Building my art CV at home

Starting from about 6 months ago, I have a new hobby. Painting. I'm gonna skip the story about how I was brought up in an art family which I had already written in my art blog.

I wanna exclaim how fast the time flashed when I found my greatest interest in life! I didn't notice I had been painting for 6 months already! That was surprising!

Anyway, back to the topic. I dunno since when, but must be within the 6 months, I started to think about letting people to know about my art. I want to build a reputation in art world, so that people know about me and my art. Deep in my heart, I have few targets to achieve:

1. I want to show people that oil pastel can also be a great medium on the same level with oil painting. But at the same time I wanna show people that I do this not because I can't do oil painting but instead because oil pastel is itself a very all-rounded medium which should be promoted to more art galleries.

2. Other than that, I also want to use art to remind people about the beauty of science.

3. I want to have a unique way of painting something common which the strokes had not been used by other people.

So I have somewhat achieved those:

1. I have replicated Starry Night by Van Gogh (which was originally an oil painting) using oil pastel and had gain lots of good feedback about the great details in the painting.

2. I have painted 2 abstract painting from the photos of cancer cell scanning electron micrograph (SEM) using oil paint and had attracted much attention from friends with non-science background. And they did get to be exposed to the beauty of science through my painting.

3. I had created a unique stroke for rose painting and am going to create a rose series with 4 rose paintings. Now I had 2 rose painting at hand.

No wonder I feel such great satisfaction! =)

Although I have achieved those targets, more have to be done to create a bigger impact. So, I decided to give myself higher goals:

1. To create a great painting using oil pastel and submit to art galleries for display to raise awareness of the all-roundedness of oil pastel

2. To paint another 2 cancer cell abstract paintings to close the cancer cell series. Then, write a nice description about cancer and promote cancer awareness. Then, submit the whole series to art galleries.

3. To paint another 2 rose paintings with the unique strokes. Then, submit the whole series to art galleries if nobody wanna buy from me.

At work, I build my science CV; Outside work, I build my art CV. =) And because of the fully utilized life, I feel contented and astoundingly satisfied.

Flower of Happiness

Work had been really tedious lately that I had to go to work on weekends. Plus my bro had appendicitis 2 weeks ago and had been suffering from infection at the wound. Life had been so tedious and tiring. So I merely have time for myself to draw one of those many drawings.

One or two weeks before this, I started to put the photo of daisies I've taken some time ago as the wallpaper of my handphone. Throughout the 2 weeks, I have been looking at the wallpaper whenever I have time. And I have always been picturing in my mind on and off, especially how the pastel should define the petals.

2 days ago, I've finally squeeze some time in the late Saturday morning to sit down and started drawing the flowers that I have been imagining over and over again in my head. Two and half hours later, unbelievably my first creation had been done! 2.5 hours only! I was really surprised.

However, the drawing is not as in depth as Van Gogh's copy. That's why I can finish it within short time. Although not really satisfied with the depth and the level of details of the drawing, this is my very first drawing! Not a copy from any paintings! =) So I've gotta love it. Right? Hehe..

Flowers of Happiness

P/S: I don't know how to copyright this drawing. But because this is my first drawing, I feel like protecting it. Hehe. So I put a © at my drawing. Hehe...

Starry Night Over the Rhone

Here comes my second piece of Van Gogh's drawing copy.

Starry Night Over the Rhone

The main character of this drawing is actually not the stars, but the reflection of the lights. So I try to make it looks as bright as possible.

Anyone interested to buy this drawing?

Size: 41.5cm x 29.5cm (16.5'' x 11.5'')

Medium of drawing: Pastel and medium grain paper

Price: RM80 negotiable

Selling self-drawn Starry Night drawing

I'm thinking if I want to sell off my drawing, would someone be interested to buy it? LoL!

Anyway, this picture I proudly duplicated from Van Gogh's Starry Night is sitting pathetically in a corner of my room, rolled nicely. Why would I say proudly? I used 100% Buncho 48 crayons (the red box) to produce this piece when at the beginning I didn't believe I could make it with so limited colour choices! That is why I think this drawing is very precious and special. =)

Just a thought someone might like Starry Night just like I do. =P

Talk about drawing, I feel like continue drawing again. =) Gonna choose another famous drawing from Van Gogh. =) I just love his post impressionist way of drawing! =)

Copy cat plan

There's a Popular Book Fair at Summit USJ recently. All the books there are 70-80% discount. Some children books are even RM1 each! The books there are not organizely arranged and dusty. But if you're lucky you can find good books by renown authors.

I went there with Get Pei on Wednesday. She found 刘庸 and 村上春树's books.

I wanted to find a book about the history of 康熙, a great emperor in China. But I didn't have that luck. I found 三国演义 though. It's as thick as a dictionary. I had always wanted to buy a detailed 三国演义 book since I had already read the 'light-and-easy' version which is just about an inch thick. But the book I found was Book 2. Book 1 was no where to be seen.

In the end I grabbed these books.



The translated version of "Chew on this: Everything you don't want to know about fast food"
And a Korean learning book.

I feel like going again to try my luck again before it ends.

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When I was walking back to car park with Get Pei we saw this:



Is this a graffiti competition? It's so cool! And one thing both me and Get Pei agreed on is that Malays are better graffiti artists than Chinese. =)

-

2 days ago I suddenly had this idea of mimicking photographed photos by drawing with hand using oil pastels (crayons).

Some people had already done that. These are some examples I found on the net:





Uhmm.. I thought I was the one who could only think of mimicking photographs.

Erhem... Anyways, I'm gonna start from simple one first coz lately very busy with work. Don't really have time but I still crave for some leisure. =P

I'm gonna start with this:



Simple and nice. Hope I won't ruin the drawing la.. hahaha..

Will post up my drawing once I'm done.


여러분,기다리세요!! =)
(Means: Everyone, please wait!!)

I'm Hope

Tonight just went to Global Arts to teach the kids drawing. I was assigned to two sweet 5 years old little girls. One of them, Anthea, kept kissing me on my cheek and my hand. And she likes to grab my hand and hugged my hand like hugging at bolster, too. So cute! ^^ Another girl, Rhienne, acted a lot more matured than Anthea and is so sweet. Aww.. It's been long since I played with kids already. =)

Got one funny thing wanna share here.

Two days ago the person in charge of this Global Art branch, Ben, asked me to find an English name so that it's easier to be called by the kids. But I still think Heay sounds more familiar.

Teacher Heay. Nice right? The good thing about having name with weird spellings is that it can be used as English name. Heay Kong. Hehehe.. Sounds so special. =P Nobody would be named as Heay I guess..

But Ben suggested Teacher Hope coz my Chinese name means hope. =.="

Erm... Sounds weird lo.. Summore so hard to pronounce.

Sigh.. Teacher Hope. Goodness gracious! I didn't even know it's a name until I just checked it on Babynamesworld. =.="

Ok Zhuang, laugh all you want. I'm Hope. lol... At least it's a direct translate from my Chinese name. Nevermind lo.. I will try to accept this name lo. Haha....

But I wanna make it clear that Hope is just my name in Global Art yea. I won't entertain anyone calling me Hope outside Global Arts. I still like being called Heay. =P

My Starry Night

Yesterday was too depressed. So I decided to continue drawing the piece of Starry Night I started more than half a year ago.

I personally like Van Gogh's Starry Night because of the lines in the sky makes the sky looks like it's built from blocks of puzzles. And I like the large glow around the stars and the moon too.




I've always wanted to imitate oil painting using crayon. Finally today I finished the drawing.



Although my favourite part (the glow around the stars with white dash) could not be achieved using crayons, my tree at the front is way too big as compared with the original, and the curvy cloud in the sky is not as texturized as Van Gogh's, I still feel very satisfied with my drawing. =) Hey, I already more than 5 years never draw a proper drawing already le. This is consider very very successful.

Summore my dad was shocked when he saw this drawing. Hehe. My dad had never praised my drawing before in my whole life. This is the first time. For all my secondary school life I've been hoping dad to praise my drawings (my dad's an art tutor, so is my mum), but I've never get any from him. This time I gained it, I felt so honoured.

Tonight I might sleep smiling. =P

Nights. =)

New skin! =)

Woo hoo!

Finally finish editing the new blog skin! I change this skin just because of the RSS Feed. Sigh... My previous blog template was in html classic blogger mode and I dunno how to set RSS Feed for that. I didn't know I dun have feed in my blog until Wey Yiing told me that she doesn't know my blog was updated because my blog has no feed! Maybe it has feed but I just dunno how to set. Then hor, now after changing to new blogger mode, only I realized that it is actually the setting problem. Hahaha.. Blur as usual.

Never mind.

I love this simple template especially the font for the header "Garden of Thoughts". Cute or not? =) And this template is easy to edit too. Actually I wanted to change my blog title to something else coz it sounds very lame. Garden of Thoughts konon. So lame. But I think everyone who read my blog are more used to this title after so many years. So I think I will just stick to it la. Hehe.


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Today actually was not in a good mood coz everyone in the lab was bullied by the janitor. Aih.. We always bullied by her one. She's more like a boss to us than us to her. Maybe we should start being more stern and firm when communicating with her. Sigh. For goodness sake, aunty, wash the toilet la!! Argh!!!

Ok. Enough ranting. Gotta go sleep. Very long never sleep so late already. Bad for health. Hehe.

Nights.

Healthy day

Today is a healthy day! I finally got my butt out of my room! This is a big move (snicker).

Managed to wake up early at 7 something, had some milo and off to a one hour jog at the field nearby. I only jogged 5 rounds (and walked many rounds) but I feel so much better! Since I started to learn swimming, I found that if I stop exercising for more than 2 weeks I'll feel like having short breaths. I feel like my lungs have shrunk.

I actually planned to go Tian Hou Kong since weekdays. And I didn't plan to go with anyone. I just wanna go there and visit Ma Zhu and come back. But Keen called up asking for Microsoft Office CD. So, I brought him along with me. He brought camera. lol.


We had fun camwhoring. Especially at the rooftop. Hehe.. Coz no one was there, so we can set up timer and take as many pictures we can. =P We brought so liveliness to the temple. =D



The first thing you should do if you wanna act like a monkey like me. lol


The theme for this picture is "rich si lai". Did I meet the theme?


Serenity..


Act cool. lol


(Click to enlarge coz I have no idea why it came out so small)



This is taken by me. Nice? Got feel or not? Hehe...


Then met up bro at PJ to take some stuff from him. Had a quick lunch with him and his ex-boss. Had some quick chat with him. Although din have much to talk with him as usual, but seeing him in person made my day. I'm happy to see him and am still proud of him doing what he is good at and interested in. =)

When I'm back home, I felt very exhausted already. Had a good nap later. It was such a relaxing and healthy day! =)

But I feel muscle sore at my waist now. Guess I got it from jogging and jumping too much at the temple. Sei la. Tomorrow still have to go Gunung Dato' for a day hike tim. Haha. But it's ok. I need more endurance training for my KK trip. So, I cant complain. lol.

Of Frankenstein and Van Gough

Actually when I was typing in previous post that I am trying hard to live my life. I mean I am trying really hard but didn't mean I manage to live my life. I feel lost, empty, depressed (again), useless and alone (nobody to depend on). And I dun feel like doing anything.

I started walking alone in Pyramid again before meeting up Yun Ying. First time after the break up. And the familiar lonely feelings came back to me when I saw loving couples pass by. But this time, I have no one with me. Which makes me feel even more lonely. And the pain was then gradually building up again. I think it did not start when I walked alone in Pyramid last night. I had this empty feeling few days ago especially when I'm driving coz you cant do other stuff to keep yourself occupied when you're driving. And the only thing you can do when you are driving is to think which either brighten up your mood or dampen your mood. My mindset automatically chose the second. How pessimistic. (I'm not always cheerful as some of you might think)

I suddenly found something fresh to occupy my soul when I saw the painting stall in Pyramid new wing last night. It was the Starry Starry Night by Vincent Van Gough, my favourite painting. If you read my blog very long time ago you will know, else, just see here for more detail.

It was staring at me from the ground floor when I was at the second floor going to Popular Bookstore. I got attracted to it. Headed to ground floor instead of the bookstore. RM300 per piece. Even though it's just a fake, but it's still too expensive for me. So this idea came to me. How about draw a painting for my room deco so that my room will be brightened up a bit? Cool idea right? Hehe. But I still thinking wanna draw Starry Starry Night or not. Coz if you know the story of Van Gough, you will know how lonely this painting represents. I duwan it to amplify my loneliness.

And then I walked back to Popular again. Came out with a box of Buncho crayon and a piece of thick drawing paper. Mum, if you're reading this dun nag me for buying the crayon when I can take free good quality crayon from home. Coz I cannot tahan already ma.. Wanna fast fast draw liao ma. Hehe. Cannot wait until bro passes it to me. Dun worry, it's a medium size box, not the big one. Wont be as expensive.

So this is my personal mini project. A painting for room deco. =)


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Forgot to write the review on this book I just finish reading.

Next. By Michael Crichton.


This cover is the one I have. Got it in MPH warehouse sales at lower price. RM20+ if not mistaken.

But I think this cover looks more appealing. Hmm..


I love this book!


He argues about the ethical problem that will arise from genetic engineering in a very Frankenstein manner. He tells it in short interlinked stories which is surprisingly pretty persuasive to me. I hate novels which are draggy (like Lord of the Ring). This novel has a fast pace, fast enough to keep me awake to read it. =P And it is addictive enough to keep me reading it when I was waiting for traffic lights while driving. Hehe. Ok ok. No more reading when driving now since I've already finish reading it.

He even put 7 pages of references (mostly journals) at the last few pages of the book. And he also put 8 pages of his own opinions on the gene patenting, use of human tissues, gene testing, bans on some genetic researches in some countries and the Bayh-Dole act. Very scientific feel. Makes me feel so sciencesick (derived from homesick. hehe)


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Oh. Talking about science fictions. I bought several old 1980s science fictions from the bookfair in 3K Subang Jaya long time ago before I graduated. And the first few pages already brought me plenty of cold sweat. The story is about the world in 2030. And this sentence talking about how hightech the typewriter will be in 2030... When I saw this sentence I suddenly lost my "apetite" to continue reading the book. I's like, hello? We dun use typewriter anymore now. We use PDAs if you want hightech for heaven's sake. lol. I'm bad.

And after that I swore to myself I will never ever buy old outdated science fictions again. Ever.


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And talking about typewriter. Ah~~ Sweet memories. I miss the 'keching' sound when it got to the next line. Hehe. And I miss how I hate stucking my fingers into the holes in between the buttons. It peeled my skin. And the tapping sounds of the sticks (dunno how to call it). And how I always liked to touch the ink strips when I was wondering where the printed words came from. I was 9... I was just playing around with the typewriter =)

p/s: For those of you who are too young to know how a typewriter looks like. =P It looks like this:

Reflection - the interior-designed hotel

Was reading Pink Pau's blog. She put up the photos of the very nice hotel in Bangkok she mentioned in her blog.

According to her, this hotel, called Reflection, has 30 rooms and every room has its own unique interior design! And the designs are so OMG-ingly good! Every room is carefully designed.

I really like to see interior designed house one lo. When I was 8 or 9, I would go dig out those interior design magazines my parents put in the shelves and flipped through every page. In that young age, being very naive, I even use a pencil to tick the designs I like. Hehe..

I still like to see interior designs now. hehe. So I went to the website of the hotel and check on the designs of every single room. Hehe.

Then I found this very soothing and relaxing room, Room number 211 =). I want my future bedroom to look like this!

I think this room is a bit Jimmy styled. I mean 几米 the one who draw illustrations if you know him. I think it will look nicer if the flowers are replaced by some other simple yet sophisticated drawings. =)

You can go see other designs in the hotel website here. Have fun =)

Random updates with pictures =)

Last week we went to eat steamboat in Yuan. The one opposite Sunway Pyramid. Because our Steven boss was here in Malaysia! For a week for company meetings. Now he's back in Indon already I think.


I like this picture especially after photoshopped. =)


3 group pictures in a row taken by Vincent. Poor Vincent. hehe...

That day the main character is Steven. Coz he few months only come here once. Steven is a funny and straight-forward person.

Here's one short story to show how funny Steven is.

Yuan always has this grilled chicken wing which is very very yummy. They serve the wings every 15 minutes starting 8pm (or 8.30pm? Around that la). Normally everyone in the restaurant will rush to the stall and grab whatever they can get. Within seconds the wings would be all gone.

All of us were very paiseh to be so unglam go there and rebut wings ma. So Steven volunteered to rebut. He don't understand why we so paiseh. Just go grab it before it's gone la. I'm very kiasu one and I don't see any problem with it, he said. lol. Funny guy. Can't imagine he's a manager. =P Maybe every manager has this kind of kiasu character. hehe...

I think this shop has the best steamboat food of all the steamboat shops I tried. Best in the terms of variety and freshness. Alamak.. Forgot to take the picture of the long stall to put food one. The stall very very big lo..

The stall is right behind us in the pictures. Summore this is only part of the stall. Not the whole stall.

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The day before steamboat, I had TGI Friday with KS. Long time never eat TGI liao. Miss the steak. Hehe..

I ordered a set where the steak comes with a side dish and a desert. Because the steak itself is RM49.90 but when it's in the set the whole set is only RM30+. Of course choose the cheaper one la. But that day KS treat me. Muahaha. But I damn paiseh lo..

Medium well. It was a bit over-cooked. I should have order medium instead of medium-well. Sigh.. I still miss the juicy steak in Marche in The Curve last year. When the knife sliced the steak, the blood flowed out. Although it sounds gross but the texture of the steak was very nice lo. Soft soft one. Miss Marche already. But this TGI steak was okay la.

Sotongs. Dun like them fried. I still prefer the sambal sotong when I went to FRIM walk... Yum!



Dessert. The biscuit very hard. Dun like also. lol..

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Yesterday was Mother's day. After went to get SYBR Green from Jong Hang, me and Audrey went to Taman Megah food court to have dinner.

Mum said I should eat good food on Mother's day. Mum said Mother's day is a day for future mother also. My mum very cute la...


Good food as in healthy food. So I ordered orange juice lo. hehe.. Healthy le..

Kampar mee and orange juice


I like this photo too. Sometimes I'm so proud of my handphone when it can take nice pictures in daytime.

Before the dinner we had lunch at Asia Cafe. Took this picture when I found that the parrots are very colourful. Din realise this until yesterday coz we always go there at night. Can't see the colour at night.

After I took this picture another parrot came to drink water and the beak unintentionally splash some of the water onto my face. Eeeww.

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Gonna end this post with a piece of photoshop work of mine


Title: Heay in love



Of course in love with Heng la. With who else wor. lol...

Get Pei's going to bomb me again. haha.

Fond of fonts

I learn one new thing today when I was blog-hopping through Nuffnang.

It's called Typography! I dunno how to explain what it is. It's like a video made up of symbols and alphabets flying here and there. lol.

Get a glimpse of the examples below then you will know what I mean. Very meaningful and at the same time entertaining and artistic. It's cool!

Example 1: The Idiots are Taking Over NOFX - About Americans frustration against Bush

I like the idea of the exclamation marks flew off.
And the words "Life, Liberty and Properties" became $$$ signs.
And the words "People, Politics, Police" became the word "LIES".


Example 2: Typollution - An awareness video about how the environment has been polluted by us, human

I like the way the commas dropping from the cloud especially when the angle is like watching from above. The commas represent raindrops.
And the way the buildings represented by H, L and M mushroomed.
And the way the flowers fell off when the buildings shot up.
And the video ended with question marks (flower petals) falling all over from the flower, ending the video with a question indirectly.



I like to see different types of fonts. When I was in secondary school, I had this habit of writing out all sorts of font types I can imagine in A4 papers and documented them in my special file. This is my another habit other than writing emo poems back in secondary times. hehe..

Remember those secondary school times when we have to make our own scrapbook on our family or something else? And we have to hand them in for some academic marks. I remember I borrowed my dad's font type book for nice fonts so that I can follow exactly the font type on the cover of the scrapbook. (Take note that at that time, about year 1997, we don't use Microsoft Word, we just draw with freehand)

After that, I didn't return that book to my dad for several years. Hehe.. I kept my dad's font type book in my drawer and appreciated every font types in the book whenever I'm free. hehe. I know I sound like a weirdo. But dun forget my parents are artists. Having some artist weirdo personality is not surprising. =P

It was appreciation of the art in the font book at first. Then, I started to draw my own fonts. And I keep them in my file and name every font type I created. I even draw from A to Z and 0 to 9, big and small alphabets. I was actually quite proud of my fonts and actually planned to submit to those websites which buy font types. That was long time ago.

Now I am still like to appreciate font types. I downloaded many different types of fonts in my font folder in control panel. Haha. Too bad blogspot only have boring font types.

Anyway, if they have various nice fonts also I won't use them one la.


Imagine something like this. Although it's artistic. But isn't it hard to read? =P



p/s: Hmmm.. Gotta go dig out my long lost font file. =) I miss the fonts.

Playing with hairstyles

Recently when chatting with Heng he always ask me whether I plan to change hairstyle to short ones. lol. "How short? Like guys ah?" I said.

But if cut guy hairstyle I will look damn weird wor. lol. So I purposely find a very man picture of mine and photoshop it with male hairstyles. =P




(p/s: Please bear with my lousy Photoshop skills =P)






Andy Lau's hairstyle


Beckham's hairstyle



Brat Pitt's hairstyle


Jay Chow's hairstyle


Rain's Hairstyle


Haha.. I lengchai or not? Don't fall in love with me wor. =P

I think the Brad Pitt one I really look like my brother la. hehe




I tried to find female short hair hairstyles to match my face and see which one is best for my face. But all the models face not straight one, either senget to the right or left. Sien. I only got three.


From Coffee Prince one. hehe..


Still look very lengchai

Too much extra fat on my face already. That's why I said short hair is not suitable for me if I wanna look like a female. Sigh.


How about this?


And this?


Still weird right? lol.




Since I had been playing with Photoshop today, just add another extra one then.

Adam said I look like Rock Lee from Naruto the anime especially when I had my fringe cut straight and if I don't pluck my eyebrows.


He's referring to this loser hairstyle (this was last year) (wah.. damn paiseh to put it on the blog again)




Compare with this fella's hair



Look alike meh?


So I combine my fierce fierce face and Rock Lee's hair and eyebrow together to see whether I look like Rock Lee or not.


Compare with this




Dun think so...