EXPRESSIVE MOMENTS. Dilshad Ismael Aldoskani. Academy of Art University, Graduate School of Fine Art Painting Final Thesis Project May 9, 9:00AM

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1 EXPRESSIVE MOMENTS Dilshad Ismael Aldoskani Academy of Art University, Graduate School of Fine Art Painting Final Thesis Project May 9, 9:00AM

2 TABLE OF CONTENTS Autobiography...3 Resume...4 Timeline Summary.7 Final Report Thesis Paintings Details Influences Artist Statement.. 23 Statement of Future Plans...24

3 DILSHAD ALDOSKANI AUTOBIOGRAPHY My name is Dilshad Ismail Aldoskani. I grew up in the small beautiful city of Duhok, Kurdistan-Iraq. I have eleven siblings of which I m second to oldest. In my childhood, I spent my days going to school, playing games and enjoying time with my family and friends, and especially being with my father because he used to teach me a lot of things about music and art. Stepping into high school was a great opportunity to gain basic knowledge. I also started to focus on drawing. With my interest in becoming an artist, my father supported me and encouraged me to join to Institute of Fine Art which is located in the same city where we live. Going to the institute began a path that led to my eventual career. My teacher taught me about drawing and sketching. We learned different ways of mixing colors in various ways in a same artwork. At the beginning, it was harder to get the mixture of color, but after practicing, things became easier. I eventually completed my five year course in fine art in the Institute. After this program, I began study four years in the College of Fine Art in Sulaimani city, Kurdistan, Iraq. This period was difficult. I had to really work hard and focus on my goals. But with patience, great support from my teachers and family, I was able to graduate successfully. I am passionate to be a part of art. I applied to teach and spent six years as a teacher at the Institute of Fine Art, Duhok. Fortunately, after teaches, I got a scholarship which have been my greatest achievement in my life so far, and now I am studying my masters at the Academy of Art University with the help of the Kurdish government.

4 DILSHAD ALDOSKANI TIMELINE Spring 2013 FA_600_01: Figure Studio Jin Sung Zin Lim FA_606_01: Still Life Painting Tomutsu Takishima Spring 2014 FA_602_03: Head Drawing Tomutsu Takishima FA_626_02: Chiaroscuro Aron Meynell Summer 2014 FA_616_01: Portrait Painting Kevin Moore Fall 2014 FA_604_01: Figurative Painting Zhao Ming Wu FA_605_01: Landscape Painting Dean Larson GLA_621_01: History & Techniques of Character Animation, Elective Tom Bertino Spring 2015 FA_607_01: Cityscape Painting Gregory Gandy FA_655_01: Midpoint & Thesis Preparation Dean Larson GLA_617_02: Mythology for the Modern World John Dobson ILL_610_02: Clothed Figure Drawing Lisa Berrett Summer 2015 GLA_601_01: The Renaissance Art World & Its Classical Origins Paul and David ILL_609_01: Watercolor Camille La Pointe-Lyons Fall 2015 FA_368_01: MS: Urban Landscape, DS Gregory Gandy FA_607_01: MS: Cityscape Painting, DS Dean Larson FA_801_01: GDS: Process and Thesis Development Aron Keynell FA_801_04: MS: GDS: Landscape/ Cityscape/ Still Life 1 Carolyn Meyer Spring 2016 FA_607_01: MS: DS: Cityscape Painting Gregory Gandy

5 FA_842_01: MS: Landscape/ Cityscape/ Still Life Painting 2 Carolyn Meyer FA_674_01: Professional Practice for Fine Artists Chery Coon Total: 63 Units

6 DILSHAD ALDOSKANI SUMMARY Expressive Moments is a series of paintings that focus on specific times of day during which the lighting creates a group of silvery gray harmonious colors. These colors create a mood in which the viewer should feel a sense of place. I chose San Francisco as my subject matter because it is a part of my personal journey. San Francisco inspires me because of its unique lighting effects. The city s architecture and skyline are a way to document this part of my life. These paintings to me are like journal entries because they depict a specific time and mood. Whoever, I tell my story and show the evolution of my process and the city itself through the continuum of color from sunset to dusk.

7 DILSHAD ALDOSKANI Final Report Expressive Moments is a series of paintings that presents an unexpected perspective of urban life through scenes of major construction projects, endless traffic, and busy people. Despite the chaotic subject matter, these pieces evoke a sense of gentle beauty and comfort through the harmonious colors that bathe the city from sunset to dusk. These are scenes of San Francisco as seen through the eyes of someone who grew up in a small idyllic city and close-knit community in Kurdistan in northern Iraq. Feeling both overwhelmed and inspired by the vast expanse of this American metropolis and its mixture of classical and modern architecture, I found solace in the dramatic colors and warm light of the San Francisco cityscape. While studying in California, I reflected on my opportunity to create something that is a departure from my previous work. I wanted to paint and learn from life, which is something that was difficult to do before in my country, and now having San Francisco as my muse, I had a lot to say and draw from. I had experienced working on landscapes and figure painting in my studio, but not from life, which is common practice. Living in San Francisco for the past three years has made me very sensitive to the ways in which the light affects the architecture. The lighting in San Francisco is so much more colorful and dramatic than the light in my hometown. It is that unique color and emotion that I wanted to express with this body of work. During these moments, when the warm light is close to the horizon, I can see the blend of harmonious colors between the sky and the ground. Some colors appear very saturated and others create neutral and silvery gray. These colors create a gentle mood and overall feeling of comfort. It is that emotion that I found very inspiring. During my artistic journey, I have developed a particular view of color, and how as an artist I can exaggerate color to create a unique mood and feeling. Throughout my experience, finding the color that I want to use has challenged and inspired me. I was looking for comfort in this big and busy city. Through these colors I can feel comfortable with unrivaled mood that I got from scenes.

8 Process My goal was to create a variety of paintings. I emphasized the importance of having a strong and clear idea for each painting, showing my craftsmanship through the arrangement of all elements, colors, composition, and technique that accomplishes the stylistic and concept goals of my thesis. Continuing to experiment and evolve with different colors and techniques for each painting, I faced many challenges. One of the key challenges was how to take night photos that would best replicate the colors and values of natural light. By taking many photos from different angles and exposures, I was able to compose the best painting I could. Since sunset until dusk is a short period of time, I was looking for colors that I could capture from the sky without thinking about composition when I took my photos references. I strove to organize all of the elements that would result in the best composition through shapes, light, shadow, and color in each painting. That pushed me to take multiple references, and to become familiar with all the colors in the sky and their effect on the ground. A key point was perceiving the strong light from the setting sun reflecting from the sky to the ground below and the silvery grays of buildings and cars that are in shadow. My focus was how the warm and cool colors create an overall expressive moment. I focused on a foreground, middle ground and background, so I could depict the illusion of a believable space. Getting clear references allowed me to control my composition by arranging all of the elements of the painting to create a sense of balance. This balance came from connecting the main elements of the painting to the continuum of colors from the sky to the ground and the range of values related to the composition. Taking evening photos of familiar scenes of San Francisco that were directly related to daily life, also enhanced my ideas. Another challenge was the painting technique. For each painting, I was very determined to find a different technique to enhance the style of each individual painting, through making each one in the series unique and more complicated than the others by using a variety of colors and techniques. I worked in a realistic style with some simplified elements and soft hues. I wanted to employ a variety of techniques depending on the scenes themselves. Some scenes work best with a realistic style and showing detail, while others may work better with abstract elements to show the mood and essence of the scene. I combined these two styles by simplifying some elements with brushstrokes around the painting, creating some abstract

9 elements and compilation of lines, colors, composition and a blurring of edges to push the viewer s eyes into the scene and to keep my focal point clear to viewers. After midpoint, I started to improve my technical skills in painting, while continuing to produce high quality paintings. Each semester after semester, I was able to learn new techniques to accomplish the stylistic and concept goals of my thesis. My instructors emphasized the importance of having a strong and clear idea for each painting. This helped me to produce better work with a particular technique tied to each piece. This challenged me to search for the ideal technique for each scene. I continued to grow as an artist and expand my repertoire with different colors and techniques for each painting. Also, I was looking for different styles around me by visiting several galleries and discovering techniques of some artists in San Francisco and at Academy of Art University as well. During my studies, I learned how viewers could get an overall mood through brushstrokes, colors, concept, or different materials. Some of these artists created their unique style using a roller, palette knife and brush. I aimed to discover how to create unique cityscapes with a strong connection between the mood and the scene. I worked in a variety of sizes depending on the photo reference and the composition. Some images worked best cropped vertically, while others were best as horizontal or even square scenes. The idea was how to let the location and my feelings deicide the format. I found several sizes to be particularly good matches for these cityscapes (18 x 24, 24 x 36 and 30 x 30). These different sizes suited particular scenes that should show different elements such as buildings, cars, skyline and sky that all were important to exhibit the essence of these scenes.

10 DILSHAD ALDOSKANI Thesis Paintings 1. Millennium Tower on Mission St x36 2. Columbus Ave x36 3. Pink Day at Beale on Mission St x36 4. Fremont on Mission St November x36

11 5. Fremont St x36 6. Rainy Day at Fremont Street x36 7. Fell Street x36 8. Beale Street x36

12 9. Green Street x Sunset at Polk and Union Street x th Street on Market St x Market Street x18

13 13. Powell Street x st St on Mission St 2016 Oil on wood 16x th St on Mission St 2016 Oil on wood 8x Duboce Ave on Mission 2016 Oil on wood 9x20

14 DILSHAD ALDOSKANI Details Millennium Tower on Mission Street, 2015,, 24x36 Just being in San Francisco, I was inspired by the variety of scenes available to an artist along with the colors of the City at dusk and at sunset. I got my inspiration by walking the streets a couple of times every week and watching the buildings grow day after day. I was interested in the movement around these streets created by cranes, workers, traffic, and crowds of people. All of these movements were core elements in my thesis. I was more confident with this painting than others because, it was the product of hard work and allowed me to find my special style using brushstrokes and blending colors with geometric shapes to make them one body on the surface that integrates the mood with the richness of harmonious colors reflected on buildings at dusk and sunset.

15 Columbus Ave in Chestnut, 2015,, 24x36 I wanted to capture some scenes that related to my journey and some places where I spent time during my stay in San Francisco. I spent every day at 701 Chestnut Street, where it intersects with Columbus Avenue, in a studio working on my final thesis project. At a specific time of day, I was struck by the reflection of colors overlapping from the sky to the ground in a very smooth continuum. In this painting I tried to create a connection between the complementary colors through the red-orange in the sky to the silvery gray on the street by overlapping these colors with brush strokes to create harmonious colors with shapes. I did this by balancing the movement of the parts of the composition. Via this process, I was able to capture similar scenes at the same time of day with varying colors and abstract elements to achieve my goal.

16 Pink Day at Beale Street on Mission Street, 2015,, 24x36 Day in and day out, I walked the streets to discover some moments that would add a variety of colors to my series of paintings. Pink Day at Beale on Mission Street was a different day from other days. At that time, the pink color dominated the scene. I was inspired by how the colors blended into each other from the sky to the ground, making geometric shapes, hard edges, and vehicles glow in the dim setting sun. I aimed to enhance the overall mood of the painting by choosing the pink base color for this piece that would make it stand out from the other paintings in the series.

17 Powell Street, 2015,, 24x18 During my thesis project, I looked at numerous colors to create each mood in my paintings. My interest began when I was at Powell Street looking at the reflection coming from the sky of purple blended with silvery gray. The cold colors coming from the sky complimented the warm street lights, which gave me an opportunity to make use of this unique combination and create a unity in my painting. It was important for me to represent the movement through colors in this painting. The intimacy of this painting lies in the focus on the scene without turning to the detail of movements around this street at sunset.

18 Folsom Street x36 Rainy Day at Fremont Street x36 For a long time I was waiting for rain. I was inspired by this specific time because I could see collections of reflections of light everywhere. These reflections from the sky and shapes on the ground made a symphony of movements. I was eager to paint rainy days that allowed me to use brushstrokes and to be free to exaggerate colors and movements that I wanted to show in my painting. I aimed to keep the form of each element of my subject but to take some liberty with my brushstrokes path to make one united body of work.

19 DILSHAD ALDOSKANI Artistic Influences Jeremy Mann My thesis project consists of many lines, shapes and colors that will show the light and movement and expressive moments in the time of dusk. There are many artists that use lines, shapes and colors that have influenced me. One of the most influential artists is Jeremy Mann. In these paintings Jeremy's style involves a combination of lines, colors, and expressive edge control. His mark making, through the use of brush strokes, rollers, and scrapers, emphasizes vertical and horizontal lines interlaced with each other that create a feeling of movement.

20 Geoffrey Johnson Another artist that captured my imagination is Geoffrey Johnson, especially his three artworks (Study Gramercy Park, Red with Gray, Rush Hour). His style is distinctive through the use of simplified elements and the emphasis of flat shapes. I admire how he combines abstract and realistic qualities in each painting. His use of directional lines helps lead the viewer s eye to the focal point. His talent of using few colors to enhance all elements in his painting keeps his style unique from others.

21 Ben Aronson Another artist that influenced me is Ben Aronson. What I like in Aronson s painting is the accurate drawing mixed with a blend of lost edges. Many of his paintings include cars with the top-lighting afforded by city streets enclosed by high-rise buildings, which shows his craftsmanship with dark and light spaces in his paintings. His use of value creates an interesting composition.

22 DILSHAD ALDOSKANI Artist Statement I grew up in a small, beautiful, quiet city, surrounded by mountains in Duhok, Kurdistan, northern Iraq, where everyone knows each other. As I grew older I wanted to paint and discover a large, fascinating, and busy city. So, I moved to San Francisco to start my Masters in Fine Art. I wanted to create a body of work that captures the essence of San Francisco, from an outside perspective. I wanted to paint and learn from life. Painting on location was invaluable in learning about color, value, and simplification. Painting on location allows me to focus on the lighting and color effects that happen as the sun goes down. During this time of day, I can see the blend of harmonious colors between the sky and the ground, where some colors appear very saturated and others create neutrals and silvery gray. These colors create a gentle mood and overall feeling of comfort. I started to emphasize downtown San Francisco street scenes to explore the atmospheric effect of the sunset. Both sunset and dusk are short periods of time, which pose challenges for me as a painter. My aim is to enhance the overall mood of my paintings by focusing on the shapes of the buildings and the movement of people and vehicles under the glow of the dim setting sun. Living in San Francisco for the past three years has made me sensitive to the unique ways in which the light affects the architecture and all these movements around me. My journey has given me fresh eyes. I have discovered a variety of colors and styles to achieve my goal. I have gained a new way of looking at this city through to my work. I hope to bring this new experience back to my hometown and show others the process of painting cityscape in Kurdistan and beyond.

23 DILSHAD ALDOSKANI Statement of Future Plans My goal is to create artwork that represents my journey with art and my experience through these years in the San Francisco Bay area from the perspective of an outsider, in my case a Kurdish citizen. Upon graduating, I will apply these skills to paint my city, Duhok and others as well. I will specialize primarily in cityscape painting. I will share my skills with cityscape painting to college students. This subject will be of interest and relevance because cityscape is considered a new genre that no one has experience with at the Duhok Institute and College of Fine Art. This will be my opportunity to teach students general skills about cityscape painting with an emphasis on expressive color and light.

24 Bibliography