A Dragon ball World

There is one massive art form that has been apart of my personal life as an artist and also a fan. It surrounds my personal guilty pleasure but also links to my way of how I see art the way I enjoy it. My personal appreciation comes from a manga series created in 1984 named Dragon ball created by Akira Toriyama. Finding out about the franchise at the age of 10 I first became a fan of the anime series and watched it religiously after school on the cartoon network channel. So obsessed I had to buy empty tapes and record all the episodes every day as well until it came out on VHS.

Some few years passed and the series finally was released on DVD. Searching online to find out more episodes that weren't released in America I browsed and became more involved on the art style. I used reference from the manga books and copied the style over and over, wanting to be able to learn how to draw the character's from memory. I become heavily interested in comic books and manga was highly being noticeable in America more through the years. I started collecting the entire Dragon ball Z manga series.

I remember spending hours on end drawing the characters that I tend to love and grow up with over the years. The back stories, character development, theme, everything that this series had, this world was the one I wanted to be in when I wanted to get away from the real world around me. In the situations the series had, it made me really think about life and also helped me relate when I had my own problems I had during my childhood with friends and family. If something happened I knew I would always turn to this series and expressed myself by drawing out my frustration making the characters in a situation I was just in.

To many people I’ve talked to, they say this is just another typical fighting ‘cartoon’, however I see it as something much more deep. Currently I am now a fan of this series for 12 years and still to this day I go back to that art style, admiration and understanding that only a hand full of people get. I had the opportunity to talked to other artists online all over the world and some I had the pleasure of meeting, sharing the same similarities and gratitude. I couldn’t stand here and tell you if Dragon Ball Z weren’t in my life I would be still drawing and wanting to be an Illustrator.

Shoes

Your foot includes more bones than any other section of your body. You rely on your feet every day, shoes at first were created to protect your feet from rocks, burning sands, natural hazards of the weather/climate, the rough ground that we walk and anything that would danger them. Only until recent years, the shoe wasn’t even worn by most of the world’s population. There of course still to this day where people walk barefoot who can’t afford any. Shoe prices can be one extreme to the next. Flip flops at Kmart can go for only $1.00 while at the Nike’s basketball shoes can go as high as $150.00.

Shoes are an item of decoration to the middle and upper class, they seem to be more focused on how the shoe looks rather than if it’s comfortable. Woman complaining constantly how at the end of the night they get blisters all over their aching feet. Some sort of silly fashion statement, or you can tell how a person is by the type of shoes they ware. Some people just buy shoes to match with other groups, to be with the in, not caring about price. Some want to be noticed on what their wearing by showing it off, bragging that they got some high expensive pair that no one can afford.

Depending on where you’re from there is a certain brand people wear. There’s so many examples so the best one I always find that stand out mostly from many are the group of boys who are skater. You can tell by the most popular skater name brand shoes they ware. They all look flat and somewhat similar. Brand names such as Vans, CD, Etnies, Osiris is most popular when riding a skateboard showing off your moves on the half pipe.

The variety of shoes one can go through in someone’s closet can be an alarming number. You need different types of shoes that accommodate the time of the year, snow boots during winter, flip-flops during the summer, but that’s not all. They types have many categories in itself. You need shoes for sports such as running, tennis, basketball, ice-skating, skateboarding, dancing. You need dressy shoes to go out to a special event and the list just goes on and on to how much shoes are a big importance.

Shoes can be worn by anyone, no matter what sex you are; anyone can pretty much get away with wearing whatever. Doesn’t matter if you buy shoes for men, woman or a unisex pair. In this generation there really isn’t any order to what you wear or how you wear your shoes.

Framed: The World Of Comics

Comics are a focus here however there are other very big displays in the open areas. The displays really don’t connect with the comics at all and seems somewhat very random. The atmosphere is welcoming yet congested; there are few less seats for students, which is bothersome and harder to get a seat. Everything in display makes it look like there is so much going on.

Angeline mascarenas "A day in the life of a snowman" pen and ink on board, 2009 This cute little snowman comic is somewhat very amusing, its simple though tells you a story that makes you ask a lot of questions, who throw the snow at him, why did he make a snowgirl and ripped out her heart. The comic is plain, nothing in the background, which was a good choice since there is not needed to be anything more. The artist didn't put any words, just pictures to let the readers mind only guess. The color is plain as well; nothing bright, mostly cool light purple, grey colors to match the snow and sky. Usually simple is the best kind of message for a viewer. Gets them to look when walking by and makes them want to stop and notice what is going on in the image.

Joyce Rice "My last winter in grawn, MI" Digital Print 2009. Her comic was on one side and on the other they picked her biggest panel from her comic and enlarged it redoing it, painting on the wall itself. The art style is very interesting and sticks out a lot compared to some; it’s her own style. Colored in only blue tones and one light brown color it looks well made and completes the image, she not even needed to put any other colors looks well. The text is easy to read and clear, cell shading, a clean piece of work. The story is compelling to make you want to view the full comic page to start from the beginning to find out what’s going on.

Stephanie wegryzn and john coxworth hellgeezer' digital print 2009 has only text on this piece is the title in English and Japanese, looks heavily shaded, tones, black and white, the mood feels serious and some sort of mystery to it. Blood in each individual panel. Detailed smoke making it confusing to the characters, black to white fading setting a mood, lighting very important hitting the characters and objects. The comic pages makes you wish there was more, or turned into a comic or a manga book.

This gallery really is a comic book artists’ treat. Seeing such variety of work from the student body, it’s really an eye opener to view and understand the talent others show and their knowledge of the style of comic books. The different styles, techniques, rendering one can do when making a comic, the feelings and ways that get the reader to get a much better understanding of what the artist is trying to bring forth in their work.

Location: 623 S Wabash Ave, first floor. Gallery Hours: Monday through Thursday, 9am–7 pm, Friday, 9 am–5 pm

Phone: 312.369.8177

Columbia College: At Close Distance: Labyrinth Of Self Exhibition Gallery

Walking in the gallery for the first time I noticed the atmosphere, it was pretty cold, a lot of open space for people to walk around, white walls and a dull looking brown painted on the pillars. The benches had pillows that were random colors and way to big placed on top. The lighting hitting only on the objects, paintings. The first body of work I came across was Jennifer Hines three paintings/photographs. The artwork to me feels somewhat weird and disturbing. Photographic images of naked women sitting holding themselves wrapped up and covered in some sort of plant liked rooted figure. The colors to me were somewhat random, as an artist myself I couldn't even relate to something like this. The pieces of personal growth, oddly shaped branches coming out of her, it just seemed generic. Another piece of work I stopped to look at was Colleen Mcgrann's of mine. 'A triptych of herself photography'. The three pictures looked rather creepy with the blurriness/mystery look to it. The pale yellow scheme, girl in white night dress looks like something out of a cheesy horror film. The process of her planting something isn't appealing since there is no visual of where she is, the background being emptiness. I couldn't feel really anything at her piece. Walking around the gallery I did seem to pause at the video clip created by Victoria Bradford called 'Blue focus'. I'm at a daze seeing images shoot out on the screen at random. The text looked like font from a typewriter, it moved at an awkward rate then disappears and reappears, background is always white, photos of a girl constantly being repeated. It looks like a complete mess and I was getting a slight headache. At first glance it just looks like a weird video to me, possibly if I had met the creator of this I would get a much better understanding. The most related piece of artwork I found out was to be a simple notebook. Kelly Parsell's my 'Spanish book revisited' was this piece. She used this book when she was a child learning Spanish but also had pictures of drawings she did and little notes. It was her personal little book that she did whatever she wanted to. I've also kept many journals, notebooks and sketchbooks from when I was younger and I can never seem to get rid of them. It's the stuff in the past I just don't want to forget or let go. A personal Journal.