Curation Progress Report

This week my curation has been going better than before, I have found new information that i want to include. I was searching for specific videos to include that may be helpful. I really want to have videos becasue i believe it will make  my curation a lot better and easier to understand if there is a visual experience. Im happy with my progress because I found a video that gives an interesting look on my topic. This has been an imporant detail that i wanted to include, so im currently content with my work so far especially becasue I was able to find a good video.

I still need to find more sources and that has been my toughest challenge for this whole project. I have been having some trouble with finding quality sources for my curation. I want to find the right ones, but that has been a challenge so this week I hope  to find the rest of the sources I need.

I like the project so far becasue I have been able to research something that im really interested in. Although I have been doing most of the work outside of class, I would appreciate more class time. I believe that would be very beneficial becasue it could really help me pace my project better.

Curation Progress Report

My curation topic was difficult to find, I wasn't very sure about what I wanted to curate and not only that but I wasn't fully understanding the curation process or purpose. As I began to read over the instructions and began doing my own research I had an idea of what I wanted to do. My biggest interest is soccer, so I knew I wanted to pick a topic related to that. It was then difficult to select a specific topic because I didn't know what aspect of the sport wanted to focus on. After I had met with Mr. Allen we came together and finally figured out my topic.

We had finally agreed on my topic being, the things people wouldn't know about soccer. At this point I have done some research but I'm having trouble on deciding what to include as my information. I have looked up certain facts about the sport and reviewed certain rules and I think I might use some of the information for my curation. One of the biggest obstacles for me has been finding good information that will fit and make the curation a success.

From this point on I need to do the following, I need to find more valuable and specific information supporting my topic, organize information appropriately, and meet with Mr. Allen to make sure I'm going in the right direction.  I want to make sure I find more information on finding specific rules and interesting facts that people who enjoy the sport or even people who are new to the sport should know.

The project for the most part is running smoothly, I believe it would be very helpful if we could be given a little more class time to work on this. I think class time would be affective in getting work done.

Best of the week: Exit Through the Gift Shop

This week we finished the film "Exit Through the Gift Shop" it was a very interesting movie, I really enjoyed all the art that was shown because it was street art. I don’t really know much about street art and i wasn’t familiar with it but seeing it in the film opened my eyes to a different form of art. I thought everything they were doing was brilliant, especially Banksy. I liked that Banksy's identity was hidden and that the world didn’t know much about him. He was a very talented street artist and I believe his passion for art was remarkable.

            Another important character in the film was Thierry. He loved filming street artists and following them along their journeys of the night. I think it was incredible how Thierry was able to make his own art and become so successful. He had never done it before, and he decides to just up and do this kind of art but I feel like he doesn’t really know what he’s doing. In a way I see what he did as disrespectful and kind of frustrating for other artists who have a passion for what they do. It was a great film because it gives a good insight on street art through the story of Thierry and Banksy.

            The film made me understand street art, and most importantly how passionate some artists are. It’s a great experience seeing these artists at work, and now the next time I see art on the streets of Chicago I’ll feel more informed about what lies behind that art.

Metacognition: Mashup

I never knew what a mashup was until this assignment. I  thought that it would be hard to meet all the requirements as in finding quotes, in class reflections, the  use of other media or art, and passages from other works in the humanities curriculum just to define one simple word.

As I was looking over my annotations in Letters to a Young Poet by Rainer Maria Rilke, I kept my mind open and remembered to take pauses to let the more complex ideas come to me naturally instead of forcing it.

Having the natural flow of complex ideas really helped in narrowing down my selection of words. I ended up doing my mashup on the word love. I choose the word love because I wanted challenge myself by exploring a word I don't take time in my everyday life to think about. One of my goals was to explore this simple word, that is often over used, and find deeper meanings for it.

While creating my mashup and searching for outside sources I realized that love ended up being not so challenging. One thing I really noticed was that love is everywhere in the world and that there is many different kinds of love. Ranging from: the unconditional love a mother has with her child, to the love two people share, to the things we love in our everyday life.  

What I really liked about this assignment was how one word can be expressed through various types of media. I really enjoyed how this project differed from every other type of project, mashups are a good way of making a simple topic or subject into a bunch of complex ideas. I like how a mashup can be interpreted differently by every person, because it allows people to create their own explanations and ideas. Over all, I wouldn't change much about this project, I would have liked to do this over the course of the whole humanities curriculum.

Best of week: post modern art

One thing that really got me thinking in class was the painting of a can of tomato soup by Andy Warhol. This picture belonged to the postmodern side of the chart under the art category. With this picture we said that “Art is commerce; style matters most of all” as a class we broke down this quote into two parts.

The first part was “art is commerce.” This means that the can of soup is a commodity, or what we buy. We watched a quick movie clip with Andy Rooney criticizing post modern art. He was basically pointing out how stupid it is and how art has become very irrelevant and apart of the human life. In modern art it is believed that “art [is] a separate and somewhat privileged kind of human experience.” By Andy Warhol creating this painting of just a can of soup gives out a message of how now art is just as simple as things we buy and how new genuine ideas have vanished.

Another way I thought about this was the style. In post modern art it says that “style matters most of all.” But when looking at this picture I think it was being contradicting. Of course now in postmodern time people want very different and new kinds of art in their home because it catches their eyes due to the new variations of style. In our class that wasn’t the case; the class was boggled by why Andy Warhol would paint a picture of just a can of soup. Most of the people in the class would rather have a picture that makes the think and create their own interpretation of meaning within the painting.

I think there are limitations when it comes to style because the society wants to fall in between both modern and postmodern art. They want to be able to think about the paintings meaning along with absurd and abstract style. For example a painting of a can of soup or a statue of a painted cow and bunnies wouldn’t be as meaning full to society. I think a lot of people would like paintings like Braque and Picasso; because their paints are abstract but at the same time not as simple as a can of soup it actually makes you think.
When talking about modern and postmodern art it is very hard for society to go completely one way now a days because we are lazy and don’t want to think as much but we also don’t want something so simple as a can of soup which we see every day in our cabinets. This puzzles me because I don’t like being in between two ideas; I want to go one way or the other. Now when I look at different works of art I am going to try and figure out whether or not the artist was trying to create a modern or postmodern piece of art.

Connection: Einstein's dreams and the butterfly effect

In the book, Einstein's Dreams , There has been many interesting topics so far. In one of these topics  mentioned, I found a direct relationship between this part of the book and the movie, The Butterfly Effect. I really enjoy the movie, so when I saw this connection I was more into the book. In the book there's a segment where Lightman speaks about the many outcomes of the man's actions, when he goes to the woman's house in Firbourg the outcome is much different compared when he decides not to. When he decided not to see her he ends up with another woman with a much more calm relationship, a good relationship but much different from the other outcome. When the man decides to go to her house, he ends up making love with the woman and then they fall in  love. His relationship with this woman is much different, with a lot of arguments and love, but none the less he is happy with her. And the other outcome which involved him going to see her, but in this version nothing happens and they end up not being together. What I took from this part, was that there is many outcomes depending on the actions taken in life. I directly related this idea to the movie, The Butterfly Effect. In the film, the main character has a power where he can go back in his life through his journal entries that he writes everyday. Depending on what happens that day is what he writes in his journal. He is able to see the many outcomes of his actions when he reads his old entries he is allowed to go back in time and react however he chooses. When he goes back in time, he doesn't remember how his life has been in that "entry". But he does get to see the many outcomes his actions have on his life. This movie and book have both made me believe strongly in the idea that life is really like this. Life is very sensitive, and any choice or decision made in life will lead to something different.

Blogging Around

For the first comment I made I chose to make it on Miguel's blog about getting organized. I found similarities in our blogs and I found new ideas that I really liked about his method of organization.
He talked about how he got organized specifically which made it much more interesting with his use of detail.
"I liked the method you chose to organize your room. I think it was smart to have separated your clothes into different categories. After reading your blog, it gave me ideas to help organize my room further. I really thought that the use of categories for clothes made a lot of sense. For example I think its smart to have winter clothes in one section and summer clothes in another. Depending on the season it wouldn't make sense to have both types of clothing out. I too felt a sense of satisfaction after this experience, and I believe organization can really help and satisfy when needed".

The second comment I made, was on Erika's blog about music. She explained the activity we did in class where we broke down the structure of music and really got a better understanding of it. I had similar feelings towards this activity, and believe anybody who cares for music would learn from this activity.
"I like that you were able to recognize that there is a lot of talent and hard work put in music, even if you don't like the type of music. I too shared the same feelings about music after this experience in class. I can now understand the actual beauty in all types of music. I like that you had this realization, because I did also and I feel like more people should be appreciative of all kinds of music even if they don't like it. because there is a lot of effort and beauty put in to all music".