Author: Riya A

Happy Monday everybody! I hope that you are all doing well and had a restful weekend. Last Friday, March 10th I had the incredible opportunity to be a featured artist for the MA:E x Stamps Gallery. This took place in the Rogel Ballroom at the Michigan Union from 6-8 pm and was a wonderful night of art and company.

I was approached by MA:E Magazine to be a featured artist for this event which was in commemoration of AAPI (Asian American Pacific Islander) Heritage Awareness Month. At this gallery I showcased my portfolio as it pertains to my journey of accepting and finding pride within my identity and culture.

Growing up in primarily Caucasian society, and over time, veering away from the strict traditions of my culture, I have found myself torn between following in the footsteps of my ancestors and creating my own path. This is an aspect that I choose to discuss heavily through my art, the culture that I was born with versus the culture that I have grown up amongst, and the difficulties that come with being pulled constantly in different directions. As time has gone on, I have come to find solace in my culture while continuing on my own self-made journey. I have chosen to accept the traditional parts of the Indian lifestyle as another part of the beautiful culture. However, now I choose what I want to be a part of my story. 

Through my art I demonstrate this initial internal battle and then my road to pride within my heritage. Starting in 2019 when I created “Modern Brahma” to now, shortly after finishing “The Festival of Colors”, I depict a clear shift in my tone and attitude towards my upbringing and shine a new light on who I am within my culture. From starting off as resentful towards my heritage, which I demonstrate in some aspects of “Modern Dhulan” and “Modern Brahma” to now when I have found pride and my own identity within my culture. I show this is the countenance of “The Festival of Colors” and “Govardhan” which shows a prominent religious scene in Hindu scripture and is a recreation of a wonderful painting by Bijay Biswaal, an incredible Indian artist. “True To My Roots” is a bridging piece, depicting my fight to be true to myself and pull away from anything and anyone trying to hold me back. 

For anybody that happened to be at the event, thank you so much for attending. It was a wonderful experience. We had some wonderful speakers share their own experiences as Asian Americans and round out the event in a wholesome and beautiful way.

As always if anything that I discussed in this post stands out, or if any questions arise please feel free to comment and share your thoughts!

Looking forward to next Monday!

~ Riya

Instagram: @riya_aggarwal.art

Personal website: https://theindianartist.weebly.com/

Good morning everyone! I hope that you all are well and had a relaxing spring break. I am definitely not ready to get back into the swing of classes, but I think at this point the best tactic is just to fake it until I make it. Today I wanted to share a video that really helped me when I started getting more into oil painting.

I have an issue when it comes to creating and working with skin tones. I am easily able to do portraits when the subject is any other color than a simple skin tone. I have done a few blue monochromatic studies, my piece “The Festival of Colors” was done in every color under the sun except for skin tones. Seeing as I am able to capture human likeness in other colors proves that I have a solid understanding of anatomy, light, shadow, and tonality. However, for some reason, whenever it comes to painting natural realistic skin, I have a hard time.

I recently started a piece in which I am doing a portrait of a woman dressed in traditional Indian garb putting on an ankle bracelet. I decided to challenge myself to create a proper portrait to get better at color mixing with oils and understanding skin tones.  The following video really helped me wrap my head around approaching color theory and mixing hues.

Florent Farges goes into incredible detail on the color wheel that he himself created, how to use it, and the theory of color mixing. For any of my fellow artists and oil painters out there, check it out and let me know if it helps you as well!

As always if anything that I discussed in this post stands out, or if any questions arise please feel free to comment and share your thoughts!

Looking forward to next Monday!

~ Riya

Instagram: @riya_aggarwal.art

Personal website: https://theindianartist.weebly.com/

Hello everyone! I hope that you all are well. I know that I have been a little MIA. This past week has been very difficult for me mentally and emotionally. I hope that you are all taking the time to check in and take care of yourselves, especially with the plethora of midterms and papers infesting our lives this week. I thought that I would approach an interesting question that I was exposed to the other day. What is the point of hyperrealism when we have photography?

I thought that I would address this question when doing research on one of my favorite artists: Jono Dry. He is an incredible hyperrealist artist who works primarily in graphite. He is able to produce work with striking lighting and thought-provoking subjects to portray incredible photo-realistic images. The thought behind this post was to address what the point of creating such painstakingly detailed works is when a camera could be used to create the same effect in a much easier way.

Jono struggled with this question earlier on in his career as well, wondering why he spent so much time creating something that could have just been photographed.

For me, I have always been so drawn to photo-realism. Being able to capture something so raw and untouched, so pure and real, has been revolutionary from the beginning of art history. Photorealism is an incredible way of demonstrating the different aspects of the human condition in such a believable way without sacrificing on the creating and artistic opportunities within it. When looking at a piece of artwork that has been so meticulous crafted as if to resemble a photograph while also demonstrating surrealist aspects, the viewer has no choice but to believe in the vision of the artist.

Jono says that “there is a catharsis in the pursuit of perfection”. For me as a viewer, looking at the immense amount of detail in a piece and understanding what the artist has gone through to achieve an incredibly realistic image is incomparable to just viewing a photo of the same subject. As the artist, putting in hours, days, months, into creating something so striking and believable, the end result is a badge of honor that makes the commodity of time worthwhile. The hopes of any artist is to get a viewer to connect with the piece. Hyperrealism reflects life so honestly back at the viewer and forces one to move closer, look deeply into the eyes of the subject, take in all of the work of the artist.

I hope this post gave a little more insight into hyperrealism as I see it. It is an incredible pursuit and magnificent when achieved, something that I strive to be able to bring out of my artwork. I have attached links to Jono Dry’s Instagram and website here. Please go check him out. He is a mastermind.

As always if anything that I discussed in this post stands out, or if any questions arise please feel free to comment and share your thoughts!

Looking forward to next Monday!

~ Riya

Instagram: @riya_aggarwal.art

Personal website: https://theindianartist.weebly.com/

Good morning! I hope that you all had a restful weekend and are having a good start to the week. I have a long week ahead of me. I just started a new job and with some fun opportunities lined up, I am going to be constantly on my feet. But I am not complaining, I would have it no other way!

I wanted to do my post today on another incredible artist that caught my eye on social media and has become an inspiration and teacher for me as I navigate my journey with oil painting. Austin Howlett is a Maui raised artist now living and working in New Mexico specializing in oil painting. His work is a beautiful encapsulation of people and the environment around him. He explains that he creates paintings in order to “explore emotional vulnerability and self discovery”.

What attracted me to his work is the beautifully vivid imagery that he creates with unique lighting and environment.

Looking at his work, you expect it to be massive, taking up rooms and exuding a grand energy. However, they are merely the size of a hand. He recently has been working on a collection of paintings all of size 5″ by 5″. The fact that he is able to capture so much emotion and detail on such a small canvas is absolute magic.

I have attached links to his website and Instagram below!

https://austinhowlett.com/

https://www.instagram.com/austin.howlett_art/

I know this was a shorter post but I really enjoy doing these looks into inspiring artists. It is important to consume the works of others, learn from them, and appreciate them. If anything that I discussed in this post stands out, or if any questions arise please feel free to comment and share your thoughts!

Looking forward to next Monday!

~ Riya

Instagram: @riya_aggarwal.art

Personal website: https://theindianartist.weebly.com/

Good evening everybody! I hope that you are all doing well and had a good weekend! For this week’s post I will be sharing the process that I take when starting a new piece, specifically, an oil painting. I started a new painting that will be a part of a potential tryptic or collection.

1. The first and most important part of starting any piece is coming up with an idea and either taking or finding non-copyright reference photos. I tend to use a mix of both. When I have an idea and do not have the means to find a model and take my own pictures, I resort to royalty free images that can be stitched together to figure out the perfect composition.
2. Next, I sketch or map out the composition. I usually always do this using a pencil regardless of if it is on paper or canvas. I also always tint my canvas with a neutral brown such as burnt sienna if I am doing a painting. This helps create a non-white base on which I can accurately read the tone and hue of my paint.
3. Start laying down the color! In the case of paint, I just dive in and start to establish my background. If it is a simple background, I try to knock this out first and foremost. This helps to cover empty space and makes the piece a lot less intimidating. I then move onto the main subject. I generally just start with the part of the piece that speaks to me the most to build up momentum.
4. Work work work! There is nothing more to do once you have established a composition and your materials of choice than to actually put in the time. My favorite thing to do is light a candle, put on Schitt’s Creek, and get to work!
5. Depending on the medium you are using, there are different options for finishers once a piece is complete. For oil paint, varnish your painting after ample drying. Air on the side of caution and wait at least 4-5 weeks. Graphite and colored pencils can be finalized with various different varnishes.
6. Nothing left to do but enjoy your hard work and brilliant creativity!

I know this was a little bit different of a post but I hope that you all enjoyed! As always, if anything that I discussed in this post stands out, or if any questions arise please feel free to comment and share your thoughts!

Looking forward to next Monday!

~ Riya

Instagram: @riya_aggarwal.art

Personal website: https://theindianartist.weebly.com/