Month: November 2015

-Part 1-

Kim Garza- I really enjoyed Kim’s presentation because she, like the other graphic design presenters, have shown me that there is a vast range of careers for graphic designers, something that puts my mind at ease when I think about what it is that I really want to do with my degree. I liked how she showed us the process of her projects, specifically her collaboration process with the Eventurist app. I look forward to having her as a professor.

Tammie Rubin- My sister is currently interested in ceramics (although she prefers clay to plastic), but I thought it was very interesting to hear Tammie’s process of creating her work and the purpose behind each piece of hers. I like how her art comes from more abstract connotations of words such as “chimera” and “nature”, and how she thinks of her art as 3D collage more than simply a piece of functional pottery.

James Scheuren- I enjoyed looking at James’s photos. You could clearly see the thought behind the work, the meaning behind each piece. I liked his initial statement that photos were indexes of what had already been. I always find images more appealing when they are spontaneous instead of staged, so I liked how that was James’s focus when he took the photos of the things that had just happened because of human interaction with objects.

-Part 2-

Overall I enjoyed this class. You guys were all funny, but you also had serious, important points that I enjoyed listening to and I feel that they helped put my mind at ease and made me feel more secure that my major, graphic design, really is what I want to be doing. If I had to give any critical feedback, I think the only feedback I could give is for Bill to not get sick again?? Haha.

Overall, I disliked the collage project because it’s simply something that I don’t think enough about. I don’t have the “abstract” mind that I feel is required for a successful collage. Thus, I went with what I knew, and that was a digital collage that had the feel of being its own image (something “magazine worthy” instead of “fine art worthy”, as was said during the critique).

I admired how abstract or well planned other collages looked, and it made me curious as to what their thought processes were for creating it. Instead of “thinking outside the box”, I confined myself to what I knew, and I think that was reflected in my collages. For me, I played it safe because I grew stubborn with physically cutting apart images that I was tired of anyway.

After hearing the critiques, I don’t think I really would have done anything differently. I don’t feel as though I would have been satisfied with any of the physical collages that I might have tried to do, so I still would have gone the digital route.

-Part 1-

Tuan: I enjoyed Tuan’s presentation, because some of the things he has done are similar to what I have done; specifically the use of his designs for “gift” art for family and friends. Several times my family members or close friends have approached me and asked me to conceptualy design a poster or a t-shirt for them. Only a handful of these have actually been put to use, but at least they serve as practice.

Hollis: I liked Hollis’ use of artwork to depict memories. Since my maternal grandfather’s passing and my maternal grandmother was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s, I’ve become more and more fascinated with memory and our emotional relationships to them, especially the polar opposites that are joy and grief. Having personally experienced these, and watched my mother experience them for her parents, there’s always a part of me nagging to express my comment on these emotions through my artwork.

Bill: I liked how Bill described the “pathway” of his career, and how there were high points and low points. I think about this often, and wonder what my own career will look like in future years with high points and low points of my own.

-Part 2-

Year 1: Find a long-term internship position that hopefully turns into a paid full-time job.
Year 2: Continue the internship or full-time job.
Year 3: Have a full-time job as a graphic designer, hopefully for advertising or book-cover design.
Year 4: Promotion within job, or seek a new job with higher pay?
Year 5: Have a high paying career as a professional designer. Preferably for book-cover or advertising.

My long term goal, as far as having a degree from college is concerned, is to have a long-term job that I love and where I can do what I love. In order to do this, I will have to be able to be flexible with my skills and improve them in any way that I can in order to “polish my resume” and be noticed for my work and what I am capable of as a prospective designer.

I found the video, The Way Things Go, to be very surprising in how well it was able to hold up for such a long time. Each action has a consequence on the next action, and yet they are all connected so well, and the precision and timing of each action that occurs is nearly flawless.

The chain reaction that is caused from the precise relationship of each object to the next is something that must have taken a very long time to perfect. Several variables must have gone into play, and they all had to connect in a way that could keep the chain going.

I especially liked how liquid chemicals and fire played such a large role in this. The one constant that seemed to recur throughout the reaction was that liquids could be counted on to go in a very specific direction and to carry a specific weight. As more liquid collided with the next object in the reaction, the pressure is what allowed the chain reaction to continue.

Gravity, though, probably had the largest role to play. Each action was connected through gravity, because each object’s weight could be counted on to have the same relationship to gravity over and over again, and this was critical to the entire chain reaction so that both cause and effect could take place.

Listening to David Blaine was stressful to me. I can’t imagine putting myself in the situations that he has been in. I kept asking myself how he could continue to do things like he did when most of his attempts were nearly fatal.

However, on a less perilous note, I can understand where he is coming from. The overarching themes of his presentation were sustainability and practice. To get to the point of holding his breath for 17 minutes, Blaine had to teach his mind and body to sustain his life for an extended period of time. Not only that, but to do so, he had to practice keeping his heart rate steady in a stressful environment.

Sustainability can go for pretty much anything. In my drawing class we have discussed how to sustain a drawing and an idea, and the same can be applied to projects in Visual Studies as well. Practicing sustainability is of course the easiest way to get there, to keep trying to reach that point where you know something has succeeded, or is finished.

I found this podcast to be very weird, but the topics discussed in the podcast are things that I’ve sometimes thought about, as well. Maybe I’ve watched a few too many episodes of The Big Bang Theory or Doctor Who, but I have always found the concept of time to be interesting. Likewise, I thought that several of the points of the podcast were also interesting.

I liked the idea that humanity is so fascinated with time because we have a strong desire to transcend it. Humanity is fascinated with the idea of time and with the idea of sustainability. Not only do we as people want to be sustainable, but we want our belongings, our material possessions, to come with us. Anything we become attached to becomes a burden to let go of.

Additionally, another major point that caught my attention was that time hates, destroys, and outlives (if it can be considered to have a life) anything that humans might create. I mean, this is fairly obvious if you look at anything that is worn or antique. The most prominent things that have been destroyed by time are architectural structures, like buildings. There are ruins all over the world leftover from early civilizations, and their evolution from what they used to be at their creation is not yet over. I remember finding an image a long time ago of a “graveyard” of cars in Belgium that were left behind when the world broke out into World War II (Chatillon car graveyard).