. LOL

(Does Marian Gold have buckteeth?)

Degradation of Psilocin in Water and Stuff

I asked my chemistry professor and this was his guess.
Since he said that I think it's probably accurate.
Goshhhhhh much more complicated than I thought!

An Artist's Facebook Project

Our Art 102 class visited the studios of the graduate art students in our school and talked to them. One of the artists, Gabriel, got an crazy idea which he called the Facebook Project. It's still ongoing.

First, he went on FB and searched for people with the same name as he and added them as friends. Then he obtained their permission to use their photos. Those people are from around the world, with very different backgrounds, some with interesting profile pictures. Gabriel then tried his best to dress up like their profile pictures and imitate them (he bought costumes and even gained and lost some weight at some point), and took pictures of himself as other Gabriels.

He hung those pictures on the wall and began to imagine a series of exciting adventure stories of those Gabriels, each with a different personality and very cool life story. For example, a Mexican masked wrestler or a guy who always carries a machine gun and lives beside a volcano. In those stories, they are heroes, villains, friends, and they interact! Finally, he produced paintings of those adventures! Gabriel even gave them family and friends based on the looks of those people's real family, friends, and pets.

Everyone was impressed. Oh, what a creative and cool guy!

Semi-blind Continuous Contour Practice

These are two semi-blind contour I did yesterday in art class.
Contour is the basic outlines of things. Continuous means that the whole drawing is one continuous line; we can't take the pencil off until it's finished.
Semi-blind means that we can only look at the paper a few times to orientate ourselves, but we can't look at what we're drawing when the pencil is moving.
I'm VERY satisfied with them!

This one was done by my right hand. 

The model was my classmate who is black and wore a wool hat.

This one was done by my left hand. LOL

 The model was another classmate who is white (Jewish, actually) and has enormous eyes and wore earrings.

A New Art Class

I have a real art class this semester - what I mean by "real" is it takes place in a studio and we have to buy a bunch of art supplies and actually produce some artworks.

The instructor apparently loves music. He began the class by playing music, talking about music (like he has been listening to MGMT a lot), and asking everyone to say what music impressed them recently in self-introduction.

I said I really like psychedelic music such as trance and Shpongle, and mentioned I went to the Shpongletron concert. He made me repeat the word "Shpongle" twice, laughed, and said "you're still tripping out!" Then he kept calling me "psychedelic biologist" until I said "stop it." It was so funny!

It looks like a fun and exciting class. However we're required to work outside of class at minimum of 5 hours per week. Wow ... I didn't know art classes have homework too!

Trying New Digital Technique

I can't draw realistic people so I let the computer do the job for me.

http://eusoniptera.deviantart.com/art/DMT-Realism-279116671
http://eusoniptera.deviantart.com/art/LSD-Realism-279116861

Because I don't have good skills and because they keep that not-entirely-realistic proportion, they look kind of creepy. =P

Inspired by those realistic versions of or untooned cartoon characters.

Cartoon Characters Untooned

By: Pixeloo http://pixeloo.blogspot.com/

Bird in Space

I don't usually appreciate the sculptures we went through in art history class, but Brancusi's Bird in Space really caught my eyes. It's such a beautiful sculpture!

People debate for a long time whether Bird in Space looks like a bird. For me, it represents the concept of a bird rather than the bird itself. Well, it's abstraction!

The Man Who Understood Symbolism

From O'Keeffe's Femininity (one of the reading assignments of my art history class)
Anne Middleton Wagner, Three Artists (Three Women), p. 40

Cover of A Goa Trance Album

Uh ... don't like psychedelic arts, don't look.

Review on Wassily Kandinsky’s Black Triangle

Just some parts from my 5-page-long art history final paper. Taking the components of the painting apart, I felt like studying the anatomy of an organism. I should have started it a few weeks ago, however finished it in the last day. Whether it's good writing or junk, it's done now! Consider how much time I put in, I'm satisfied. Hope prof. MC will like it.

Wassily Kandinsky, Black Triangle, 1925

Source: Paul Overy, Kandinsky: The Language of the Eye 

New York, N.Y., Praeger Publishers, Inc., 1969, p. 91

Kandinsky!

The deadline of final paper for art history class is coming fast. It has to be about an artist we talked about in class and one of his/her works that we didn't talk about. I picked Wassily Kandinsky. His paintings often have the prettiest colors, mainstream yet spiritual (that's what he tried to emphasize and achieve for life), and frequently induce synesthesia of sounds in me. They're like candies to my soul. Can I say I'm becoming a fan of this Russian artist? X))))))))

The Paintings of Music

Oh those wonderful synesthesia-inducing artworks!
Can you hear them?