Habits of the Creative Mind

Paying Attention

 

Reflection:

I was intimidated at first when trying to draw this because I am not an artist and I rarely do any sort of drawings. The picture was complex and there was so much to figure out even though I knew that it was okay that it wouldn’t be a direct copy. Though I actually really enjoyed drawing it. It was fun to figure out how to get all of the lines and create shapes that I saw in the original. I ended up sort of playing around with proportion and creating something more monstrous than human looking because I couldn’t properly figure out how I was supposed to get the proportions correctly.

When drawing, I think that my mind was mostly clear and just focused on trying to create something. However, I will admit that I did have a couple of songs that were stuck in my head running through while I drew. It was nice and different to have this sense of calm to just focus on the moment, get lost in your own head and in the feeling of creating lines, shapes, space, and some sort of figure. I don’t know very much about art and the processes that go into it, but I definitely now have more of an appreciation for it because it was very difficult to even create a replica much less an original work.

 

Reflection:

The queens in these pictures are so different from each other, yet have clear similarities. They wear the same objects: the orb, the ermine, the sceptre, and the pearls. This is mean to show ethos and tradition, that they have the divine right to rule. The orb is a symbol of godly power and symbolizes the religious power that comes along with being the Queen of England. The sceptre represents imperial authority and protection of the people. The ermine symbolizes power to be able to kill that many animals to create such a thing. It also represents royal moral purity in that the royal family has an automatically clear conscious because of their power in religion and state. The pearls represent longevity and ancestry, furthering the idea of the divine right to rule. However, despite both queens wearing the same objects, they are utilized in different ways to convey different feelings for the civilians that view them. Elizabeth II is shown to be more warm and inviting that Elizabeth I by showing more skin and having more light around her to make her look ethereal. Elizabeth I is more intimidating by staring the viewer directly in the eyes and being completely covered up to remind you of who has the power. The vectors of attention in the portrait of Elizabeth I make you look at each object and take note of the power that it represents. With the portrait of Elizabeth II, the vectors are all over the photograph, so you see the warm background and how she is inviting you to look at her, making her seem more friendly.

 

Reflection:

Image Detectives was not something that I had thought that I would be good at. Analyzing words is something that I find to come naturally to me, but pictures and photos are so different. However, it is different than what I thought it would be. There are so many different elements that go into creating a picture and trying to tell a story with it. I never actually thought about how where the photographer is in relation to the subject could affect how you see a picture. When looking at the Joe Rosenthal photos, you could tell how the second one was staged from where the camera was placed and other small details in it, such as the flag. Vectors of attention and where your eye is drawn to first affects the way that you look at a picture. For example, when analyzing the Queen Elizabeth portraits, they draw your eye in different ways. In the portrait of Queen Elizabeth I, the objects become vectors of attention and keep your eye in a triangle shape. In the photograph of Queen Elizabeth II, your eye is drawn to everything in the photo from the light background, to the queen, to the objects that she is holding. Each of these are meant to convey a different feeling; Elizabeth I was to convey intimidation and power while Elizabeth II was to convey a warmth and signal that times were changing. There are always metaphors in what artists and photographers put into their images. In the 2007 photograph if Queen Elizabeth II, the gloominess of the background being cut through with the light is meant to symbolize that times are changing, things for the monarchy are becoming difficult, but that better times are ahead since Queen Elizabeth II will lead strongly as she stares directly at the viewer.

PSA Film: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=weS3TDDUIQQ&list=PLfQSpO72OaXa2UcwVjccTT8iG231TOldA&index=45&t=0s

I found this PSA about preventing forest fires to be interesting. I wanted to look at a topic that wasn’t national news and that was a bit off of the beaten path. I found this PSA from 1969 to provide an interesting and unique take on preventing forest fires. It wasn’t what I was expecting.

“Looking At War” Response:

Sontag’s essay, “Looking At War” raises interesting ideas and questions about the photography of war and its atrocities. She brings up the point of “who believes today that war can be abolished? No one, not even pacifists. We only hope (so far in vain) to stop genocide and bring to justice those who commit gross violations of the laws of war (for there are laws of war for which combatants should be held), and to stop specific wars by imposing negotiated alternatives to armed conflicts.” This point is especially interesting because it points out a generality and a common held belief in most people, but is also a belief that no one has actually ever said. There are all of these idealistic and overly optimistic goals about all of the horrible aspects of the world such as corruption and war will disappear with the snap of a finger. Sontag acknowledges that things don’t change overnight and it is one of the only accounts that I have seen of someone saying this. Another one of her points, “this is photography as shock therapy” is also interesting. It brings up a phenomenon that we have been seeing more and more lately, where photos depicting graphic and intense situations around the world are shown in major outlets. This is done for the reason of being able to raise awareness for these issues, but many people question the validity of this.

On Looking and Looking Again: Observations of an Organic Object

Day One: I am looking at a tree right outside of my dorm room window. Most of its leaves are green. The ground is has a handful of leaves. The leaves are either pale orange or yellow. It’s been raining outside and the ground is wet. It’s surreal to see the tree begin to look so empty. The trunk of the tree is damp from all of the rain.

Day Two: Only a few leaves fall at a time. It’s nice and peaceful to watch them fall. Usually, the pale orange or yellow ones fall while the red ones hang on. I, personally, like the bright red ones the best. Most of the leaves are still green. I’m too far away to see them right now, but when I go outside, some of the leaves are half green and some are half red. It’s a nice mixture of colors.

Day Three: The leaves get progressively more red. I find that the leaves closer to the top of the tree are more pale, orange, or yellow than the leaves towards the ground. The whole tree becomes a nice ombre of colors. It’s weird to think how something dying is actually so beautiful. However, I suppose that the beauty in it is that we always know that it will come back in the spring and that the winter brings its own sort of beauty with it.

Day Four: You can see more and more of the branches each day. It’s eerie in a way because it is a bit sad to see the leaves fall to the ground. It is also peaceful. It reflects the changing of the seasons and is a reminder that time is always passing. Things will always change and sometimes that change is beautiful.

Day Five: About sixty percent of the leaves are not green. The tree still has most of its leaves, but it sticks out from the other trees where more of the leaves are red or orange. It’s a nice rainbow of leaves and it looks rather pretty when the sun hits it. The weather has been changing so wildly over the past couple of weeks. It’s nice to finally see the seasons working the way that they’re supposed to.

Reflecting

Image One: A photo of my friends and I, the one where we’re all just staring at the camera.

Image Two: Stephen Sheffield’s “Smoke”

Image Three: “The Persistance of Memory” – Salvador Dali

  

All of these pictures (the first two being photos and the third being a painting) are all surrealist. They are displaying physical and real things, but there is something off about them all. In the first photo, everyone is staring at the camera, which is normal for a photo, but they all have blank expressions. Some are even pointing. They aren’t staring at the camera, but at the person viewing the photo. It almost seems like they’re shaming them and it causes the viewer to wonder what they did wrong. The second photo should just be a normal photo of a person smoking. Having the smoke obscure his face doesn’t seem too out of the ordinary except that his face is clearly blurred, as if it almost isn’t there at all. The way that he is dressed is also so dated. It’s clearly not modern, but the photo is focusing on this part of him, so you cannot see the background. It’s unclear where he is or who he is at all. This photo also connects to the first in that it is the first in a series of three blurry/obscured face photos of the same man where the third is called “Shame”. The third picture is a famous painting. It takes real objects such as the clocks and twists them. Many people don’t even realize that they are clocks at first.

Alternate Order: Three, Two, One

To me, this new order tells a story. Time is melting, perhaps the world is even ending. So, you loose your morals and inhibitions. It’s the end of the world; why should you care? Perhaps, you do things that aren’t moral or something that you will come to regret later. This is shown in the smoking. Finally, you come to reflect on your life and your actions. You come to feel ashamed of them. While the original order also shows surrealism, this new order hightens it by playing with time, setting, and circumstances. Everything feels so disjointed that it somehow makes it all more cohesive. If you want to create a backstory for it, my immediate first thought was something apocalyptic, where the world has been thrown out of balance and is now paying the price for it.

The changing order makes a difference because it changes the way you view the pictures. You take your thoughts, assumptions, conclusions, etc. from the first picture and the move to the second and third. When you move between pictures, you are unconsciously making connections between them. Through this, you can determine for yourself what each of these pictures are trying to say and how they relate to each other.