'The Mistakes We Made'

My artwork shows two different aspects of how the world is today. Left is a beautiful pond full of life and nature but then you look across to the other side, with words surrounding a polluted ocean like dead, gone, destroyed. The subject matter is a bottle and a pond.

The title for my work is “The mistakes we made” The elements visible are balance, form and shape. The media my artwork is made from is watercolour paints. The process I used was I drew a copy in my book of all my thoughts and ideas and what I wanted it to be about, then I drew that onto an A3 piece of paper. I still wasn’t sure what kind of paints I wanted to use, or if I would spray  it, or make it into a sculpture. I tested it out with water colour, I liked how it looked, I did a better one on another A3 piece for my final copy, painted it with water colour and I liked how it turned out.

Something that inspired my work was how my friends went diving in the great barrier reef and told me about how all the colours were all destroyed now it’s all gone. My artwork expresses a social issue that we have created because we don’t look after our oceans well. The emotions my artwork I tried to show was like the good part of the ocean had leaked out of a plastic bottle and to I summed that part up with one word, perfect. In the other half, in the plastic bottle I drew a grey, dull ocean with no fish, just pollution and filled the ocean with words of how I feel we have destroyed the ocean.

My goals for this artwork were for when you look at this artwork it makes you realise what we have done and that we need to take more care of our ocean, so it lasts. I think I achieved these goals because when I look at it I see these points and it makes me feel like we need to do something now. While creating this artwork I learned how I can cover up mistakes with this white liquid that you paint over onto the parts you have messed up.

I think the hardest part for me was it smudging around the outside of the painting, so I had to use this liquid to help fix it up. It’s a bit noticeable but overall, I am happy with how it turned out because I feel like it makes a strong point. This piece will influence my future artworks because I have learnt many new skills like how to fix up smudges and how to use watercolour.