Week 13

Commonalities and differences between Elizabeth Gilbert's talk and Sir Ken Robinson's talk.

Elizabeth Gilbert talked about her career and used many metaphors to an elusive and serious topic. The emotional struggles of artists over the years. She discussed the history of artists, and found that there is an assumption that creativity leads to suffering. Creative people over all genres seem to be undone by the gifts and become mentally unstable. Gilbert discussed an ancient philosophy of a 'Genius' that was thought to accompany creative minds. The 'Genius' was believed to be a spirit that was also be responsible for the creative process and pressure. Gilbert made light of an illusive subject, she described a psychological construct that is like a coping mechanism, one that when people lose their grasp on life and their passion they should look to.

Sir Ken Robertson talked about a climate crisis, of both the natural and human resources. He mentioned that many people don't use their abilities and skills and often choose a lifestyle that they endure not enjoy. You need passion in your life. Robertson revealed that we build our society around conformist ideas not innovative thinking, which is what erases passion in our goals and lives. Communities depend on a diversity of talents, both in ability and knowledge.

They both talk about love and passion, and what seems the lose of it in the contemporary world. They reveal their discussion with a sense of humour, to lighten the subject. Both present very humanist ideas of life. Essentially we are losing our individuality and if we do find it we stress over it, usually because of the pressures from society, be it financial or emotional. If we step back and realise why we choose to do what we do and if or why we love it we can appreciate our gift again and not curse ourselves to an unhappy lifestyle. It is best to enjoy not endure!

WHY I WANT TO BE A DESIGNER??

Throughout my life I haven't had any certainty in my life, I strive to do things that make me happy and the people around me. I am a firm believer in living for myself, living every day to the maximum if i am able to and things happen for a reason.

I applied for a very broad range of courses at the start of the year (ranging from midwifery and teaching to graphic design and art history) I got an interview at Wesley and felt excited about it. I have always loved to create and put my feeling and ideas into a design be it paper or computer. I love to learn new things and hope that those new things will help me in the future.

I want to express my emotions and ideas, I do so through music and dance also but Graphic Design stood out to me and I am enjoying myself in the course so far. I hope to enjoy the rest of it and keep my passion for it and eventually gain exposure.

I suppose it's similar to what Elizabeth Gilbert and Sir Ken Robertson discussed in the TED.com talks, you need passion in your life and to be able to enjoy every moment, that is what i strive for out of my life.

The Inhibitors to creativity:

• fear of making mistakes
• admiring logic too much (trust intuition)
• avoiding ambiguity (clarifying things too quickly)
• wanting to be practical
• thinking play is frivolous
• thinking "that's not my area"
• not wanting to be foolish
• deciding you are just not creative

Examples of work and drawings by Basquiat and Dubuffet.

BASQUIAT

http://www.metapedia.com/wiki/index.php?title=Cultural_Hybridity_Discussion_Fall_2007:_Week_7

http://jesuiscommejesuis.files.wordpress.com/2007/08/untitled_acrylic_oilstick_and_spray_paint_on_canvas_painting_by_-jean-michel_basquiat-_1981.jpg

http://srjerman.files.wordpress.com/2008/08/15basquiat_30.jpg

http://anthagonics.files.wordpress.com/2009/10/jean-michel-basquiat-picture2.jpg

http://jetgeneration.files.wordpress.com/2009/01/untitled_acrylic_and_mixed_media_on_canvas_by_-jean-michel_basquiat-2c_1984.jpg

DUBUFFET

http://www.contemporaryartdaily.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/11/dubuffet_inst_2008_v05.jpg

http://willaw.bleublog.lematin.ch/media/02/00/2110998414.jpg

http://www.gadflyonline.com/11-5-01/dubuffet--panoramas.jpg

http://madamepickwickartblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/03/dubuffet8.jpg

http://www.museum.cornell.edu/hfj/permcoll/euro/img_20c/bouche_l.jpg

http://squallyshowers.files.wordpress.com/2009/06/jean-dubuffet.jpg

week 11/12

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sn/tvradio/programmes/howart/images/logo3.jpg

Movie - HOW ART MADE THE WORLD

"How do the images we surround ourselves with today come from a world that is thousands of years old?"

Over time artists have been obsessed with the human form. Throughout history there is a variety of artworks incorporating the human form, all with one thing in common; not one is realistic. Scientists believe it has something to do with the inner workings of our brain;

"Our brain is hard-wired to focus upon parts of objects with pleasing associations."

Exaggerated statues like the Venus of Willendorf reveal the fixation that artists over the years have had with accentuating certain parts of the body that appeal to them, an exaggerated beauty. The makers of the Venus lived in a harsh ice-age environment, therefore the tiny statue has great significance for their time and reality, they exaggerated what was important to them. (fatness and fertility)

http://www.utexas.edu/courses/classicalarch/images1/willendorf-large.jpg

Ancient Egyptians created a stylised human figure based on the grid work of their wall art, while the Greeks created heroic statues almost to a naked perfection, yet still unrealistic.

As a race, human beings have always been obsessed with fantasy and dreams of perfection, this links us all with our ancient ancestors and explains our "more human than human" images, statues and designs of the human body.

In our everyday life we see many lines and shapes that we interpret as symbols, the question is raised how one could ever recognise an image if one has never seen one before? What archeologists have called the 'creative explosion' created this movement into what we rely on hugely today, that is symbols that we recognise as representations for certain things.

http://www.collegenews.org/Images/Altamira-Cave.jpg

http://blogs.guardian.co.uk/art/rockart460.jpg

The first prehistoric paintings ever to be discovered were in a cave in the hillside of Altamira, in Spain and give an insight into why we felt it necessary to make shapes of what we saw in reality. Most prehistoric cave paintings were of animals and consisted of black or red circles and strokes, searching over continents and strangely enough this was the same. It was discovered that the paintings inside the caves away from any admiration were painted because of a deep trance that the people would go into. They were not just of the physical world but of a spiritual world that they experienced in this trance. These hallucination were so strong and inspiring and lead them to painting them onto the cave walls. The spots and lines were due to the lack of light in the caves, the altered state of consciousness made the brain produce this pattern. They felt compelled to paint their visions and from this we can live our lives highly relying on symbols for direction and classification.

http://www.safetysignsupplies.co.uk/images/product_imgs/full/1024_1_1_s.gif

http://www.freefoto.com/images/41/04/41_04_97---Give-Way-Roundabout-Road-Sign_web.jpg

http://www.pbs.org/howartmadetheworld/episodes/human/

week 9

Milton Glaser

An American Graphic Designer, well known for his iconic 'I Love New York' Symbol and posters in magazines and for artist like Bob Dylan. His style ranges experimenting with techniques from Avant Garde and sometimes even further back or from present day, his work was very unique, simple and direct. Throughout his career he has developed his own studio and broadened his horizons with New York Magazine designs and become an influence on contemporary artists, within design and illustration. He amongst many other artists are taking a stand, calling for a change of priorities, after such event of 9/11 they are renewing the 1964 manifesto (read further at [www.eyemagazine.com/feature.php?id=18&fid=99]).

http://elvinakkan.files.wordpress.com/2009/06/ilovenewyork.jpg

Exercise: Compare 'Sydney Opera House' with one of Gehrys' buildings.

Rasin Building - Dancing House in Prague.

Both have a structure, the Opera House has a more geometric structure where as the Dancing House has what seems to be a random collaboration of rectangles pushed and morphed into unusual shapes. Gehrys worked from what is known as the Deconstructionism or Post-structialism, where he ignored the form follows function rule that was prevalent for the Modernists.

These two buildings have some similarities of shapes and form although the Opera House has a repeated shape, while the Dancing House has one random column oddly warped. Both attract the eye and are aesthetically pleasing to the viewer. The repetition creates a rhythm and balance throughout the Opera House design and the odd shape for the Dancing Hou

se does not create balance or unity with the rest of the building. It does however create a movement within the architecture.

Both are icons in their own rights, they mirror what they are made for and around .

The Opera House is for concerts and performances the large interior allows for music to be heard to its full extent and the exterior mimics the water or the ships sails.

The Dancing Building has a traditional building structure but branches away with one column to relate to the movement of dance.

Therefore both are similar and different but for the purpose they were created they fulfill the bill.

http://www.aspen-ridge.net/Places/Australia/Sydney_Opera_House.jpg

http://dilarairmak.files.wordpress.com/2009/05/frank-1.jpg

week 8

Postmodernism (discussed in a previous post)

Alessi, a kitchen utensil company grounded in Italy. The company saw many high designs of a variety of ordinary objects and tools and was common stylised in the post-modern mode. Some

memorable products were the 'designer kettles', 'designer toothbrushes', 'designer graters' and so no all are Alessi products.

http://www.architetturaedesign.it/immagini/philippe_Stark.jpg

Philippe Starck is a French product designer and well known in the New Design style. His work varies from interior design to mass produced consumer goods like chairs and toothbrushes. His technique often included stylised, organic and streamlined products and furnishings to get them ready for mass production, he revamped a variety of household i

tems, introducing them into high design.

http://besttopdesign.com/interior/interior-design-of-hotel-fasano-rio-de-janeiro-by-philippe-starck-in-rio-de-janeiro/

The Memphis Group was an Italian group of designers and architects in the 1980's that challenged the conventional attitudes towards textures, colours, patterns and shapes in producing many fabrics, furniture, metal, ceramics and glass objects. In direct contrast to the so called 'Good Design' of the time and drew inspiration from the Art Deco and Pop Art movements, appropriating from futuristic themes and 50's Kitsch styles. Resulting in colourful, bright and shocking pieces in this group that the 'mentor' Ettore Sottsass influenced by his radical work, he dubbed the group as the 'New International Style'. The unconventional shapes, disregard of function, bright colours and radical textures shocked the art community and challenged the 'modern' design of the day and furthermore developed what we call Post Modernism.

http://www.artscenecal.com/ArtistsFiles/ShireP/ShirePJPGs/PShire10a.jpg

http://isiria.files.wordpress.com/2007/09/memphis-1.jpg

This group has been described as

'vibrant, essentric and ornamental' http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Memphis_Group

http://www.essential-architecture.com/IMAGES2/Sottsass3_thumb.jpg

week 7-exercise

CLASS EXERCISE

Contemporary designers and artists who share ideas...work has similar characteristics...and who break rules??

Some artists we came up with were David Carson, Stephan Sagmiester, Paula Scher, Seymour Chwast, Milton Glaser, Yulia Brodskaya, as a few. They all do not share the same ideas but some connect with others, they all used experimentation in their work and in doing so broke the so called rules of the time, breaking the traditional boundaries. The artists who incorporated typography into their work used many different techniques of collage, grid, shapes and were not always created to be ledgable, this was their challenge to the rules.

http://www.designingwithtype.com/essays/images/essayCarson.gif

"As time goes on the world becomes more and more sophisticated."

I believe the sophistication of art has to do with the ever growing and advancing technology and science which is making the place we live in far more complex. Artists are only making sense of the world that they live in and following the trends of the time. Many artists turn to the past to the basics of painting and skething and improving upon those skills, or experiment with their own ideas and techniques, from this the sophistication grows every new day in relation to art. Artists keep expanding upon their own ideas and the ideas from the past.

http://krasabear.files.wordpress.com/2009/03/brodskaya.jpg

week 7/8

Post Modernism

1975-1990

This was developed in rebellion to the strict structure of the Swiss/International period. This period re-established wit, humour, irony through visual symbols and motifs in all areas of design; art, fashion, architecture, graphics, furniture, etc. It was a very free period of expression in art, it was a reaction against the modernists and their 'less is more' approach. In Post modernism their wasn't many rules to follow but to convey your message in your art any way you could, sometimes the more extravagent the better, other times the subtler the better.

A good example is the Sydney Opera House, designed by Frank Lloyd Wright which ignored the modernists obsession with pure geometry. The building is shaped to symbolise the sea, flight of the seagull and the sails of a boat.

http://www.wayfaring.info/wp-content/uploads/2007/03/800px-sydney_opera_house_sailsk.jpg

Many architectural designs mimicked natural forms rather than the modernists approach of geometric shapes. The fashion industry saw a major change in style and what was accepted by the evolving community, they saw a merging of men and women's cloths...typically seen in Boy Georges' style when the gay culture that was embraced in the 80's. Also Madonna showcases the undergarments as clothing.

The Post modernists completely went against the rule of form must follow function, they played with proportions, abstraction and deliberately broke the rules in a playful matter. The 'Memphis Group' was a group of Post-modernists that created a unique look, with vibrant, eccentric colours and design in reaction to the humourless design of modernism.

The Post modernists also challenged the ideals of the viewer, usually with simple and clean designs incorporating an organic curve to upset the balance, yet very postmodern. Many artists would use found material to create a loose, arbitrary design of collage, similar to the Punk Movement. Many artists were influenced by past movements and techniques by older periods and this is what makes postmodernism so hard to define. It is a variety of styles and techniques often appropriating other works and that allow for wit, humour, irony or juxtaposition to challenge the viewer into rethinking their preconceived views. They tried the 'untried'. Artists like Wolfgang Weingart who embraced experimentation with layers, textures and collage.

http://artisticholicz.files.wordpress.com/2008/09/new-wave-2.jpg

The postmodern period saw many artists that have influence the contemporary society today. The movement are forever influencing each other and each new artists or designer has their own style. Because the Postmodern movement allowed for freedom many practices were explored and famous artists were produced. For an example, Morimura, he challenged the idea of the artist and the sitter by being both, and challenged the gender barrier in most of his artworks.

week 6-part2

Swiss/International

http://thumb1.visualizeus.com/thumbs/08/08/03/berg,blue,design,fortner,grafik,graphic,design,international,typographic,style,josef,muller,brockmann,layout,poster,swiss-a4a3dd9c5c0f5e30195de8e5eee30783_m.jpg

The style was developed in Switzerland hence the name, it is also known as 'The International Typographic Style' and overlapped with Modernism from 1945-1985. Often based on pure geometry the clarity and order to the style was ideal to produce something socially useful, scientific and accessible. It was a strict clean style emphasising readability and objectivity often using Sans Serif typefaces, a grid and an asymmetric layout.

http://www.achievement.org/achievers/joh0/large/joh0-023.jpg

A good example of Swiss/International style can be seen in many buildings in Chicago, the architectural design done by Mies van der Rohe. It illustrates the styles focus on cleanliness and simple forms. The style is evidently introduced into society, also into chair designs and planes particularly the Concord which was engineered for speed it is extremely simple in aerodynamic form.

http://www.aeroflight.co.uk/types/international/aerospat-bac/concorde/Concorde.jpg

One of the most influential designers of the time was Josef Muller-Brockman, he used contrast in size and scale for impacts aswell as bold typefaces, grids, collage and diagonal vectors to encourage movement, this became a new language for the graphic poster designers. He created many posters and promoted many concerts using his grid organisation and minimal, bold text to entice the reader, he sometimes used a tilted axis in his rebellion against the mainstream. Unity was often formed by repetition and transformation of geometric shapes, again very simple and clean approach.

http://www.publishedart.com.au/images/graphic/big_josefmuller.jpg

This style influenced many artists and several major companies within society. Such as Knoll International, signage and a map for the New York City subway system, both in clean cut, easily read font (Helvetica) and socially useful and recognisable.