Contrasts in Nature (Martha Began's Book)

The human hand and the hand of nature contrasting with one another.

Matthew Laurence/ Daydreams

Hello my name is Matthew and my theme for this sketchbook is 'DAYDREAMS'. The cover for this sketchbook is shown above. Over the summer I visited my father's place and in the guest room was this small antique crib toy that I photographed and wanted to incorporate into some type of artwork. I played around with Adobe Photoshop and separated the crib from the background and added a color gradient and downloaded a bird brush to add the winged creatures into the sky. Later, I printed the image out onto photographic paper and then applied several layers of tempera paint to the background and scratched away the surface to get that deteriorated look. Last, I added color markers to the work in addition to applying several layers of varnish to protect the surface.

This is my first image of the 'DAYDREAM' theme. It is a collage of work that started out as a teacher example for my printmaking class that is focusing on the principle of design, unity/harmony. This work uses the technique of the collagraph to which textures of objects are printed off of. the leaves taken from my apartment complex were used for the collagraph and a bit of photo collage from a magazine laying around completed the work. I will be using a number of my posted based off of a collage of media since it is something I find enjoyable and allows me to 'play'.

It's never too late to have a happy childhood-