I've come to realize that school officially starts in two days. Although I can't say I'm happy about that, I can say that I think I'm prepared for AP Art! My three paintings are done and ready for critique, but that doesn't make me any less nervous about the school year. I guess my main goal for AP Art right now is to just get stuff done on time- it took me an entire month to complete one painting, and I'm pretty sure I'll get about half that during school. It will be especially hard considering I have four AP classes!! Hopefully my brain won't go on mental overload! I think that's my only goal for right now, but I'm sure as the year goes on I'll think of a few more.

My mom and I went to the Historic Third Ward to visit some galleries and found one in the Marshall building. I have to admit it was kind of awkward, because no one except the three people that worked there was actually there. Well that was better than the single lady in the other gallery we went to...Anyway the paintings I saw were really good but very expensive. I don't know who has $2500 to spend on a 8x11 painting of a bird. I did see some artworks that were more modern which were really neat because of the precision and perfection of the colors and lines in them-they looked computer generated, but the sign specifically stated that they were done using oils.

Paintings/photograph are done by Sandra Lo, Idell Weiss, and John Sun.

I just got back from my California Mission Trip this morning! We were staying at a camp in Santa Cruz, which is covered in gigantic Redwood trees- some of which are close to 2000 years old! What is even cooler is that everything was on mountains, so the scenery was absolutely amazing which of course means that I have amazing photographs! I was able to finish my one painting before I left for this trip so my new goal is to finish 1 1/2 other pieces by the time school starts. I'm going to be super busy these last few weeks (sad face), so we will have to see how close I get to reaching that goal.

Since I don't have any of my own pictures yet I searched for local artists of San Fransisco who also "captured" the city. These three stood out to me the most because of their colors, their realism and their strong compositions. I would choose a favorite, but I love all of these!