Concentration 10

Manipulation of Materials:

For the mural, I chose to paint something outside of my concentration, partly because I had finished all of my pieces, but mostly because I wanted to try something new and different from what I usually did. I had originally planned to do a usual acrylic painting, but then Mr. Correa advised me to do something really big, obvious, and colorful since it's going to be viewed from a distance in the library. So I chose to do a palette knife painting, something I've always found interesting but never got to try. Using a palette knife is a lot more different than what I usually do, mostly because I usually stick to painting lots of details. However, it was so refreshing to do something kind of messy and quick, and I'm glad I tried it out, especially because I had so much fun with it. The palette knife created effects that made it have a lot more texture and dimension, which made the colors pop from a distance. 

Problem Solving: 

Because this was my first time trying out a painting with a palette knife, I had to experiment and try new techniques to find what suited me. I had to repaint over the piece a few times, mostly because I wasn't sure what I was doing the first time. I definitely underestimated the level of difficulty with palette knives, thinking that it would be a lot easier to manage. One of the biggest problem I had was trying not to blend too much. The problem with palette knives is that if you paint too much, the colors get mixed in together more than you want it to, resulting the entire piece to have less shape and contrast. It was also hard to get used to the thick texture and waiting a longer time than usual to wait for the paint to dry. Despite all of this, it was a refreshing piece to do and I would love to do more paintings like this one in the future.