Chapter 7: Advertising, Consumer Cultures, and Desire
We are constantly surrounded by advertisements—so much so that we don’t even realize them all of the time and we become desensitized to them, forcing advertisers to be on a constant search for new techniques that will capture and hold our attention. Ads make promises to consumers (whether or not they can keep them) and present an “abstract world” that does not necessarily line up with reality. Some ads disguise themselves as more than ads—some as art, entertainment, or “culture jams.” Consumerism is something that is deeply ingrained in our present society much as capitalism is in this country. Capitalism functions when people consume large amounts of goods beyond what they need to survive. Mobility was an important part of the spread of capitalism, because it allowed urban populations to grow and become more concentrated. Because of mobility becoming more important in consumerism, the city streets became “forums for advertising.”
Part of consumer societies is the idea that some of one’s self-image is constructed through their purchases and through their use of commodities, which are said to fill the void of a closer-knit community and give meaning. “The idea that consumer products will offer self-fulfillment is crucial to marketing and consumption.”
When arcades became popular, people changed their idea of “shopping” from a mere necessity to a pleasurable experience and even as a form of entertainment. Arcades became places not only to shop, but to walk around and look at beautiful buildings and artworks.
Anne Friedberg wrote that an increased “mobility of vision” was displayed in the interest of 19th century panoramas, dioramas, and the emergence of photography, and later, motion picture film.
The automobile became a symbol of “individualism, freedom, and conspicuous consumption” and people began to see that embracing these ideas as part of a “broader social engagement with consumption as a kind of civic duty.” The paradox that lies within using commodities to fill emotional needs lies in the fact that people generally think they will be happier if they consume more goods, but this is not the case.
Advertisers seek to create consumer relationship to brands so that brands become necessary, familiar, comforting, and “loveable.” Advertisements establish relationships between the product (signifier) and the meaning (signified) to sell products and also the connotations associated with those products. To promote ethnic awareness and political correctness, many advertisements now use models from several different ethnic backgrounds.
Marxist theory doesn’t exactly extend to today’s advertisements and the idea of contemporary consumerism because Marx did not foresee the complexity that the system has taken on today. Consumers today are increasingly interested in where their goods are produced. Issues like fair trade and worker conditions are becoming the focus of more business practices for the general public.
Pop art was an “attack on distinctions between high and low culture.” People who produced pop art took things from television, comic books, advertisements, symbols, and brands, to make “high art.” Andy Warhol was famous for this—especially for his artwork employing the image of a Campbell’s soup cans.
Establishing a brand is something that advertisers and companies strive for. However, a company can be too successful at this, and the brand name ceases to refer only to the brand but encompasses the whole kind of product—Kleenex for tissues, Xerox for making copies, Coke for any soft drink. This is known as genericide.
Guerrilla advertisements seemed very strange to me. The idea that a company or business would hire someone to act like a person not working for that company or business—say, to act like a tourist and praise the features of the camera they are using—seemed slightly bizarre and even a bit unsettling. Also, advertisers and companies are finding ways to advertise by tapping into social networks like Facebook and MySpace. I’ve even noticed recently that ads pop up in the middle of YouTube videos.
Overall, in “late consumerism, the boundary between the mainstream and the margins is always in the process of being renegotiated.”
Thursday, February 26, 2009
Monday, February 23, 2009
Chapter Six
Chapter 6: Media in Everyday Life
In the 19th century, the term “the masses” arose in order to describe the structure and changes in societies that were undergoing industrializations and the rapid growth of a working class. Because this group of working class people was so large, the they were seen as having influence on the opinions of a society and on societal practices. Karl Marx used the concept of the masses to explain how the working class fit into industrial capitalism. Sometimes, this term is met with a pejorative connotation. The negative connotation comes from the idea of seeing the “masses” as an undifferentiated group of people who are basically sheep who passively accept what they are told by the media and who can be easily manipulated.
A criticism that arose in the 20th century in respect to the idea of the masses was that the sense of community and belonging diminished with the rise of urban populations and a more homogenous and isolated worldview. There was also the criticism that there was a decline in family and community life due to urban sprawl and suburban life.
The term “mass media” has existed since the 1920s and is used to describe the forms of media that reach large audiences with shared interests. In the 20th century, most forms of mass communication were visual, with some exceptions such as radio, and with the rise of electronic and digital media consumers of media devices such as computers, cell phones, the Internet, are likely to view themselves not only as consumer but also as partial producers in information and media.
Before the radio, when literacy rates were also low, only an educated minority could read and write, and, therefore, they controlled the exchange of information beyond the level of word of mouth. As literacy rates rose and new forms of media arose that did not involve reading, this began to change more and more.
When we talk about the “media” we usually refer to a plural for of medium but also to a unified and singular group of ideas and messages. The different forms of media used to convey a message can heavily influence how that message is received by an audience.
When looking at how our society judges the media, we can look at how they gather their information about news and politics. According to the book: “We might consider news parodies to be more reliable sources because their biases are explicit, and there is no pretense of neutrality.” I know that I’ve read statistics before that say a surprising number of young adults use parody news shows (such as the Daily Show and the Colbert Report on Comedy Central) as their only or major source of news and political information. While I think that sometimes major news networks can be biased towards the news they portray, I’m not sure that I would go so far as to say that parodies of the news are any less biased because of their supposed neutrality. To solve the problem of biased news, I suppose that my suggestion would be to check several different sources for news and information, rather than just relying on one source, let alone a parody of other sources.
There is an interesting idea that mass broadcasting fosters “conformity to dominant ideas about politics and culture,” which I would agree with in a sense. Rather than conforming to one dominant idea, I think that mass media leads to the polarization of ideas, where the middle ground is less populated than ideological extremes on either end of a spectrum. People tend to listen to others who share their ideas while sometimes neglecting the views of others. And there are different methods of mass media that appeal to different groups of people, therefore, polarizing their ideas even further.
“Public” can be defined in several ways, but as the term applies to media, is refers to the space of discourse where people can exercise personal and impersonal public speech in a social situation that allows for the “circulation and exchange of ideas.” This public space can be a physical space, a social setting, or a media arena—any “place” where people can come together to discuss the “pressing issues of their society.”
The idea of the traditional networks and news organizations—such as the BBC and CNN—being displaced and encountering competition for worldwide audiences from relatively new and influential news networks from the Middle East and Latin America is a very interesting scenario. In the coming years we will no doubt be able to see the continued effects that these new and different news powerhouses will have on global opinion and differing worldviews.
In the 19th century, the term “the masses” arose in order to describe the structure and changes in societies that were undergoing industrializations and the rapid growth of a working class. Because this group of working class people was so large, the they were seen as having influence on the opinions of a society and on societal practices. Karl Marx used the concept of the masses to explain how the working class fit into industrial capitalism. Sometimes, this term is met with a pejorative connotation. The negative connotation comes from the idea of seeing the “masses” as an undifferentiated group of people who are basically sheep who passively accept what they are told by the media and who can be easily manipulated.
A criticism that arose in the 20th century in respect to the idea of the masses was that the sense of community and belonging diminished with the rise of urban populations and a more homogenous and isolated worldview. There was also the criticism that there was a decline in family and community life due to urban sprawl and suburban life.
The term “mass media” has existed since the 1920s and is used to describe the forms of media that reach large audiences with shared interests. In the 20th century, most forms of mass communication were visual, with some exceptions such as radio, and with the rise of electronic and digital media consumers of media devices such as computers, cell phones, the Internet, are likely to view themselves not only as consumer but also as partial producers in information and media.
Before the radio, when literacy rates were also low, only an educated minority could read and write, and, therefore, they controlled the exchange of information beyond the level of word of mouth. As literacy rates rose and new forms of media arose that did not involve reading, this began to change more and more.
When we talk about the “media” we usually refer to a plural for of medium but also to a unified and singular group of ideas and messages. The different forms of media used to convey a message can heavily influence how that message is received by an audience.
When looking at how our society judges the media, we can look at how they gather their information about news and politics. According to the book: “We might consider news parodies to be more reliable sources because their biases are explicit, and there is no pretense of neutrality.” I know that I’ve read statistics before that say a surprising number of young adults use parody news shows (such as the Daily Show and the Colbert Report on Comedy Central) as their only or major source of news and political information. While I think that sometimes major news networks can be biased towards the news they portray, I’m not sure that I would go so far as to say that parodies of the news are any less biased because of their supposed neutrality. To solve the problem of biased news, I suppose that my suggestion would be to check several different sources for news and information, rather than just relying on one source, let alone a parody of other sources.
There is an interesting idea that mass broadcasting fosters “conformity to dominant ideas about politics and culture,” which I would agree with in a sense. Rather than conforming to one dominant idea, I think that mass media leads to the polarization of ideas, where the middle ground is less populated than ideological extremes on either end of a spectrum. People tend to listen to others who share their ideas while sometimes neglecting the views of others. And there are different methods of mass media that appeal to different groups of people, therefore, polarizing their ideas even further.
“Public” can be defined in several ways, but as the term applies to media, is refers to the space of discourse where people can exercise personal and impersonal public speech in a social situation that allows for the “circulation and exchange of ideas.” This public space can be a physical space, a social setting, or a media arena—any “place” where people can come together to discuss the “pressing issues of their society.”
The idea of the traditional networks and news organizations—such as the BBC and CNN—being displaced and encountering competition for worldwide audiences from relatively new and influential news networks from the Middle East and Latin America is a very interesting scenario. In the coming years we will no doubt be able to see the continued effects that these new and different news powerhouses will have on global opinion and differing worldviews.
Thursday, February 19, 2009
Second Life House
Although when I first started tinkering with building things in class I had a good bit of trouble, when I went home and started messing around with all of the features, I found that I had a lot less trouble getting things to work the way I wanted them to work.
I must say that I enjoyed this assignment more than the assignment on making clothes. This could, however, possibly be attributed to the fact that I've never been terribly interested in clothes.
I made my little hut a round shaped room with a dome top. I've always liked rounded shapes more than rigid, square or rectangular shapes. The outside of the walls (wall?) is a blue tile, and the inside is a light blue wallpaper. I made the floor the texture of beach sand. It's not the most traditional flooring, but I miss living at the beach, and I figured I could make the floor whatever I wanted to since this is a virtual world (and a virtually sandy floor would only make things virtually dirty). The dome of the hut is probably my favorite part - it's translucent and shaded white so it's like clouded glass. I like a lot of natural sunlight in buildings, so I figured that a cloudy glass roof would allow for plenty of that.
Sunday, February 8, 2009
Chapter Five
Chapter 5: Visual Technologies, Image Reproduction, and the Copy
Technology has made is somewhat easier to reproduce images. Drawings and paintings dominated thousands of years of visual reproduction, but new technologies such as photography have opened up more options for those wishing to recreate or capture an image.
Technology develops in strides but also gradually sometimes. I think it’s really interesting to see how some technologies are used decades later for things you couldn’t have imagined earlier—such as the military technology that morphed into the Internet. Some technologies, such as cell phones, have grown so dramatically over the last decade that I have a hard time seeing how they will develop further until they come out with some feature that at first seems totally superfluous and then becomes standard.
Motion and sequence photography are two of the most drastic advancements in image reproduction. The techniques used in motion picture film and sequential photography opened up many more opportunities for photographic uses, such as studying movement through time-lapsed photography and making films with motion pictures. Sequential photography allowed for studying movement that was too fast for the naked eye to take in and observe.
The idea of a kinescope—a device in which only one person at a time could view a moving picture—seems very strange to us, or at least to me, today. In a way it reminds me of those big binocular things at different tourist spots where you insert coins and then get to look through at a landscape more closely, or those toys where you have a round disk-like card with little pictures on it and you put it into the plastic viewer and scroll through the pictures (I cannot for the life of me remember what these are called).
It’s interesting to think about what could have happened to motion photography if the technology allowing people to view it had not coincided with the technology to produce the motion picture film. However, I can’t really believe that there would have been too much of a gap between these inventions, because throughout history, if there has been a need for an invention, it usually doesn’t take too long for someone to come up with a solution.
It is interesting to note that throughout history, even though copies and the tendency to copy images has existed, the value of an original, uncopied image is usually always more valuable than the copy. This is evidenced today in many ways, such as an original painting by a famous artist selling for millions and millions of dollars, while reproductions are worth relatively little. Today, “hand painted” items are usually always going to be more costly than items that are not original or painted by hand.
I found the idea that “authenticity” has come to mean something that is “timeless” or “classic” instead of something unique or original to be interesting and seemingly contradictory at first. Although, I can’t help but admit that this is true especially in advertising today, where mass-produced items are deemed “authentic.”
The section talking about how some works are so universally reproduced, such as the Mona Lisa, made me think of how many times I have seen that image copied and reproduced. One of my favorite instances is in one of my favorite movies—Elf—where the main character uses and Etch-A-Sketch to draw the picture and hangs it on a Christmas tree. The joke implies that most people will understand that this particular image has been reproduced so many times that we are almost desensitized to its beauty.
Whoever owns a copyright literally has the right to copy that image. Today, copyright laws are so important to artists, writers, and in many other areas because some people make a living from the images, writings, music they have created.
The copyright section was interesting to me, as a amateur photographer. I participate in photography as a hobby now, but one day hope to learn enough and develop my skills and craft enough to do something with it (and as I’ve been put in charge of the wedding photography for my cousin’s wedding this March, it’s a goal that doesn’t seem as unattainable as it once did). Since I’ve made a transition from film to digital photography, I have always been apprehensive about putting my pictures on the Internet, since I have no way to keep people from using the images for their own purposes. I put the pictures on the Internet in the first place to show them to people I would like to see them, and it’s the easiest and most accessible way to do that, especially when communicating with people hundreds of miles away. But at the same time, there’s nothing to stop anyone from right-clicking and saving the images to their computer. Sure, the images won’t be high resolution at all, but the idea is still there, and it’s a bit of an unsettling thing to think about.
Technology has made is somewhat easier to reproduce images. Drawings and paintings dominated thousands of years of visual reproduction, but new technologies such as photography have opened up more options for those wishing to recreate or capture an image.
Technology develops in strides but also gradually sometimes. I think it’s really interesting to see how some technologies are used decades later for things you couldn’t have imagined earlier—such as the military technology that morphed into the Internet. Some technologies, such as cell phones, have grown so dramatically over the last decade that I have a hard time seeing how they will develop further until they come out with some feature that at first seems totally superfluous and then becomes standard.
Motion and sequence photography are two of the most drastic advancements in image reproduction. The techniques used in motion picture film and sequential photography opened up many more opportunities for photographic uses, such as studying movement through time-lapsed photography and making films with motion pictures. Sequential photography allowed for studying movement that was too fast for the naked eye to take in and observe.
The idea of a kinescope—a device in which only one person at a time could view a moving picture—seems very strange to us, or at least to me, today. In a way it reminds me of those big binocular things at different tourist spots where you insert coins and then get to look through at a landscape more closely, or those toys where you have a round disk-like card with little pictures on it and you put it into the plastic viewer and scroll through the pictures (I cannot for the life of me remember what these are called).
It’s interesting to think about what could have happened to motion photography if the technology allowing people to view it had not coincided with the technology to produce the motion picture film. However, I can’t really believe that there would have been too much of a gap between these inventions, because throughout history, if there has been a need for an invention, it usually doesn’t take too long for someone to come up with a solution.
It is interesting to note that throughout history, even though copies and the tendency to copy images has existed, the value of an original, uncopied image is usually always more valuable than the copy. This is evidenced today in many ways, such as an original painting by a famous artist selling for millions and millions of dollars, while reproductions are worth relatively little. Today, “hand painted” items are usually always going to be more costly than items that are not original or painted by hand.
I found the idea that “authenticity” has come to mean something that is “timeless” or “classic” instead of something unique or original to be interesting and seemingly contradictory at first. Although, I can’t help but admit that this is true especially in advertising today, where mass-produced items are deemed “authentic.”
The section talking about how some works are so universally reproduced, such as the Mona Lisa, made me think of how many times I have seen that image copied and reproduced. One of my favorite instances is in one of my favorite movies—Elf—where the main character uses and Etch-A-Sketch to draw the picture and hangs it on a Christmas tree. The joke implies that most people will understand that this particular image has been reproduced so many times that we are almost desensitized to its beauty.
Whoever owns a copyright literally has the right to copy that image. Today, copyright laws are so important to artists, writers, and in many other areas because some people make a living from the images, writings, music they have created.
The copyright section was interesting to me, as a amateur photographer. I participate in photography as a hobby now, but one day hope to learn enough and develop my skills and craft enough to do something with it (and as I’ve been put in charge of the wedding photography for my cousin’s wedding this March, it’s a goal that doesn’t seem as unattainable as it once did). Since I’ve made a transition from film to digital photography, I have always been apprehensive about putting my pictures on the Internet, since I have no way to keep people from using the images for their own purposes. I put the pictures on the Internet in the first place to show them to people I would like to see them, and it’s the easiest and most accessible way to do that, especially when communicating with people hundreds of miles away. But at the same time, there’s nothing to stop anyone from right-clicking and saving the images to their computer. Sure, the images won’t be high resolution at all, but the idea is still there, and it’s a bit of an unsettling thing to think about.
Wednesday, February 4, 2009
Paper Proposal
Paper Proposal
Photography in the 1930s: The Great Depression Through the Camera Lens
Problem Statement
The issue that I would like to explore in my paper this semester is the use of photography in the 1930s to capture the spirit and emotions of the Great Depression. During the 1930s, photography as a medium of journalism, artistic expression, and archiving changed dramatically with the attitudes and outlook that accompanied the Great Depression and coincided with the continual rise of Modernism in areas such as literature, film, and art.
It is difficult to determine if this change and progression in the field of photography was a result of the attitudes of the Great Depression or if the photography that began to infiltrate the media perpetuated and enhanced the emotions that were expressed and experienced during this difficult and trying decade. New technological advancements during this time period also contributed to the ability for photographers to practice their craft in innovative and ground-breaking ways. The cause and effect of the innovations in taking photographs on the kinds of images that were captured in this decade is also an interesting situation to investigate.
Current Situation
Photography during the 1930s and the era of the Great Depression underwent a transition as a medium for stiff portraits to a means of capturing the emotions of the people in the photographs. Photographic journalism experienced a surge, but people also began to realize the potential for photographs to evoke emotions in their intended audience. It was at this time that photography began to become a way for people to raise awareness about certain issues—it began to have a role in certain branches of activism.
Some of the more modern ideas that we associate with photography originated during this time period. The practice of seeing photography as more of an art form as opposed to an objective and almost scientific application was greatly explored during this decade. As a new medium, photography had assumed an identity as an objective medium—at least more objective than more easily-manipulated and interpretable fields such as painting and drawing. As people began using photography as a way to draw emotions out of viewers, this view of photography as an objective medium slowly began to disappear. People became slightly more aware that photography could be used to different things, such as emotional manipulation and even propaganda. Despite this slight change in perspective, most people would consider a photograph to be more objective than any other medium—a belief that exists even today, despite the invention of image manipulating software.
Solving the Problem
There are certain iconic photographs that emerged from the 1930s, and I intend to take a closer look at these images and discuss their impact on society during this time as well as the field of photography as a whole. The different styles that emerged during this time period are also important in discussing the issue of how photography continued to evolve and develop and must also be discussed throughout the paper.
It is impossible to discuss photography and the leaps that the art form made in the 1930s without focusing on photographer Dorothea Lang, whose works have become iconic and a recognizable representation of the Great Depression. During her trip around the country and to California, she captured some of the most remarkable images from people living in the Great Depression. The impact of her photographs was so great that they are still centrally discussed and greatly relevant in conversations about modern photography today.
In investigating the photography of the 1930s, one must also mention Ansel Adams. His photography leading up to the 1930s and extending beyond that decade also helped to reshape the idea of photography as an art form and a means of promoting activism—in his case, the defense of nature and environmental preservation. He is still one of the most famous modern American photographers, and his style is easily recognizable. He has written many books about photography and is a well-respected authority, even posthumously. His landscape photographs and unusual compositions also helped to transition photography from the stiff portrait and business-like applications to an art and means of expression.
In addition to pioneering photographers and changes in style, the technological advancements must also be researched and explored in such a discussion. The rise of Modernism as a movement in American also impacted the kind of photographic revolution experienced in the 1930s. The attitudes that infiltrated the decade of the Depression were reflected in the arts, literature, film, photography, as well as in the mindset people carried with them in their daily lives, and the impact that these attitudes had on photography specifically is something that will have to be explored throughout this research paper.
Photography in the 1930s: The Great Depression Through the Camera Lens
Problem Statement
The issue that I would like to explore in my paper this semester is the use of photography in the 1930s to capture the spirit and emotions of the Great Depression. During the 1930s, photography as a medium of journalism, artistic expression, and archiving changed dramatically with the attitudes and outlook that accompanied the Great Depression and coincided with the continual rise of Modernism in areas such as literature, film, and art.
It is difficult to determine if this change and progression in the field of photography was a result of the attitudes of the Great Depression or if the photography that began to infiltrate the media perpetuated and enhanced the emotions that were expressed and experienced during this difficult and trying decade. New technological advancements during this time period also contributed to the ability for photographers to practice their craft in innovative and ground-breaking ways. The cause and effect of the innovations in taking photographs on the kinds of images that were captured in this decade is also an interesting situation to investigate.
Current Situation
Photography during the 1930s and the era of the Great Depression underwent a transition as a medium for stiff portraits to a means of capturing the emotions of the people in the photographs. Photographic journalism experienced a surge, but people also began to realize the potential for photographs to evoke emotions in their intended audience. It was at this time that photography began to become a way for people to raise awareness about certain issues—it began to have a role in certain branches of activism.
Some of the more modern ideas that we associate with photography originated during this time period. The practice of seeing photography as more of an art form as opposed to an objective and almost scientific application was greatly explored during this decade. As a new medium, photography had assumed an identity as an objective medium—at least more objective than more easily-manipulated and interpretable fields such as painting and drawing. As people began using photography as a way to draw emotions out of viewers, this view of photography as an objective medium slowly began to disappear. People became slightly more aware that photography could be used to different things, such as emotional manipulation and even propaganda. Despite this slight change in perspective, most people would consider a photograph to be more objective than any other medium—a belief that exists even today, despite the invention of image manipulating software.
Solving the Problem
There are certain iconic photographs that emerged from the 1930s, and I intend to take a closer look at these images and discuss their impact on society during this time as well as the field of photography as a whole. The different styles that emerged during this time period are also important in discussing the issue of how photography continued to evolve and develop and must also be discussed throughout the paper.
It is impossible to discuss photography and the leaps that the art form made in the 1930s without focusing on photographer Dorothea Lang, whose works have become iconic and a recognizable representation of the Great Depression. During her trip around the country and to California, she captured some of the most remarkable images from people living in the Great Depression. The impact of her photographs was so great that they are still centrally discussed and greatly relevant in conversations about modern photography today.
In investigating the photography of the 1930s, one must also mention Ansel Adams. His photography leading up to the 1930s and extending beyond that decade also helped to reshape the idea of photography as an art form and a means of promoting activism—in his case, the defense of nature and environmental preservation. He is still one of the most famous modern American photographers, and his style is easily recognizable. He has written many books about photography and is a well-respected authority, even posthumously. His landscape photographs and unusual compositions also helped to transition photography from the stiff portrait and business-like applications to an art and means of expression.
In addition to pioneering photographers and changes in style, the technological advancements must also be researched and explored in such a discussion. The rise of Modernism as a movement in American also impacted the kind of photographic revolution experienced in the 1930s. The attitudes that infiltrated the decade of the Depression were reflected in the arts, literature, film, photography, as well as in the mindset people carried with them in their daily lives, and the impact that these attitudes had on photography specifically is something that will have to be explored throughout this research paper.
Tuesday, February 3, 2009
Second Life Clothing
I played around with my outfit for a while before I decided on this:
I created a gray short sleeved undershirt (using some weird texture like basketweaving, but I can't really remember it now), and layered it with a free shirt I got, which I shortened and made into a half tank top sort of thing. I could have done this by making the shirt myself, but I thought the little design on the shirt was nice, and I didn't know how to reproduce something like that, having not learned how to create textures yet. Then I made a pair of Bermuda shorts (which look kind of like a pencil skirt at some angles which is cool), with a plaid material which is pretty subtle because they are such a dark color.
Monday, February 2, 2009
Chapter 4: Realism and Perspective
Realism and Perspective: From Renaissance Painting to Digital Media
“Realistic” images are not always what something “really” looks like—it is rather an interpretation of someone’s perception of that thing. Realism can and has been liked to different approaches and conventions over the years that are in turn linked to various political agendas. Realism in the visual arts has been seen as a goal for the artist to depict something as it would have been seen by the eye; however, the visual arts do not always try to produce a “realistic” looking image. During the Renaissance, painting changed as artists strived to produce images as they would have appeared to the eye of the observer rather than using art as merely symbolic productions. I was amazed to read that the emperor of China’s Chin dynasty was buried with 7,500 life-size clay warriors and horses that were individually shaped and uniquely made. That’s an incredible amount of time and effort, especially during 200 B.C.
Cubism is an abstract art style where planar shapes are used to represent nonlinear objects and are then shifted around space. The conventions of representation both in art and image making give rise to new worldviews.
-Visual Codes and Historical Meaning
Image codes and conventions reproduce historical meaning because they change over time, and the images created in the past therefore look different than images created today or in any other time period.
Sepia toning of photographic prints was common during the nineteenth century largely because the process made the photographs more resistant to decomposition over longer periods of time than regular, untreated black-and-white photographs produced at the same time. Because of this, we tend to associate sepia tones with older photographs. The portrait of Alice Liddell holds special meaning not only because the subject is the inspiration for the Alice in Wonderland story, but because her portrait is unusual for the time period, containing a natural background, a more relaxed pose, and softer edges. This is a reproduction of the early classical Renaissance artists before Raphael. Reproduction of a work’s style is a nostalgic remake which doesn’t necessarily reflect what is considered to be “realistic” during the time period of the reproduction.
-Questions on Realism
Aesthetics and people’s tastes change over time, and this is reflected in the art from different time periods. Realism best typifies the set of conventions or style or representation that is considered at a given historical moment to accurately represent nature or what is real. There isn’t a universal standard for realism; rather, this is something that varies between cultures and time periods. For instance, Josef Stalin mandated and return to a classical pictorial realism in the 1930s which became known as socialist realism. Because of this mandate, abstract art became very dangerous and artists who refused to abandon or change their work were sometimes exiled to Siberian work camps. There is an episteme for every period in history. An “episteme” is “an accepted, dominant mode of acquiring and organizing knowledge in a given period of history. Later epistemes are not inherently better or even more advanced than earlier ones.
-History of Perspective
“Perspective” comes from the Latin word perpicere which means “to see clearly,” “to inspect,” or “to look through,” and refers to the mechanisms used to produce images of objects in space.
-Perspective and the Body
In ancient Egypt, people of greater importance were represented in images as being larger than people of lesser social importance. Today we do not typically employ the same standard; however, this is a good representation of how images and their standards change between time and cultures.
-The Camera Obscura
The camera obscura served as an aid for artists and even scientists and mathematicians to visually recreate images as they appeared.
-Challenges to Perspective
The movement of Impressionism developed in the late nineteenth century and contained techniques that employed visible brushstrokes and unique depictions of light to represent movement in the recreated images. Cubism “deliberately challenged the dominant model of perspective through an analytic system that broke up the perspectival space of the conventional painterly style.” Cubism and surrealism spar with the dominant worldview for which perspective is the paradigm, which makes sense because realism has been the dominant worldview in Western societies for centuries. Abstraction’s purpose lies in emphasizing a perspective that is not a universal principle.
-Perspectives in Digital Media
Digital imaging presents new modes through which viewers experience varying perspectives about the virtual words that appear on computer screen, television screens, and other modes of depiction. John Haddock, for instance, recreates famous images by rendering them as if they were images in a video game and then making screenshots of them known as “isometric screenshots.” Virtual images are simulations which represent constructed or ideal images rather than actual conditions. They are most likely images but can also be applied to real-world objects such as pacemakers and hearing aids which act as simulators. Technology has allowed visual reality systems to become teaching aids to medical students in situations where the students would not otherwise be able to exam internal structures of the human body.
Talking Points:
1.) What would we consider “realism” today in our society and cultural frameworks?
2.) Compare figures 4.2, 4.6, and 4.20. Do you think perspectives go through cycles? How are these three images alike, yet come from very different time periods?
3.) How can virtual representations be used or seen as art? Are video games and the like the new medium through which artists will create?
4.) Have all the barriers of “art” been pushed so far that any new ideas of what “art” is seem contradictory to what we would normally consider art?
“Realistic” images are not always what something “really” looks like—it is rather an interpretation of someone’s perception of that thing. Realism can and has been liked to different approaches and conventions over the years that are in turn linked to various political agendas. Realism in the visual arts has been seen as a goal for the artist to depict something as it would have been seen by the eye; however, the visual arts do not always try to produce a “realistic” looking image. During the Renaissance, painting changed as artists strived to produce images as they would have appeared to the eye of the observer rather than using art as merely symbolic productions. I was amazed to read that the emperor of China’s Chin dynasty was buried with 7,500 life-size clay warriors and horses that were individually shaped and uniquely made. That’s an incredible amount of time and effort, especially during 200 B.C.
Cubism is an abstract art style where planar shapes are used to represent nonlinear objects and are then shifted around space. The conventions of representation both in art and image making give rise to new worldviews.
-Visual Codes and Historical Meaning
Image codes and conventions reproduce historical meaning because they change over time, and the images created in the past therefore look different than images created today or in any other time period.
Sepia toning of photographic prints was common during the nineteenth century largely because the process made the photographs more resistant to decomposition over longer periods of time than regular, untreated black-and-white photographs produced at the same time. Because of this, we tend to associate sepia tones with older photographs. The portrait of Alice Liddell holds special meaning not only because the subject is the inspiration for the Alice in Wonderland story, but because her portrait is unusual for the time period, containing a natural background, a more relaxed pose, and softer edges. This is a reproduction of the early classical Renaissance artists before Raphael. Reproduction of a work’s style is a nostalgic remake which doesn’t necessarily reflect what is considered to be “realistic” during the time period of the reproduction.
-Questions on Realism
Aesthetics and people’s tastes change over time, and this is reflected in the art from different time periods. Realism best typifies the set of conventions or style or representation that is considered at a given historical moment to accurately represent nature or what is real. There isn’t a universal standard for realism; rather, this is something that varies between cultures and time periods. For instance, Josef Stalin mandated and return to a classical pictorial realism in the 1930s which became known as socialist realism. Because of this mandate, abstract art became very dangerous and artists who refused to abandon or change their work were sometimes exiled to Siberian work camps. There is an episteme for every period in history. An “episteme” is “an accepted, dominant mode of acquiring and organizing knowledge in a given period of history. Later epistemes are not inherently better or even more advanced than earlier ones.
-History of Perspective
“Perspective” comes from the Latin word perpicere which means “to see clearly,” “to inspect,” or “to look through,” and refers to the mechanisms used to produce images of objects in space.
-Perspective and the Body
In ancient Egypt, people of greater importance were represented in images as being larger than people of lesser social importance. Today we do not typically employ the same standard; however, this is a good representation of how images and their standards change between time and cultures.
-The Camera Obscura
The camera obscura served as an aid for artists and even scientists and mathematicians to visually recreate images as they appeared.
-Challenges to Perspective
The movement of Impressionism developed in the late nineteenth century and contained techniques that employed visible brushstrokes and unique depictions of light to represent movement in the recreated images. Cubism “deliberately challenged the dominant model of perspective through an analytic system that broke up the perspectival space of the conventional painterly style.” Cubism and surrealism spar with the dominant worldview for which perspective is the paradigm, which makes sense because realism has been the dominant worldview in Western societies for centuries. Abstraction’s purpose lies in emphasizing a perspective that is not a universal principle.
-Perspectives in Digital Media
Digital imaging presents new modes through which viewers experience varying perspectives about the virtual words that appear on computer screen, television screens, and other modes of depiction. John Haddock, for instance, recreates famous images by rendering them as if they were images in a video game and then making screenshots of them known as “isometric screenshots.” Virtual images are simulations which represent constructed or ideal images rather than actual conditions. They are most likely images but can also be applied to real-world objects such as pacemakers and hearing aids which act as simulators. Technology has allowed visual reality systems to become teaching aids to medical students in situations where the students would not otherwise be able to exam internal structures of the human body.
Talking Points:
1.) What would we consider “realism” today in our society and cultural frameworks?
2.) Compare figures 4.2, 4.6, and 4.20. Do you think perspectives go through cycles? How are these three images alike, yet come from very different time periods?
3.) How can virtual representations be used or seen as art? Are video games and the like the new medium through which artists will create?
4.) Have all the barriers of “art” been pushed so far that any new ideas of what “art” is seem contradictory to what we would normally consider art?
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