eva middleton's art blog

 Language - Honors Studio Assignment #3 Artist's statement:  Language impacts our understanding of the world growing up, specifically the expectations and indications of what we are told. Constantly, we are asked, “Who do you want to be when you grow up?” This guided my thinking as I thought about why  societal expectations wanted me to know who, what, why  I wanted to be the way that I am. I thought of explanations: our obsession with education and success instead of feeling like a person, and I ultimately ended up back at the freedom of self expression, boxed into a single answer:  I don’t have to “be” anything. I have a “face, eyes, mouth,” so what is a body except to hold my person? I wanted the wire to represent “stitching” yourself together out of what you want to be, and rip the cardboard in a way that felt protestful, but also provide texture. The canvas cutouts were made up of different facial features, intended to look out of context (youthful and femi...

 Lost Childhood Object - Honors Studio Assignment #2 Our task for this piece was being given a random partner in which we would tell each other about a lost childhood object and be specific as possible: The color, size, weight, material, and any story attached about said object. My partner, Maggie, told me about a heart shaped barrette she lost while at school. It was pink and green (her two favorite colors) and the heart was a sewn textile material. It fell down a drain outside and Maggie described being able to see said barrette but not being able to reach it as it sat in vines.  One example of an initial idea.  I went through several interpretations of the story surrounding the story Maggie told me and this was evident in my brainstorming as sketches transformed my initial ideas, but the most important thing I took away was that the barrette remained visible, but unreachable, as though taunting. So I wanted to use something that would hold the barrette away from the vi...

 Steal Like An Artist - first Honors Studio project  My main theme was to steal from my sketchbook over the summer, as much of what I documented was in a journal style, observational motive. The things I stole from consisted of: Sheet music scores (largely from Fiona Apple’s Shameika ) maps, newspaper clippings, and a discarded Argentinian(?) children’s book  My grandmother, particularly depicted with her self-cocooning coziness (drawn from an actual photo I took of her on the couch) One of my best friends.  Figuratively, my idea was also to use recycled materials in a purposeful manner as it related to the prompt. From the beginning I knew I wanted an untraditional canvas, like a music score (my initial idea) and from there, I also came to the conclusion that this would have to be a piece with many literal layers in order to successfully steal from many things.  I also chose materials like red wire and red “location” pins  to bring my sketchbook to life. I...