Assignment:
Active Learning Projects are interactive exercises that bring difficult visual concepts to life.
The project involves a physical art project that must be created this semester, specifically for this class. You may NOT use previously created work. All original art works must be photographed or videoed and posted to Canvas, in addition to the written portion.
You will also create a 300 word response that:
• examines how your project brings specific artistic elements/principles to life.
• Connects what you have learned from your project with the material we studied or that you have seen elsewhere.
• Make sure that your writing is college level, proofread and uploaded as a word document.
• Below are several choices available to you, you must complete one.
1. Architectural style influences, and is influenced by, the surrounding environment, so that environment is a major concern for designers. Understanding how a building will fit is a challenge for even the most visionary architect. Print or photocopy color pictures of various buildings, at least 1 private residences and at least 1 large public buildings. Using scissors, cut out the buildings from the environment that surrounds them, then color photocopy the buildings at 50% of the original size. Now print several color background environments, a cityscape, a countryscape, and a beach area. Once again, cut out the individual buildings from the paper they are on and place them in each of these environments. What environments work best for your buildings and why. Which ones do not? How does this experiment help you to understand unity and variety in Architecture
2. Film and video evolved from the sequencing of still images to replicate the appearance of life moving in front of our eyes. As an illustration of the concepts behind moving images, make a flip book. Choose an action or motion and break it down into ten discrete parts (e.g. jumping off the ground, a bird flying, the sun moving across the sky, etc.). Draw (or photograph) each part of the sequence on a 1 x 1-in. piece of paper or use a light colored package of post-it notes. Put your pictures together and hold or staple one side to make the flip book. Share your flip book by making a recording of you flipping through the book. What kinds of changes effectively create the illusion of continuous motion in the flip books? Where wold a process such as this be most beneficial?
3. The art in this chapter emphasizes the lived moment, or actions as they are happening, by focusing on the processes involved. Take this practice as an inspiration for making your own process art piece. Begin by listing or documenting as many actions as you can for a three-hour period during your day. Now take an art piece, in any format that seems to express that small segment of your life effectively. Keep in mind that artworks made using alternative media and processes draw our attention away from art that tells a story, or that seems to be a picture of something, and toward the acts of making, thinking, and experiencing. What do you notice when you reflect on your list? Which things reflect normal, mundane, parts of your daily routine? Which things are unusual? How can you effectively convey or communicate your experience for this time period? Consider artworks in this chapter or elsewhere in the book for inspiration.