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For me, I have been to many places in the world, and I have seen lots of public art during the trip of different countries. I have never thought about the importance of public art before I read this week’s reading. It is important for me to learn about public art, and it makes more sense when I go back to think about the meaning of public art in our society. There are many kinds of different public art such as painting and sculpture. In my opinion, public art is one of the main elements for civic improvement. We have different public art because it can express the spirit of a place in distinct ways.

This week, I went to the Knight Library and viewed the original pieces of the Runquist murals. The Runquist murals is an interesting piece of public art because it stated the evolution of the arts and sciences. It will be benefited for people to view this artwork as it helps the civic improvement. In my opinion, the reason this Runquist murals came out is for people’s need. The public art will represent the civic identity and it is based on what people thought in that area. When looking back to this week’s reading, Doss stated that “public art is, by definition, the product of public feedback” (Page 6). This means that the public art is designed from the public feedback, which will express the public thought. Moreover, the Runquist Murals could be considered as public art because it is related to the spirit of the place. According to the reading, Doss mentioned that “Public art is seen as a solution to the problem of placelessness, especially in its ability to remedy social alienation and generate a sense of civic and community identity” (Page 5). This means that the Runquist murals should contribute to civic improvement and it is the sign for the civic identity of Oregon.

The Runquist murals are also a good example of how public art shows the diversification for people who have different value systems and belief. I talked with my friends about their feelings about the Runquist murals, and there are distinct ideas come from them. They will view the murals depend on their own life experience and their own view of what art is. As an international student, my friends all come from different cultural background, which gives them a distinct point of view of what the Runquist murals are for them. In the course reading, Doss also stated that “public art should be as diverse as the people who view it” (Page 1). This means the different people will have different views toward the same piece of public art, and that is an important fact for the civic diversification.

In conclusion, I think the role of public art shows in various aspects relate to the development of civilization and the diversity of human cultures. The purpose of public art is to help people find out their needs and fulfill their spiritual world. In the course reading, Doss mentioned that “Public needs, public participation, and public responses are all key to the making and meaning of today’s public art” (Page 6). I think public art is a necessary art form for the civic improvement and civic identity. It will express people’s need and what they view art as a part of their life.

Reference:

Doss, E. (2006, October). Public art controversy: Cultural expression and civic debate. Retrieved from http://www.americansforthearts.org/pdf/networks/pan/doss_controversy.pdf

Keywords:

Love, inspiration, culture, humanity and hope.

Here is the remix image I created for this assignment. I think the most important things for artists are love, inspiration, culture, humanity and hope. Everyone need to love others and others will love them. An artwork should be inspirational. There is unique cultural background from each artist. As human beings, humanity is the basic foundation for an artist. The artworks should always bring hope to others.

I think my remix image could be considered as art because it could offer something important to the viewers. This image focus on the characteristic of artists, and the viewers will have a better understand about art after view this image. According to the article “What is art for?”, Dissanayake mentioned that “Art is not universal, but conceptually constructed by individuals whose perceptions are necessarily limited and parochial” (Page 19). This means that it is not so critical to be considered as an artist if we can create something interesting.

After reading the course material and the videos, I am thinking about what position should copyright law hold in this current situation. In my opinion, the copyright law could not fit within this information age anymore, which means it will limit innovation and creativity in modern society. One of the great examples is an implementation of the Google books library project. This is a project created by Google, which is basically scanning all the books in the world and make a digital copy of those books online. Google will make those books available online for free, and display ads in those web pages in order to make money. Google said they will share the ad revenue with the authors of the books. Many of the publishers and authors disagree with this project because they think it will violate the copyright laws. However, I think this is a great idea to share the information we need through the internet. I think those authors should happy about putting their books online because that will make the books available for more people. I believe it will generate more revenue than selling the hard books, because people are more willing to search online rather than buy books nowadays. This project will put all the books online which will be easier for us to search and find the books we need. I think the most important part is to make sure that the authors can get revenue from their online books which is the reward for their intellectual property.

In the article “Computer Graphics: Effects of Origins”, the author Jones discussed about how computer graphics development influenced by the old forms of art. The primary thesis of this article is that the development of modern technology highly depends on the historical art and cultural background. Jones mentioned in her article that “These changes are not simply technical effects. They contribute to maintenance and change of culturally conditioned conceptual patterns in the larger cultural historical context” (Page 21). This is the key idea for this course reading, and the author gave us many examples to explain the meaning of this thesis. One of the historical examples that Jones mentioned in her article is that “The stone columns of ancient Egyptian architecture were based on earlier bound papyrus columns” (Page 21). This gives us the idea that our technology development is influenced by old art or historical content. There is the need for people to learn from the past and create new ideas from what they learned. People will be influenced by the cultural background and their knowledge, and those historical content will make the people become who they are. It is impossible for us to develop each technology without the help from older content, and it also wastes time to create a brand new technology from scratch. This article tells us that the importance for us to keep learning from the old content and then develop new ideas based on those learnings.

I think one of the illustrations of Jones’ thesis is the example of the invention of the flying car. I think people will not able to design the flying car if we have never create cars and airplanes. The flying car is a combination of cars and airplanes, which means it is close related to the development of those two technologies. This is how we learned from the past and create the new things for our future. In the article, the abstract mentioned that “New forms of art and technology are frequently cast in the mode of old forms, just as other aspects of material and symbolic culture have been,” (Page 21). The flying car is a perfect example for this article.

Reference:

Jones, B. J. (1990). Computer Graphics: Effects of Origins. LEONARDO: Digital Image – Digital Cinema Supplemental Issue, pp. 21-30.

It is really interesting topic to discuss about how gaming change our life. In the presentation from Jane McGonigal, she talked about the current situation about online gaming and how games can make a better world for us. I am a gamer for several years, and I will spend about 10 hours each week to play games. It is true that play games will spend us lots of time for doing other things. However, I view gaming as a good way for me to entertain and make friends with others. For me, gaming is a communication tool for my friends. We really enjoy playing games together and we learned how to cooperate with others to finish the games. It is a good idea to design games that can solve our real world problems, and I am willing to play this kind of games to make some contribution. I think it is a good thing for us to explore the possibility that gaming can make some good effort for our real world.

How do you define “spirituality”?

For me, spirituality should be the thing that created by our mind and we all have a different spirituality which we born with. Spirituality is the source of our value system and it is the key to understand the distinct personality of each individual. The cultural background and the environment we lived with will affect our spirituality in some aspects. There is no single sentence for me to define spirituality because it is complex in the sense of how it works in our deep mind.

Does spirituality differ from religion?

Yes, I think spirituality is differ from religion. I think both of them are focused on what we believe, and both of them are the primary sources for our value system. However, spirituality is different than religion because it is a personal practice, and religion is more like a social practice. We can all have the same religion belief, but we should have a distinct spirituality for each individual.  We should not consider religion belief as the spirituality of people because it cannot represent what the deep mind is for that person.

How do you define “creativity”?

Creativity is just simply how our brain generates new ideas. It is the process for our brain to perceive the information we have learned, and then use this information combine with personal values and experience, which create the new point of view for something. I think creativity is a special talent of human beings, and this is the main difference between human and other animals. Creativity could be expressed in many places in our life

What is the source of creativity?

There are many sources of creativity, such as knowledge, inspiration, and spirituality. We learn knowledge from classes, books and through the communication with others. Inspiration comes from outside environmental influence. Spirituality comes from our deep inside and it is mostly what we born with. Those sources help us to generate new ideas and they are the foundation for our creativity. I believe that creativity can be enhanced by practice, and the more we understand how it works, the more we can do to improve the ability to create new things.

This week’s reading is really interesting because it discussed about the question about the spirituality and creativity of how artists generate their artworks. It is sure that art and spirituality are close related with each other. I think artists have different views for the artworks they see, and this is what they pursued the mission of art. It is helpful for me to understand that how artists perceive those works of art. According to the course reading, the author Grey mentioned that “Drawing is a way of entering into the spiritual practice of art and seeing” (Page 86). This means that artists are not only drawing the artworks based on what they express the world they see, it is also a tool for them to present what their spirituality looks like. This is a two way thinking between creating the artwork and using the creating process as the way entering their inside world.

Another interesting thing is the creative process mentioned in the article. Grey stated that the creative process is included formulation, saturation, incubation, inspiration, translation and integration. (Page 75) I usually think that the creative process should be complex, however, the process here in the article gives me a good idea about how to understand the process of creativity. I think the hardest part in this process is the incubation and inspiration part. We need to really get the idea inside of the brain and make the incubation to create new ideas. The inspiring part is always being considered as one of the main differences between an artist and normal people.

The first article I find online is called “Why our brains love horror movies”. The author Sharon Begley discussed about several reasons for why people love horror movies and mentioned about different aspect of the art of horror. In the article, the first reason discussed is people go to horror movies to be scared. People know that the movie should be scary, but it is fine because they will not have any hurt after watching the horror movies. And another reason is the horror movies are one of the best ways to be excited for people who love it. Therefore, this is also why horror movies are popular through the younger generation. The article also discussed about the catharsis theory as one of the reasons for people to watch the horror movies. People could express their negative emotions when they watch the scary movies. However, it is not good for young people to catharsis while watching the horror movies, they rather to learn how to manage their fears by the horror movies.  The reason that older adults are not interested in horror movies is that they do not want to experience the fears in the movies, and the normal life they live with is scary enough.

Another article I find online is called “The critique of pure horror”. The author, Jason Zinoman discussed about the question why we love to be scared and the reason why people are doing the research on the art of horror. The author mentioned that scary movies are the windows for us to express our society represses or oppresses. Some scholars think that horror will hurt the positive emotions, however, others believe that the horror movies are the safe and cathartic way to express the negative feelings. There are several books which relate to horror was mentioned in this article, and the theories of horror were discussed in different aspects. The reason for introducing those theories is ask the question why people love horror experience, and there should not have a single theory that can explain why horror art is beautiful.

In my opinion, the reason why we love to watch horror movies is that basically as the human nature. People will explore what is unknown for us, and it is always an interesting topic for everyone to discover. In the course reading, the author Carroll mentioned about the horror movies that “It engages its audience by being involved in processes of disclosure, discovery, proof, explanation, hypothesis, and confirmation” (Page 279). This means that the process of how people view the horror movies are similar as the process of science or other human findings. This point of view also being discussed in the article “The critique of pure horror”. The author, Jason mentioned that “The horror is rooted in the unknown, but this strangeness also sparks curiosity and fascination” (Jason 2011). By stating the nature of horror, we could find that it has a close relation with the unknown as well as curiosity.

Another issue being discussed in those articles is that horror movies will make people exciting and catharsis their negative emotions. For me, I will feel better after I watch the horror movies, because I will see something scary but I am not in the situation as it shows in the movies. People will experience the aesthetic of horror, and they will catharsis the bad feelings they have. According to the course reading, Carroll mentioned that “The disclosure of the existence of the horrific being and of its properties is the central source of pleasure in the genre” (Page 282). This proof that horror movies can help people feeling pleasure. In the article “Why our brains love horror movies”, we can also find the evidence for how horror movies influence human emotions. The author Sharon mentioned that “There are people who have a tremendous need for stimulation and excitement, and horror movies are one of the better ways to get really excited” (Sharon 2011). This is why the art of horror is an important part of human culture.

Reference:

Begley, S. (11, October 11). Why Our Brains Love Horror Movies. Retrieved May 11, 2015, from http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2011/10/25/why-our-brains-love-horror-movies-fear-catharsis-a-sense-of-doom.html

Carroll, N. (2002). Why Horror?. In Neill, A. & Riley, A. (Eds.) Arguing About Art: Contemporary Philosophical Debates (2nd ed., pp. 275-294). New York, NY: Routledge.

Zinoman, J. (2011, July 16). The Critique of Pure Horror. Retrieved May 11, 2015, from http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/17/opinion/sunday/17gray.html

One example of a diegetic sound is in the beginning of the film when the little girl was singing the song with a box in her hands. We know that the sound was coming from the girl which means this is a diegetic sound. This diegetic sound contributes to the aesthetic of horror for the movie because it makes me afraid when I heard the song from the girl. I guess there must be something horror after the sound, and I am right because the man becomes the ghost then.

One example of a non-diegetic sound is when the building where the ghost living shows up, the background music is horrify and scare me. This happened in about the 22 minutes of the movie. This also contributes to the aesthetic of horror for the movie, because the sound means that ghost will come out and catch people.

The example for mise-en-scene is when the ghosts and zombies come out to catch people. There were several ghosts who are floating on the road, and those zombies are followed with them. It was in the night, and only little lights around them. This was scared because those ghosts were nauseating, and the zombies were horrified. I think this mise-en-scene contributes to the aesthetic of horror for the video as it wondering what will happen after.

It is true for everybody that they will change their dressing style and body adornment for different life phases. My dressing style also changed a lot through my life, and those changes were caused by distinct reasons. For now, I will dress like an American college student because I have come to US for four years. My classmates and the community will influence what I dress. I would like to wear a shirt with simple design and also jeans. Sometime I like to wear cloth pants and sports shoes. I do not like any adornment because I think adornment will make me feel uncomfortable. I will not have makeup or dye hair. I think my main value comes from my family and the community I live with. Having a simple life without too much things bothers me is what I view as the main value for me. I will make my choices based on my personal experience and the value system I have. As a college student, I do not view dress and adornment the most important way for me to express who I am. I think the most important thing is to learn and understand how to think differently to be an international student at America.

For my family, we all view dress as the basic necessary, and we just wear what we think can fulfill our need. We do not view dress as further required to make us look differently. However, this does not mean we do not express our values through the dress we have. It only means that we value toward dress are simple and easy. My father is the person who never buys clothes for himself, and he does not care about that. My mom will help my father to get what he needs, and each morning she will prepare a set of clothes for my father to wear on that day. My mom as a woman has more concerns about what she wears. However, she will not buy a lot of fashion clothes and change dress every day. She will only buy the clothes with classic style. She will wear one dress for several times a year, and this dress will last for several years. This means she has a constant dressing style instead of follow the popular style each year. In my opinion, this shows the value for the confidence to choose what she needs and will not be influenced by others. I am mainly influenced by my father’s dressing value, which view the clothes as the basic needs with no more functions.

As a student in the University of Oregon, my peer community is the college students. Most of the students here share similar values and we can find those values expressed through their dress and body adornment. People in University of Oregon love to play sport a lot because we have a strong sport culture in the campus. The value to have a better body with fitness and sport is expressed by the dresses from students here. Many students will wear sport shoes and sweatpants. Many of them will expose their muscles to show the strong body they have. This core belief affect my value system a lot when I came here as a student. I did not view fitness as necessary in the past, however, I start to do fitness after I came to Eugene because there are so many people doing that. Some of my friends are influenced by this value position even more deeply. They will eat healthy food and do fitness every day in order to make their body stronger.

As an international student who come from China, I have another peer community which is the Chinese friends who also study here. We all influenced by American culture and values, and we will influence each other as well. As a foreigner, we are trying to keep our traditional culture, and we adapt to the new culture at the same time. This becomes a new mix culture and value system for us to share as a community. Some of the Chinese students are very shy to meet with Americans because our tradition is subtle, and the traditional Chinese are not open. As a contrast, some of the Chinese students changed a lot to the American value, and become very open and outgoing. I have no idea to judge which one is better, and I think it is just the difference we need to adapt. For me, the community here really changed my value a lot compare the value I have before I came to America.