#whitescapes

For the Whitescapes Art Assignment, I took a white piece of paper outside to photograph with the white snow on my white car. Then I came inside and recorded my observations on the paper. Transcript: 

The paper looked bright and blue against the snow, a more neutral white beneath the paper. The wind* fought my ill-prepared plan, ut I managed to get some snow on top of the paper. Against the blue, it took on a slight reddish tinge. I'm sure I would have had different--and perhaps slightly more interesting--results, if I'd gone out in the day time and again around now, in the dull blue fading twilight on a stormy day, but procrastination got the better of me.

Back inside, under my incandescent light, and with no other whites around, the paper takes on a more neutral white. The splotches where it was soaked with snow, however, are no longer white at all, but a sparkling mid-gray.

Art Assignment: Whitescapes Paige Breisacher Mar 14, 2017

This assignment started with me (badly) describing it to my roommate and then her pointing out all the white things in our house. Because she was cooking dinner at the time, I decided food was the best thing to use. Also, because my roommate gave me so many options, I decided to do another set.

   Test 1    - Inside of an egg shell and Rice: When put side by side, the rice looks more yellow and the egg shell is pink. We turned one light off in the kitchen and left another on in the second picture, making the rice gray and the eggshell brown.

What is white? What is any color? Philadelphia-based abstract painter Odili Donald Odita talks with us about his work and offers us an assignment about color. Your specific instructions:

Whitescapes.

This is an Art Assignment inspired by Odili Donald Odita

Aim: to describe a few white objects in different lightings.

I chose to photograph a cotton fabric on which I placed - an origami crane, a set of earphones, a cotton ball, and pearl earrings. 

I have always remembered my earphones to be completely white, (I would describe this white as a premium plasticky one), but when placed next to fabric, it seemed quite dull (and dirty!). The cotton fabric & cotton ball looked more or less of the same shade. But it was the origami crane that, when the surroundings were lit up differently, showed more drastic change in (perceived) colour. The pearls shone similarly in all the pictures, with very less or no change in the intensity of the shine.

After looking at the whites in different scenarios, I can’t think about the other objects, but if I had to name the colour, I would name the earrings to be “white sheen”, and cotton balls to be “white fluff”. Its more to do with the texture rather than the colour, but thats okay.

This assignment was so fascinating to me. I took three objects- two paper and one porcelain, and compared them under a yellowed light with the sunshine peeking into the room, and then a dark, blind-drawn room. The comparisons were done in the afternoon, which I think is important to note because what we see depends on the amount of light. I think that the lighting drew out a blue or lavender grey in one of the papers, and a steel-like grey tint in the porcelain when it got dark. Porcelain was very matted in either light. In contrast, the notebook paper ended up being a yellow tint.

This allowed me to contemplate the idea of white being either a uniform or a range of colors that we have simply codified to make life simpler. I have always known white to be the absence of color-and this opened my eyes to see just how expansive white can be, and how it changes throughout time. It really makes you feel something new about such a neutral shade. I’m reminded of when you want to redo your paint in your house, and you go somewhere like Home Depot to get paint swatches to place by your walls- suddenly what you thought would be a simple task turns into a thousand options for the one color you thought you were going in to get- it’s ivory, light pearl, condensed milk, and powdered sugar white-after awhile, you’re not even sure there’s a difference anymore😂😂