I decided to pursue my thoughts about Marshall's work a bit further and I decided on a little aesthetics/rhetoric experiment.
My inquiry was to find out whether I could observe the work at several different levels, all descriptive, and each time using less words to describe what I saw.
This is a challenge I encounter frequently when reviewing books for the American Library Association journal "CHOICE," where my comments are limited to 191 words. Most of the time I enjoy the challenge and I especially like presenting it to students.
In all of my classes I assign writing within strict word constraints, ten words, 100 words, 500 words. If you've tried something like this you may have noticed that students don't particularly like to be held responsible for limited word counts. All of us like some wiggle room, especially when we're not quite sure how to organize our thoughts.
But I think it's important to try. Words are an abstraction and when we put anything into words, whether oral or written, we are creating an abstraction. Can words help solve problems by taking apart an image, a situation, a phenomenon, and abstracting it? I think yes. And further, I think this can work in all kinds of settings, not just art criticism but science problem solving and, hey, why not? conflict resolution.
Anyway, here's my exercise in "taking apart" and abstracting what I consider to be a formidable piece of art.
I studied each panel and wrote my "long" description, then came back to each panel and wrote a shorter description, and finally returned a second time to write my "short" description, comprised of only one word. Below I've included some photos of the panels and all of my written work. Of course I'd love to hear what you think about this approach.
******************************************
James Kerry Marshall
Untitled 1998
Color woodcut with hand coloring
Twelve panels
Panel 1
The city endless grid stamped like dollar bills a sky of floating clouds
17 blocks straight line perspective
Endless
Panel 2
The brick wall yellow and flower box fake planting?
Five flowers three bricks angle
Intimate
Panel 3
The rug a lamp inside a line a space an opening
Rug and wall horizon table plays
Transitional
Panel 4
An upturned head a hand outreached a host in shorts ballet
Shoes and legs three men kitchen
Moving
Panel 5
Spare couch with resting hand food plates on floor & table
Three plates one hand
Focal
Panel 6
Three men sit on the green rug under lampshade and black box
Back and front torsos, verticals
Discursive
Panel 7
A corner bisect pink & yellow quiet but empty & expectant
Two panels and a rug
Blank
Panel 8
A frank pink wall but lighter than the wall in panel 5 a corridor
Large panel narrow run of rug
Bare
Panel 9
Opens a door and first glimpse of new space. The door is pink
Door jamb white formal angles
Quiet
Panel 10
A bed well made recessed under a black hole in the bedroom private
Tight secret
Torrid
Panel 11
Shadow of a a vase & flowers in a shadowy black vertical rectangle
Abstract secret
Tropic
Panel 12
Turn the corner for another pink wall a rectangle a lost black face
Humorous secret
Sumptuous
This did not make as much sense to us as the other passages we have just read because the end result of each description of each panel would not have been our choice. You are trying to get across the process of deep analysis of the different artwork. You observe and document each step of your analysis very well. This art connects to science because each description of the panel breaks down more and more until it is very specific just like the process of experimenting in a lab. We can not think of anything that we would add in this moment.
ReplyDeleteSammy Nassif
Alli Armstrong
Meg Shepro
Alana Rockoff
When we observe natural phenomena, instead of breaking our observations down into scientific details, we can look at it with an aesthetic perspective. These posts do make sense in that we were able to understand the reasoning behind these observations. We observed that the paintings are arranged in the same area to be connected and related to one another and that the paintings relate to life. When you look at paintings, you can only see, but not hear or feel the senses in the painting. But through imagination, you can make the scene (of the painting) just as real as an actual scenery. There are artistic values to be seen in the natural world, it’s just a matter of perspective. In the “Tangled Bank” picture, there is a multitude of things inside the picture, and that itself is somewhat similar to an art gallery because there are various components to it as if it were a gallery. These posts relate to the process of aesthetics because we say that a picture is worth a thousand words, but using just a few words to describe makes the picture just as abstract as the words. When you dissect the painting into words, you are putting effort into analyzing the picture. The more you analyze it, the more you appreciate it. If I were the writer, I would add descriptions to my analyzing process.
ReplyDeleteJerry Tarn
Davi
Jesse
Samuel
Katie
Victoria
Yes, they both make sense. We tend to overanalyze and extrapolate when that can complicate the message. By thinking of things in simpler terms, we can understand them on a different level. In terms of observing, documenting and analyzing: it's important to observe without overanalyzing, and our documentation can become confused when we attempt to observe everything all at once and then analyze the larger picture. Art is often considered abstract and loose, with a greater emphasis on a separation from reality; art is commonly thought of as a transporting medium, where we are not expected to consider how real life applies necessarily. Science is usually reduced to raw facts, with an emphasis on clear and direct comprehension; we are not expected to evaluate science on the same level as art because science is, by nature, about real life. However, when you cross the two--consider art in the light of science and science in the light of art--you can understand each topic on a different level: that art can be simple and factual without degrading its beauty, and that science can be abstract and loose without delegitimizing its truths. Aesthetics concerns inspiration and beauty, and the conceptuality of art and the straight-forwardness of science can both inspire feelings of awe and surprise in equal measure--just as you don't need something to be abstract to consider it beautiful, you don't need something to be factual to consider it valid. If we had authored these articles, we would have considered how understanding things on a smaller level can assist in the understanding of the whole; the difference between top-down and bottom-up processing.
ReplyDeleteJane Lu
Eliza Zhitnik
Brendan Sullivan
Anna Greene
Megan Uehlein
Natalie Jamnik
Jaime Bennis
This a great idea, to self-impose restrictions on one's thoughts and descriptions. A very human instinct is self-importance, which I think leads to loving the sound of our voices and thoughts ( I know I'm guilty of that.) Also, By shortening the description of the panels, you managed to capture a complex sentiment or feeling or expression, without complicating it, that while it may not resonate with every reader, it is sure to make a great connection with few.
ReplyDeleteAlejandra Rodriguez