#research studio

This is a new part of my collection. I saw it on a website called Society6 and I had to get it. Mermaids have been apart of my life since childhood, I use to want to be one(still do!). It wasn’t until I saw this pillow that I remember my passion for all things mermaid. And once I remember that it influenced me to start writing and sketching out mermaid/underwater photos. I don’t have all the equipment that I need to go underwater and shoot with a model but I do know that there are ways to make it seem like it’s underwater so I’m going to start practicing different techniques of doing that. Once finish the photos I’ll add them to this post even if the don’t turn out that good Failure is apart of both art and learning!

该课程培养了学生的批判性思维，同时提高了基础制作能力，并向学生们介绍了艺术家和设计师们制作过程中使用的各种方法，为了使每个主题更加具体，每个主题被设计成由多个阶段组成。学生们提出问题, 并且展示了调查问题，搜集参考资料, 用各种材料试验,制定决策,记录结果的能力。通过本课程的学习，他们能够流利表达出自己的想法和制作过程。整个过程涉及到最初的灵感，探求，技术学习，解决问题和演示诸多方面。

教学记录：过程

This course builds critical-thinking skills in tandem with foundation making skills. Students are introduced to different methods in which artists and designers approach the making process. Each topic is organized as a multi-phased process allowing for extended engagement in specific topics.  Students formulate questions and demonstrate the ability to investigate topics, search for references, experiment with materials, make decisions, and document results. Through the course, they are able to articulate their thinking and making process as it relates to initial inspiration, exploration, technique acquisition, problem solving, and presentation.

I was particularly drawn to Theaster’s passion and involvement with buildings and his community. His reclamation of materials from demolished buildings can be seen as a means of preserving that building, or as recycling materials that would have otherwise been trashed.

His going into and playing for a dying church stood out to me, the image of him playing the cello is burned into my memory. His “last sermon” for something as holy as a church built in the 1890’s, one that he didn’t have the means to save, was powerful and poignant. One goes to a church to worship, to have their soul saved, and yet the Church was unable to be saved.

What makes one building more worthy of preservation than another? Theaster spoke of buildings being preserved because it means a fat check for a contractor, or of it being destroyed because it happens to be in a black, yellow, whatever colored neighborhood where it’s not “culturally significant” enough to be saved.

Speaking on the Dorchester Project, where he acquires abandoned buildings, guts them, creates art from the innards and uses the funds to restore and refurbish with found materials; is almost creating a performance out of the bureaucracy of saving a building. He spoke of talking to and spending money on lawyers for three hours every day to give money away, I wonder how many hoops he has to jump through to preserve a building? He gives the reclaimed building an entirely new purpose, and everything that goes into the rebirth of the building has a story of its own. It’s beautiful. Perhaps it’s all for the church that he was unable to save.