Mikael Klefstad

Artist Statement

Initially, I planned on creating an image that would be dark in tone and theme. I knew I wanted to include subject matter that would allow me to create gadgets and gizmos. It was to be a somewhat complex image that would allow the viewer to tell the story behind what they’re seeing.
While I’ve maintained portions of my original plan, I did find myself having to deviate from it for several reasons.

Initially, I started working in Photoshop, creating dials and cords with shading and volume, on par with what I did in the volume assignment. But after spending a couple hours on some small parts, I realized I wasn’t going to finish on time at the pace I had set. Once I moved into Illustrator (where shape creation can happen faster), I knew I’d have to give up gradients for the most part since I didn’t really have a good grasp on how they worked in the program. Thus, things flattened out a bit.
At this point, I had already decided on a triadic color scheme, using green, orange, and purple, as inspired by the color studies. Halfway through building the central orange machine, I knew I had completely lost my original plan to maintain a dark tone.
From there, I simply tried to keep things interesting and balanced.

As I continued working on the central machine, I began seeing what reminded me of faces in Mayan artwork. I decided to go ahead and push this aspect of it by creating what could be two eyes, a nose, and mouth. I offset it just a little within the centered orange shape. There’s a kind of imperfect symmetry to the design that I had hoped for since the beginning.
I knew I wanted the machine to be the focal point surrounded by an “above” and “below”. By placing lines and smaller objects floating around and standing below, I hope to draw the viewer’s attention away from the orange center to explore the rest of the image. Using repetition, dilation, and rotation within these shapes helps to create a sense of motion. While the figures underneath the image seems stuck, the freer vehicles above are still tethered to the machine, still not able to break away. I hope this communicates the darker tone of a menacing machine I had originally hoped to achieve, but I’m still not convinced it does. Bright colors really don’t help.

As it stands now, it could probably use a little makeover. There are still details I’m hoping to put in the smaller portions of the image. But overall, I’m rather happy with the way it turned out, even if it isn’t exactly what I had planned.