In long time ago, people eat food just for feeding themselves. However, nowadays, there are so many different kinds of restaurant, such as Chinese restaurant, French restaurant, Italian restaurant and etc. Moreover, people still classify the restaurants by the different foods. For example, fast food restaurant, seafood restaurant and etc. According to this, we can see that people treat food seriously. Therefore, in my opinion, if we think food is art, then food is art. Because when food is given by the waiter in the restaurant, we always evaluate it in not only the taste, but also the appearance. Moreover, some people still think about the matching of one kind of food to another food. And the most important part is that, not everyone could cook a beautiful and delicious food. Just like Chopin could create some classic music, and Da Vinci could draw some extraordinary paintings.

For example, as we can see, they are sushis. And moreover, there are oranges under them, how creative they are! When I look at this picture, I cannot help to eat them all, even I’ve had the dinner half an hour ago. On the other hand, let’s see another picture.

Indeed, when people are hungry, they must really want to this meal. However, we are talking about food’s art. For example, people might not go to art museum to see the painting when they could not even have a place to live or have something to eat. Personally speaking, when I look at this picture, I am just seeing a lot of unhealthy junk food. Compare to the sushi picture, I would not eat these unhealthy food even I am hungry.

Furthermore, in my opinion, food’s art is not only the taste of the food, but also the appearance of it. In other words, for some food, we do not eat; we just watch it. For instance, When I first look at it, I really thought it is a shoe. However, when I stare at it for about six seconds. I just realize that it is a burger. However, If this burger is put in front of me, I won’t eat it. Because it is so cute. And I will I could wear it.

Some people even draw on the food, . For some people, this is an apple. But for some other people who are artiest, it is a thing to release their creative mind. Just like this apple in the picture, someone drew a world map on it! And I am thinking that how did he/she do that? Did he/she do it by pen, knife, or mouth? This is the glamour of art.

The topic for this week is food. And we read the paper Food As Art by Tefer,E. She analyzes food’s pros and cons to determine whether food could be thought as art. In my opinion, it is. In long time ago, people eat food just for feeding themselves. However, nowadays, there are so many different kinds of restaurant, such as Chinese restaurant, French restaurant, Italian restaurant and etc. Moreover, people still classify the restaurants by the different foods. For example, fast food restaurant, seafood restaurant and etc. According to this, we can see that people treat food seriously. In Food As Art, Telfer writes that ” art is by defnition a man-made thing, even if the human involvement need consist of no more that putting a natural objuect in gallery and giving it a title.”(page 12) This states that everything could be considered as art, as long as people give it a title and be shown in front of people. Furthermore, she writes that “in a highly-specialized society like ours, the arts are also specialties and may exist for their own sake apart from ritual or any other purpose” (p. 21). Therefore, in my opinion, if we think food is art, then food is art. Because when food is given by the waiter in the restaurant, we always evaluate it in not only the taste, but also the appearance. Moreover, some people still think about the matching of one kind of food to another food. And the most important part is that, not everyone could cook a beautiful and delicious food. Just like Chopin could create some classic music, and Da Vinci could draw some extraordinary paintings. At last of her paper, she says “If food cannot be more than a minor art form, there is a danger of being precious about it – of treating it, that is, as though it had more aesthetic importance than it does.”(page 26) Indeed, people could not alive without food, therefore, as the time goes by, the food is getting more and more important for human beings. Thus, when people appreciate food, they will compare one restaurant with another one, then, food is being appreciated as art.

This week, our reading material is “what is art for” by Ellen Dissanayake. In this article, she talks about her own experiences living abroad for about 15 years. Then she has to force herself to understand the exotic cultures, and get involve in the exotic societies. She writes what “Living in another culture also makes you realize that different as other people’s beliefs may be from one’s own, we are all still recognizably people – and so wonder what is universal”(page. 16). I like the quote, “Adopting the species-centered view of art allows us personally to better appreciate the continuity of ourselves and our artmaking with nature” (p. 26). This just means that art connects people and art is beneficial to the betterment of society.

I also have some experiences which are about this topic. When I was a  middle school student in China, I had to learn how to speak English. And in that time, I just hated English, because I thought if I want to communicate with someone, I could use Chinese, even when I want to talk to someone who does not speak Chinese, I could use dictionary or translate. However, I changed this thoughts after I went to England. When I came back to China from England, I thought the language is no longer a subject. It is a tool- a tool of communication. I could use different languages to deeply comprehend different cultures. I really want to thank the people who create this diversified world. People are living in many different societies with many different cultures. Then we could feel different life styles. Personal speaking, cultures are arts. One could only deeply understand three or four cultures in his whole life at most. Because cultures should not be read in books or internet, they should be felt or touched.

Hello visitor!

My name is Houzhi Wu, but you can call me Gary if that makes you feel better.

This is my second year in the University of Oregon, and my major is mathematics, because I’d like to study financial mathematics in the future.

Furthermore, I love music and movie. I have made some movies before, and I still have made some original music. I play the piano, the guitar, and the Ukulele. Compare these music instruments, my favorite one is the piano. I have played piano for about five years. And my favorite musician is Chopin.

If you want to make friend with me, I will be so glad to chat with you.!

In this week, we discuss about “personal values”. To me, personal values are mostly developed during the childhood, which means the educations from parents are the most important factor of developing personal values. The term “educations” means that the behaviors from parents and which places parents go often. Because, for children, everything is fresh, and everything is acceptable. They learn whatever they see and hear.

In H. Lewis’ “A question of Values: Six Ways We Make the Personal Choices That Shape Our Lives”, he writes that “the proposition that individual human beings are programmed into their values, either by the influence of genes on personality or by social pressures.” (page 8.)  I totally agree with this statement, because, as I said, personal values are mostly developed during the childhood. Furthermore, when people grow up as adults, they might have the integrated personal values. However, they still have the right and the ability to judge what is wrong and what is right. Therefore, they might realize that some principles, told by their parents when they are children, are incorrect. Since people might receive much more advanced education than that of their parents, they could make their own decisions to whether believe or not believe something.

Moreover, why do people believe something, such as the length of one meter, the color of the sky, and so on. In H. Lewis’ essay, “For the color of our eyes or flatness of the earth…which we come to “believe” or “know” anything.”(page 9.) In short, observations, sense experiences and logics are the vital factor of believing something.

Nevertheless, to me, I have some different opinions. the three main factors of believing something are just for the rational people. For the perceptual people, they actually have the vague personal values,because they are always changing their personal values. For example, one loves Chinese culture, since China has 2000 years history, and he is really interested in what people do in the ancient times. However, one day, when he watches the movie Iron Man. He suddenly feels bored about the history; he wants to explore the future. Then he becomes a super crazy fan of American culture and American movies, because there are a lot of high technology stuffs in United States.

To sum up, there are too many factors which could influence people’s personal values, from the H. Lewis’ article, the most important factors are sense experience, deductive logic, emotion, intuition. With these model, people could develop their own values.