Four years ago may not seem like a long time ago, but within the past four years I have gained four A Levels, a degree and embarked on my Masters course! Looking back, completing my A levels and leaving school seems much longer ago. My school days are something I will never aspire to revisit again, but I was always happiest at school within my art classes and have my fondest memories of school in those lessons.
So, it was quite a lovely surprise when my sister pointed out to me that my artwork was on the school’s website. This all now sounds quite self-indulgent, but it’s nice to feel appreciated and unforgotten after years of having left the place.
Studying the piece again, I still believe it to be quite a successful painting, but it did make me evaluate just how much my work has changed since embarking on my degree. Aside from the obvious change in subject matter, I feel as if my control and use of colour, as well as drawing capabilities have improved massively. This gives me a growing confidence to my more recent pieces of work which I still believe to be new territory for me as an artist.
It also made me more determined than ever to keep increasing the scale of my work. Not knowing the exact measurements of my A Level piece, I do remember it was roughly my height (5’7) and about 2ft wide. So maybe that’s the potential scale my work could currently aspire to?
In many ways, my work seems to have come full circle in terms of how I paint. My A levels ended with me using exaggerated amounts of colour and on a much larger scale during my degree my work had its ups and downs and so my confidence fell, but towards the end of my third year my confidence grew again and so did my use of colour and scale of my work. Now I’m painting in a much more elaborate and exciting manner.
Again, looking back upon my A level work, it makes me miss painting and drawing portraits which I would like to have a go at again in the future!