Module 6

"Through the Eyes of the Sculptor" was a really interesting video.  You got to really focus in and see what artists think about their work and the time and effort that really goes into it.  It was interesting to see the process of creating the marble statue because I just thought you would sculpt it out of clay but the effort and detail that go into it never even crossed my mind. 

In the video, "Glass & Ceramics," there were a few things I knew but it was mainly all new information.   It talked about how glass is made from sand but the properties of glass are entirely different from sand.  I learned that glass is a liquid that stiffens when cooled and is burned in a fire in a furnace.  Different temperatures give different characters to the product.  It talked a lot about the process from beginning to end of stained glass windows which was really interesting to me.  I remember in high school learning about the kiln and burning ceramics to make them harden where you can paint them so it was a review in a sense for me when they talked about ceramics.  The video also went into detail about different types of windows and the purpose for insulation with the pressure of sound waves.  If you put two windows of different thickness together it cuts the sound in half and helps with insulation.  It talked about how to make the glass safer and thicker which is like the windows used in schools and sports buildings because it prevents shattering.  I never knew all of this detail went into glass and ceramics so it was really interesting to see it up close. 

In the "Installation Art" video, it was all new information to me, other than what I had already read in our text.  I had never really heard about it before so it was interesting to learn about.  Installation artwork is artwork that takes over and defines the space it is in.  It is all around you and there is a physical and attitude definition to it.  It is 3D artwork that uses the space around it and within it rather than just using a flat pallet.  There was an artist that talked in the video about using an entire window as his artwork.  They talked about site-specific installation art which cannot work unless it is in a specific location.  The Spiral Jetty in Salt Lake, Utah, for example was made to be there and it couldn't exist anywhere else.  It is a process that at one point doesn't even look like art but it takes time.

Each video related to the readings but I enjoyed watching the videos rather than reading.  It really helped to actually see the process of some of the things discussed in the text like the creation of glass and sculpting. 

I really enjoyed the films.  I thought that they added a lot to my understanding of what the topics in the text discussed.  I'm more of a visual learner so it helped me to see the process of each individual art.