I had the privileged to visit the Museum of Modern Art this week and was able to observe awesome paintings and other works of art. My day of the visit was on a very warm sunny day and the neighborhood was also in a fancy and luxurious location. The building itself of the museum was also very fancy. I felt I was walking along a beautiful and rich luxurious home. The Museum had all the walls white and very bright lightened rooms all around. The White paint color on the walls really helps illuminate and highlight the works in display. The panting that captured me the most and also have loved since I was young was the famous painting of Vincent Van Gogh and his Starry Night.

 As I observed my painting and took notes I decided to teach my daughter Crystal Luna age 13. She is also in love with art and she will be heading next September to Fashion Industries High School. She is a very good talented artist. I explained to her the type of painting, the style, and went over the visual elements along with the definitions so that she could understand easier my observations.

My painting is an abstract landscape painting. In the painting I found geometric and organic shapes with no negative space because the painting is filled with detailed shapes. The value of the painting is mostly dark colors uses light colors here and there but since the artist is portraying the night sky then we would expect it to be a dark painting. The color being used is also a mix of primary, secondary, and cool colors with is also associated with the sky which is what is greatly highlighted in the painting. The painting also gives off a sadness and homesick feelings. The texture of the surface seems to display movement as if we can feel and now see the wind move along the night sky. The circular motion and swirls in the painting is what brings it to life. The painting also ties to illustrate to us how the night sky moves if we were able to see it with the naked eye. We that the wind exists because we can feel it but we cannot give it a shape, color or form and that is where Van Gogh takes action. This painting has always captivated me for many years. I just love observing the painting.

As I was teaching Crystal she seemed bored because she knew what I was talking about. She felt it like a review and had no questions for me. In reality she helped me explain myself and clarified some of my own doubts in regards to my observation. It was very easy to teach her or review with her because of her knowledge and background of art that she already has. I faced no challenges in my teaching and the communication was very simple and quick.

Based on the contextual analysis from the painting I can observe that the location painted probably was a place that Van Gogh knew well and admired. A location that inspired him to illustrate and paint the way he did. His painting is very unique and very well known by many others. And as I read the label it helped me understand my observations and understand some of his motives of the way he decided to portray his painting the way he did. As I roamed the museum I saw many other marvelous paintings and some surprised me greatly. I viewed rare and common works of art and I hope to return again and explore the rest of the museum.

 Monica Luna-Serrano Essay 2

essay 2

My visit to moma was a very pleasant one. I have never been so interested in art and usually I never get enough time from my busy routine to visit places like this, as, if I do get time I always love to enjoy nature. Moma is a very beautiful place, quite contemporized forms of arts are present 3D models, sculptures, paintings, wire models, political art etc. because I like paintings and I stay comfortable with them that is why I chose paintings this time too, as they give me room and space to talk and think about. Anyways my notes when I visited moma were these,

·         It’s quite beautiful the way many paintings are placed in one room to give certain messages as in women empowerment, or gender race etc.

·         The three D structures were very beautiful and intriguing but very plain.

·         The paintings I chose were, Jackson Pollock’s, Claude Monet’s, and “what is painting?’

·         I usually would have picked up one of Degas’s beautiful artwork at display but to be honest when is saw these paintings at a larger scale and made so old they blew my mind.

Me and my friend contemplated a lot about what was Pollock trying to while making the painting and we ended up thinking that he was probably just going crazy with the paint brushes and smudging and throwing paint on the canvas, although when I googled more about how Pollock used to make his artwork, I found this great video on YouTube which showed that what kind of tools Pollock used to make the paintings and etc. the painting to me is a master piece, the preservation is also beautiful as to I feel over the years the paper would have become fragile.

The second painting was what my friend chose and it’s called water lilies by Claude. He was a French impressionist painter. His painting of water lilies is very beautiful when it comes to the colors, but there is nothing properly defined there are hints of pastel or pink to show the outline of lilies blue for water and green for leaves etc. it seems more like you’re watching the painting and there is a blurredness in it.

The third art me and my friend chose was not actually a painting it was actually an artwork with writing, describing what actually is a painting? Hmm according to this artist art needs words but when I asked my friend about her opinion she said she is not quite sure as to appreciate art and to see it you need an eye if you just glimpse through everything you want really get much out of it.

After going through the exhibition when me and my friend started talking about all the paintings we saw including the degas exhibition I asked her what stood out the most to her, she said that what actually stood out to her was the fact that most of Degas’s paintings were expression less the people had no faces, he did not draw a mouth or eyes, it was very boggling as to the viewer can only guess through the type of colors used if the scenario being depicted is happy or sad. I asked her if she used the two-minute technique or no while looking at paintings, and she said although she spent too much time on Pollock’s painting but she still could not make sense out of it. We discussed how beautiful is the water lilies as it gives a cool and pretty vibe. Then she mentioned about the lighting and the setting of the paintings also emphasize on their subjects.

This was all of my and her discussions. And we had a great time at moma but Degas’s artwork really left me speechless and I was awed.

john polock's painting

what is painting? by jhn baldessari

water lilies by monet

 

Mm! Mm! Good!

Art is very unpredictable. Ordinary everyday things can be so unordinary in an art form. I am sure most of you probably already figured out which art piece I am talking about. That's right, I am speaking of the "Campbell's Soup Cans" painting collections by Andy Warhol that is being display at the Museum of Modern Art. Who woulda thought? A Collection of paintings of your dinner soup cans could make such a unique art piece. Then I would hear my girlfriend's voice in my head saying, "This is not unique, how is it unique when he made so many copies of the paintings?!" Unfortunately she's wrong, every can from the collection is different. If you looked closely, each soup had their own different flavors, the color reds aren't exactly the same on each can, and the prints on the cans aren't all even. Not only that, even the reflection on the can lids are different between each soup cans. That's what made it more interesting, from far you are able to see the repetitive of Campbell's soup cans, but view from close up, you can see the details and changes Andy Warhol included to make each soup cans different.

I always had a dream of becoming a great teacher. Unfortunately I lied, after this art lesson I had with my girlfriend insured me that teaching really isn't my type of job. First, I must question why are there so many different art elements? I can not blame artists for coming up with them and I can not blame my girlfriend for not knowing it. Therefore, I can only blame myself for not explaining it to my girlfriend before our lesson. I started by questioning her to see if she knew the style of the painting. She then told me, the style is being repetitive. I guess most people would not know representational, abstract, and non-representational, so I then taught her the meanings for each style. Gladly she caught up very quickly and was able to answer me that the paintings are representational. Asking her the mediums of the painting was extremely easy, because a painting would not be a sculpture or a photo. Therefore, she was able to answer me very quickly. Beside the answer, she also gave me the "did you think I was stupid" look. I then quickly made a come back by asking her if she knew the type of the painting. Indeed, my plan worked, she did not know. I laughed and taught her the types of paintings. It felt good, this was when I realized that I would be such a mean teacher. Last, I asked if she was able to list out all the elements in the paintings. She then asked me, "What elements?" At that moment I knew I was in trouble, because I would need to teach and explain each elements to her. However, gladly she was able to understand them quickly and explained the elements on the paintings back to me. In conclusion, going to MoMA with my girlfriend was fun, but teaching her was more fun. Never again though. PS. My girlfriend is very smart. She just did not know the right art terms. She totally did not focus me to type this.

MOMA essay

            Last Sunday, I went to MOMA. I actually went to MOMA several times. However, I never got to see everything and I was excited. As soon as I got to the 2^nd floor where the exhibition starts, I saw screens of a map. There was a headphone connected to the screen. I picked up the headphone and listened. The men was explaining which places he went illegally. 

This project of a video was about people who were had to go to journey illegally due to political and economic circumstances. It was interesting how someone’s journey could turn into an art piece. After looking at the video, I went to the 4^th floor where I’ve never got to explore. There were many modern arts that attracted me. One of them was an art named Checkmate by an American artist named Richard Lindner that was created in 1966.

            I looked at the art for around a few minutes and took notes to tell my partner about the art. This art is a drawing by the watercolor, pencil, crayon and ink with the prints that are cut and pasted. The painted background of this art was the first thing that I noticed. It had a patterns of a checker board. The colors that were used for the background was different from the checkers. There is a colors of black, white, purple, and orange and etc. The pattern is created with a shape of squares like a chess board. Also, the pattern is created through repeated colors of black, white, purple and blue mostly. You can find monochromatic of purple, and blue. (Some dark and some are light colored) Most of the parts are positive space with the prints and painting. However, there are negative space with an empty space of a white squares on the background. In the center, prints that are cut is pasted.

 Through the way the prints are cut and pasted in the center, there is definitely an outline. The shape of a triangle is implied through a figure in the center of the art. The center of the art seems to show a sculpture of a men wearing a hat. It is interesting how it shows a sculpture of a man like a 3D through a value. You can see a rages from light to dark in the men’s hat, his face and his cloth.

Overall, there seems to be a lot of different colors used in this art. Not only primary colors but you can also find warm colors like red, yellow and orange. Cool colors like blue, purple and green can be found as well. On the two circles on top, left and right, you can see that colors of red and yellow is used which is an analogous. However, it is interesting how the color of purple is used in the center of the circle which makes it complementary with the color yellow.

I mostly looked at the art in formal analysis by looking at the details and each element of the art. 

Explaining what I have analyzed by the details in the art to my partner was easy. However, the part where I didn’t understood what the artist was trying to show and convey wasn’t easy. My partner and I had a discussion of wondering what the artist is trying to tell us through his work. My partner said, the artist might put some small prints of some guys next to the sculpture of a man to show that the chess mate can be anyone and they can be someone who’s smart. We also looked at the face of a men in the center. He is smiling. Through the face that he has, the partner can’t really examine what the men is thinking and his concerns. It seems as if the men is really enjoying the chess if he makes that face while playing a game.

            

My experience “teaching” an artwork

          

                

                     I went to MOMA last Wednesday morning. Before I go to the museum, I usually check the museum’s website to know what exhibitions they have now. I have heard about the exhibition of Degas from my friend, and seen the advertisement in the station. I saw the video about how Degas made artworks using monotype of printmaking. Therefore, that helped me to get good start to visit MOMA. The Degas’s exhibition is amazing, especially the printing and painting of ballet dancers. I felt the movement of the girl jumping in the painting. Even though I have visited MOMA many times, every time is different. The museum never makes me bored. Nevertheless it was the Wednesday morning, many people were visiting. Also, there were many students bringing sketchbooks. The class of elementary school students was taught about artworks.

               I chose Marc Chagall’s painting for my experience of “teaching” an artwork. I asked my friend, John, to listen to my explanation. We sat down in the cafe and talked about this painting. The title of the painting is “I and the Village,” which he painted in 1911. It was painted during the cubism period. It is oil painting. The type is abstract. The form is painting. I think the style is the genre painting. There are primary colors. The complementary colors of red and green are used. There are shapes of circles, triangles. There are thin outlines.

                Then, I asked what he thinks about this painting. He told me that the way he uses colors make it feel multi-dimensional. Also, it makes the painting peaceful and beautiful. It looks powdery. The painting feels alive. It is dreamy, imagery and scenery. It is blended together well. He told me that the scene might be from a dream. He was the one of artists who can communicate their dreams. He started to paint, and it comes from his unconscious mind. It is personal because it is subconscious. You can’t see his intention. He said he likes the blue color of the animal. He feels it is like the sky. The animal has more emotion. The eye is like human’s eye. The green man has white color eye. There are thin threads between their eyes. He states that probably, Chagall made the circle of the center first.

                The question he had is why there is a church and the guy with the cross in the painting because he knows that Chagall was Jewish. Therefore, we looked at Wikipedia about Chagall. It says that in his childhood, he grew up in religious family and felt like an outsider from the Christian city. But, he liked including all the humanity in his work not any specific religion. What I felt “easy” to communicate to my listener is that he likes art and Chagall is one of his favorite artists. I was happy to talk about art with him. The challenges I faced while I was teaching is that Chagall’s works are difficult to describe styles and technical concepts because Chagall has such a personal style. I found that it is also difficult to simplify the paintings into a discussion of technical concepts.

                Every time, this painting looks different. I think the abstract and cubism are like poetry. I was trying to “teach” the artwork, but eventually I learned many things from my friend and this experience. I think having discussion about art with somebody else is good way to know art, and realize that there are various interpretations. Even though I have seen this painting many times, I still question why the woman and houses are upside down. I felt something connection between human and nature from this painting.

Zoma's Art Teaching Experience

We had a great experience teaching Art, about an artwork. We will relate that experience in the following. The work was picked in the museum MoMA. It was entitled House by the Railroad, made in 1925 by the American Edward Hopper (1882-1967). The reason why this has been our choice will be treated further, because it was the object of a question asked by one of our students. Edward Hopper, as we has already studied one of his works, is known for his paintings evoking urban loneliness of the great cities of the 20^th century. This idea clearly appears again in this artwork at the first glance. The methodology for this assignment was to visit the museum MoMA, select an artwork, observe and analyze it, take notes and pictures, then process the notes and the reflection into bullet points, and teach someone about, and according to what had been studied in class about Art and artworks. We got two students to teach. The first was Asiyatou. She is a classmate in my Chemistry II class. The second was Steven, a friend and a student in Electrical major. The outline of our lecture was:

1- Definition of Art

2- Conditions of exposure of the artwork in the museum

3- Form, Type and Style of the artwork

4- Visual effects of the artwork: color, value, shading, lines, shape of spaces

To say it honestly, one of the most difficult things we found in this experience was to define Art. In our point of view, it would be inconvenient to start teaching someone about an artwork, without telling him what Art is. Our general idea about Art was an expression of beauty, a cultural expression, the expression of an artist’s vision, … But when we started searching about, we found it was not as easier as we thought and there was even a controversy between philosophers about the definition. So we were trying to avoid the definition in our presentation, but then we realized that the students could ask us that question. We finally decided to include it, and we formulated a visual definition based on the medium of Art. The definition we gave to our student was the following: “Art is an expression of an individual (artist) or a group (cultural) through a medium like painting, drawing, sculpture, photography, etc”.

In our second point, we chose to talk about the conditions of exposure of the artwork. Because the work was selected in a museum and was exposed in specific conditions we found it relevant to discuss about. In this section, we precised that works of art in museums are presented in an environment specified by the artist himself or chosen by the museum, and which can contribute to have an effect on the spectator. In this artwork the background was white but slightly dark because there was no direct light on the picture. The light was yellow, and was coming from the ceiling of the hallway, in parallel to the picture. The frame was a dark yellow wood. Definitely, this environment either it is purposely chosen or not, does participate in conveying the message of “lonely urban life” of the work designed in a monochromatic dark tone.

The third point of our discussion was straightforward. The form of an artwork is its medium: drawing, painting, sculpture, photography, printmaking, etc. Our artwork House by the Railroad is a painting, an oil-on-canvas art. The style is the way the content is presented. It is representational when it presents the reality without distortion, and abstract when it does it with distortion. It is non-representational when the object is not real. The present artwork is representational. The type of an artwork is historical when it depicts an historical scene. It can be is portrait, portraying a human or non-human character. It can be landscape, representing landscapes. It is a genre artwork if it depicts ordinary scenes. This work of Edward Hopper is a genre painting. It denounces the type of life lived by his contemporaries, that was a lonely life in great cities. In this picture, the artist is presenting a big and apparently empty house, that may certainly be populated, but whose sign of animation seems to come only from the railroad.

In the fourth and last point, we defined the visuals elements as the technics used by the artist to give the sensation of space he desires, and to express his message. Concerning the color, the artist used an overall monochromatic blue tone. The blue is a cool color symbolizing luck of energy, sadness, as refer to the ambiance of this lonely environment. The monochromatic choice means monotony and solitude of such atmosphere. On the contrary, the author employed a red color (hot color) in two locations: the railroad and the chimney, as to mean that the animation of this place comes only from those locations, not from human interactions. The value and shading in this work is remarkable. The author deliberately projected the light from the back of the house, leaving the front of the building dark, with shadows. We know that the front of a building is its point of focus, and is even given much more architectural attention. It is the face of the edifice and its “smile”. But, Here Edward Hopper is showing a house with a dark face, without smile, to emphasize again the lonely life of those cities deprived of shininess and brightness. The lines used by the artist are amazingly straight for a painting. This is part of the style of the artist. We can observe this rectitude in the horizontal lines of the railroad, and the vertical lines of the building. Concerning the shape of the spaces, there is a duality characterized by a positive space formed by the house and the railroad and a negative space formed by the sky. This explicit choice of the artist is to reinforce the loneliness of this isolated house which has only for coexistence a railroad and the sky.

     At the end of our presentation, we ask our students if they had questions. We expected many questions, but only one question was asked by Asiyatou. She wanted to know what oriented us to our specific choice of this artwork among so many others in the museum. Our response was that we had studied an artwork of the same artist. We learned that the author was known for treating the topic of the urban individualist mode of life. So, when we saw the work in the museum it looked strangely familiar to us, and when read the name Edward Hopper on the label, this confirmed our previous feeling that we knew something about this artwork. Suddenly our lecture of the artwork became easier. We could then easily see the monochromatic blue tone used by the artist, as he did in his artwork Summertime (1943).We could also see the straight lines, the dual positive and negative spaces. The way of looking we exercised in this work was essentially biographical. So this question was an opportunity for us to talk about the ways of looking of an art which in our case was mostly biographical, because we quickly recognized the artist's style on his artwork after we knew he was the author.

Finally, we ask our students if they understood.  Their response was positive. We hope it really was. The main difficulty we had in that experience was that English is a second language for us, and it is embedded in our French accent. So, during our lecture, we felt sometimes necessary to make sure that the students got our pronunciation.

Essay #2 - My MOMA and Teaching Experience

I headed to the MOMA last Friday for the first time, and it was an awesome experience. I saw a lot of kinds of art which I feel I wouldn't be able to find in places other than a museum like this one. I feel like this museum has a lot of variety, which keeps things really interesting; every time I turned a corner or headed up another floor, I had no idea what I would find. I definitely plan to go back at some point. 

There was one exhibit of the museum that really caught my interest, though, moreso than the rest. It was a room filled with different architectural models showcasing all kinds of buildings, some of which ended up being built while others were never made. I love architecture AND miniatures, but I never really had the chance of seeing models up close like this, so I absolutely loved looking at all of them. However, I particularly loved this one:

This piece is called Minna no Mori Gifu Media Cosmos by Toyo Ito, and it is a model of a library and community center located in Gifu City, Japan. For those curious, here is a picture of what it looks like. Isn't it amazing?

In terms of the model itself in the museum, though, I fell in love with the design of the buildings (especially the roofs) and just the structure as a whole; I found it quite aesthetically pleasing. I loved the intention behind the idea, too. Toyo Ito came up with the concept as part of his focus on building a sense of community, which was especially significant considering this was taking place right after the recent earthquake in Japan.

Before sitting down to teach, I made sure to practice going over some notes regarding the classification and visual elements of the piece. Here's what I came up with:

• For starters, I noted that this piece was a 3D sculpture (or model) made using 3D printed resin, polystyrene board, and paper. 
• It is representational as it is depicting something that is very much real, and the objects within the piece are easily identified.
• In terms of colors, there's a lot of white. We can also see some red and green used; red and green being complementary colors. However, color is obviously not a focal point here.
• There's a variety of organic and geometric shapes. The trees, for example, are organic. The squares and rectangles within the gate are geometric. 
• While not completely throughout, the gate has a pattern using the continuation of squares--almost like netting.
• There's a lot more negative space towards the outside of the gate, and a lot less inside. If you look closely, you can even see that there are a lot more people (represented by the teeny tiny stick figures) inside. I think this helps to establish a sense of liveliness for the structure, as if the community really feels alive within that gate (which I imagine is what architects hope for when they build community centers like this).

I decided to teach my dad, who loves learning, but doesn't actually know that much about art at all. The experience was actually really neat! As someone with an interest in teaching, it was pretty fun and was actually a learning experience for myself, not just for my dad. It was a little funny because I only have experience teaching people younger than me (I was a tutor for a few years) and not people older than me, but especially not my dad. He's usually the one giving me lectures and teaching me things, so maybe it felt a little odd to him too.

As someone similarly mentioned below, I had to be prepared to answer questions I didn't quite know the answers to 100% of the time, so I ended up making educated guesses. For example, when talking about color, my dad asked me, "there's a lot of white. Why is that?" He probably knew I didn't have the answer, but worked with me and patiently waited as I came up with one. "You know, while I'm not entirely sure, I think a reason why they might choose to use so much white is because it's a lot easier to look at the intricacies of the structure that way. If he used an actual color, like orange for example, it would be a lot harder to note all the little nooks and crannies, right? I imagine it's also much easier to see shadows with white, which is a big deal for architects." I said something to that effect.

My dad just sort of nodded and continued looking at the piece. Unbeknownst to him, though, was how proud I felt in that moment for coming up with a decent answer on the spot! Hopefully I was at least somewhat accurate. 

I really enjoyed asking him questions. He mentioned that one thing that stuck out to him immediately was the curvature of the roofs, so I asked him what he thought the artist had in mind when coming up with that design. I think he actually gave a really great answer; he mentioned that the circular roofs seemed a lot more free and inviting. "There are no corners," he said, which helps bring people together. I think that lines up perfectly with what Toyo Ito had in mind, so I was really impressed.

Aside from throwing questions back and forth, which I really liked, I made sure to teach him all about the visual elements at play and their importance in all kinds of art. I think he really liked learning about that as he never really realized that the visual elements in art were really a "thing"; he kind of just assumed people make it and that's that. Which is actually exactly what I used to think before learning about them myself.

In conclusion, this little project was a lot of fun. My favorite part was definitely teaching my dad, and it made me want to keep teaching other people about art too. I'm also excited to return to the MOMA and experience the things that I missed as well as re-experience the things that I saw last week!

Teaching with MoMa

Landscape with Steer. Pollock. 1936-37.

This was my first time going to MoMa. It was really interesting. I really loved seeing all that different kind of art from simple paintings to extravagant sculptures.

One of my favorite things about the trip to the museum was the opportunity to see the art pieces of three Venezuelan artists, one of them being the famous Jesus Soto (in case you are wondering why, I am Venezuelan).

I got into the Pollock Gallery, it was really amazing seeing his paintings in real life. I chose an art piece by him to explain it to my friend it is called “Landscape with steer.”

I enjoyed the experience to teach/explain to my friend about art, giving her different examples and explaining to her the technical language along with the painting itself. Then I asked her to analyze it with her recently acquired artistic knowledge.

It wasn’t hard to explain her everything, but since we both are Deaf some technical words were a little hard to explain using Sign Language, so she had to read them. Overall she understood me, so I guess I was a good teacher. Also was a funny experience because I would never imagine I was going to be explaining this topic, and doing it in Sign Language made it more captivating.

Her analysis is this:

            “It’s a landscape painting and it has a representational form (the ox). The red section shows the aggression part of the painting and it looks like smoke coming out. The yellow part looks like a farming because the ox. The blue part looks like the ocean on a house with mountains with snow (white color). It has lines and shapes; the hue is analogous with a little primary colors. More warm than cool colors, with different values.”

            I can say she really understood me after checking her analysis, because I did my own one in order to compare both, and we have some similarities. I came with this:

My friend notes

            Is a 2D form (lithograph), installed in the MoMa as the “Pollock Gallery,” it has a Non-representative abstract style with the exception of the ox which is the only identifiable part of the landscape. It has different lines that make silhouettes that I can’t understand but let my imagination do the work, I doesn’t have a negative space, the painting is fully done. About the hue, Pollock used the Primary colors to realize this art piece, however for each color he used different values to add a special effect in the painting, which at the same time helps to add texture too, like rocks and fire.

            The painting has a Warm-Cool combination, being the wines of this challenge. My emotional response is chaos, this painting make me fell emotionally twisted, lost, if I watch it as a whole, but depending where I focus my attention also makes me feel a special way. If I focus in the read part I can feel the anger, the fire getting out of me, the blue part makes me feel nostalgic, and the yellow one bring me peace.

            Although my analysis is deeper than my friend, I can tell she had a basic understanding of the explanations I gave to her. Also was an enjoyable experience because this topic (art) is something that even though is subjective, always keep people together.