Art Reflection

Art was a way for students to express their inner thoughts and views creatively. For senior Lauren Mabe art was a way to express herself in various ways. Students’ artwork was inspiring to many and held significant meaning. “Art is a form of personal expression. It teaches everyone how to observe life in every detail. It teaches people how to develop concepts and think more deeply about a topic. As an artist, art creates a form of pride- there is nothing better than stepping back from something you have created and saying ‘Wow, I actually did that!’ The only thing better than that feeling is when someone pays you for it,” said Ms. Wilson.

I genuinely love and appreciate art and the fact that you can express anything through it. When people feel emotional through my art, I feel alive and energetic. Ever since I was young, I always attempted to create something and because of that, I developed a great habit of expressing anything through art. The ability to create an artwork using colors, lights, lines, forms, and shapes, is a unique feeling. I was always an artistic kid where I was always interested in language, expressing

Vincent Van Gogh, a brilliant artist from Auvers-sur-Oirs, France, once explained his passion for art: “I dream my painting and then I paint my dream.” The importance of art classes is a highly debated topic in the educational system and whether or not art is a necessary class to provide students. There is an extensive amount of different forms of “the arts,” including music, drama, foreign languages, painting, drawing, and sculpting. No matter what form of art, they all have many positive outcomes. Art classes should be fully funded in public school because they help the emotional development of students by allowing them to communicate their emotions, take a break and relax from any stress, and express their beliefs and opinions.

The art programs at my school gave me a family I could have never had otherwise. All artistic classes and extracurricular activities that I have participated in have taught me how to be more engaged in my learning, express myself in a healthy way, give myself constructive criticism, and boost my self-esteem. The arts made me excited to wake up in the morning and go to school. When I am on stage, I am free to do what I love and be whoever I want to be without fear of judgment. I did not just learn about the arts. I have experienced it, I have felt it, I have lived it. The arts are who I am. The arts are essential in schools.

Art has always been a part of my life for as long I can remember. Art class was what I anxiously looked forward to in grade school. I recall the sadness that I would experience when my teacher did not pick my coloring sheet to be put on the wall of my second grade classroom, but I also remember the immense pride I experienced when I discovered that my seahorse sculpture had been picked to be put in the Zane Grey museum in the third grade. I participated in Chalk On the Walk every year. I loved it so much that I even had a chalkboard wall painted in my bedroom. My dad would even lift me up onto his large shoulders so that I could draw on the parts of the wall that my little arms could not yet reach. I remember drawing a series of pictures, marching down the street with childish conviction, and selling my drawings to anyone who would buy them for a quarter a piece. When I look back, I realize those drawings certainly were not as amazing as I believed. The people who had bought those awful drawings were just trying to be nice to a cute little child. Nevertheless, it started a confidence and dedication that eventually led to who I am today.

The artwork was like nothing I had ever seen before. Sculptures filled the entire space; huge sculptures, some taller than I was. And, they didn't just depict human poses. There were birds suspended in midair, sheep surrounded by arrows on all sides, skulls burning with fire, tree branch collages and huge kaleidoscopic tunnels. Things were made out of who knows what,the colors were bright, the work was surreal. I suddenly understood that art was not in fact, limited to painting on canvas. That it could focus on anything, be made out of anything, and mean

Although art is not considered an “academic” subject by some, I am certain that art is important to all students’ education because it promotes creative thoughts, teaches students to celebrate individual uniqueness and gives historical and cultural perspective. I myself, being a student, have always enjoyed my art classes more than any other, and sometimes it is my only reason for going to school at all. Even though I am not very skilled at it, I remember asking myself, why are we not able to attend these classes more than once a week? And although I may enjoy it because it feels like a break from all the other rigorous learning in other classes, I only recently realized how much I was still learning from it. With the growing minds of

Throughout this course, I have reaffirmed my desire to engage others in the process of learning. I have always been fascinated by the potential museums possess to involve visitors in inquiry and even cultivate a love for learning. Accordingly, my goal has always been to bring my passion for learning to museum visitors. Due to my background in archaeology, I have always given the bulk of my attention to objects within museums, giving little thought to my own experience let alone the experiences of others. Museums Today: Missions and Function, however, has taught me to emphasize the museum audience and the experience of visiting rather than the collection itself. The concept of being audience focused rather than collections driven, is

Art is special because it takes so many different shapes and forms that every single

When I found out the first paper assignment was going to look at the SIUE art show, I was intrigued. I have only been to one other art exhibit in my life and it was in Washington D.C. I did not have as high of expectations for the SIUE show as I did for the one in D.C., but I do enjoy looking at art so I was excited. It was a slightly different experience than my D.C adventure, but still interesting. There was not as many people and it was quieter. I liked this setting better because I was able to focus more on understanding and interpreting the art. Going into it, I figured most of the art would be either paintings on canvas or sculptures.

On September 15, 2017, around 12:40 a.m., I attended a Byron May Exhibition in Austin, Texas at an art gallery called ART on 5th. The collection consisted of multiple stainless steel plates painted on with vibrant soy based paints made by the artist. Every piece was meant to be worn with 3D glasses to help create depth and emphasize various colors.

Dr. Burkhard Henke, a professor of German studies at Davidson College, once said something along the lines of this: “Why do we like art? Why do we read books and go to operas and look at paintings? Because, somehow, we think that it enables us to be a better person.”

Art can tell stories of the past events, which were significant to that culture or a person. Female images take a special place in the representation of the art. Women have always been used as a subject of art and displayed as ideal feminine figures and sexualized objects of desire. The notion of femininity, along with the idea of the female gender role, has substantially changed throughout the centuries. Through the several art pieces authors show how the social, political, and religious circumstances of the different art periods affect the way women were represented. Comparing the work of Johannes Vermeer and Philippe Halsman it is clearly to see how the separations of centuries and different techniques affected the vision of the women’s beauty. Although both, American actress Grace Kelly and The Milkmaid, represent femininity as the main idea, one shows a realistic expression of the beauty, the other image is the author’s perception of the same idea through the different composition settings, style, and creation time.

I feel that my Exhibition this term was a lot better than my last. I was able to do a lot more things I wanted to do and got into more depth with the topics I talked about. I was able to engage my audience even more with the activity which I would say was a better improvement than last exhibition.

Before you even start painting you have to decide what type of material you will be painting on. In modern days you will most likely land on paper as the material you choose to paint on. After choosing to paint on paper you should decide on what type of paint to use. The artist’s painting, I am looking at choose to use watercolor paints on a watercolor paper. Apparently watercolor paper is made with linters or cotton rags unlike how printer paper is made. Cotton rags are supposedly stronger than wood fibers or linters, as a result the paper is relatively strong. An additional advantage to using cotton rages is it makes the paper flexible, therefor less likely to rip. If you use older pieces of cotton rages you would be recycling, which I consider is another advantage. I assume that the artist used watercolor paper that was made a similar way, but I don’t know for sure.