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Welcome to my art page! Here you can see some of my paintings,
drawings, photomontage and other visual art. Enjoy your stay!
Abby and Norma Comic
Click the picture to check out my web comic, "Abby and Norma." Abby is a college girl with Asperger's Syndrome, and Norma is her friend. Their insights about life, normality and the autism spectrum range from amusing to bitter.
Abby and Norma is now on a new website, with automatic updating and everything! This should mean no more late strips, and a much nicer-looking page.
For more info, take a look at:
the Abby and Norma Q & A
the Abby and Norma Early Strips Archive
Abby and Norma Merchandise
Photomontage
I hate tomatoes. I don't know why. It must just be the texture; I like
tomato soup and ketchup, but I can't put a tomato or a chunk of a tomato
in my mouth without gagging.
I didn't hate my high school art teacher; she and I got along very
well. But I did get kind of annoyed with her when she kept nagging me to
do artwork that had "meaning." I disagreed, maintaining that art could
fulfill its purpose merely by being pleasing to the eye, and I retaliated
with a photomontage that had a meaning, namely, that I hated tomatoes.
At first it was going to be the outline of a tomato made out of
clippings of things I hated, but she said I had to narrow my focus to
one thing that I hated. I surveyed my list of hates, found that
"women portrayed as sex objects" were the easiest to find in magazines, and
made my tomato out of those. Only later did I learn that "tomato" is a
slang term for a sexy woman.
Tomato
Picture
That was one of several photomontages I did in that class. I had developed something I called the "outline-montage," where I searched magazine pictures for bits of outline and borders between colors, and then pieced those bits of line into a shape of my own. Sometimes you have to look at the montage for a while before you can see the outline.
A few of these did have meanings, expressed by the choice of outlines and the choice of clippings to make them from. For example, often I made a food outline out of human images. One issue that interested me was that all the organic material in the world is constantly being reused, and however much I try to be a vegetarian, I will always be eating particles that have been part of animals, including humans.
Outline-Montages
Paintings
In this same class, I did a lot of paintings of aliens. I had invented
this species that lived on a faraway planet and did all sorts of things:
hunted while riding in the pouches of strange domesticated flying
creatures, took baths with pet "cleaning-fish" that ate the dirt off them,
played a sport kind of like life-size chess, got married in groups of
three (one for each gender), and harvested and cooked "wheelberries" from the "wheelberry beast," an animal that grows
fruits on its tentacles.
Alien
Pictures
In freshman year of college, I took another art course and improved my
painting skills considerably. Here are the paintings I did in that class.
Nail Polish 1
Nail Polish 2
Pablo 1
Pablo 2
Corner Shadow
The Keen Little Neons
In the Dead Linen Cupboard
Nic, Frozen in a Paralysis of Incredulous Shock
My final for that course was a triptych of paintings that has great
meaning for me, entitled "Earth to Erika: An Interplanetary Eclipse".
Earth to
Erika
Here are some paintings I have done since graduating from college.
Twisted Leaf (2005)
An oak leaf I found that had an interesting shape.
Before (2005)
A red glass candleholder before it broke.
After (2005)
The same red glass candleholder after it broke.
Freedom (2006)
The last clipped wing feathers our parrot shed, and some of his newer unclipped feathers.
Pointless Project, top (2006)
A bikini top I crocheted, glued onto a canvas decorated with random painted designs. (Originally I planned to make the bikini wearable, but it didn't fit me, so I made it into a piece of art. The title comes from the fact that, all the time I was crocheting it, my husband was telling me how pointless it was to crochet a bikini.)
Pointless Project, bottom (2006)
The bottom of the same bikini, also incorporated into a painting. (By the time I started on the bottom, I had given up on wearing the bikini and was making it solely for painting purposes. It's much smaller than the top.)
Woman and Crow Approaching an Apartment Complex (2007)
While driving toward a friend's apartment, we saw a lady walking a little black dog, and the angle was such that, for a moment, I thought the dog was a huge crow. Somehow, it inspired a painting. I'm not sure it's fully done yet-- I'll probably work some more on the grass-- but this is the way it is now.
Two Chickadees (2008)
Inspired by birds at our bird feeder.
"Belief" and "Disbelief" are an idea I had been toying with for a long time... I finally got around to doing it in the week after New Year's Day, 2005 (after graduating from college and moving into my first apartment).
"Belief" is a closed, wrapped box, affixed on a canvas on which I wrote the words, "There is a beautiful sculpture in this box; that is the point of this work of art; that is, in fact, the work of art that is on display here. But, you may not see it; you must simply have faith, because this work of art is about belief."
"Disbelief" is the reverse: also a closed, wrapped box on a canvas, but the words say, "This box is empty except for some cardboard and Kleenex. There is no point to this work of art--it is in fact not a work of art at all. People may tell you otherwise, but you must show them only disbelief."
For those who must ask me whether there is really anything in those boxes, I do have an answer.
There is a sculpture in one of the boxes, but even I do not know which. I know what the sculpture is, though: it is an intricate blue flower that I made out of paper (the blue flower, or die blaue Blume, was the German Romantic ideal of a goal that cannot be reached).
I found two nearly identical boxes, dimmed the lights until I could barely see (to avoid picking up any visual cues that might have allowed me to distinguish the boxes) and placed the sculpture in one of them, and some cardboard and Kleenex of similar weight in the other. I moved the boxes around until I had no idea which was which, and then I turned the lights back on, wrapped the boxes in colored paper, mounted them on the canvases and added the words.
I chose which box to put on which canvas based on my gut feeling... which may be based on some subconscious awareness, or may just be random.
Remember, however, that you have only me to rely on for the truth of this explanation-- I might have invented every word of it for art's sake. The artwork is still about belief and disbelief.
Drawings
I took a drawing class in college, and did several drawings and studies.
Drawings
Studies
Here are some cartoons done later in college:
The Buffy
Layer (inspired by biology class)
Worlds
Island
Lately, my brain wants to make palindromes, so I'm collecting a few of the better ones and making cartoons of them. (The cartoons are very sketchy, the kind that I draw when I have three spare minutes and a cut-rate computer graphics tablet. If you want to see what I can do with lots of time and motivation and some real drawing supplies, my pencil-and-paper drawings are the place to look.)
Palindrome Cartoons
Other art
Here are some of my animated movie clips-- some of them interactive.
A Walk in the
Woods
This is a computer game where you can make choices and get various different endings, like a "choose-your-own-adventure" story. I made this for a college computer design class.
Monster Makers: a game for one or two people
Shortly after taking that class, I made this. You can design monsters and make them play various sports. (I've noticed some errors in this, and I seem to have lost the editable version of the game. But there are no problems that'll crash your computer or anything. It's just things like the wrong monster appearing in some scenes. Also, the 2-player version is kind of awkward to play; I couldn't figure out a really good way to design it.)
Klein Bottle
A Klein bottle is a theoretical shape that can only truly exist on 4 spatial dimensions, which is impossible in this universe. People have made 3-dimensional representations of Klein bottles, but they are not true Klein bottles because a true Klein bottle's neck has to pass through its side without a hole.
But in Jan. 2006 I had an idea: If you used time-- this universe's fourth dimension-- in place of the nonexistent fourth spatial dimension... then you could make a much truer representation of a Klein bottle.
Unfortunately, I don't have the equipment to make a four-dimensional animation, and my Klein bottle still has only two spatial dimensions plus the dimension of time, so it's still an inadequate 3-dimensional representation. Someday I may make a Klein-bottle-shaped frame and cover it with Christmas lights programmed to chase in that pattern...
And finally, crocheting! I learned to crochet in summer camp... I made several hacky-sacks, and then forgot about it for many years. My interest re-awakened, though, and here are some of my more recent pieces.
Hat (2004)
I meant to make it big enough to give to my cousin, but it turned out too small for anyone but my teddy bear.
Scarf (2004)
Shown mid-creation. Ended up shorter than I planned, but still long enough to wear.
Hat (2004)
This one turned out big enough for me. I look like a ruffly snowball, though.
Fuzzy hat (2005)
Done with Angel Hair yarn. By this point I was getting the hang of it pretty well. The hat's tight on me, but feels nice and soft.
Big giant blue doily (2005)
I spent a really, really long time on this one, and I'm very satisfied with the result... my first try at crocheting lace. It's now sitting on top of a lamp shade.
Various balls (2006)
These were basically done for fun; I don't have any idea what I'd do with them. They follow the hacky-sack pattern, but are stuffed with cheap white yarn. The fuzzy ones are made of the stuff they call "eyelash yarn"... I suppose if you got that in light brown, you could crochet a tribble. ;-)
Parrot Toy (2006)
A toy I made for our parrot Rain Man. Includes three little bags for edible treats, and three loops on which I hung tape dispenser rolls full of strips of paper. Rain Man loved to chew on it.
Parrot Toy 2 (2006)
When Rain Man wore out his old toy, I made him a new one for Christmas. This one not only has food bags and tape dispenser rolls full of paper strips, but also some loose ends for him to unravel.
Note: For most birds, I would not recommend toys like these, because there's a risk of getting toenails caught in crocheted string. Rain Man has very thick, short toenails and a generous dose of common sense; that is how he avoids getting tangled up in his toys.
ASCII binary (2006)
And here's one more little thing. See if you get the joke.
Thanks for visiting!
Send me feedback at humanalien@gmail.com
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Erika Hammerschmidt's Art Page