What Is Art?

Not Art…

Kachina Doll (Kokopol), probably late 19th century, Brooklyn Museum

Art…


Modern Kachina Doll Carving - $500-4,000


Not Art…

Anasazi pottery from the late 1300’s

Art…

Modern Hopi Pottery Vase - $4,700

The first chapter in the book Believing Is Seeing: Creating the Culture of Art by Mary Anne Straniszewski asks the question What is Art? The main focus of this chapter is that modern culture has created art and decided what constitutes pieces of art. As a modern society we have taken many ancient pieces, given them names and placed them in a museum. We consider the ancient works art because to us they have an aesthetic value. When they were created they were not considered art, in the way we think of it. These items were woven into the societies that created them. The Kachina doll in the top picture was used in ceremonies and hung on the wall to teach young people about the Hopi beliefs of the spirit world. In contrast the modern Kachina in the next picture was created as a work of art by a member of the Hopi tribe to be sold to people outside of the culture. Similarly, the ancient pottery was probably used to hold liquid for daily living. The modern Hopi pot was created to sell and will most likely be placed on a shelf or used as a vase. Even though the items of each set are similar, they were created with different purposes. The author suggests that if the creator did not have the purpose of creating an aesthetic piece, then the item should not be considered a work of art. The author does not deny that these pieces have aesthetic value. She only suggests that we should consider the history, known or unknown, of these items. That we can not know how the items were seen in their time because our context is so different than that of the people who saw and used them.   

Digital Photography Experiences

Over the past few weeks I have been experimenting with digital photography. I am thankful to have had the opportunity to learn more about this medium and explore its artistic possibilities. I have been taking pictures with my DSLR camera for several years, but I was mostly using the automatic settings. Through the readings and assignments on photography, I was able to learn more about using manual settings and how this can enhance my photography. I am beginning to understand the relationships between the ISO, aperature and shutter speed, and how to use meters to know if the shot will have the right amount of light. I really enjoyed the framing photos exercise. I like framing subjects in unusual ways and this exercise gave me more ideas on how to do this and create an appealing shot. I also experimented with different perspectives, lighting and movement. I learned how to adjust manual settings to stop or blur motion. I still consider myself very much a beginner, but now I can build on the basics I have learned to improve my picture taking skills.
Editing digital images is a way for an artist to add their own personal vision into a photograph. I have learned some basics in Photoshop and I am eager to learn more about this program and what I can do with it. I really enjoyed working with the colors of some of my pictures. I think that creating colorized photos adds more of my own artistic spin on an image. Editing also allows me to narrow in on particular aspects of a photo that I would like to highlight. This process may challenge some people’s ideas on photography. Since the finished photo may have little resemblance to the actual picture that was taken, it may not be viewed by some as an authentic photograph. Unaltered photographs can be viewed as art, but there has to be a distinction between photographs that merely document what we see and those that have been manipulated into another form of art.

Here is the link to my digital photography website: www.lissabphotography.weebly.com

Stop Motion Dude

Here is a link to our finished stop motion video using our 3-D printed blue robot. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kN0Ar2bZt7k The process of taking over 200 pictures was a tedious one. We moved the scene millimeters each time we took a photo. I have a new appreciation for people who make longer stop motion videos and full length films. Moving a scene millimeters at a time for days, weeks or years has got to be an act of passion. But I will say that dropping our photos into movie maker and seeing the scene actually move was very rewarding!

The Blue Bot Group

Our stop motion animation short idea is about a robot going fishing. It evolved from a 3-D printed blue robot. I found a free 3-D printer plan on a site called Pinshape. The creator of the articulated robot, Tony D of commandodesigns.com, only asks for credit to use his design. My husband printed the robot for us and as a group Averill, Shannon and I drew up a story board for our movie short. Our Robot, out to become more human, decides to go fishing. He pushes his small row boat into the water and climbs in with his fishing pole. As he travels down the river he begins to realize how difficult a task this is. He becomes bored and frustrated. Then he catches a huge fish, only to fall overboard trying to pull it in. He swims over to an island where he climbs out and finally does catch a fish to cook over his fire. We are planning to shoot in black and white to highlight the modern robot learning an ancient human task of fishing to provide food.

A few more links to stop motion videos...

Stop motion shorts for inspiration:

An oldie but goodie: Marcel the Shell with Shoes On

https://youtu.be/VF9-sEbqDvU

Game Over

https://youtu.be/Ovvk7T8QUIU

Stop Motion Animation Examples

Here are a few examples of stop motion animation that I enjoyed. I particularly like the t-shirt wars- Fun!

Best post-it note stop motion animation:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=-ZtxHOfmhH4

Walking in bed animation:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=C3Ue1AXSzyw

T-Shirt Wars:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=DKWdSCt4jGE

Using Text in Photoshop

This photograph of an icy puddle was taken on the Notch Road in Jeffersonville, VT. I cropped the image and added the text with a drop shadow to highlight the words. I really like the reflection of the tree branches offset with the frozen dog tracks. 

Photoshop Before and After Photos

This assignment was to use several features of Photoshop to edit pictures and post the before and after photos.

I combined the two photos above using layers and layer masks. I blended them using a radial gradient and then blended around the gymnast to make it look like she is flipping through the sky. Here is the composite photo.

I tried another composite photo with a more natural feel. Here are the two photos.

And the blended photo...

In these photos I worked with the curves to adjust the shadows and colors.

Before...

After...

The Same Subject in Different Light

We were asked to take photographs of the same subject in different lights. I took several in the morning light coming into our porch. The sun was behind the subject and most of the pictures came out too dark. When I used the flash it washed out her face and made the image flat.

These were both shot at 500 ISO 1/80 f/8. On a cloudy morning.

Later in the day the sun came out, so I tried several shots from different angles with the light.

The first image is the subject facing the sun. Besides squinting a lot, the light also makes her look washed out and gives a flattened appearance to the photo. There are harsh shadows on the left side of her face. This type of lighting makes the photo seem harsher. The photo on the right was taken with the sun to her right and behind with a bit of shadow from the building. The photo has more dimension  and an overall softer feeling. 

I love the light in this shot. The sun was behind her and gave her face the dimension and highlights for a softer look and defined features without harsh shadows. The only issue is the circle, I don't know why that happened. These photos were all taken at 400 ISO 1/400 f/8.

Here are a few more shots where I had her wear a hat. Adding something else that gives off shadows is another challenge. I think that adding some fill light might have illuminated under the brim of the hat and lifted the shadows.