The Soul of a Nation exhibition at the Brooklyn Museum, really brought chills up my spine. Every piece of artwork meant something, it showed pain and sorrow but also courage on how African Americans spent so many years of their lives or rather all their life. Each piece of art also showed how many people fought for their equal rights and had the courage to stand up for themselves and their own people. The art piece that left me without words was The First One Hundred Years: He amongst You who is without Sin Shall Cast the First Stone; Forgive Them Father for they Know Not What They Do by Chicago artist Archibald Motley. With only focusing on the colors in this piece we can see that the artist is showing the lightness falling into darkness using different tones of blue with black and grayish shadows. Right away I could see all the evil in this work, there was a window mural on a tree what seemed to be baby angels with whom was supposed to God, but his face was shattered or splattered in black ink. Then there was the head on MLK Jr and JFK on the tree as well, and below there was a lynched body. Motley showed suffering and mistreatment by the whites towards the blacks in this painting, he added specific detail in what they were called and groups such as the KKK, all these people were the devils themselves using their power to harm others. The painting depicted “hell” for the African Americans, it is a powerful piece of art, which showed assassinations, murder, pain and suffering.

In unit 1, we began with sharing our thoughts on what art is to us and how do we express and are able to connect to it. Art comes in all different ways and forms, from historic painting to graffiti on subways to even music and dance it is all a form of expression. Art can show viewers an artist mood and creativity, although each viewer may read any way of art in a different perspective which makes it more interesting. We were later introduced to formal analysis in art. We learned that it focuses on the elements and principles used by the artist. The elements of art include, shape, line, form, color, texture, mass and scale. While the principles of art include things such as pattern, contrast and balance in a piece of art.With formal analysis we as viewers are able to learn about the visual facts of the artists work and begin to interpret what the artist is trying to portray. Everyone has a different idea when looking at a piece of art even without referring to any outside sources, though we do use historical context of an artwork to helps understand why the artist did such and such in the piece of art. We look at elements such as color used and what mood it may represent, we also look at lines to helps tell if artwork is two or three dimensional. Overall with formal analysis we have a better understand on how to interpret artwork in a whole and what things we can point out that others may miss in order to understand what the artist is trying portray.

We also discussed the “Banking Concept of Education” by Paulo Freire which described a way of education in which the educators/teachers deposit information and “knowledge” into students as if they were actually just a bank. This concept relied on teachers just needed to teach and students are taught, they were taught just to listen and memorize without being able to express any opinion on anything they were being taught, in simpler terms “teachers knew everything.” Student memorized and repeated, which lead them to not be able to be creative thinkers but only have their thinking controlled by an educator. I believe this only holds a student who may be a genius from the future, it did not allow them to actually understand the why’s and what if’s, and it didn’t allow their opinion or expression to be heard which ruled out an creativity they may have had.

Throughout this unit I learned how to look at art differently especially ancient art, I am now able to point out things I missed before. I can tell how color and lines can change an entire perspective of a piece of artwork. I was also able to realize how much art has changed throughout the years and how every detail in a historic piece of art can have so much meaning.

 

Art, is all around us. It is a form of a expression in the world around us. Without art, life would be boring (to me atleast). Art is a way people express their emotions, feelings, visualizations, imagination & inner thoughts.  It is a form of creative human expression, we are able to distinguish the moods of an artist through their art weather its happy, sad, or just a fantasized world that they’ve come up with it. Art can also be a form of therapy to many people, like myself. Although I am not a professional artist, I love to draw just to ease my mind, my favorite form of art is actually street art because I love to see how creative and talented a person is using more than just a pen and paper, how they are able to make colors come to life and truly make a picture speak a thousand words. I believe every art piece in the world, from different culturals have a meaning and purpose, and I would like to learn how to truly figure it out especially on historical pieces.

Unfortunately I missed the first day of class, but because of everyone else I am now able to catch up ! These blogs really helped ! Thanks guys !

First, you need to register yourself for CUNY academic commons & log into your account. Once you are registered you have to add yourself to your group which would be ART 1010 9:30am class.

You will stay logged in and in your corresponding group, you will see menu bar on the top of the screen, click on “+NEW” to begin writing your post.

Give your post a title such as “BLOG 1:How to Post”

Write out your assignment on the body section or attach a file/photos.

Finally select a category and a tag.

When your done with all this make sure to click the “PUBLISH” button on the right.