We all know TIPsters are incredibly talented people. And since we’re talking about colors this month, we thought the best thing we could do was talk to a TIPster about art.
Riley Stussie is a fourth grader from North Carolina who creates illustrations to go along with stories he writes. One of them even received an excellent rating at the ACSI Art Festival. Here’s what he had to say.
What’s your favorite subject, and how does art relate to the other things you study?
My favorite subject is math. Art intersects with my love to write. I write stories and then imagine images to go with the story. This helps bring the story to life. Some drawings do feel like they’re not at all the same thing [as the stories] but most do.
Tell us a little about the piece than won the award at the art festival.
I drew a lighthouse with a sunset behind it on an island in oil pastels. What inspired me to draw a lighthouse was how when I think of a lighthouse, I think of it as something to show the way. I approached it with the idea of what I was thinking about to draw and then used a picture I selected as a guide. I chose a lighthouse because I thought of how Jesus is the light and shows the way just like a lighthouse.
Where do you find inspiration for your art?
Mainly my surroundings in my free time at school or when I’m on trips and sometimes just my pure imagination.
Tell us a little about your process when creating art. Does it always turn out the way you expect? Do you sometimes change while you’re making it? If so, why?
I usually just go with the flow—think about how something that might look bad on paper and then just think how I could make this look better. Then, at the end, if I don’t like something, I erase it and fix it. It’s really 50/50 on what I expected it to look like at the end, because usually I make changes through out the process.