Seeing the World

My own world view is that we should live in harmony with nature, but, like most people, I think that individuals can’t stop climate change or mass extinctions, so I don’t make a real effort to be more environmentally friendly. But I do try. My parents are vegetarian and buy organic produce, which is where I got my consciousness about the environment from. My girlfriend studies environmental science, and is trying to go “zero waste”, so I’ve been influenced by her and try to recycle and compost as much as possible, and I try not to buy things packaged in plastic.

Our world views influence the way we see others; I judge people if they’re using polystyrene or plastic knives and forks because I wouldn’t use these things. They also makes us more or less conscious of our own effects on the environment. I try to leave nature as I found it.

World view, ideology, identity and personal perspective are all closely linked. They are all influenced by social and cultural norms, our family, and our past experiences. Ideology is less personal than identity and personal perspective. I think that personal perspectives are often kept on the inside, and not talked about.

A collective world view is that we, as individuals, are too small and unimportant to make a big change like saving the planet. This marginalises indigenous world views, which are about living in harmony with nature and giving back as much/more than you took.

If yours was the dominant world view and it became marginalised, I think you would be pressured, possibly subconsciously, into changing your world view . If everyone starts taking a different world view, you’ll feel like the odd one out, and want to think like everybody else does. This shows how superficial world views are.

Mirzoeff’s world view is that a change needs to happen in order to stop us from destroying the world.

Our world views are subconsciously incorporated into our visual texts. They add depth to our texts, which influences how others read our texts. Different meanings can be found in one text. For example, someone with one world view might connect with the same view in that text, whereas someone with an opposite world view might see that text and completely disagree with what it’s saying, even though the artist wasn’t even considering world views when making that text.

The Myth of Photographic Truth

The ‘Myth of Photographic Truth’ is the notion that an image taken with a camera depicts reality, but is not actual reality. Photographs are influenced by the photographer, through the choice of framing, light and personalisation, and by the camera manufacturer, through aesthetic choices like how the camera interprets focus and colour. The notion also applies to other imaging technologies like painting, and implies that what a visual text connotes depends upon different social and historical contexts.

The notion applies to my essay topic because the information on climate change that I get from the visual texts is influenced by how the texts are made. For example, Friedrich’s Wanderer Above the Sea of Fog depicts a man looking down towards an expanse of fog. He is above the level of fog, showing his dominance and power over the scene. The position of the man is decided by the artist, and the painting may not be what the actual scene looked like, if, indeed, there was a physical scene and this wasn’t just painted from Friedrich’s imagination.

Making an Image

Different imaging technologies come with different connotations. Artists and designers can choose what imaging technologies to use to influence how the viewer looks at their image.

All imaging technologies are influenced by the artist. The artist has control over where they put the paint, what stroke to use, when to take the photo. However, in a painting artists have a lot more influence than in, say, a photo. Every line and stroke in a painting is made by the artist, whereas a photographer only has one button to push. They do have to frame the photo, adjust lighting etc. but they don’t have control over every little bit of the photo. Photographs can be digitally manipulated afterwards, unlike paintings, which makes them ideal for advertising and fashion. Sculpture was a representation of cultural and social advancement, and were often religious. Large sculptures were used to impress or intimidate, such as the Great Sphinx built 4,500 years ago.

When viewing a photograph it’s important to realise that it is only a snapshot of time. It depicts reality, but is not a reality. The photographer chooses what they want to show us, and what they want to leave out. They are trying to influence our view of the world, places, people, history, events, and they do this by emphasising a specific subject, even though in reality the world may not look like that.

Paintings and sculptures can also depict augmented realities, and make us think specific things, but I think they’re less influential than photographs. Photographs are of actual real world things (unless they’ve been digitally manipulated afterwards), which makes them seem more ‘real’ and important to us.

The ‘Truth Value’

An idea I found interesting in The Myth of Photographic Truth from “Images, Power and Politics” by Marita Sturken and Lisa Cartwright, was the idea of ‘positivism’. During the Industrial Revolution, as machines became more precise, people started to think that the subjective nature of scientists would affect the outcomes of their experiments. People had more faith in the machines because they couldn’t think for themselves like scientists could. Artists were also thought to be too subjective, hence why the camera started to be a popular medium. The mechanical nature of the camera made it seem more ‘trustworthy’ and objective.

Another idea I found interesting was about manipulated photos. Nowadays, Photoshopped images are everywhere; in advertising, fashion. We know photos are easily altered and often they look ‘too good to be true’, but people still believe that the photographs are “truthful records of events” (Sturken and Cartwright, 18).

Sturken and Cartwright also talked about how beauty standards are historically or culturally constructed, and not natural. Ultra-thin bodies have become the idea of ‘beauty’ “not because it is simply naturally true that such bodies are objectively more beautiful than other types but because the connotative message has become so widely incorporated as to seem obvious and natural” (Sturken and Cartwright, 21). Simply because we see thin models repeatedly in fashion and advertising – two things so important in our lives – it because the ideal body type. It is about ideological views. If enough people believe something then it becomes normal, and other views are shut-out.

Works cited:
Sturken, Marita, and Lisa Cartwright. “Images, Power and Politics”. Practices Of Looking: An Introduction To Visual Culture. New York: Oxford UP, 2009. 9-48. Print

Reflection on Learning

The thing I’ve found most interesting in this paper so far was Nigel Spivey’s documentary, “The Day Pictures Were Born”. Having never studied art, I was intrigued by the beginnings of it all, and the reasons behind why we draw pictures today. The documentary was easy for me to understand, very thought provoking and memorable.

In terms of the content, readings, resources, tasks and approaches so far, I have found the mind maps helpful for clearing my head and sorting out my ideas, and the videos helpful for understanding concepts. I find that videos are generally easier to understand than writing, and I can maintain concentration when watching a video better than when reading a piece of writing. Things that weren’t so useful were the word clouds. This is because they didn’t provoke any thoughts or ideas for me, and were simply ‘brain-dumps’. I suppose they could be helpful for clearing one’s brain, making thoughts permanent on a page, and thus allocating more room for thinking.

My assumptions of artists’ meanings have been challenged. I never considered how different viewers could gain such different meanings when viewing the same work. Everyone looks at art in a different way based on their experiences, and I don’t believe that there should be one true meaning to a piece of art.

One creative approach I’ve taken during this paper is to use feature a visual text alongside each blog post, making the blog more interesting and visually appealing. I’ve also tried to use captivating titles for my posts to draw the reader in and make them want to read them.

The things I’ve learnt in this paper can be applied to my other studio and BDes papers. I can analyse artists and their texts for initial research in my other papers. This will provide backing for my own projects, and some initial ideas to get started. I also understand that everyone goes about their projects in a different way. Discussing our projects and processes in my other papers will be helpful to sort out any of our own issues, whether they’re concepts we don’t understand, or practical issues like how to use a marker pen.

I understand the relevance of this paper to our own art or design practice, and I’m starting to enjoy it. I have a new appreciation for art, the reasons behind it, and the wider-world issues some artists are trying to convey.

We’re Killers

Noam Chomsky’s presentation at the 10th. Annual Pen World of Voices Festival in New York, 2014, was about the impending disaster to Earth caused by humans. Since the Industrial Revolution began in 1760, the human race has been “poised to destroy the prospects of decent existence and much of life” (Chomsky).

What I found interesting about his speech was that the people who have the money and power to make a change (the U.S.A., rich companies), are only interested in getting more power and money. They will not help the indigenous people fight climate change, stop extinctions, and stop us from killing the world.

I realised that it will probably take something quite personal or close to home for people to pay more attention to our negative effects on the environment. This could be something like seeing our grandkids in a world without snow, or watching water levels rise above our own city.

Art is a universal language, which is why it is important that artists and designers communicate ideas about our negative effects on the environment. It makes it easier for the public to see the effects and realise we need to do something.

Works cited:
Chomsky, Noam. The Anthropocene Period and its Challenges. The Cooper Union, New York. 2014. Speech.

Ideology in Visual Texts

Bellows, George. Forty-two Kids. Oil on canvas. National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.

Understanding ideological views is important when analysing this visual text. When looking at Forty-two Kids by George Bellows, the viewer assumes that the kids swimming in the polluted East River are poor immigrants from the Lower East Side of New York. We assume that these are the kids who can’t afford to go to swimming pools, and who don’t know any better than to avoid swimming in the polluted river. In actual fact, at this time in New York, even the rich families were indifferent to the pollution, and many of these kids could be New York’s richest.

The Changing World in the Outside World

These are some online discussion groups and feeds from people talking about climate change in an art context.

• http://www.maskbook.org
• http://artofchange21.com/en/home/
  • https://twitter.com/artofchange21
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iZRGUADAu2Q
• http://odaraia.livejournal.com
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-ifhfCnLUZQ

Visual Text in Context

Friedrich, Caspar David. Wanderer above the Sea of Fog. Oil on canvas. 1818. Kunsthalle Hamburg, Hamburg.

When people first began creating pictures, 35,000 years ago, they drew pictures of auroch and deer on cave walls (Spivey). They were obsessed with these animals, almost as if they wanted to ‘conquer’ the animal kingdom . In the modern age, Western cultures are absorbed in their idea of ‘conquest of nature’ (Mirzoeff, 220). People are forever trying to tame nature, and make it malleable.

Wanderer above the Sea of Fog is an example of the ‘conquest of nature’ in a modern setting. The painting depicts a man looking down towards an expanse of fog. With his hand in his pocket, the posture of the man is very informal and relaxed, as though he has calm control over the fog. His position “is contradictory, suggesting at once mastery over a landscape and the insignificance of the individual within it” (Gaddis, 1). He is well above the level of fog, showing his importance and power over the scene.

The painting is very emotional, typical of the Romantic style. With the man’s face turned away from us, we consider his part in the scene, and in nature. He is surveying his kingdom, which extends as far as the eye can see.

Works cited:
Gaddis, John Lewis. The Landscape of History: How Historians Map the Past. Oxford; New York: Oxford UP, 2002. Print.

Mirzoeff, Nicholas. How to See the World. London: Pelican, 2015. Print.

Spivey, Nigel. ‘The Day Pictures Were Born’. How Art Made the World. BBC, 3 July 2005. Documentary.

Developing Context

The process of looking closely at this visual text and understanding its context helped me focus my essay direction by simply getting the ideas out of my head and onto a physical document. Seeing my notes on a page allowed me to combine ideas, strengthen arguments and come up with more ideas . I now have more information to relate to the ‘conquest of nature’ in my essay, and a visual text analysis to back up my ideas.

Looking closely at the text made me understand that it’s important to consider what was happening in the world at the time an artwork was made, especially within the art-world, i.e. style, era. This is because it helps us understand why the artist chose to do what they did, and what they were influenced by. “Familiarity with an idea or style of work makes us more confident when addressing others of a similar nature” (Annals, Cunnane, and Cunnane, 22). We can relate a text to social and political views, or to other artist’s works which helps us “identify new translations of the work’s symbolism” (Annals, Cunnane, and Cunnane, 23).

These ideas and processes are important in my own design practice because they help me gain a deeper understanding of the subject – an understanding which I can then apply when critiquing my own art.

Works cited:
Annals, Alison, Abby Cunnane, and Sam Cunnane. ‘Working with Images and Ideas’. Saying What You See: How to Talk and Write About Art. North Shore, N.Z.: Pearson Education New Zealand, 2009. 12-39. Print.

Gaddis, John Lewis. The Landscape of History: How Historians Map the Past. Oxford; New York: Oxford UP, 2002. Print.