The Artworks of Ari Glass: Discover the Artist's Inspirational Journey

Ari Glass is an emerging artist and storyteller who seeks to transform the world through his innovative forms of media and entertainment. Originally from South Seattle, this self-taught painter, sculptor and designer blends traditional styles with modern elements. In his paintings that tell stories about "The King" and "The Kingdom", gold paint or gold-hues are his go-to medium. Throughout history, gold has represented royalty and divinity, and for him it is spiritual. The Out of Sight 2016 show in Seattle's King Street Station led to his second art show at the Paramount Theater. About a year ago, Ari Glass had his first solo show, "The Sun is Made of Gold." As a result of encouragement from people, he intends to take his art to a whole new level in the future. Hillman City's Black and Tan Hall is currently being painted by Ari Glass. Additionally, he is preparing a new gallery space in Georgetown. Ceramics' three-dimensionality has recently become his greatest obsession and a new medium for him. Painting remains his main interest, regardless of how much he enjoys and loves sculpting.

 

Visual and Textual Form

We’re happy to announce the successful closing of Ari Glass' latest major solo exhibition, which showed this month in Life Gallery Studio. Under the title “Visual and Textual Form”, Seattle artist Ari Glass exhibited linocuts divided into five smaller thematic units. There are four imprints together with the final fifth, representing the culmination of all matrix in one imprint.

Types and Degrees of Pencils

In order to write this article, we interviewed Ari Glass, the Picasso of Seattle, about the fundamentals of pencil drawing.

According to Glass, having a strong respect and understanding of the process and fundamentals of pencil drawing is essential in order to become a better artist.

In this article, Ari Glass will help us to better understand what the pencil denominations consist of.

Graduations of Pencils

The pencils are divided into degrees or graduations according to their hardness or darkness. A harder pencil produces a lighter shade on the paper, while a softer pencil produces a darker tone.

A hard pencil keeps its shape much better than a soft pencil because it has a firmer texture. The pencils of this range are preferred for technical drawing because the tip retains its shape for longer. Here, Ari Glass gives an interesting note: 'you can take a hard pencil and make its tip so thin that you can cut a paper with it.'

If you do not have the proper touch, hard pencils can leave marks on the paper or hurt it so much that it breaks when we try to erase it. If we usually try several sketches or ideas during the creation of our drawing, we can mistreat the paper and ruin our work. Therefore, for the illustration and drawing the softest pencils are used. Not only are they softer for the paper, but they also produce a range of darker shades. Consequently, they can stain the sheet if we mistakenly put our hands on it and require more effort when erasing (this is more common for the softer pencils on the scale).

The denominations of the pencils have two letters: "H" and "B," which correspond to the English words "Hard" and "Black". This letter is accompanied by a number, which corresponds to the hardness level. For example, a "2B" is a soft pencil, while a "6B" is a much softer pencil and produces a darker tone.

In Ari Glass’ opinion, there will be times when we want to put darker shadows on our drawings. For this reason, we are using a softer pencil. A 6B is enough for the vast majority of cases. Some artists often use soft pencils such as a 2H to make initial sketches, because they can be erased easier.

Which pencils are recommended for drawing?

Ari Glass shares: ‘Personally, I use only an HB pencil. That's enough for all my pencil drawings. To get a better range of shadows, get pencils 2B, HB, and 2H as I suggested earlier. It's enough to start. As you need softer pencils for darker shades you can buy a 4B and a 6B.

I was presented with a Mars Lumograph game by the Staedtler brand that brings grades 8B, 7B, 6B, 4B, 2B, and HB. It's my favorite when I go out to draw. I thought that I would go to use them all constantly, but the truth is that I always end up using only one, the HB or the 2B.

Unless you want to make a portrait or a realistic pencil drawing, which requires several gradations of tones, you can produce very good drawings with one or two pencils. So, do not become obsessed with trying to collect all the pencils that exist under the sky. Start with what you have and as you progress, experiment with another type of pencils.’

Follow Ari Glass on Twitter.

Ari Glass on Optimism and Alienation

At the Gallery of Events, today at 7 pm, Ari Glass will open his latest exhibition titled "Beyond the Mental Picture". Glass' new collection of paintings is a continuation of the artist's earlier project where he questions his own identity through fragments of memory by autobiographical discourse. Each of Ari Glass’ paintings looks as a seemingly unrelated sequence from the painter’s life and a reflection of certain emotions, but behind each experience lies the entire amalgam of various thoughts, feelings, and ideas that tie all the pieces.

Artist Ari Glass on Subversion of Capitalism

On Friday, June 30, at the Peter Lik Soho Gallery in New York City, multimedia artist Ari Glass presented his latest exhibition under the name ‘Zoo Politics’. The exhibition deals with the identity of a man as a political creature, that initially at the time of Aristotle meant something different than what it means today at the time of consumerism. At the opening, Glass also did a performance of ‘O Zoo Politics’.

Glass with an Exhibition at a Gallery that is Closed for Visitors

The latest work of Seattle-born artist Ari Glass eluded most people who saw it from a window on the top floor of the building. On the second floor of the New York museum, the artist had lined up a bunch of dotted paper, fabric, pieces of wood and plastic. After seeing the artwork, each of the visitors sought an answer, is it a drawing in space or an installation?

Ari Glass Uses the Tools Given to Him at Birth to Take Art to the Next Level

Ari Glass is a young, emerging artist from South Seattle. He mostly works with oil paint on canvas using paint brushes, but he also uses innovative forms of media and entertainment in order to make a statement and transform the world of art. Even though painting is his biggest passion and his most important interest, still he manages to find a time and prove his talent in other art fields. From creating new music EP, to designing clothing for his line REVERIE® as well as merchandise and visuals for the Graffiti Village Tour, there is always something interesting happening in his life. This self-thought artist has been creating art since he was a little kid, but it wasn’t until a few years ago that he started to feel comfortable calling himself an artist and doing art shows.