My Time at ART SQOOL

I recently played a game called ART SQOOL. I had no idea what to expect going into it but after finishing it, my impression of the game (as someone who did not attend Real Art School) is that someone really just wanted to compress the experience of going to Real Art School into a few hours of gameplay. It seems like they succeeded (again, as someone who did not attend Real Art School).

I ended up enjoying it much more than I thought I would. I have always been terrible at art and creating things visually, but I was able to create some things that I kinda liked.

When you first start playing, you’re introduced to a computerized professor AI that has allegedly been “trained on over 100,000 teraflops of the greatest art in the world”. You’re then given your first assignment (picked from a pool of about 150 possible assignments), a blank canvas, some tools, and are allowed to roam the ART SQOOL campus freely.

I occasionally like to try to be funny, so here is what I painted during my time at ART SQOOL.

• Draw something you hate.

An accurate representation of people that live in my geographical region.

• Combine two shapes to make a new shape

Deep.

• Draw an outfit for my friend Qina to wear to a fancy dinner.

I think I was thinking more “modern fashion” than “fancy dinner”.

• The assignment may have been “The Sky”. I am unsure, as it’s just some random shit.

Welcome to ART SQOOL!

• Draw the ugliest thing on campus

I think I was roleplaying as an insecure college student.

• No, wait, maybe this one was “The Sky”?

Really, the sky is crazy.

• In the maelstrom of creativity, I forgot what some of the assignments were. Perhaps this one is a logo for something? We’ll never know.

It’s a couple shapes. Welcome to ART SQOOL!

• What do sports look like?

Of all of the assignments I did, this is my favorite piece.

• What time is it? Draw for four minutes.

It was about 4 o’clock. I guess the number kinda got stuck in my head.

• Draw your earliest memory.

A legitimate drawing of my grandparents yard. Also, I just picked up the squiggly line tool and had to try it out.

• Draw 100 degrees

That squiggly line tool really paying dividends.

• Claim a spot on campus as your own. Draw it.

In case you could not tell, it is a bench, complete with the shadows being cast from it. Also, I feel like claiming a bench as your own is pretty self-centered. Was I still role playing, or is that who I am?

• Draw something age-appropriate, please.

Who doesn’t worry about Very Important Contracts?

• I guess they didn’t like the first version of “Draw something age-appropriate, please.” so I drew the same thing but added more colour to it.

That ought to fix it.

• They have a very strict definition of what is age-appropriate, so I was forced to redo the assignment again. This was the start of my rebellion.

Apparently the most age-appropriate thing I could draw.

• Draw something that hasn’t been invented yet.

Technically correct.

• Draw a perfect circle using your non-dominant hand.

I gave up after about 10 tries. Also had to test out the new grease pencil.

• Draw something that would make people mad in a museum.

I don’t know what would actually make someone mad in a museum. I think people would look at this and think “Now that’s a statement.” before continuing on to the 100 paintings of Jesus section.

• Draw what it would look like if two of your friends had a baby.

Apparently one of my friends is Peter Griffin.

• Draw a bad idea.

Fairly straightforward. I think it meets the assignment criteria.

• I guess it didn’t meet the criteria. My second attempt at “Draw a bad idea”.

Remember, college students: huffing paint is a bad idea.

• Draw something that I can sell at auction in 10 years.

I guess I wanted to be known for my rebellious streak?

• Draw something using the wrong colors.

Are they wrong, though?

• Diagram your favorite sentence.

I say “rad” a lot. So i tried to diagram that. Things went off the rails around figure 3.

• What did the sky look like the first time you looked at it?

Had to test out that new stamp tool.

• Draw three things that are opposites of each other

I’m not sure I ACTUALLY completed the assignment as per specifications. But I passed, so who cares!

• Draw something at actual size next to something really shrunken down.

The tiny little man really lends to the scale of the apple.

• Draw one of the billboards on the ART SQOOL campus.

I thought it was an alright rendering.

• The professor disagreed with me. “Draw one of the billboards on the ART SQOOL campus.” take 2!

I guess they like my billboards better than theirs.

• Find a hole in the ground on the campus. Draw it, then fill it in.

I am unsure why the hole is filled with puppies. It seems unsafe.

Fill as much of this page as possible.

I have just the tool for that.

• Invent a food.

I think my thought process was that blue hot dogs on pink bread did not already exist. I don’t know if changing the colour of an existing food counts as invention.

• Draw the following sounds: Splonk, Wheesh, Blurp, Zooooooop.

Three out of four aint bad?

• Knock something over on on campus. Document your results.

I thought this was an alright rendering of an upturned chair.

• The professor disagreed with my assessment. I guess I’ll have to knock something else over?

Would a real professor put up with this?

• Look down at the ground, then up at the sky, then split the difference, then split it again, then draw what you see.

I didn’t understand the assignment, so I made up some deep art bullshit. It worked.

• Write out your darkest secret. Immediately draw over it so no one can ever see it.

I did write something there, and then paint over it. I like to think I got bonus points for that.

• Listen to the room you’re in. Draw the sounds.

This is an actual attempt to draw the clock I can see from my desk. This is why I’m not a real artist.

• I don’t know what the assignment was, but I think it had something to do with being mean.

This seems mean, so I guess I passed?

• Draw a map of the ART SQOOL campus from memory.

Seriously, the place is a nightmare.

• Draw all the buildings on the ART SQOOL campus.

I think I caught the important ones.

• Draw what’s happening in the outside world.

It was snowing quite heavily at the time. I think this was supposed to be snow. Could also represent the current state of affairs. Maybe the snow is a metaphor? Welcome to ART SQOOL!

• Write your name backwards.

I would not want to have me as a student.

• Make a geometric shape composed of exactly ten lines.

I couldn’t get the geometric shape tool to give me a 10 sided shape, so 8 would have to do. But I passed, so who cares!

• Draw something that I will have no choice but to destroy.

If only one could destroy a meme.

• Draw something upside down.

There is an upside-down house on one of the islands. Made the work of drawing something upside-down much easier.

• Make a drawing for someone you don’t like that much.

If you receive this drawing from me, you’ll know.

• Draw something that costs $34.42

The implication being that purple paint costs $18.43.

• Draw a fungus.

I think I was actually trying to draw a person under the effects of a fungus.

• What do you see when you catch your reflection in a car window?

I got an A on the previous assignment, so figured this would be another easy A. I was correct.

• Draw as fast as you can, for as long as you can.

I scribbled for a couple minutes until I got bored. When I was appeased with the work, I made sure to document it.

• Draw a comic about what you’re going to do after this.

I kinda got obsessed with how easy it was to get a passing grade with the fungus man drawing.

• Make a portrait of someone not wearing their glasses.

I thought it was clever.

• The professor did not. Portrait sans glasses part 2. It’s a doozy.

Oh well, at least I know how to easily pass an assignment!

• I’m not sure what the assignment was, but I think I just didn’t want to do it.

So I didn’t. The professor didn’t take kindly.

• Despite not wanting to do it, I had to do it again.

When all else fails, add more colour.

Draw a corner.

A friend and I took a trip to New York when we were in our early twenties. While in Central Park, we were approached by a man who claimed to have “Got the hydro”. Being even more naive than the average person of my age, I did not know what that meant. Luckily my friend knew and managed to put a stop to the conversation before the fourth repetition of “I got the Hydro.” … “What?” could be exchanged.

• Yeah, the professor didn’t like that story either.

I am surprised that fungus man didn’t make an appearance by this point.

• I guess I was struggling to figure out exactly what the professor wanted when they asked for “a corner”.

Sometimes writing “What the fuck?” with the rainbow tool is enough for a passing grade.

• I am not sure what the assignment was, but at this point I had every single brush and tool, so I decided to try all of them out.

Not exactly my best work. But I passed, so who cares!

• Draw something that’ll make my neural network light up like a Qmas tree.

I know Doge makes my neural network light up.

• I don’t know what the assignment for this one was.

But I think if I’d known it was my last assignment before graduating, I would not have hidden the message “HOPE U DIE” in it. Sorry Professor.

All in all, I very much enjoyed my time playing ART SQOOL. I highly recommend it, regardless of your artistic ability.