Master's Art Poster

This was a project I did in 2009 in Drawing for Graphic Design. This was my first project using Illustrator (or any program from Adobe Creative Suite, for that matter). The finished size was 11x17.

We had to research our favorite Art Master and recreate a design of our choice. I chose Erte. He was a famous designer of the 1920's era. Most of his work was centered around fashion design, during the Art Deco Era. 

No live tracing was allowed. Ha! I didn't even know what live tracing was when I first started out as a baby graphic designer :) Anyway, I also didn't know how to use most of the other tools in Illustrator either and for this reason, I had drawn each individual line using the pencil tool. I look back and think about the tools and techniques I used in creating this design and I realize I have come a LONG way since then. It really is amazing. These days I never use the pencil tool, I just don't have any use for it anymore. I have since found much more useful tools in illustrator and more efficient ways of reproducing a piece like this, from start to finish.

So, the first half of this project was to do research on our favorite Art Master and write up a one pg. paper about the artist. Then we recreated a design of our choice. The last part was to incorporate our finished design into a poster to be displayed in a museum where our Art Master's work is or would be typically displayed. I chose the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York.






Top - My design
Bottom - Copy of Erte's original design

Exciting new blog for exciting new changes!

So, today was the first day back from spring break at MCC. I had mostly mixed feelings about it: a little depressed because Spring Break was my first real break since summer and it was over; excited because now that it is over, I am one more week closer to my Associates degree. Winter break was nice but I didn't get much of break, it was more stressful than relaxing. As for Spring Break, it started out with me having a gallbladder surgery so I was literally forced to relax and do nothing but lay in bed and recover for a few days. It was relaxing and amazing, to put it lightly.

I judge most of my days being good/bad days on how productive they are towards my current goals, long-term and short term. My most important short-term goals include finishing up my classes so I get my associates degree from MCC, looking for a summer job or second internship, and doing whatever else needs to be done in order to transfer to an art school with a bachelor's in graphic design program. On good days, I get a lot of emails, phone calls and internet research done. On a bad day, almost anything can and has gotten in the way of me being productive. As of the past two years, I can say there have been many good days, even great, fantastic days. As with life always, there were also a fair amount of bad days but not enough to stop me from making [huge] progress on this entire process of this step in my life.

In the past two weeks I have recieved letters of acceptance from Kendall College of Art and Design in Grand Rapids, MI and from Otis College of Art and Design in Los Angeles, CA!


I cannot describe how excited I am to KNOW that I have a future waiting for me that will begin only a few short months from now. It is something I have not really had almost ever before. The closest time I've had exciting news like this was two years ago when I lost my job and got into the No Worker Left Behind program and they paid for me to get my associates in graphic design at MCC. But this is bigger than that because I will be more independent for this journey and it marks the passing of one milestone and the beginning of a new one (and probably many more that I don't even know about yet.)

Anyway, as I walked into GRD 200 today (my Portfolio Prep class at MCC), my instructor, Nancy said we would be creating professional blogs today. I was a little skeptical at first because I sometimes have trouble updating even my facebook account but now that I am started, I am really happy about it and have great expectations for this! The background I chose looks like a scan of a watercolor painting. For those of you who know the pre-graphic design version of Abby, that is why I chose this background...because I LOVE fine art. I love painting, I always will. I love watercolors and I love acrylics. Painting is one of the greatest escapes I know of. One thing about it though is that I rarely have time for it and when I do, even then does it rarely happen. I miss it. But, hopefully every time I make a new blog post I will think of it and it will motivate me to make time to paint.

I am planning on keeping up regularly with this blog because I think if nothing else, it will help me track my journey as a new and emerging graphic designer. Keep an eye out on here for newly finished projects of mine!

Thanks for reading!