Viz

ARTS 102: Foundation 2-D Media

Instructor: Mary Griep
Studio Art, St. Olaf
Fall 2011

Course Description
This foundation-level studio course introduces the aesthetic, conceptual, and technical foundations of two-dimensional art-making and ways two-dimensional media inform the creation and understanding of art in cultural contexts. Students explore the form and space of two-dimensional images through a wide variety of materials and media. The course emphasizes strategies for idea generation. Students engage in dynamic activity, spirited investigation, and thoughtful creative expression. Materials fee. Offered each semester.

Field Trip to Carleton College

Students completed the following assignment to complement their visit to Seeing is Knowing: The Universe at the Perlman Teaching Museum, Carleton College.

Assignment:

This "exhibition presents contemporary art, historical books and photographs, charts, and scientific visualizations, considers the powerful role of vision and the visual in exploring celestial realms. Artists and scientists, seeking truth beyond the visible and the tangible, offer fresh perspectives on astronomy and give new life to poetic celestial metaphors."

So what are "poetic celestial metaphors"?
(Be sure to read the didactic materials on the walls - it will help!)

What is a metaphor? According to Webster's Dictionary a metaphor is "a thing regarded as representative or symbolic of something else, esp. something abstract: the amounts of money being lost by the company were enough to make it a metaphor for an industry that was teetering."

If the work you see today is using metaphors what might they be? How might an artist express a visual metaphor?

Pick one drawing or photograph that you feel is using a metaphor.

1. Describe the piece you have chosen. First, be sure to adequately describe the piece, not just subject matter, use your formal vocabulary: line, value, form, shape, volume, color, etc.
2. What is the metaphor?