An Ode To 100 Days

It has been a summer to remember; devoid of human contact. That, however, is not necessarily meant to be taken in a negative light. Over three months of peace and quiet has left me time to recharge, and reacquaint myself with, well, myself.

Yes, I'm ready to socialize again, strangely enough. More than ever, I think, which is (for lack of a better word) good. I'm also ready to attempt to make myself a little more noteworthy in Penn State's Architecture Department; a goal I didn't even come close to accomplishing last year.

But I digress. Here's my summer, in a three-minute nutshell.

(For larger versions, check out my Facebook album, or I can send you any upon request).

It's gonna be a good year.

Mosquito and Headless (Revisited)

The papier maché is done!

At long last, the beginning of the end of my antisocial summer-of-art-projects has come upon me. As I said a few entries ago, one of the models was going to be a 3D recreation of one of my 100 Days. Rarely do I ever consider anything I do, "good", but this sculpture (dubbed Mosquito) is as close to (what I consider) perfect as I've ever gotten with a private project.

If you're interested, take a minute or two and check out my bangin' process montage:

The song is "Out of Egypt, Into the Great Laugh of Mankind, and I Shake the Dirt From My Sandals As I Run" by Sufjan Stevens.

But wait, there's more.

When we moved from Texas over a year ago, we had to leave one papier maché sculpture I made as a kid that my mom really liked. I decided that since I was working in the same medium again, I could remake that same sculpture for her at the same time as I was working on Mosquito. That being said, this is Headless (Revisited):

And how it was made:

The song is "The Captain" by Guster.

P.S. We're on day 98. It's been quite the summer.

One week

was an improper prediction for completion time.

HOW-EVUH,

all is well.

There is still much to be done, but the sculptures are taking shape.

It's like 8th grade

without the shitty parts.

I used to do a ton of papier maché stuff in my awkward preteen years (turns out spending your Friday nights making monsters out of newspaper doesn't get you laid like I thought), and I recently got the idea to start my old operation back up again. In my previous post, I said I was going to reproduce an abstract ink drawing I did a few weeks ago; the sticky process is in full swing.

Marvelous. Should be finished within a week.

PAPIER

MAH SHAAYYY

papier mache. modeling drawing for funs?

(this was day 48 of 100)

HEY

It's my birthday. :)

DEPRESSING BIRTHDAY PICTURE TIME

This is day 30 out of 100.

Noticeable Changes

I wouldn't normally post a drawing involved in my 100 Days project individually (the bottom drawing is a part of one), but check this out. The shoes on the top were drawn about two years ago. The ones on the bottom, tonight. Different shoes, but same type and taken from the same angle.

This is what formal drawing classes do:

100 in 100

As I sit with my Mac on a ramshackle hotel bed of a Red Roof Inn in Toledo, I feel it necessary to announce the start of a project of pretty decent lengthiness.

100 ARTS IN 100 DAYS

READ ALOUD AND PRESS PLAY

Yes, it's exactly what you think. From May 10th to August 18th, my goal is to produce 100 half-decent to decent original works of art. That's 100 possibilities for something small and unnecessary to include in a portfolio, 100 possibilities for a Facebook comment that will resemble "OMGZ I LUV UR ART", and 100 possibilities for something to go up on my grandma's fridge.

Also, I figure if I do 100, at least one will be good.

If you were curious, no, this is not an original idea. I credit this little project to one guy (whose blog I happened to have found on StumbleUpon), who did what I'm planning, but on a much larger, more ambitious scale. He did one creative work of art everyday for 365 days; really original, and pretty cool.

Unfortunately, it's not all that original. After a simple Google search, it turns out a shit ton of people have done the same exact thing, and are currently in the process of doing so for this year. Fortunately, that doesn't make it not cool.

So it's not the most original idea I've ever come up with (and I don't come up with many), but thorough research has confirmed that it is, in fact, cool. I won't be posting a blog for every day of the 100, but rather a final blog at the end of August with a cool scrollbox or something showing all of them. If you want day-by-day updates, check my photo album on Facebook that I'll be dedicating to the project (friend me - Blake Gifford).

I'll still be posting the other side projects (like the 24"x 36" posterboard I plan to go to town on) I do on here, so keep watching for posts!

P.S. 1038 views = awesome. Thanks everybody!

One month and ten days

...since my last post. Quite the time span, but justifiably so; this project for architecture has literally presented zero opportunities for anything design-related, let alone artistic. The design process for the structure was cool I suppose (I contributed my fingerprints), but even that was riddled with troubles and complications that any group would encounter when trying to work together (BITCHES).

However, the structure is nearly done, and construction went pretty well, aside from a few last-minute design changes that became necessary when the concrete foundation was poured off-level.

(This is where photos would go, if I took any. Regardless, it looks cool.)

The recycled metal roofing we're still using has to be added, in which case it should look like this:

SUMMER IN ONE WEEK.

I've got some cool-ish projects planned; let you in on those later.

A foreign fanbase?

Tonight, I logged into my Vimeo account for the first time since this summer. Surprisingly enough, I had one single message in my inbox. Thinking it was spam, I indifferently clicked the link to read it. Here it is:

"Hi Blake,
I am the founder of filmsdelover.com a French website dedicated to review all the rom-com and love stories in the films but we also have a section for short film about love and we included your short film, "A love story" on our website because we absolutely loved it. So thanks for that, i just wanted to tell you. We embedded the video from vimeo so I hope it is not an infringement of any copyright.

Now, i do have one question for you : What are your 3 favorite films about love stories or rom-com, films you watch with your love on a rainy afternoon ? Don't see any creepy intention here, it is just to add on the website if you don't mind on the page dedicated to your short film, for visitors to know you a little bit better.

Your page is here :
filmsdelover.com/courts-métrages-de-lover/a-love-story/

Thanks so much for your film and best of luck for your career !
Greetings from France,
Fred Renouf"

Sweet. Here's the link:

http://www.filmsdelover.com/courts-métrages-de-lover/a-love-story/