The phenomenon I am choosing to focus my shrine around is people’s obsession and connection with video games. Over the past few decades, video games have quickly become a huge part of many people’s lives. I think lots of people almost worship their video games. That is why I want to make a shrine about videogame addiction and how people feel such a strong connection to something that is virtual. This phenomenon is important to me because my friends and I play video games together a lot and it made me think about how video games have affected my life, other people’s lives, and the world. I want to focus solely on the connection between video games and people, physically and mentally. I want to try to represent this by creating some sort of monolith-type structure of a gaming console as if it was something that you would kneel before or worship. This is because my audience is people who play video games and understand the impact it has on the world and how it has manifested itself into something real.
Jingyi Zhou – Project 2
- The shrine will be focused on cats, because I’ve always been attracted to the mysteriousness of cats. I love its strength, spontaneity, cuteness, elegance, and independence, and I’m especially drawn to their life style, living in the moment and looks chill all the time. Sometimes in life, I couldn’t balance work and life, and end up stressing myself too much. So I would like to celebrate those characteristics of cats using the form of a shrine in this project. I will probably make several visual representations of these characteristics and arrange them in an organic way. The audience will be both myself and everyone who sees this, because the theme won’t be hard to comprehend, and people are generally familiar with cat. (since cat is the second most popular pets in the US)
3.
Ginger Cat – Edge Sculpture
Workshop/CraftsmanMatt Buckley / Edge Studio
I love how the sculpture captures both motion and emotion of the cat using swirls and lines.
Research Assignments Project 2 – Reilly Babcock
Assignment One:
I have decided to center my shrine on cats. Cats are my favorite animal, well domesticated animal. Beyond that fact, they mean a lot to me within my personal life. I have loved animals since I was a little girl; I would read books and draw pictures of the animals that mesmerized me. Around 6 years old, my family adopted a little black and white kitten, who we named Oreo. We picked him up behind a gas station; from the moment is first I held him; my life changed. Cats became my number one. Over the years, I built a deep connection with my little friend, who ultimately became not so little. About six years later, I adopted two more cats; they were brothers from a local rescue. Ozzy and Jif also became my best friends. I spent every moment at home with my little babies. The love that I felt for them cannot not be described. When I was 16, Oreo passed away. The pain and grief I. experienced was unimaginable; I had lost my best friend. I basically worshipped the little man, so his death was life changing. I think that moment solidified my connection with cats. Since then, I have adopted two more rescue kitties, both little girls. First, I adopted Mika, who I believe led me through some of the darkest periods of my life so far. She became an idol to me. Later, my family adopted Elsa, our little tripod kitty. Caring for her has been one of the happiest experiences for everyone in my family. My connection to cats has only strengthened over the years, so I believe there is no better choice for this project than to center my shrine around them. I want to connect my shrine to religious iconography because my relationship to cats seems like I worship them. I think I want to try to communicate my feelings toward cats to the audience; I want to show the importance of such relationships.
Assignment 2:
Assignment Three:
I am drawing my inspiration from pocket shrines. I liked the idea of this design because it conveys the need to worship in times of need. It reminds me of how I feel the need to be with my cates when I am feeling down. These shrines often include an iconographic image, something similar to a rosary, tiny amounts of holy water, and other small significant objects. I want to twist these objects to fit into things cats like; for the image, I want to create a holy image of a cat.
Assignment 4:
Project 2 Topic
For the second sculpting project, I chose to look into the phenomenon known as the Dunning Kruger Effect. My shrine for this project will focus on how people tend to feel like they know everything about a topic by barely learning anything about it. As they continue to learn more about said topic, they realize that they know very little. Then, after they have become experts on the topic, they realize that they know quite a lot about it but still have limitations. This phenomenon is important to me because I feel like it is engineering in a nutshell. Freshman year, we all felt like we know a lot about what we were learning but this year I am realizing that I have only scratched the surface. For this project, I want to highlight how often this happens. I want to do this by either recreating the standard plot of the Dunning-Kruger effect or by making something similar but comedic. My audience for this project will be both myself because I have witnessed this firsthand and also others who may have experienced it but aren’t aware of it.
Angela Meckley Project 2 Parts 1 & 3
Part 1:
For my sculpture/shrine I would like to focus on the specific locations of Venice, Florence, and Rome, Italy. When I was in high school, I went to Europe to study Italian Renaissance art and culture. Many of my interests as an artist have been inspired by these locations in Italy. While I was in Italy, I got to see famous iconic works of art such as Michelangelo’s David and Sistine Chapel, as well as Raphael’s The School of Athens and many more well-known works/locations. Aside from the artwork, I got to appreciate the atmosphere and culture of Italy, so I would like to include some representation of what I did/ate while I was there. I would like to somehow focus on specific landmarks, famous artwork, and Italian culture within my sculpture. To achieve this, I will be looking to include some representation of what I saw while I was in Italy by including small replicas of them or things that remind me of them. I also think it would be interesting to include my emotions that I had while I was on this trip through a specific color scheme that also reflects typical colors seen throughout Italian culture/artwork. The shrine will most likely turn out to be a shrine to myself about my trip to Europe to study art, because it was a monumental experience for me.
Part 3:
I would like to borrow from Michaelangelo’s aesthetically pleasing qualities displayed in his sculptures such as balance, ideal form, and harmony.
Project 2- Part 1 and 3
Part 1:
For my shrine, I want to focus on the topic of mental health. This phenomenon/theme is important to me because there is often a stigma around mental health. People tend to think that poor mental health is a reflection of weakness. This misconception often prevents people from seeking help. In my own life, I have made conscious efforts to improve my mental health. Beyond that, I have seen how prioritizing mental health has helped so many other people in my life. I hope that in creating a shrine centered around mental health I can demonstrate and convey its importance within my life, and others. I also hope that I can encourage others to start to recognize and destigmatize the negative attitudes around mental health. There are three ways I can look at mental health for this project. The first is to focus on things that can impact mental health. The second is to focus on ways to improve mental health. The third is mental health as a whole, as a breadth of feelings/emotions. I hope that through the use of intentional icons I can emphasize to my audience, and myself, that mental health can and should always be a priority. I want people to see how important focusing on my mental health has been in my life as well.
Part 3:
I intend to use this piece as a strategy to borrow as it depicts emotion in a simple and indirect form through the use of portraiture.
Proj 2 Part 3
Lilly Dawson, Project 2 Spring 2019
The whole Folklore album by Taylor Swift is extremely meaningful to me (I even have a tattoo in reference one of the songs) and I knew I wanted to do something in theme with my skeletons and about actively trying every single day. This idea literally just came to me when I was looking at previous projects and I saw Lillys. I think I want to do wood but defiantly taking inspiration from the form.
Proj 2 Part 1
I really want to play off of this quote by Taylor Swift when she was talking about her song this is me trying: “I’ve been thinking about addiction and I’ve been thinking about people who.. if they are either suffering through mental illness or they are suffering through addiction or.. they have an everyday struggle. No one pats them on the back everyday. Everyday they are actively fighting something, but there are so many days where nobody gives them credit for that. And so how often must somebody who is in that sort of internal struggle must wanna say to everyone in the room ‘you have no idea how close I am to going back to a dark place’ or ‘you have no idea’.”
I want my shrine to focus on every day picking up the pieces of your life and actively fighting your demons. As someone who struggles with mental illness but is very good at acting normal this is very personal to me. Every single day I have to fight to take care of myself, fight to make my bed, fight to put things away. I am actively trying everyday to put the pieces of my life together and as Taylor said, no one gives you a pat on the back. In keeping with my theme of skeletons, I want to show a skeleton that has fallen apart and is putting itself back together. I would say that this shrine is a way of patting myself on the back but I think it could also speak to others who may not even realize that they are putting themselves back together and how hard that is and deserving of a pat on the back.
Ben Snook Project 2 part 3
Alec Freytag Project 2: Parts 1-3
Part 1: Clarifying Topic
For this project, I want my shrine to focus on the aspects of freedom and tranquility in life. I associate these two words together and find that I feel the freest when I am calm and relaxed. I want to portray this sense together in my shrine by creating a piece that is delicate, open, and has a softer feel. I think this can all be portrayed in many ways, possibly including broken locks, softer and squishier materials, lighter colors, and much more. My audience for this piece will be primarily myself. I often lose track of this freedom and relaxed feeling when I am at school and busy, so I want to incorporate personal items that relate to freedom and tranquility in my own life.
Part 3: Borrowing a Strategy
Peace Fountain, Greg Wyatt
I intend to utilize aspects of the base of this fountain, including rounded pieces of material that show a flow and make the piece feel smoother. I also enjoy the range of objects that exist in this piece spread throughout the entire fountain.