I visited so many breathtaking places while I was traveling through the beautiful, historic country of Italy. It was amazing to view artwork in person that I had only seen in photos. Despite my knowledge of art history, I was still able to lose myself in artwork that I had never seen before. I was overtaken by a sense of inspiration; the entire time I spent in Italy, I wanted to transport back into my studio to create art. When you go to Italy to see art, you will be going into a lot of churches. Within these churches, there are lots of repetitive patterns. Even within the complex frescos, patterns can be seen everywhere. Some patterns were so complex and complicated, yet others remained simple. Depending on the period which the items were built and decorated, you can see a direct line of inspiration. There is a lot of Greek-inspired or just straight Greek art. The Greek works and churches were where I pulled a lot of inspiration from. One of the last cathedrals that I visited in Italy was right outside of Venice. It was small, family-owned, and family-created. There was a small museum attached to it with hundreds of ceramic vessels displayed across the campus. Many were of Greek and even Egyptian origin. The most exciting part, for me, was seeing so many completed ceramic pieces in a museum setting. Seeing ceramics, especially in a museum, tends to be rare. Seeing the shapes that they would use as inspiration and the methods they would use to craft the vessel was so interesting. I took some of these shapes and recreated them using my own style. Then, I drew inspiration from different patterns I had seen from all over the country to create my own pattern.
