Reflection Post

Coming into this course, I knew little about Chicano/a artists and art overall as a subject. When asked to write down names of artists,  I came up with six, only one of which was a Chicana. However, in comparison to the second time we were asked to write down names, I was surprised that I was able to name twelve, all of whom were Chicana artists. Before taking this class, my interaction with art was highly limited to works by famous authors, such as Picasso, and my own personal attempts to sketch images. In this class, I learned that art is not just a hobby done on a whim but work produced by individuals with a message. In the case of Chicanas, I learned that their work has been incredibly under-represented despite their quality and powerful messages. Through the work produced by myself in class, I learned that art takes much time, thought, and creativity and found that my appreciation for artists majorly grew. When Professor Lopez instructed us to draw hands for the majority of our sketchbooks, I was terrified because that was always the thing (in addition to faces) that I was never able to master before. However, by the end of class, I was able to see that with practice my hand drawings got better over time. Now, I'm glad that Professor Lopez challenged me to improve my skills, for now I will not shy away when something seems impossible.