Gwen Gleason
My Portfolio
Whitefish Bay: Class of 2021
Bowdoin College: Class of 2025
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Currently involved in debate, student council, stage crew, students demand action, and SMART team.
Studying government and visual art next year.
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AP Art
2019 - 2020
In AP Art, I strove to demonstrate the symbiotic relationship between humans and the environment, as well as the effects of humanity's actions on both nature and ourselves. But, I also maintained a balance between life and death, beauty and horror, and hope and fear. I began by combining landscapes and portraits to show how when we harm the environment, we directly harm ourselves. I then moved on to add nuance to this initial thought by creating works with a more specific meanings behind them. I researched topics like how plastic harms the environment, how farmers are being hurt from climate change, and how butterflies are now in peril due to human interference. Towards the end of the year, I evaluated my own feelings about climate change -- just how scared I was that humanity will have to face the consequences of our actions all too soon. I challenged myself to reuse materials like cardboard to embed the meaning of my portfolio into the process of making it. I decided to end my portfolio with a painting reversing the roles of humanity and nature, with the environment slowly chocking the life out of the figures much like how humanity is killing the planet.
Ap Art Semester 1
2020 - 2021
Artist Statement
This year in AP Art, I wanted to do something vastly different from what I’ve done before. Instead of focusing on my external world, I chose to make a more introspective portfolio that reflects my personal life experiences. Therefore, I thought that my childhood memories would be the perfect basis of my art this year.
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I started with a more literal interpretation of memory by painting how I remember events and places. Then, I moved on to paint more abstract memories, such as my fear of having my head turned into a DVD. I enjoy both of these areas, though I find I have to push myself more to find unique viewpoints for my upcoming pieces.
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My process for all six of the finished pieces below is relatively the same. I start by sketching my ideas and figuring out how I will execute them. Then, I do an underpainting in either oil or acrylic paint. For several of my pieces, I prepped my canvas by splatter-painting bright acrylic paint to give myself colors to work off of later in the painting process. After my underpainting, I add additional colors until the painting is complete.
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Piece 1
Zoo Memories 1
I started with two paintings of my memories of the zoo, both done in oil paint on a wooden board. The first one shows my sister and I with a butterfly. I used broad brush strokes to represent my foggy memory of that day. Matched with vibrant colors and a lush background, this painting shows how I remember the zoo as a magical place.
Process
Piece 2
Zoo Memories 2
The second zoo painting depicts me with a lion creeping up behind me. As this happened later in time, I used a more realistic style with muted colors to demonstrate how I remember more recent events. But, I maintained the surreal aspects from the first zoo painting, removing the glass barriers and creating the illusion that this scene is happening in the wild.
Process
Piece 3
Mini Series
My third piece this year is a mini-series of details of some of my childhood homes, done in acrylic paint on paper. I made sure that these paintings were realistic by looking up the houses on Google Maps. But, I made the colors much more saturated than they are in real life to reflect how I remember these places. I also made the houses look somewhat fake, like dollhouses, to reference childhood again.
Sketches
Process
Piece 4
The Shining Parody
My next piece is focused around my childhood memories of Halloween. I used the twins from The Shining as inspiration. This was done with oil paint on canvas.
Sketches
Process
Piece 5
Artist-Inspired
For this piece, I was inspired by the painter, Bo Bartlett, to make a surreal, yet candid scene of my grandmother. I started by sketching some of Bartlett's paintings to learn more about his style and process. For my painting, I splatter-painted first with acrylic, then used oil paint to make the figures and landscape. The was done on watercolor paper.
Sketches
Process
Piece 6
DVD Heads
When I was little, my mother used to threaten my sister and I that, if we watched too much television, our heads would turn into dvds. I thought that this was a great concept to make a strange, brightly colored painting. I started this piece by sketching in both my sketchbook and on my iPad, which allowed me to use colored photos as inspiration. On a wooden board, I used acrylic paint to paint the yellow background and green drips. Then, I painted a blue underpainting and continued from there.
Sketches
Process
Piece 7
What I'm Doing Next
For my next piece, I am planning on doing something monochromatic and large scale. I did research on an artist named Anthony Cudahy, and created a plan for my painting by collaging images. I plan to make my next piece on a piece of cardboard and use acrylic and oil paint.
