Installation Art

We've been taught this about 2 weeks ago, and somehow I forgot to update about that here. Oops.

Installation art is basically using various materials to create a work of art that can be seen all around (360 degrees). It can vary from wall art to sculptures - although I think installation art is more than just a sculpture, like the Thinker:

Figure 1: The Thinker. Legion of Honor (2013)

To put it in easier terms:

Figure 2: A simplified depiction of what installation art is about. Although I'm not quite sure if anyone can actually understand that. Personal collection.

My concept involves a Chinese dragon. Dragons in Chinese culture signify power, wisdom, prosperity and protection, and even when I'm not exactly any of these things, I think this symbol empowers me greatly, as a person, a woman, and as a student. Coupled together with roses (a yellow rose signifies more than just 'friendship growing to love'  - it also signifies intelligence) and lotuses (it signifies purity - lotuses grow to be beautiful even though they emerge from mud), these symbols provide a good representation of who I am.

This is how my initial sketch looks like:

And this is how it looks like refined:

Obviously this is not, in any way, the final outcome of the installation art as I might do plenty of changes.

Bibliography:

Whats-Your-Sign.com, 2005. Life is symbolic, start interpreting. Available at: http://www.whats-your-sign.com/ [Accessed 31 May 2013]

Learning Outcomes for Graphic Design 1 and how it Relates to Installation Art

This time, I'm to see how the learning outcomes for Graphic Design 1 applies into my current project. It isn't an easy task to do, but as I work on my project, I should be able to achieve the following:

1. Be able to develop and process creative ideas from initial sketches through to
finished printed resolutions.

This will involve how my workflow goes from initial sketches all the way to the final result (the installation art that has been created)

2. Demonstrate imaginative and creative responses to given projects.

As this project details about how we see ourselves, the possibilities for how I can present myself is endless. It depends on what I use and what concepts I employ in this project in order to create the final product.


3. Be able to undertake visual research to support their ideas.

My ideas involve quite a bit of research, considering one object can represent entirely different things depending on the culture and society. For instance:

The color red may signify good luck in Chinese culture, and can denote passion and energy - but in South Africa, this is the color of mourning (Color Wheel Artist, 2008)

This is how visual research helps in giving my ideas more substance.

4. Recognise how their practices are pertinent to a wider cultural context.

The usage of symbols can mean wholly different things to people of different cultures, therefore this outcome applies greatly (if not completely) to my project. I need to be able to recognize that one object may give different meanings to people with different cultural backgrounds (going back to the color red example, if my work is completely red, a Chinese may think of prosperity, while to a South African it might give an impression that I'm mourning for the loss of something - or someone) and apply that in my project.


8. Work within a given time frame.

There is, of course, a deadline to this project, which I must meet. Therefore I should plan ahead and work constantly on the project so that I can finish it in time.

Bibliography

Color Wheel Artist, 2008. The meanings of red in various cultures. Available at: http://www.color-wheel-artist.com/meanings-of-red.html [accessed 31 May 2013]

Study Skills - Preparing a Proposal for Installation Art

For our installation art, we are required to prepare a proposal for it. This is covered in our Study Skills class, in which the tutor personally guides us on how to prepare a proposal. 

A proposal's structure looks like this:

• Introduction
• Objective
• Problem statement
• Idea development
• Methodology
• Outcomes
• Conclusion
• References

The tutor instructs us to prepare a rough draft on our proposal, from the introduction to the methodology, then we were to discuss about it in today's class. 

This is how the rough draft of my proposal looked like, initially:

Introduction 

Since time immemorial people have been turning to nature for signs and symbols; using an object to represent a quality or trait. They turn to these signs as guidance on what they should do in life, or to celebrate a coming of age, or in rituals. 

The idea is to choose which of these signs, whether it is one sign as a whole or a combination of different symbols, and use them to represent the self. The combination of these symbols that can help give one a sense of self and get to know them more, by choosing symbols that best describe them, can be united as one. 

It is to be presented using a combination of a papier mache sculpture 3D stained glass. 

Objective

The objectives of this project is to better understand the self and project that to others who would be viewing the finished project. It is also a way to explore how people perceive signs from a cultural, religious and social context. 

Problem statement

Signs have been used to convey meaning and understanding as well as a guidance for various cultures since the beginning, whether for religious rituals or philosophy. 

Idea development 

Currently there are little books about signs, so I am currently reading up on symbols on websites. These websites offer vast information on symbols according to religious, societal and cultural context.

For my installation art, I have chosen to work with papier mache and stained glass (or at least an alternative of it) to create a combination of a 3D sculpture of a Chinese dragon and flowers. For the introduction, I should add more detail on the concept I am working on, as well as a little bit about what installation art is and how I can combine my desired subject matter (in this case, symbols) with my concept.

The objective needs to include a brief description of what I referred to as part of my initial research (research), an analysis of how I can combine what I learned from my research together with my concept in order to create an installation art (analysis), and how I can apply this to the final installation (outcome). This is not included in my initial draft, and I needed to amend it.

For the problem statement, I should only include a few lines of what problems may occur that brought me to create my work - in this case, the problem is to adopt symbols into creating a work that describes myself, putting into consideration cultural and societal contexts, as one symbol can mean different things depending on the culture.

Ideas and development includes initial sketches and ideas on the work, working upwards to create the final sketches. So far I've only done just a few sketches, but I'll be adding more as I refine my ideas.

Figure 1: The initial idea

Figure 2: More sketches and explanations on various symbols to be used in the installation art.

Figure 3: A few studies of flowers

Figure 4: Study of Chinese dragon heads

More needs to be refined and added to this proposal, which will come soon. There are still quite a few more things I need to research on, such as alternatives to stained glass and tutorials on how to create papier mache sculptures. 

The Animator's Survival Kit - Chapter 1 Summary

The first chapter of Richard Williams' "The Animator's Survival Kit" is pretty much a brief history of how animation came to be. Since ancient times, people have been depicting movement in their drawings and work of art - it was only matter of actually making these drawings move, like we've done today.

Depicting movement in drawings have been done since ancient times - from cave paintings to Grecian urns - these drawings depict movement in a sequential order which suggests movement.

Figure I - example of a cave painting. Animal Cults of the Ancient People, 2012.

There have been attempts on animating since then. Athonasius Kircher's 'Magic Lantern' comes to mind - created in 1640 it was the first attempt at projecting images to a wall. What Kircher did was hang glass shards with drawings on them on a device, and by moving strings from above, the images began to move.

It was only in 1824, however, that Peter Mark Roget introduced the theory of persistence of vision - that our eyes temporarily keep an image of anything we've just seen. This a basis for animation - a series of still images that move when they are projected in a sequence.

From Roget's theory, many inventions were created, such as the thaumatrope and the zoetrope. These toys rely on the illusion of movement to project moving images.

In 1914 Winsor McCay, who was already famous for his work on Little Nemo in Slumberland and known for using animation as a form of art, created Gertie the Dinosaur, an interactive animation which he also starred in person, captivating the audience on how engaging the character was in the film.

From then on, animation began to slowly expand, beginning from the silent cartoons of Felix the Cat to Disney's Steamboat Willie in 1928. Then Disney went on to create Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, the first full animated feature, which brought animation into the Golden Age, spearheaded by Disney.

After the second World War and the rise of television, animation began to grow cruder and simpler, allowing for animation production houses to produce more. The 'old way' of making animation was then largely forgotten in favor of quantity rather than quality, but today what has been applied in the golden age was beginning to resurface today.

It is important to understand how animation came to be at this point - it's essential to know how people did it and how it came to be, and why animation has become such a widely-known form of entertainment as well as a work of art today.

The Elements and Principles of Design

The elements and principles of design are essential ‘tools’ that are used to create a visual design or a work of art, allowing for the message to be communicated to the intended audience through visual stimuli. Both go hand in hand in creating a work of art or design, and good usage of both allows for the underlying message in a work to be conveyed effectively to viewers.

Lines are marks connecting two points to suggest movement and rhythm. It can either suggest form, used to divide space, or direct the eye. Lines come in various forms such as zigzags, straight lines, or curved lines. Lines could be either expressed outright or implied through the usage of other elements.

Shapes can be found everywhere – from logos to typography, and they are essential in design; they can be used to create patterns, layouts, or define forms. Shapes are an area created by boundaries that define its outer edges. Shapes can be either geometric or organic, 2D or 3D. When used together with size (another element of design), they create an illusion of space and direction.

Color and tone are two other elements of design. They go hand-in-hand to establish the illusion of form in a design, as well as create a contrast, emphasis, or harmony to a single design. Colors begin from the three primary colors blue, yellow and red, and other colors can be created from mixing any two of the colors together – for instance, blue mixed with red will form the color purple. Tone, or value, on the other hand, refers to the relative lightness or darkness in a color, and this helps to establish form or space in a design.

Texture refers to the tangible quality of an object – things we can feel through touch. Textures can be smooth or rough, hard or soft. It creates a sense of realism in a design, as well as give it a more tactile feel to it.

The above elements go together with the principles of design in order to create a good visual design. One of these principles is balance. Balance refers to the visual equilibrium in a design, and can be either symmetrical or asymmetrical. The eye is pleased with a balanced composition; and a lack of balance can disrupt the communication between the viewer and the design itself.

Another principle of design is proportion. This refers to the variation in size and scale of different elements in a design. This can be used to establish an emphasis or contrast, as well as create a sense of balance.

Repetition is the usage of patterning to achieve a visual ‘beat’, they can be either uniform or varied, which gives the design a sense of rhythm. Emphasis and contrast are two more principles of design that go hand in hand; emphasis is the interruption of an element in a design, and contrast refers to the arrangement of different elements.

Finally, the usage of unity and harmony is also important. Harmony refers to a combination of similar elements creating a visually pleasing combination, while unity is the combination of various elements and principles in order to create the overall design; in other words, it is a summarization of all elements and principles of design.

Bibliography

Charlotte Jirousek. 1995. Introduction to the Elements of Design. [ONLINE] Available at: http://char.txa.cornell.edu/language/element/element.htm. [Accessed 20 May 13].

Eric Miller. 2013. The Elements of Design. [ONLINE] Available at: http://graphicdesign.about.com/od/elementsofgooddesign/tp/elements.htm. [Accessed 20 May 13].

The Learning Outcomes for Graphic Design 1

Each course and modules have their own learning outcomes - something like a 'goal' for what to achieve. For Graphic Design 1, the learning outcomes are as follows:

1. Be able to develop and process creative ideas from initial sketches through to
finished printed resolutions.
This simply means that by the end of the module, I'd be able to be creative in my work; from the beginning all the way to the end process.

2. Demonstrate imaginative and creative responses to given projects.
For this module, I'm required to be imaginative and creative. The classes aim to help me in honing those skills and demonstrating them in my work.


3. Be able to undertake visual research to support their ideas.
My work needs research from time to time, and my research would help me in being able to better explain and visualize my ideas.

4. Recognise how their practices are pertinent to a wider cultural context.
It's essential that my work can be understood by people from various cultural backgrounds, even if my work conforms to my own culture - when people from other cultures can understand my work, the message I want to convey would be easy for them to grasp.

5. Be able to work safely and competently within a range of Graphic Design techniques
and practices.
This quite speaks for itself - safety first at all times. I might be required to handle materials or tools I probably have never even seen before in my work, and therefore safety (and knowing how to use them) are important.

6. Develop the use of these techniques within their own areas of study and interests.
My area of interest is animation, and through learning from this module, I'll be able to apply them in my animation classes too.

7. Work safely in studios and workshops with a knowledge and practical understanding of health and safety issues.
This is pretty much the same thing as point 5, but this stresses on safety most of all.


8. Work within a given time frame.
This module will have deadlines and I'm expected to meet them.

9. Contribute to group activities, i.e. seminars, critiques etc.
The module requires me to speak up and talk about topics relevant to the class, and be able to give critiques where needed.

Yesterday's class helped me in understanding what's required of me:

This is a 10-second drawing of a student. The goal was to complete the drawing in 10 seconds. 

A drawing of the same student, but this time in 30 seconds.

A 1-minute drawing. We're required to draw all 4 students in the class.

A drawing done with my eyes closed. It yielded a very....interesting result.

Contour drawing. This one is done as a response to what I 'feel' about a given piece of music being played as I drew this. 

For the time-limit drawings, I focused mostly on details that stand out rather than attempt to get everything in at once, which is the same thing I did for the blind drawing. 

So for this exercise, I learned (and hopefully achieved) the following outcomes:

1. Demonstrate an imaginative response

2. Work in a given time frame

This is a really fun exercise to do and I've learned a lot of new things and got quite a lot of interesting results. I need to practise more on not seeing things the way they are, but find another way of seeing things. It certainly helps me a lot with my creativity.