Humanism

Today has been a long day...In contextual studies I attended a lecture about Humanism which was very interesting. Essentially it is a philosophy whereby humans are the centre of the universe. It can be translated into every aspect of Art. Architects such as Le Corbusier use a measuring system based on humans. Leonardo Da Vinci - Vitruvian Man(1492) is a classic visual representation of the humanist ideal. The circle and square around the man imply that man can do the impossible- circle the square. Rationalism was related to humanism, the idea that through rational,logical ideas can prevail, arguably at the expense of religion. We also explored the use of Classical Greek and Roman architecture and how it is a style that reoccurs throughout modern times, for example the White House. This gives the impression that the history of style and culture is not linear. I found the lecture particularly interesting because it related to my previous studies of politics, philosophy and history.

In Visual studies I A0 paper to explore scale. I made a 3D form out of screwed up white paper- a very simple idea- then I used chalk, charcoal and brown pastel to draw the form on a large scale. I was fairly satisfied with the drawing after spending 3.5 hours on it, at first glance it is hard to tell what the picture represents because of the scale on colours used, however it is still visually interesting. One of the main points of this exercise was to explore tone, the paper was white but the folds crated interesting shadows. I need to spend a couple more hours on this drawing until i am happy with it.

In photography I have learned the basics about aperture, shutter speed, focusing and exposure. I did some experimenting with long exposures outside in the dark. I used a technique known as 'light painting' which uses a low shutter speed to capture the movement of light. I created some interesting images of cars traveling past which just show as bolts of light.The image above is one I took at the Custard Factory using light painting. I think its cool how the bolts of light go from the DJ to the speakers like an electric current of something.