Amorphous
by Daren Condor
My name is Daren Condor. I have been a student at the Art Students League of New York for the past 10 years. In my journey as an artist, I’ve been working in realism for a few years. While working with Ms. Marilyn [Friedman] in the teen art class, I started out drawing on a miniature scale which really helped me focus more on capturing precise details. I developed my skills in drawing still lifes and people. I learned to work more loosely and capture more in less amount of time. I got a lot of opportunities to draw people which helped me develop my knowledge in anatomy. With this experience I was able to go to a specialized art high school.
Now I’m a high school senior. My fine arts program requires me to develop a sustained investigation, which are 15 works of art that portrays a theme or message personal to me. I initially had no clear idea of how it would begin, until my mother got a baby conure bird. My mother always wanted to have a parrot, she has a deep love for all animals, because as a young girl she would take care of her mother’s farm and feed the animals they owned. She would always say that she’ll get a parrot when she goes back to Ecuador. But being in New York for a while, she eventually got a bird as a surprise for the family. When I first saw it, I was inspired to paint it, and since this would be my first time ever painting a bird, I wanted it to make it look amazing and new to me.
Nowadays, I primarily work on pre-gessoed panels, for its flat smooth surface. With the help of my father, I learned that I can have them cut out. My father is a carpenter, he’s been in that industry for about 25 years, and he can make any projects involving wood. With his help I create designs and shapes that can be unique to every painting I create. I’m pushing myself to practice and study unnatural silhouettes, and designs that are found in nature. In the near future, I plan on using cut shaped panels to help develop my vision in my paintings. I want to show people’s experiences through them, form a connection between the model, the artist, and the viewer.
You can view more of Lois’ art @villasbird on Instagram
Matias (side view).
Matias (progress photo).
