Designing for Community Sites: Art in the Environment

For this Field Study students were asked to become familiar with Art & Environment Initiative projects in Meadville by 1) walking Meadville's Urban Art Trail and 2) looking for sites and/or project ideas that might be worth exploring.

Students worked together to identify a series of site options and then develop individual proposals (drawings, models and where essential both) for a public art project for that site. All projects were intended to be specific to the site, and in an effort to maintain connections to the Urban Art Trail, all proposals had to explore water or include a water theme in some way.

Collage Compositions

Picasso 

For this Field Study Unit students were asked to gather 3 - 5 collections of images and use them, not necessarily at one time, to create a 2D collage, or a 3D assemblage/relief (something designed with reference to a flat picture plane) that:

• explores pictorial space (2D space)

• explores composition (unity, variety, balance, lines of movement, placement, position, compositional space, etc) 

• considers how composition can reinforce the inherent meaning of the images being placed together....what do the images evoke? what does the organization suggest? what do the shapes hint at? Can you work with these elements rather than impose something onto them? 

• explores material integration

Size was left to individual choice, but students were asked to limit themselves, at least initially, to black and white, with one accent color. This was a a suggestion to keep things simple at least at the start so students would be able to learn how color and shape interactions can structure space....and also to remember that sometimes, less really is more.

Finally students were asked to consider how what they were making stood as a reflection of what they were learning about composition, craftsmanship, content, creativity (i.e., the 4C's).

Through this Field Study Unit students developed 3 - 5 collage compositions, each of which was evolved through 2 - 3 revisions over time. Our discussion focused on compositional organization, spatial organization, serial images vs. centralized pictorial space, integration of materials, color, shape, texture and intention.... and much more).

Transformed Objects

This unit involved observing, understanding and transforming an everyday object by: 

1) drawing the object

2) photographing the object 

3) considering what the object connotes/evokes 

4) transforming the object
5) using all of the above to develop an installation in which composition is carefully considered

Blind Contour Drawings

Part-way through our work with transforming objects, it seemed that many of you needed to slow down and consider the importance of deep looking, authentic engagement in the creative process, and finding what is most interesting in your own work (learning, as Bruce Mau says, ...'to love what you make like you would love an unwanted child")

Mind Maps

Mind Mapping was used as our starting point for exploring visual communication,

composition and design, creative thinking, and learning about ourselves and each other.

Some images from 8Hr Projects

For the past 15+ years the art department has hosted 8 Hour Projects. For this show, the first of the academic year, artists spend one full day making a work of art in the gallery. Students and other visitors get to talk with the artists and often help them or even collaborate with them. Don't be fooled by this 8 Hour concept - most artists invest many many many hours planning for the day to ensure that things will work as imagined. For those who do not plan well or who run into unforseen problems, the results can be disappointing. Most of the time though the process that unfolds during the course of the 8 Hours is so magical and inspiring it just makes you wanna make art!

Materials Archives

Students were asked to collect materials and images that could be used in our work this semester. The prompt for this talked about being tuned into and aware of the things that attract our attention aesthetically and conceptually.

Image Source

Image Source

Image Source