Month: April 2015

Person one:

I chose a Chinese female student, and she was sating in Lillis Atrium and watching her iPhone. I think she may be waiting for her friend from class. She was carrying a blue bag pack, and the bag looks very heavy because full of stuff. At first glance, I think her style is athletic, because her adornment is simple and athletic. She was wearing a black T-shirt, black fitness pants and a pair of Nike shoes. Her outfit is common, but the Nike shoes look very fashionable and expensive. She was also wearing an eye-catching watch, and it looks very nice and stylish. According to her decorations, first, I think she likes sports and she is very healthy, because I think that she probably goes to the gym every day if a girl usually dressed as athlete. Secondly, I think she is interested in fashion. Although her outfits do not look very expensive, there are some details showing that she likes fashion, such as her fancy shoes and watch.

Person Two:

The second person I observed was a Chinese girl sitting next to the person one, and she is totally different with the person one. Her hair is black and straight, and it seems too she care very much about her hair. She wore a white sweater as a top, and it looks both stylish and expensive. Also, she was wearing a white dress and black high heels. I think that the girls should be like clean very much, because her clothes look very white. She looks very calm, and it seems she was thinking about something. I deliberately watched her bag, because her bag is the limited edition from Chanel. Therefore, I think that she is very concerned with their appearance. First, I think that people who like to wear white clothes normally have strong sense of self. Secondly, her outfits and decoration are expensive and fashionable, so I think she is a relatively care about other people’s opinion about her.

Person Three:

The third person I chose is an American guy. He and his friends were siting on the chairs and discussing problems. They are dressed in suit, and he looks very nervous. It seems that he would have a speech later. He dressed in black suit and red tie. His suit looked very clean and very trim. I feel that he seems have been well kept his suit. His shoes are very bright and well kept. He looks like a very professional businessman. I think he is a very detail-oriented person. First, his decorations are carefully prepared, so I think he care about her appearance. Secondly, from his red tie, and I think he might want to attract the eyes of others from his speech. Overall, I think he has professional and great attitude, whether from the outside or look inside, because he was very seriously prepare for the upcoming presentation.

Caitlin Freeman, Leah Rosenberg and Tess Wilson are three artists and pastry chef for Blue Bottle Coffee in San Francisco. They create simply and beautiful desserts inspired by modern art. The book Modern Art Desserts wrote by Caitlin Freeman. This book is an amazing place to inspire people to express their ideas through desserts. Here is the website they introduce some artworks created.

From Caitlin’s perspective, Desserts is not only art but also a modern art tool. The website FLICKR shows some desserts which exhibited at the SFMOMA. It illustrates their artistic desserts and the inspiration which are some modern artworks. Desserts have aesthetic appearance, and the majority of people feel sweet and lovely when they see desserts, especially for girls. A lot of girls would like the opportunity to treat themself with a dessert. Basically, all my friends like desserts, and especially almost every girl are crazy about dessert because of their amazing appearance. I always hear that “This cake is too beautiful to eat”. Personally, I think people like eating dessert for several reasons. First, most desserts looks very attractive, and the appearance of fine desserts attract a lot of people. Exquisite desserts appearance can stimulate the sense of visual. For example workers who temporarily leave the boring and repetitive work, and it is definitely a good choice to see such a rich aesthetic desserts at that time. Enjoying the beautiful things can relax both body and mind, and at this time the dessert is no longer a simple food, but a work of art. Here is a clip shows how Caitlin create the art of desserts.

Also, desserts can stimulate the sense of taste. According to studies, there is a great use of dessert is releasing the psychological pressure, and this is exactly one of art’s objectives and impacts. Sweet could allow buds fully enjoy the taste, of course, and this dessert is sweet rather than greasy. Imagining, when you taste the sweet and refreshing ice cream and the moment let it melt slowly in the tongue and sweet gradually filled, and then the mood will naturally feel comfortable. At the moment, you would just want to enjoy a delicious, and put all the troubles behind. Art is about to look up everything with an art point of view which means positive for me. There is no doubt that not everyone can exactly read artworks, but everyone could have sense of aesthetic appreciation of food. It is an amazing approach to create desserts by the inspiration of modern art, because the advantage is advocating modern art through food which is more familiar with our life. At the same time, it is a kind of attitude of living express everything in our live has connection, and no matter it is food or art. There are a thousands of perspectives seeing the world and expressing your ideas, food is one of the amazing perspectives because food is our life.

Work Cited

http://www.modernartdesserts.com/templates

https://www.flickr.com/photos/51653636@N02/sets/72157624277977793/with/4753047179/#_=_

Occasionally, I hear some people said, “This dish is too beautiful to eat”, and they may also said, “This dish is like a beautiful work of art.” In the bottom of this case, people who eat the food actually pay attention on color, appearance and shape. Of course, their so-called “art” belongs to the visual arts. Nowadays, there is a popular way to express idea through food, and artists become food to visual art in a variety of ways. Artists remove nature of the most important features of food to sublimate food to be able to make people appreciate the art. Telfer mentioned, “The essence of the process [of duplication] is that it enables an artist to produce many copies of one work. Since we can call each engraving a work of art, we can call each pie a work of art, at least in the classifying sense,” (Telfer, 17). Everything could be called “art”. Therefore, I think food is art, because beautiful food could be visual art and also artists create art by using food. However, the question is why would they think that only the desirable food could be called art?

If we think about the question from the other side, the “eating” is also seen as a way to appreciate art, because the mouth also is an artistic touch. Assume there are no eyes and ears anymore, so the teeth and the tongue is a way to stir the human perception of art. In this way, we will be able to find the most experienced food adventure and the most specific nature of food. Therefore, if the food is really an art, so the only way we appreciate this art is to destroy it. We can experience the full beauty of food through action of eating, in order to understand the essence of food as an art. The value of food is the moment of a lifetime’s death, because we can never enjoy the food if we don not destroy the food. Food is art, and the only way we enjoy it is to eat it.

In Ellen’s article, he talks about that human’s value has different meaning in different period in history. Historically, the arts influence community and the people in different way. For example, in the Middle Age, art are closely relating to religion to advocate god. In the Renaissance, artists believed in humanism. Like Ellen mentioned “As medieval society and art was God-centered, that of the Renaissance man centered.” (Dissanayake, p. 21) Art has different meaning and value at the different period of time. Today, art is a broad concept, and it includes various forms, such as painting, sculpture, dance, music, movies, and so on. Although there are different forms of art, but basically they are intended to convey the essence of the artist’s thinking. I think art is becoming more and more creative, and more and more people are creating art to express themselves. Ellen said in the article “I hope that a more human future society and art will be species-centered that is, will regard all human as a like in having the same fundamental needs.”(Dissanayake, p. 21) As Ellen’s hoping, artistic environment is becoming relative free, so artists would represent the publics to pursue the needs of individuals and the society. Comparing to the art environment in the Middle Age, the environment has changed today. Artists have relatively free environment to create, however, art is more surprising and stranger in the contemporary art. For the general aesthetic of the outside, the contemporary is weird and unacceptable. Only the art piece contains significant meaning could stand the test of time. Also, Ellen said that “Everyone may be and artist-decorating their bodies and possessions, dancing, singing, versifying, performing-even when some person are acknowledges as being more talented or skillful than others.” (Dissanayake, p. 19) Everyone could become an artist, because people desire to express. Now, A lot of media coverage in making art, and there are many art-related consulting on the network. Therefore there are a lot of opportunities for artist to exhibit their artwork, and also the people who love art have opportunities to learn more about art.

I think the definition of art is a carrier which express human value, and the point of art is artist because art conveys thought of artists. The definition of human value is the way people observe and treat things. For me, art is like a teacher who taught growing up with me because I have studied piano when I was 8 years old. Through the years I was learning piano, art built up my human value which is to be positive and enthusiastic to life, family and friends. I think the reason art and human value exists is to make people feel about life. Art makes emotions subtler and more delicate and human value affirmed the value of our existence. Like Lewis mentioned in the article, “Although the term values is often used loosely, it should be synonymous with personal evaluations and related beliefs, especially personal evaluations and related beliefs about the “good,” the “just,” and the “beautiful,” personal evaluations and beliefs that propel us to action, to a particular kind of behaviors and life.”(Lewis, 7) I have been interested in pursuing my value or my principles of life for a long time. In order to basically understand the human values, I tried to talk with a friend, to observe the surrounding area, and to read books and articles. I realize that each people’s value is the reflection of his or her belief. Since different individuals have different values, everyone achieves his/her values in different ways. For me, I started to learn the piano from the age of eight, so I grew up on the way the piano has been with me. Piano experience let me find my values and principle of doing things, because the piano made me a very optimistic person. I really like this kind of optimism, paradise mentality. However, in the process of communication with friends, I realized that everyone has their own value, it just depends on the size and its value is reflected, since the purpose of different people are different ways to achieve their values.

This weekends, I watched a movie named Birdman. The movie is really intense and meaningful. After watching this movie, it was a little bit obscure for me to understand, so I went online and found an interesting review called “The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance” helped me a lot.

This review is very sophisticated and educational, and I finally understand this movie after read the article. This is a very clear personal style of the film, and lots of long shot similar to God’s perspective. Intense drum soundtracks run through the whole piece of explosive dialogue and performances. The article inspired me that this movie is talking about the director’s thinking self-perception and social value of irreconcilable contradictions. To be clear, it is about ego. Also, the article lead me to recognize ego. Ego people always overestimate the ability of individuals to lose self-knowledge. However, in the appropriate condition, ego can stimulate our morale to overcome difficulties and to move forward.