Process Paper - Natalee Schiavoni


My choice for my capstone was very selective. After going through many fantastic ideas I knew that I had one passion that I wanted to pursue. My final choice was to produce and develop my art skills. Before entering Science Leadership Academy as a freshman I knew that I wanted to involve myself in the Art extra curricular class. In this class I wanted to become advance with my artistic abilities and find my ability to explore the world in the view point of a growing artist. I believe that there is no better place to learn art than in an art class room. I had the opportunity to learn not only about the world and its cultures, but themselves and their own communities. Art introduces ideas about how other artist and people live, worked and though, whiles nurturing an appreciation of their own way of life.  


I chose this project mainly because of my extraordinary love for art and how developing it became over time. My sketching and artistic abilities have immensely improved over the years and art having become such a standing point in my life that producing an art portfolio to show only felt right. In order to begin my work, I kept a close sketchbook near by.  As an artist I wanted to show my processed work and how I developed ideas by also showing how my work has matured. I also created a website to show case my finished work online as well as other information that I used such as a variety of youtube videos and resource pertaining to beginners to advanced art lessons/videos.


My capstone addresses the “presentation” core value because within my portfolio it documents visually my process of how well I developed over a course of time.  This project also involved the other core values that made my final project into a finished visual product. Though presentation best fits the representation of my project it also involved a lot of research. In order to do the research portion I needed to conduct some questions. What are some important aspects to improve as an artist? What other techniques and drawings can I challenge myself to? I needed to come up with a portfolio that embodies my ideas, research, innovations, skills, and work process. I also had to dig deep into the research to demonstrate good technical skills by making sure that I have the basics down such as anatomy, color, lighting, etc. A creative art piece without proper proportions is not going to impress and well slow down the process of improving. I collaborated with my peers and other outside sources as well as feed back on artist blogs. This feed back helped me when any questions I had on certain topics that related to art techniques and advice. For the reflection part of my capstone I was able to go to the free library of Philadelphia and get a couple books based on the fine arts and art techniques. I made sure I used all my research from the book and incorporated it into my final portfolio. 


In order to complete my final product I needed to start sketching what I learned from the research and begin my process in my sketchbook. As I began to start using all my open time into sketching I found it becoming fairly easy as I was familiar with beginners art techniques. The process started to become more and more interesting to me because I found myself coming across videos using online resources that helped me learn newer techniques and that is what gave my sketches a realistic feel.  To begin my process I first did some preliminary research on basic art techniques and art history. I then made a timeline to plan out the days I would be working in my sketchbook and updating my website, and also meetings with my capstone mentor Ms. Dunn. The videos that I research refreshed my memory on techniques that could help towards improving skills. 


One obstacle that I faced was coordinating with my set timeline and getting the right amount of time in for finishing up certain sketches. If I wasn’t done one of my sketches, it would become frustrating because I would not able to start another sketch until I was completely done the one I was originally working with. This problem keep some of the days of track and held me back from doing more sketching in little time. Obstacles as such gives a heads up for future awareness that time management can play a role in your art life. 

The thing that I’m most proud about my capstone is that I am about to represent myself as a learning artist. After finishing up anything that took you awhile to a complete, you have the greatest feeling of accomplishment. Looking back into the process of this capstone there were a lot of trials and errors due to the fact that this wasn’t my original plan and I started the portfolio idea later into the months because of my other idea not going through as planned. I feel proud of myself that I stuck through and choose something that not only helped me grow as an artist but also as a person, by finding myself through my art work. 

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