My figure drawings are closely related to my paintings. When I started figure drawing class with Professor Gordon Wilson, I took a different approach to drawing than I had in the past. Like my Watercolor Exploration Series of paintings, I started with a medium that flowed and was easy to experiment with and move around, although in this case it was charcoal, not paint. Professor Wilson gave students the freedom to try different types of materials and mediums, and he challenged us to draw the figure with movement and in combination with other objects.  

When beginning a drawing, I start with a very loose gesture drawing in order to understand the weight of the model’s pose. I try not to worry about perfect lines or anatomy until I go back to clean it up and fix proportions later. Instead, I focus on the placement of the figure on the page and cropping the figure in dynamic and interesting places. Typically, the live model would switch back and forth between two poses. I enjoy combining the poses and layering the figures on top of each other much like I do with layers of watercolor and other materials. I strive to push charcoal’s inherently smoky, fluid and dirty qualities. Oftentimes, I’ll draw with my fingers, wipe out areas, or selectively erase detailed areas like the face and the hands. Through this process, I find myself creating fantastical creatures and weird combinations of humans and nature. One of my current favorite drawings is a nymph-elvish depiction of the model that shows her in two poses and fills the entire page. I placed the model in two sitting positions, abstracted her features, accentuated the drapery that clings and blends into her legs, and mixed the fabric with root-like imagery. 

A story of wood-nymphs blending into a damp, twisted forest came to fruition the more I played with the drawing and added new elements. My gestural use of the charcoal lends itself well to combination drawings, and as I observed the model, I thought about how I could emphasize certain areas, blend others, and give the drawing an enticing element of mystery or invention. I pull from the scattered parts of my mind and give in to the intuitive thoughts that tell me to start a whole new drawing, erase an entire area and add horns or branches to the leg or face. Switching back and forth each day from painting to drawing has been very helpful in my artistic practice. It has made me realize that there is a common thread of whimsy, flowing compositional elements, personal narratives, and mark-making between all of my artwork. 

During the Spring of 2022, I have continued my position as Campus Chapel Visual Arts Coordinator. The themes for the Spring chapel services have come from the book of Exodus. The first painting in the series, If it Weren’t for Your Mama, is representative of Exodus 2:1-10. Here, Pharoah’s daughter is opening the woven basket that contains baby Moses while his birth mother watches from the distance.

To capture themes from Exodus chapters 3 and 4, I painted I AM – an abstract depiction of the burning bush from which God spoke to Moses. Within this piece, my goal was to reveal God’s name, nature, and promises. Using text, I wanted to communicate God’s empowerment of ordinary people for divine purposes through God’s interaction with Moses in chapter 4.

The Exodus and Deliverance depicts scenes from Exodus 12, 14, and 15. On the left of the canvas are three important parts of the Passover: a doorframe painted with lambs’ blood, a stack of unleavened bread, and a row of homes being passed by the angel of death. These elements can be found in Exodus 12. The scene on the right side of the painting illustrates Moses parting the Red Sea. This pivotal scene is representative of the Israelites’ deliverance from Egypt’s oppression.

Exodus 16 follows the Israelite’s escape from Egypt and shows God’s provision and grace, giving them manna in the form of coriander-like dew on the grass regardless of their disobedience and doubt. In this same passage, God emphasizes the importance of rest and observing the Sabbath. With the goal of creating a contemporary scene with these elements in mind, I painted a person resting in grass with coriander flowers. Surrounding the figure, I paraphrased Exodus 16 and 20, writing, “The Lord has given you the Sabbath. Everyone has just as much as they need. Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy. The Lord blessed the Sabbath and made it holy.”

In praying and processing about what I would paint for the chapel’s Easter message, I felt God clearly pushing me toward a tribute to Ukraine. It would be foolish not to reflect on Jesus’s death and resurrection in the context of Ukraine’s pain during this time. I know that I, along with many other students and faculty, have been desperately grieving for our brothers and sisters suffering so deeply during this war. It felt necessary to paint with this in mind. 

This piece reflects on the Easter message of Christ’s victory over death while also interpreting it as a metaphor for hope in Ukraine in the midst of all this death and sorrow. Sun beams extend beyond the storm clouds in the sky, reflecting the colors of Ukraine’s flag. I painted this piece on Good Friday, realizing the relationship between this day – when Christ’s followers wept for the death of his body – and the death being experienced in Ukraine. I wanted Easter to be a day of rejoicing over Christ’s resurrection and hoping for God’s intervention in Ukraine.

To conclude the Exodus series, I painted I AM Therefore You Are. In Exodus 19 and 24, God is seen by Aaron and Moses in a cloud covering a mountaintop. With this imagery in mind, I painted a sky of clouds that look peaceful and powerful. The text reflects God’s name, “I AM,” from the beginning of the series while also including the aspect of personal transformation through God’s glory and freedom: “Therefore you are.” 

After graduation this month, I will be starting as the marketing and communications coordinator at Eagle Nazarene, a large church in Eagle, Idaho. A large portion of my responsibilities will include developing event and sermon series graphics, then promoting them on social media. For this reason, I decided to use this spring to get some practice in making templates for events with my focus on keeping the design consistent between formats.

I started these designs a few weeks before Easter, so I thought it would be fitting to promote special services like Palm Sunday and Easter – that often attract more visitors than a typical Sunday. I wanted to steer away from the traditional pastel colors associated with Easter, which is why for the Palm Sunday graphics I went with a deep forest green paired with gold type. 

For the Easter Sunday post, I wanted to keep the layout consistent with that of Palm Sunday to visually show that they are related. I chose to use a light yellow as the primary color in these graphics to represent the happiness and light felt on this holiday.

Next, I wanted to develop templates for a few of the different ministries that have events occurring throughout the year. Because these events are not on a routine schedule, I left placeholders for the date and time so I can easily update and post them when they go on the calendar. For the men’s breakfast, I chose a simple line illustration with warm color blocks paired with an old-style typeface. The typeface conveys a steady and more masculine feel while the illustration shows the lightheartedness of the event itself.

The last template I made was for the women’s Bible study. The illustration style is very light and airy, and paired with a cool color palette conveys the comfort and peace that should be felt in these small groups. I chose to use a lightweight script font as another way to appeal to the female audiences who will be the main target of this post. 

In addition to both post and story size graphics, I also developed a splash screen or title slide size for each of these events that would be added to the pre and post service announcements on the large screen in the sanctuary. Through working with these graphics and problem solving to make strong designs in each size format, I feel well prepared going into my job this summer.

For more content and personal information, visit my portfolio site at www.delaynareiss.com

In my previous blog post, I discussed my main long-term goal as a designer and illustrator. Here, I will be discussing a couple of my general design interest with some of my more recent work as examples. 

I’m sure this is a bit redundant at this point, but I really enjoy making illustrations, both in general and for the purpose of adding it to apparel and other merchandise.

The images above show one of my most recent digital illustrations. If you’re Christian or have listened to Christian music in the past, you probably know what song I’m riffing off of here. I had the sketch for this sitting in my sketchbook for a long time but I’m glad I finally worked on it. This was a lot of fun to make, and I like how it turned out. (If you’re interested in having this as a T-shirt or sticker, I have a Redbubble shop @ leviathancrow.)

I also quite enjoy designing logos and working on branding guides and materials. I’m not going to lie, part of it is because depending on the project, I might possibly have the opportunity to include illustration work as a part of the logo. I am aware of how clichéd this sounds, but I also enjoy the problem-solving aspect of it too. 

The idea for the project featured above was to create a logo for a hypothetical company that fit my tongue-in-cheek style and interests. I settled on a satanic-themed edibles company called Devilish Delights. This went through a lot of iterations throughout the entire process, and I’m presenting the final versions of the ones I liked here. My favorite part of working on this logo was coming up with the way the goat merges in and out of the cannabis leaf, especially where the bottom of the neck ends. I also think the texture I added to it works quite well.  

For the last post, I am throwing it back to my roots. Before I get too much into explaining the pieces, I want to give you the chance to know a little more about me! I was raised in a town called Turner, which is a small farming community in the Willamette Valley of Oregon. I was raised in a family that loves each other and loves Jesus even more. My dad, Pete, is the principal of the high school in our town and my mom, Kathleen, is the family advocate for the district. They are not only my parents, but also the people that I look up to the most. They taught me to be strong, to stand up for what I believe in, and most importantly, they led me to the Lord, which is why I will forever be grateful for them both. I am the oldest of three; Brady and Brooks are my two teenage brothers. Although I cried when they were born because they weren’t the sisters I wanted, I can say that God definitely knew what He was doing. They drive me up a wall sometimes, but at the end of the day, I know they will always be my biggest protectors and best friends. They will be a freshman in college and junior in high school next year. 

I have always been a free spirit. I am my best self when I am creating.  My attraction to small town living that shows up in both my fashion and photography not only emerges from my upbringing, but also my love of music from the south… country with heart, folk, and soul. Like many girls, I grew up dreaming of being on a big stage with a microphone in my hands. Ask anyone who knows me and they will tell you, that this girl never stops singing. So, when I was first told about Nashville, “Music City USA”, I set my sights on getting there. From singing at sporting events, to taking voice lessons, to recording in the studio with my talented, song writing aunt, I have never stopped dreaming about life in the south. The simplicity of life in Tennessee is something that I try to capture in my design work as well. Whether through my western denims or photoshoots out in a cornfield, I try to envision what that world might look like. 

So, if you take anything away from this, hopefully you see that I am dreamer. I like to capture the simplest moments that this world has to offer. The elegance of our country and the importance of family and faith is often overlooked, so it is my hope to slow down and help others notice the beauty that surrounds us all. I believe this last set that I am showing you, does just that. Meet Jackie, a girl who loves Jesus, loves people, and shines the brightest light I’ve ever seen.

The Lyric Series as a concept that came to me in the beginning of the spring semester. I had a challenging time conceptualizing what I wanted to present for my exhibit, what truly embodied me as an artist. I was torn on what kind of art I wanted to present, it was between graphic design or illustration. It was then I had my “lightbulb” moment, what was a medium that incorporated both illustration and graphic design? Poster work, like the works of Wes Wilson and the psychedelic movement. I began thinking about what I wanted to present in the posters, the figures, the typography, and even color schemes or themes. I decided to create a test poster, which became the first poster in this series. 

Harvey was purely experimental, compared to the rest of the series, it looks quite different. I decided to use lyrics from a song that I hold dear to my heart, the song “Harvey” by the band Hers. For the visual style, I was once again inspired by Wes Wilson’s cell shading style along with crosshatching from my early print work. It was quite different from what I had done previously with digital art, instead of heavily blended elements it was much more illustrative. I will not forget the impact this work had on me, for it was the first time in a while I had felt fully confident in my work. I knew there was potential in this series, and it embodied not only my style, but also my artistic journey at Whitworth. I had started with dry point, the crosshatching. Then the graphic design/digital artwork, through both the typography and visual style. It felt truly representative of my art, and I was immediately inspired to create more of these posters. 

My process for making a poster usually started with choosing a song, I would listen to the song fully and reflect. Both through the lyrics and reflecting on how the song made me feel emotionally. A goal of mine through these posters was to tell a story, through the lyrics and design. I wanted to recreate the song’s sound through the posters, through color and line. For example, with my poster Honey Thighs, I really wanted to channel the wavy/fluid sound in the song, it felt bubbly. With the figure specifically, I wanted the eyes to stand out the most in the poster, since the lyrics I chose focused on the eyes. A lot of the design was meant to reflect on the song and lyrics, making it an illustrative representation of the song. The focus for this series was to not only present my visual style, but to represent the themes I have discussed throughout my art career. Identity, individuality, representation, etc. The Lyric Series presents individual figures, with lyrics that tell a story. I wanted each character or set of characters to have their own story to tell. Like with people, we all have our own individual journeys. We all have gotten to the current day, and we all have things that make us unique. I wanted the characters in the series to present that idea too. I find people to be such beautiful creatures on this earth, despite the issues of the current day. We all have things that make us ourselves, despite generalizations or stereotypes. This series is a love letter to the beauty of humans, what we create and how we express. As well as being a love letter to music, and how much it means to me. This series holds such an emotional significance to me, like in my first blog post I discussed how unsure I was of myself. I know myself now, and I know what art I want to create and put out in the world. 

My artistic journey at Whitworth was no doubt an emotional rollercoaster and looking back there are aspects where I wish I did more or risks I could have taken. But I would not have it any other way, for I am happy with the artist I am right now. I am content with myself, and I know that my future will be an eventful one. I have many people to thank. The Whitworth art community, specifically Leah Yand and Levi Wilson, have encouraged me since the beginning. The Whitworth art Faculty, who believed in me when I did not. Finally, I must thank my mom, Julie Shanholtzer, and my oldest sister Darcie. Without them and their continuous love and support throughout my life, I would not be where I am now. I appreciate you, the viewer, for reading my story. Keep being you. 

For commissions and purchasing prints, my email is shanhjay000@gmail.com

For the spring season sports, I had the challenge to create new templates for softball, lacrosse, tennis, baseball, track & field. This was a great opportunity for me to research these sports and create a unique theme. Similar to the fall season sports, my designs include important information regarding the date and time, location, and team names. Since February 2022, I created over 25 Game Day Designs and included over 20 individual athletes.

Even though I am a sculpture major, I am still pursuing 2D art, especially printmaking. Themes of animals and the supernatural cross over to this medium as well. I really enjoy extreme value changes and linework in 2D art, and printmaking does both naturally. After graduation, I plan to pursue a way to combine both sculpture and printmaking. 

For my final blog post I wanted to talk about my Fleaves piece that is currently on display in the corner gallery in the Lied Art Center! I came up with the idea for the Fleaves piece last fall semester in my Senior Seminar class. As you may have learned from past blog posts, I am really interested in the natural processes of nature. This interest and curiosity about how things like rain, wind, water and other moving natural processes function make its way into my everyday thoughts and dreams. 

The idea of fleaves came from a couple of dreams I had of fish and leaves combining! Natural currents that certain fish move and flow through within the ocean and in natural waterways somehow got linked to how leaves move through wind currents. I think it helps that leaves and fish have somewhat similar geometric shapes to them also! But I thought it would be fun to show this meshing of fish and leaves in a visual way, so using glass, I went about creating fish and leaves flowing into and becoming “fleaves”!

At the time of its creation, I was still exploring the relationships weaving and glass could have with each other, so I decided that the ambiguous currents that the fish, leaves, and fleaves would be moving through would be woven and knotted. The giant woven current part of the piece took a lot of time and patience and was threaded with wire so that I could keep the piece sculptural. The glass elements were made using the Pâte de Verre method where I sculpted each individual fish/leaf, made a mold of it, and then filled that mold with glass frit and fired it to a solid! I really enjoyed the process of making this piece and I am very happy with the outcome. Getting to display it in the corner gallery has been a treat!

Find more on my website: https://mayamarkillie.wixsite.com/portfolio

Contact me! mayamarkillie@gmail.com

I had only worked with charcoal, graphite, and chalk pastels and I was convinced that my career at Whitworth would be focused on drawing. That was until I registered to take printmaking during Jan term of my junior year. I needed to fulfill the credit for the 2D major anyways, so I decided to take it then to leave space for my drawing classes. Printmaking instead introduced me to a new way of artmaking and I knew I had to keep going. I didn’t take my next printmaking class until the fall of my Senior year. This is where I often felt lost, and I didn’t quite have a focus yet. My interests in culture, identity, and heritage are all a part of what I make. Each print I created seemed to jump from experiences to culture to language and so on. I knew Senior exhibition was coming up so I felt pressure to find something to focus on. Eventually, after going through a few prints that were mid at best, I found it. The 2022 Senior exhibition currently has six pieces of art I created this spring. These pieces feel like a culmination of what I had been thinking of these past years. This last fall, I spent time looking at Mexican printmakers like Leopoldo Mendez and Jose Guadalupe Posada. My focus was on their technique in woodblock relief printing and the content they explored.

This triptych is a portrait of my father. He worked in Central Washington harvesting different kinds of fruits. He primarily worked in the apple and cherry orchards, but he also harvested pears and pruned grapevines. The series highlights the work he did for ten years. Some of the most taxing work he’s done was picking pears. At times, the bag was so heavy that it cut into his shoulders, leaving him scarred. These prints force the viewer to focus on the fruit first and then consider the worker second. It was important to me that the figure was not fully representing my father because these pieces speak to the experiences that hundreds of workers go through. Many of them are immigrants and because of their status, they’re often ignored. However, we gladly enjoy the fruit of their hard work. 

These woodblock prints were my first attempt at working with wood as the material for the matrix of the print. After spending a year looking at Mexican printmakers and working on a digital piece that emulated the technique, I wanted to try out the medium. I see these pieces as a response to my coin drawings. The coins symbolized the feeling of displacement. I’d constantly think about the phrase, “I am neither from here, nor there”. These prints, however, speak to the family experience and the cultural heritage I’ve received. They are a part of who I am and I don’t have to choose one over the other. 

This painting, while outside of my preferred media, still speaks to the shared experiences of many first-generation Mexican Americans and other underrepresented people groups. It’s based on a situation that happened in first grade, when my teacher celebrated Cinco de Mayo. She had every Mexican student bring traditional foods and then lined every Mexican student at the front of the class. While she had good intentions in honoring our heritage, it placed us in a strange position. I became aware of who I was and why I was being seen as different. No longer am I just another student in the first grade but I’m also a Mexican kid who has different foods, different language, and a different way of living. While none of those things are negative, it was the moment and feeling that I wanted to capture in this piece. The feeling of being othered while also proud of the heritage I bring. The strange feeling of being a part of this country while also feeling excluded and different. 

These pieces work as one, adding to each other and showing different aspects of who I am. They are personal to me yet, I hope they allow for others to be seen. My work continues to focus on my personal experiences and as I continue developing my artwork, I hope to create space for community and advocacy. These past three years of being a part of Whitworth’s Art + Design department has allowed me to grow as a designer and artist. I’ve learned to create opportunities if there aren’t any, to find and reach out to professionals in the field and connect. While others might worry about the starving artist, I’ll be in the studio and in the community making something.

This body of work is an optics series inspired by artists like Bridget Riley and Victor Vasarely of the Op Art movement of the 1960’s. They also pull from compositional and stylistic choices that mimic animation styles like that of Pink Panther in The Pink Phink. As a launching point from a study I did on optics, this series of work further incorporates the use of the laser cutter to create detailed linoleum blocks. 

It’s a continuation of designing an entirely visual experience for the viewer. Themes of perception apply in that directness of visual content. My hope is that this work is approachable in its non-specificity and lack of narrative which this form of abstraction lends itself to.

Working with relief printing I am combining this very old process with new methods of developing these prints. I am exploring what can be done with line and shape, and how their arrangement can create visual movement from a still image. Being in the studio and printing these is a slow and repetitive process that has been a really incredible space for personal reflection and growth in my art-making.

Shout out to my professor, Rob Fifield, for his investment in my art and design practice and his efforts in helping me develop my usage of our printmaking studio’s laser cutter for this series. Also, for recommending so many albums to listen to as I worked on this print series.

See prints Benign Understanding, Congruence, and Latency as a part of the Myriad exhibit at the Bryan Oliver Gallery until May 21st, 2022.

More work at www.dylangriffdesign.com

One of the most rewarding experiences during my time at Whitworth has been my job as the design editor of our yearbook. As the only graphic designer on the yearbook team, I’ve been tasked with creating the visual identities of two published books of about 240 pages each. 

Before dealing with the content of each book, I worked with the editor-in-chief to decide how the theme would be communicated. Last year, our editor-in-chief, Sophia Lizberg, and I decided on an illustration of ponderosa pine roots to connect with the book’s theme: Resilient. The goal was to convey that—like roots—the Whitworth community grows around any obstacle it faces.

This year and last, I have been in charge of creating style guides, page layouts, cover designs, and promotional materials for the books. As the 2020-2021 school year was influenced by the COVID-19 pandemic, we relied on illustrations in place of many photos. This was especially important when group gatherings were not possible and events were held online. I created over 30 custom illustrations and graphics for last year’s book. The 2021 book was designed playfully with bright, flat graphics and a fun, dynamic headline font. Because the 2022 book is the 100^th edition of the publication, it has a more classic feel with some elements—like the art-deco inspired fonts—reminiscent of the 1920s. As we curated the content of the book this year, we chose to include old photos from the last century dispersed occasionally through story pages and featured prominently on divider pages.

The professional experience I’ve gained while still in school these past two years is invaluable. This job has pushed me to expand my understanding of layout, typography, and book design in general. My organizational skills, time management, and patience have been challenged by this role, but the ability to have designed two complete published books is something I will always be grateful for. As I write this, I am only days away from seeing and holding the 2022 yearbook for the first time. The distribution of this book will be bittersweet. I will miss this job deeply, but I see it as only the start of my design career.

Find me online at jaimecrainart.com and on Instagram @jaimecrainart and @jaimecraindesign

These images are from my most recent series, exploring themes of time, humanity, and creation. These paintings mark a new era and style of artmaking that I look forward to continuing to explore.

This is the third piece in my Creation Series, where I explore concepts of time, creation, and the earth. My biggest concern while making this painting was to make it look ancient and futuristic at the same time. The texture that I achieved through adding spackle to the painting was to make it look like my design was a carved stone relief. While each of the symbols in this piece mean something to me, I wanted to give the impression that I was paying homage to the earth, as echoed in my title. The concept of this series comes from my own personal struggle with coming to terms with the climate crisis. If I can think of civilization somehow prevailing in thousands of years, and the types of art that will be made when humanity starts over, it gives me hope that not all will be lost. 

This painting is the fourth piece in my Creation Series, and has a different tone compared to my previous painting. In this painting, I wanted to focus on making a futuristic composition through the symbols and the color choice. I wanted to vaguely replicate the colors that may be present in a projection, and contrast painterly strokes in the negative space, with the mechanical nature of my design. Much of my design inspiration for this series comes from symbols found in pre-historic cave paintings, artist such as Joaquin Torres-Garcia and Tim Ely, and other forms of geometric abstraction. 

In the Fall of 2021, I was hired as the Campus Chapel Visual Arts Coordinator (also referred to as the “chapel artist”) at Whitworth University. My job was to create paintings that correlated with and responded to the messages being presented at chapel services. I created these pieces bi-weekly, visually combining the messages from two weeks at a time while incorporating elements that were specified by the speakers. Due to the nature of the position, the specific artworks do not represent my usual or preferred painting style or content; however, it encouraged me to process themes from scripture in a creative and valuable new way. 

This blog post covers the series of paintings from the Fall 2021 semester – the Gospel of John series.

Lord, I Believe is a piece that correlates with John 8:12-20 and John 9:1-41. Combined is the imagery of the blind man from John 9 emerging from darkness with a burst of light across his eyes. This signifies the gift of sight from Christ, “the light of the world.” In John 9:38, the man says “Lord, I believe” – the statement that gives him, and all people, new life in Christ.

Lazarus is a visual representation of John 11:1-44 and John 15:1-17. It is an image of Lazarus’s grave clothes trailing from the tomb, removed while he walked from death toward life (Jesus). The cypress tree that grows in front of the tomb has been pruned of dying branches, representative of John 15. The grave clothes and pruned branches are together abandoned on the ground as symbols of death defeated, while the healthy tree continues to grow, and Lazarus is alive beyond the painting. 

Jesus of Nazareth, The King is a painting of Jesus’s crown of thorns casting the shadow of a crown of royalty. It is in reference to John 18:33-40 and John 19:19-30, John’s description of Christ’s crucifixion. The crowns are symbolic of Jesus’s reign through his suffering. The text on this piece refers to the inscription that Pilate, the governor of Judea and presider over the crucifixion, instructed to be above Jesus on the cross (John 19:19). 

Rabboni is a Jewish title of respect for a master or teacher, specifically one of spiritual insight. This is what Mary called Jesus when he approached her after his resurrection. In John 20:1-18, Jesus approaches Mary in the garden, gently calling her name and proving his resurrection with his pierced hand. The back of Mary’s head is in the foreground of this piece so that the viewer may be welcomed into the scene, being approached by Jesus in a similar gentle way. In contrast to the other paintings in this series, I intentionally left sketches revealed in this piece and used thinner washes of paint. The purpose is to represent a simpler and less dramatic scene, signifying God’s presence in simple moments, not only in what’s flashy.