: Aram KIm Illustration Blog: Have You Eaten? coffee

I need to get my texts properly edited for my book project HAVE YOU EATEN? soon, so I was revising some texts I had already written. Somehow the most difficult subject to write about was the vending machine coffee, which was practically the starting point of this whole project. I just had too much to say and it wasn't organized and wasn't that interesting even to me. After a fruitless sitting down session in front of the computer screen for awhile, I just stood up to see what I wrote in 2008 when I made a preliminary painting for this project. (Of course I didn't know it was preliminary, then.)

I still remember I was painting this in 2008 after I became a junior in undergrad SVA. It was special because I did this for fun. I was always overwhelmed by loads of homework when I was in undergrad program, I never made anything for fun. I didn't have enough time for homework. But somehow, this piece made its way out. I was exploring with using gouache on black gessoed wood board, and with my favorite subject. Vending machine coffee had always been nostalgic to me and I just had fun making this. I remember my friend was pointing out bad anatomy and ugly cloths on people. It is a pretty bad painting. (Not that my paintings are any better now. *sob*) Still, somehow, this piece is one of a very few pieces that are out in my room. While pretty good pieces are in the drawer, this one is in fact on the shelf displayed.

When I revisited this piece and read what I wrote on the piece, I was a little surprised. So simple and yet it was actually much better and much closer to the essence of what I wanted to say than the writing piece I was struggling with. Maybe I felt about this subject much more vivid at that time. Still, am I going backwards or what?!