A Slice of Red Velvet Waist

​This piece, acrylic paint on 8x10 inch canvas board was featured at the Dali Museum in 2021 after being submitted to a Student Surrealist competition. I painted this while working on my AP art portfolio and had a lot of fun experimenting with surrealism. 

The tag next to the piece reads as follows

​Janeva Buczynski

A Slice of Red Velvet Waist

East Lake High School

Teacher: Eileen Iacobucci

Grade 12

This piece was inspired by eating disorders and the delusion that results from being unable to meet unrealistic desires, which causes delicacies to become deadly. I’d like the viewer to know that no questionable methods of physical improvement will achieve sustainable results, and you need to love yourself no matter what you look like. You are more than just a body

2021 Art Exhibit

You can see the other winners’ submissions from schools in Pinellas County 2021 using the button to the right, and other years are listed on the Dali site as well. Middle school and high school students in Pinellas or Hillsborough County can apply for this competition through their art teachers.

In addition to trying a new art style for this piece, I also made some changes to my art process in planning and revision. When planning this piece I took reference photos to help me with the perspective of the bathroom and the figure/reflection and I used the gridding technique to sketch the reference on a bigger scale. Before this, if I was referencing a picture, I would grid and draw straight onto the canvas but heavy handed marks didn’t erase well and the graphite grid lines would show through the paint in the final product. For this piece I gridded a piece of vellum paper and transferred only the best linework of my sketch to the canvas board. This trick changed the game for me, it’s a little more work to begin with but relieves a lot of effort later on in the process and has a big impact on how clean the final product looks. As far as revising this piece, I presented it to be critiqued in class and my teacher immediately suggested making all the shadows darker and I explained that I was afraid to go too dark where it wouldn’t make sense for the lighting in a bathroom but she assured me darker shadows would improve it. I took a picture and edited it to see what'd it look like before I used paint and eventually took her advice. The increased contrast definitely gave the piece greater depth and a more finalized look so thanks Mrs. Iac. 

A Slice of Red Velvet Waist before and after revising the level of contrast, specifically the shadows

You can see more about the competition and my art process for this piece in this YouTube video.

Overall, I had a lot of fun with this piece, and learned from it, and it was a surreal experience to see my own work in my favorite art museum. Thanks again for visiting the blog, come back soon!