EXPLORATIONS

INTRODUCTION

Hello, and welcome to my final website! This unit was focused on the theme of Explorations, the ability to search for our own likes and dislikes, inspirations and mechanizations of art and varying artistic techniques. In web, we learned about Responsive Web Design, a coding technique that allows for screen adjustment and easy access of a site or page on any electronic device. Responsive Web Design has a rather steep learning curve, but I felt that for a first-time student of such a technique, I managed the challenge well. Go to my website on your iPhone, Tablet or laptop to see the results! I'm so grateful for the entire Freestyle experience because all of the classes, as well as the entire community, forced me to be more honest in my writing, art, and photography. Fitting the mold is something that earns an A at Mountain View High School, but a concept that's sorely frowned upon here. Looking back, getting to create a research paper on a local goat farm, interview a city council member, and perform a humor skit with my closest friends were all highlights of my high school experience.

BLINK

The final unit in English was the Blink unit, in which students read the book, Blink, by Malcolm Gladwell. I had already read Blink, so I opted for another of Gladwell's, What the Dog Saw. The overarchign concept of the two books, and of Gladwell's body of work as a whole, is that humans are subject to making continuous and instantaneous judgements and assessments. This is called a snap judgement, or thin slicing. We are prone to analyzing our surroundings or situations very quickly. They say that you can tell if two people will be romantically inclined just in the first few minutes of watching their interaction. And those people are right. I really enjoyed this unit because human behavior and thought processes are extremely interesting to me, and are concepts I hope to delve into further in college.

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I chose the prompt Anticipation, because I felt that the concept best represented my feelings and emotions of the time at which I created the art. Anticipation thrives in the gray area of what we know and what we don’t. I find anticipation to be useless in most occasions, and ironically, an inevitable reaction to most occurrences. Anticipation is a reaction of both our ability to instantaneously perceive and our desire to know what’s coming next. For instance, the words in the piece “Fight or Flight” give the viewer a sense of what I was thinking as the artist. They can imagine possible narratives for the story I tried to tell. Overall, I wanted to create a piece that was both explicit and implicit in its meaning, reliant on both the artist and the viewer to tell a story as complex as the many lines that cover the tree.

Humor
To start the piece I first used watercolor on paper canvas. I drew a tree to start, and then soon realized that the tree could be converted into a face, with other natural elements comprising the eyes, nose, and lips. I scanned this image into the computer and uploaded it to Adobe Photoshop, where I then erased everything except for the tree, my focal point. I then added a texture filter, experimented with a new technique, and added the words. I opted for a large yellow circle because I felt that the image needed focusing. The final component I added was the background of the overall photo, that I decided to add texture to, as well as color with a slightly translucent pink.

HUMOR

The humor unit bridged the narrative and explorations units. To start, we viewed short clips of humor from some of our favorite comedians to analyze their style, different techniques, and the overall level of efficacy. I chose to study Jon Stewart and Mindy Kaling, because I enjoy both of their styles, and more importantly, admire their work and the messages they send. For English I performed a skit with Sheila and Chiara, in which we acted as charactertures of ourselves in a a strictly self deprecating piece. For example, I made fun of feminist stereotypes and the reputation I have as a "big, loud feminist." For Design, I created a poster that continued the theme of feminism, and satirized popular commercials in which women are the focal point. Below is my work and corresponding artist statements.

Humor
Click image to view design work

Design Artist statement: The final Design project related to our humor unit. My humor project and skit focused on the media's objectification and simplification of women, so I wanted to parody common ads that exploit women's bodies to garner attention and capital. I asked a friend to pose with a car, like many women have, sexually. The reason this photo works is because we don't expect to see men dressed down, or used as props, and for that reason, it makes us uncomfortable. Our society places a higher value on men's minds and women's bodies, and I wanted to draw attention to that. This piece employs satire and irony, and I hope you enjoy.

WEB MINI PROJECT

The final component of the explorations unit is known as the Web Mini Project. Mr. Flo challenged us to explore a facet of web design that we wanted to know more about, and that we could complete on out own. I chose to expand my knowledge of online photo galleries and the various ways one can present photos. I found an online tutorial that could help me figure out the code, and I then tweaked it to make sure it worked. Here's the link!