Academy - Week Five

Anita Kunz gave us our assignment: Conceptual Portrait.

I chose to do a conceptual portrait of Hillary Clinton. I focused on her outrageous accent/manner of speaking and statements recently when speaking to primarily black audiences. She comes across sounding like a racist depiction of blacks from the 19th century. It's her own fault.... she even said that "Congress is run like a plantation.... and you know what I mean." It think that's ridiculous. So this is Hillary in blackface. And that's why I put her in front of the capitol building.

The instructors loved the idea and thought it showed the power of illustration.... but the only way I could pull it off would be to do it in the style of 19th-century political illustration. I referenced Thomas Nast. Jon Foster was also here to provide direction. I explored a lot of different techniques to get that engraving or etching quality but ended up doing it in pen and ink on watercolor paper. I learned that a razor blade makes a great eraser on ragpaper. (Thomas Nast image below).



The critique went very well. Lots of kind words. The only negative thing seemed to be that I overdid it on the speckles. But speckles were too fun to do.

WEEK SIX: Alumni instructor week. Doug Chayka and Jenny Kostecki are the instructors. Our assignment is do a double-page spread (11"x17") for chapter three of Pinocchio.