Wk 14 – Artist Conversation – Nicole Alvarez

This week I decided to write about the work of Nicole Alvarez. Her painting of corner liquor stores is incredible. She says she likes using liquor stores for their florescent lighting and she tries to recreate the glow they give off at night. This is to lure in the observer similar to the way the lights lure customers into the stores. Her work was very nice and I really felt drawn to the works. The colors brought me in and the rest of the painting kept me staring at the work of art.

Wk 14 – Classmate Conversation – Jonathan Juarez & Frank Chhay

 

For my final classmate conversation I spoke with my friend Frank Chhay and a new person, Jonathan Juarez. To read more about Frank click here.

As for Jonathan, he is a 19 year old sophomore at CSULB. He is studying business accounting and has really enjoyed his time here at CSULB. Johnathan has an older brother and a younger sister. He doesn’t mind being the middle child, he says its great to have both younger and older siblings. He hobbies outside of school include soccer, video games, and just hanging out with friends. He enjoys pizza, he says it is his favorite food. When asked what type of art has had the biggest impact on his life he said he feels it has been graffiti and seeing all around the city as he grew up. Speaking with Frank and Jonathan was a lot of fun this week. Links to there pages can be found here: Frank Jonathan

Wk 13 – Artist Conversation – Tyler Turett

On Thursday I got to see the incredible work of Tyler Turett. His artwork consist of 2d character designs and animation. He wants to work in animation and enjoys creating new characters and using them to tell stories that are filled with joy and humor. Tyler talked about the process of making his characters which entails many steps and Tyler says it can be tedious at times. When he first started he would draw his characters on paper then transfer them to the computer, now he draws almost exclusively on his computer. Once he has his characters drawn and looking the way he wants he imports them into a program that allows him to rig the characters to be animated. He attaches a virtual skeleton to them so instead of redrawing the character for each frame he can simply move the skeleton and the software does the work for him. This still takes a while to animate, but the finished product, at least the ones I’ve seen, look amazing and deserve recognition. Tyler’s work was a lot of fun to learn about this week since I’ve always found animation interesting. To see more of Tyler’s work click here.

Wk 13 – Classmate Conversation – Daniel Guerrero

On Thursday I talked to Daniel Guerrero. I met Daniel last semester and haven’t gotten around to interviewing him in art class until now. Daniel is a junior at CSULB and is studying Biomedical Engineering. He lives off campus in an apartment with his friends. Daniel also works at the school’s Rockwall which is located at the rec center on campus. When he isn’t studying or working Daniel likes hiking, football, snowboarding, or anything that is outside and active. Daniel really likes CSULB, but also wants to graduate so he can start his career helping people as a biomedical engineer. When asked the question of the week, Daniel said his opinion on art hadn’t changed much but he has enjoyed the class.

Hanging with Frank and Danielle while making our plaster castings.

Wk 12 – Artist Conversation – Christopher Linquata

Sacred and Profane is an art exhibit featuring paintings of an artist’s friends and family at a beach in San Pedro. The artist is Christopher Linquata. Christopher’s art is inspired by the idea of a Sunken City, but not Atlantis. Instead the sunken in this context refers to a fall from grace as shown by the graffiti covered concrete rumble displayed in the paintings. After 10 months Christopher had used his imagination memory and rough sketches to create his final paintings. He says he tried not to use photographs because when painting from a photo he fells the picture comes across as flat and lifeless. The use of his friends in his work stems from economics, “models are expensive” so he just used his friends and family. Christopher’s work feels very real and I think that comes from the ruinous state of the concrete as well as the amount of graffiti covering the slabs. I really liked Christopher’s exhibit in the Gatov-West art room at CSULB.

Wk 12 – Classmate Conversation – Matt Carder

This week I spoke with Matt Carder. He is a junior mechanical engineering major here at CSULB. He hails from Rosemond California and lives on campus. He hopes to specialize in either automobiles or go into aerospace with his degree. Outside of school he enjoys snowboarding, baseball, and being outside in general. Both his parents are from California. Matt’s favorite animal is a Hippo. When asked the question of the week Matt said red reminds him of his high school because it was one of his school colors. In five years Matt hopes to be working a good job and have a plan for the rest of his life by then. I enjoyed speaking with Matt and agree with him in that we are both unsure about what we want out of our futures.

Wk 12 – Activity/New Start – Site update

Hello, I’m Thomas Lyons and this is my WordPress website. For the past 12 weeks I have used this site to turn in my art 110 homework. It will remain that way for the next 3-4 weeks, but at the end of this semester I’ll be looking into posting things regarding my major and other things that interest me. This spans anywhere from what projects I have going on in Chemical Engineering, photo’s of my latest hiking excursion, and any thing I find interesting and want to share with friends. I hope I don’t loose interest after the end of the semester and this site becomes something of a second Facebook.

Here are some pictures from my hike to the top of Mt. Baldy over Veteran’s Day:

Here are a couple from last year’s ski season:

Wk 11 – Artist Conversation – Kathy Yoon

This week at the Dr. Maxine Merlino Gallery I saw the work of Kathy Yoon. Her art showcase was a series of ceramic sculptures that reminded me of the art style of The Nightmare Before Christmas. Kathy originally went to cypress college with the intenstion of being a math major, but after taking her G.E. art class she fell in love with art and changed her focus in school. After finishing her schooling she wants to work in character design. Her art was inspired by her switch in major and not knowing what to do in her life. She used mostly black and white in her sculptures and the red coloring was used to highlight features of the sculptures. I found  her work unsettling, not creepy like a Halloween character but  unsettling in the way they were posed and you could see how they could be animated and it just screamed Nightmare Before Christmas to me. I really enjoyed Kathy’s show. If you want to see more of her work click here.

Wk 11 – Classmate Conversation – Nick Ramirez

This week I spoke with Nick Ramirez. He is a 4th year kinesiology major at CSULB. He lives in Whittier California and commutes to school. His hobbies include snowboarding, wakeboarding, drawing, and weight lifting. He is the oldest in his family with 2 younger brothers. When asked the question of the week Nick responded by saying he believes tattoos are art but hes not sure if he would get a tattoo or what the tattoo would be of. I enjoyed talking to Nick this week and if you want to see his word press account click here: https://nicholasdramirez.wordpress.com/

Wk 10 – Activity – Geocaching

This week our activity was geocaching. For those that don’t know geocaching is a game where you anonymously leave a small box with a logbook somewhere and post where it is on the geocaching website. Our assignment for the week was to create a geocache and to find a geocache. The one I found was in Sullivan’s Grove, a park near a friends house. Inside the container I found a crayon a few coins and magnet and a close pin. The box was on the inside of a canopy, resting on one of the support beams. I signed my name to the logbook and put the box back where I found it so others could find it as well. The cache I placed was closer to my house by a nearby school. I used an Altoids tin and inside I placed a logbook, a pencil, and an empty plastic box. After submitting it on the geocaching website, with in a few hours I received emails that people had found it. One of the comments read “it was a nice hide, and the coordinates were right on. Now I understand that the recent influx of caches in Long Beach is due to an art class. Enjoy the class, welcome to the hobby, and thank you for all the new caches.”. This was a nice surprise to see that people had found my cache and that they noticed there were a lot popping up in the area around CSULB. At the moment however the cache is not available to find. I place the box to close to a school and decided to remove it so nobody looking for the cache would end up at a school. This week’s activity was a lot of fun, not sure what it has to do with art, but I think this might actually become a hobby of mine.

My cache and what I put in it.

A shot of my cache hidden behind a wall

The contents of the cache I found

Where I found a cache.