Arts, visual arts. --- .This section is about the visual arts. Topics include: ( ) Background. ( ) Cartoons. ( ) Color. ( ) Computer art. ( ) Doodling. ( ) Drawing. ( ) Grafitti. ( ) Painting. ( ) Photography. ( ) Philosophy of visual arts. ( ) Related subjects. ( ) Sculpture. ( ) Symbols. ( ) Visual arts vs. words. ( ) What. ( ) Why. --- 1/24/2006
Arts, visual arts. --- "Man on a horse" statues, there are far too many of them as it is. They are patriarchal baloney. --- 9/16/1999
Arts, visual arts. --- (1) A single curve. The half risen sun. A half moon. (2) A single curve. Catenary. Rope bridge over river gorge. --- 10/2/1998
Arts, visual arts. --- (1) Art about Nature. (2) Art about mans relationship to Nature. Green living. Gaia hypothesis. Sustainability. --- 5/25/2000
Arts, visual arts. --- (1) Black and white drawing. (A) Black lines on white background. (B) White lines on black background. (2) Gray tone painting. Monochromatic. (3) Color. (A) Primary colors. (B) The spectrum. ROYGBIV. (C) Full palette. All colors. --- 10/2/1998
Arts, visual arts. --- (1) Power of the idea. (2) Power of the form of expression of the idea. --- 12/30/1992
Arts, visual arts. --- (1) Representation: Figurative. Scapes. Objects. vs. (2) Abstract: Pattern, form, color, shape. --- 6/3/2004
Arts, visual arts. --- (1) Simple static images. (2) Multiple static images (ex. comic strip). (3) Multiple moving images (ex. movies without sound or subtitles). --- 4/11/2001
Arts, visual arts. --- (1) Subjects. (A) Scapes: land, sea, air. (B) People : full figure clothed, nudes, busts, portraits; individuals, groups. (3) Nature subjects: plants, animals. (2) Emotion, tone, mood. (3) Attitude. (4) Themes: view of subject. Approval vs. disapproval, optimism vs. pessimism. --- 12/30/1992
Arts, visual arts. --- (1) The development of Perspective was required for the development of Realism in the visual arts. (2) The development of photography presented a challenge to Realism. Impressionism developed as a response to photography. (3) The acceptance of Abstraction was made possible in part by the development of formalist theories of art. --- 11/2/2005
Arts, visual arts. --- (1) What should a person paint after the invention of photography? (2) Painting is primarily about color, not line, shape nor texture. --- 1/31/2004
Arts, visual arts. --- A history of high school notebook margin doodles. --- 2/1/2002
Arts, visual arts. --- A single line. Horizon. Divides a field. Partitions the plane. It was ever so. --- 10/2/1998
Arts, visual arts. --- Aesthetics. Current, western aesthetics of humans: male and female, face and body. --- 12/30/1992
Arts, visual arts. --- Aesthetics. Paul aesthetic system. (1) Paul nature aesthetic system. (2) Paul human-made art aesthetic system. (3) Paul visual art aesthetic system: power, subtlety, philosophy, psychology, profound, elemental, bones, base. --- 12/30/1992
Arts, visual arts. --- All aspects of painting are controllable by the artist. Photography is less controllable, and requires either more exactness by the artist, or else the alternative of the artist giving up control. --- 12/30/1992
Arts, visual arts. --- Art therapy for children and psych patients. --- 12/30/1992
Arts, visual arts. --- Artist as photographer on acid. --- 07/23/1988
Arts, visual arts. --- Background and Void. (1) Background. (A) The subject can be in the background or on the margins (ex. foreground center subjects may be a ruse or decoy). (B) The subject can be the background itself (ex. many landscape paintings). (2) Void. (A) The subject can be what is not here or what is not mentioned (ex. damning with faint praise). (B) The subject can be the void itself. Emptiness or nothingness (ex. Eastern painting). --- 4/11/2001
Arts, visual arts. --- Background. There are no things, only situations. Things exist in relation to each other. A thing only exists in a setting, and is influenced by its setting. This is why background is so important. Even the Void is either a thing or a background. --- 12/06/1988
Arts, visual arts. --- Background. We become savvy when we look at backgrounds. (1) Seeing things in context gives one more information. Seeing foreground against background lets you put things together (like the way two and two equals four). (2) The background often contains revealing slips of the tongue. Unconscious expressions. Unposed and unrehearsed. --- 4/11/2001
Arts, visual arts. --- Backgrounds and environments. --- 12/30/1992
Arts, visual arts. --- Baseball stitching is to the sphere as the Tao symbol is to the circle. --- 11/30/1993
Arts, visual arts. --- Building a visual image library. (1) Photos, drawings, paintings and sculpture. (2) In print form and digital form. (3) Usually reproductions. Some originals. (4) Landscapes: land, sea and air. Biomes: desert, jungle, arctic, savanna, etc. People: male and female, young and old, portrait and body, single and in groups. Animals and plants, flora and fauna. Space, stars, planets, galaxies. Nature and man made objects. Abstract and representational. --- 12/27/2003
Arts, visual arts. --- Building a visual image library. (1) Printed. Go to the store on January 1st. Buy calendars at half price. (2) Digital online free images in the public domain. --- 12/26/2003
Arts, visual arts. --- Cartoon types. (1) Single panel comic. (2) Comic strip. (3) Comic book. (4) Animated comics. (5) Comics with words and without words. --- 5/14/2004
Arts, visual arts. --- Cartoons. (1) Animated cartoons vs. still cartoons. (2) Still cartoons. (A) Single pane political cartoons (serious) vs. Four pane funny strips (not serious). (3) Cartoons for kids vs. cartoons for adults. (4) Serious satire cartoons vs. lame joke cartoons. --- 4/4/2000
Arts, visual arts. --- Cartoons. Comics. Japanese animie comics. U.S. superhero comics. Both are strangely mannered worlds. --- 1/1/1999
Arts, visual arts. --- Cartoons. Interesting points about cartoons. (1) Cartoons are a type of short form, like haiku and pop songs. (2) Cartoons combine words and pictures much like a billboard. (3) The four pane cartoon functions like the frames of a motion picture. --- 4/4/2000
Arts, visual arts. --- Cartoons. Moving and nonmoving. With words and without words. Are cartoons art? --- 4/1/1994
Arts, visual arts. --- Color and emotion. Cool and calm colors like blue, gray, and green pastels, which remind us of things like water, sky, and trees. Hot and exciting colors like highly saturated reds and oranges, which remind us of blood. Is there a universal reaction in humans (and animals?) to colors such as above? Did it evolve in humans over millions of years, from when we lived close to nature? --- 4/14/1999
Arts, visual arts. --- Color. In all cultures, colors are naturally, arbitrarily assigned meanings. (For example, black for death and white for virginity in the USA). And all things we see contain color. Therefore, everything we perceive has arbitrary symbolic content. Everything is a symbol to some degree. Man is a symbol using animal. Is this natural, arbitrary assignment of color symbols helpful, harmful or neutral? I say generally neurotic. Can the natural, arbitrary assignment of symbols be undone? Can we get people up from neurotic, magical, symbolic thinking? (2) At some level, everything is symbolic of everything else. And everything refers to everything else. Either directly (one step) or indirectly (more than one step, in a chain of associations). Our minds are always associating everything we perceive (externally through our senses, or internally in our minds) with other things, in ever expanding circles. --- 12/27/1998
Arts, visual arts. --- Color. Is there such a thing as Universal Color Symbolism? For example, does the color green mean the same thing in all cultures? (2) Is there such a thing as Universal Shape Symbolism. For example, does the shape of the circle mean the same thing in all cultures? (3) Is there such a thing as Universal Object Symbolism? For example, does the flower mean the same thing in all cultures? (4) The short answer is no. Then where is the hard-wiring? --- 5/12/2000
Arts, visual arts. --- Color. Why is blue for boys and pink for girls? Because the sky is blue. The blue sky reigns over all, so the boys get blue, because its all based on a bogus traditional patriarchy. At the opposite end of the spectrum lies another primary color, red, which we tone down to pink and give to the girls. We tone down colors for babies by adding white to make peaceful pastels like pastel blue (sky-blue) and pastel red (pink). The result is sky-blue for boys and pink for girls. On Mars, where the sky is red, the result would be pink for boys and sky-blue for girls if a patriarchy existed. A matriarchy on Mars would give pink to girls and sky-blue to boys. Get it? --- 3/24/2000
Arts, visual arts. --- Combination art. (1) You can mix abstraction and representation. (2) You can combine drawing, painting and photographs (ex. Rauschenberg). (3) You can combine image and text (ex. Basquiat). (4) You can combine image and sound (ex. Silent movies). (5) You can combine image and text and sound. --- 5/25/2000
Arts, visual arts. --- Comic books. America's fascination with comic books. Comic books are colorful. Comic books depict people. Comic books depict action. Nothing fascinates humans more than to watch people in action. --- 5/27/2006
Arts, visual arts. --- Comic books. Are comic books visual art because of the pictures, or are comic books literature because of the words? --- 6/9/2006
Arts, visual arts. --- Comics are the haiku of the visual arts. --- 6/20/2006
Arts, visual arts. --- Comics are to today as pantomime was to the 1970's, and as silent film was the the 1920's. --- 4/27/2006
Arts, visual arts. --- Comics. Comics with words versus comics without words. Comics without words are like silent films. Comics without words are like music without words. --- 8/4/2006
Arts, visual arts. --- Communication through visual image: art and non-art. --- 12/30/1992
Arts, visual arts. --- Computer art. Do your visual art on the computer. Computer lets you mix media, by combining photography, painting, drawing, 3-D sculpture, animation and audio-video clips. --- 9/30/1996
Arts, visual arts. --- Computer art. The computer screen gives you no sense of the size of the work. The mouse gives you no sense of "arm". What the computer artist needs is a digital screen the size of a wall. On the screen he could delineate the size and shape of the work he wants to create. He could have various size "brushes". Everything would be digitized. For three-dimensional art works use virtual reality. --- 9/13/1998
Arts, visual arts. --- Criticism of visual arts. Paul's cannons and criticism. Academic cannons and criticism. Criteria: clear, true, powerful, and important. --- 12/30/1992
Arts, visual arts. --- Do I have to draw you a picture? The visual arts are the fall back position when it comes to explaining something to someone else. Hand puppets. Colorforms. --- 1/14/2006
Arts, visual arts. --- Doodling is like whistling. --- 12/30/2001
Arts, visual arts. --- Doodling is the haiku of the visual arts. --- 2/26/2001
Arts, visual arts. --- Doodling. All the visual arts have their genesis in doodling, and doodling is essentially an unconscious, involuntary, nervous activity. --- 3/3/2001
Arts, visual arts. --- Doodling. When you hand a person a pencil and paper the person starts doodling. Does that imply that the subconscious mind is constantly doodling? --- 1/14/2006
Arts, visual arts. --- Drawing is to painting as black and white is to color. --- 6/9/2004
Arts, visual arts. --- Drawing. Pencil. Ink: pen line and brush wash. Paper. Techniques and methods. --- 12/30/1992
Arts, visual arts. --- Drawing. Single line drawings. Where the pen does not leave the paper. --- 5/12/1999
Arts, visual arts. --- Evolution of the visual arts. Humans were seeing long before they were talking. So the visual arts preceded the oral literary arts, let alone the written literary arts. Every time you make a face, a gesture or a pose you are creating a picture for someone else to see. --- 3/29/2002
Arts, visual arts. --- Factors, variables, and principles. Methods: analyze and synthesize elements. Elements: color, texture, pattern, line, and shape. --- 12/30/1992
Arts, visual arts. --- Good art is meaningful and powerful. --- 12/30/1992
Arts, visual arts. --- Graffiti as pure art, as pure literature, and as a mix of art and literature. Beautiful writing: calligraphy? See literature. --- 04/21/1993
Arts, visual arts. --- Graffiti. PART ONE. Is graffiti a transgression or an example of freedom of speech? It depends if it is graffiti on one's own private property, someone else's private property, or on public property. And anyway, who decides what public property looks like? The public? PART TWO. Is graffiti a justified response when society implicitly says "You are not supposed to talk here. Shut up!" Or is graffiti a form of bullying on the part of the graffiti artist. Interrupting. In your face. PART THREE. (1) Graffiti as visual art (pictures with no words). (2) Graffiti as literature (words with no pictures). (3) Graffiti as a mix of visual arts and literature. (4) I say it is always a mix. (A) All writing, both handwriting and typeface, has a visual arts element. (B) All visual art has word content. We silently talk to ourselves about the visual arts we see. For example, we silently say the names of the objects and colors when we look at a visual artwork. --- 4/11/2001
Arts, visual arts. --- Graffiti. What are some of the most common types of graffiti? (1) Name and date. (2) X loves Y. (3) Political statements. (4) Economic statements. (5) Statements about work. (6) Statements about school. (7) Statements about places where people live. (8) Sexual statements. Pictures of sex. (9) Words of wisdom about life. --- 7/1/2006
Arts, visual arts. --- Graffiti. What is the oldest graffiti you can find? Hidden away somewhere. Uncleaned. Unfaded. --- 7/1/2006
Arts, visual arts. --- Graffiti. Where is graffiti found? (1) Public toilets. (2) Public walls. (3) Schools. (4) Work. --- 7/1/2006
Arts, visual arts. --- Graphic arts. (1) Logo art. (2) Magazine advertisement art. (3) Billboard art. --- 12/28/2003
Arts, visual arts. --- Graphic arts. (1) Movie poster art. (2) Rock album cover art. (3) Rock concert poster art. --- 12/28/2003
Arts, visual arts. --- Hello, people. The clouds in the sky do not look like physical objects. The clouds in the sky are not in the style of realism. Lets recognize the sky for how it really looks. The sky is an abstract expressionist work of art. --- 6/4/2000
Arts, visual arts. --- History, origin. What was the nature of the first art produced by humans? Thirty thousand years ago, a primitive human draws a picture of an animal on a cave wall. (1) He may worship the animal. He may pray, "Oh animal, you are great, please let me find you to feed my tribe". (2) He may treat the painting of the animal like a voodoo doll. He may stab the painting of the animal with a spear, just like a voodoo priest puts pins in a voodoo doll. He may say, "Look out animal, because I am going to mess you up. That's right, I am bad. Don't mess with me." That is to say, we cannot say that primitive man did not have an attitude of healthy self-confidence. (3) She may have used the painting like a menu. She may have said to her husband, "See this? Go out and bring one of these home for dinner". (4) They may have used the painting as a trophy wall. For example, they may have declared, "Og killed four deer in a day, a new world record." --- 7/11/2000
Arts, visual arts. --- Imaging. Seeing an image. (1) The sculpture is an image, not a picture. (2) The light on the retina is an image created by light reflecting off an object. Whereas, a picture is a physical object. (3) Light. The visual arts is all about light. Specifically, light reflected off objects. --- 6/9/2004
Arts, visual arts. --- Is there such as thing as a Universal Visual Arts Grammar (UVAG)? If people have different visual art vocabularies do people at least share a similar visual arts grammar? Much like is the case with spoken language? --- 5/12/2000
Arts, visual arts. --- Library of visual images. Paul works: originals, copies. Others works: originals, copies. --- 12/30/1992
Arts, visual arts. --- Light and shadow. Mass and void. Center and margin. Bright and shadow. Big and small. --- 4/4/2005
Arts, visual arts. --- Line. (1) A line in the visual arts is not like a line in geometry, because a line in the visual arts has width and a line in geometry has no width. (2) A line divides a plane. A line has to sides. When you use a single brush stroke to draw the outline of an apple you are drawing two apples because there is the apple defined by the interior of the line and there is the apple defined by the exterior of the line. --- 10/2/2004
Arts, visual arts. --- Me. (1) My composition goals for each visual art and why. (2) My favorites and why. The Paul aesthetic. --- 12/30/1992
Arts, visual arts. --- Medium: materials, tools and techniques. --- 12/30/1992
Arts, visual arts. --- Moving sculpture: example, waves. --- 11/30/1999
Arts, visual arts. --- Painting. Colors are like musical notes. Color chords and musical chords. Color harmony and musical harmony. --- 3/10/1999
Arts, visual arts. --- Painting. Colors. (1) Psychological effects of color. (2) Symbolic meanings of color in a culture. --- 12/30/1992
Arts, visual arts. --- Painting. Types. Techniques and methods. Ink and brush, pastel, water color, tempera, acrylic, oil. Canvas: unprimed vs. primed, wet in wet vs. wet dry. --- 12/30/1992
Arts, visual arts. --- Palette types. (1) The natural color palette. Colors of nature. Earthtones. Grunge. (2) The artificial neon plastic palette. Danger, excitement. --- 5/22/2000
Arts, visual arts. --- Perspective. The illusion of perspective. How do humans trick their eyes into thinking that a two dimensional image is a three dimensional space? --- 8/29/2005
Arts, visual arts. --- Philosophy of visual arts. The power of the image in general. The power of a specific image, for a specific personality, or for a specific society. --- 12/30/1992
Arts, visual arts. --- Philosophy. Specific philosophies of the visual arts in general. Paul's. Academia's. Any other. Any individuals. --- 12/30/1992
Arts, visual arts. --- Photography, video, and motion pictures (1) Cameras: slr. (2) Lenses: variable zoom vs. fixed distance. Wide angle, close up, zoom. Aperture (f stops): wide or narrow. Shutter speed: high or low. (3) Film. Black and white vs. color. Instant film. Speed. (4) Printing. Editing: crop, add in, rub out. Lighting: natural vs. manmade. (5) Composition. (6) Background vs. subject: relationship to background, pose, borders. --- 12/30/1992
Arts, visual arts. --- Photography, video, and motion pictures (see also low arts). Why are they important? (1) Documentary tool. (2) Fast, on the scene. --- 12/30/1992
Arts, visual arts. --- Photography. (1) Fake background, fake body poses, fake facial expressions. Vs. (2) Candid backgrounds, candid body poses, candid faces. (3) The former are often contrived, phony, pseudo, bogus. The latter are often real, truthful, honest. One can often learn much more from the latter than the former. (4)(A) The professional actor-director team tries to convey truth with their face and body. But the professional model-photographer team uses the face and body to sell a product. The model looks like a mannequin. Happy face. (B) The non-professional model-photographer team are after something else (ex. vacation photos, holiday photos). Often what they are after is merely to not look like an idiot in a bad photograph. Thus there is often more truth in non-professional photography than professional photography. (5) Two types of non-professional photography models. (A) Those who know their picture is being taken. (B) Those who don't know their picture is being taken. --- 6/30/2000
Arts, visual arts. --- Photography. (1) Photography as art. (2) Photography as a leisure pursuit. Example, vacation snapshots. (3) Photography as a communications tool. Example, photojournalism. (4) Photography as a scientific tool. Example, strobe photography to stop high speed motion. --- 7/11/2002
Arts, visual arts. --- Photography. How does one describe the experience of sifting through the photography archives? The millions of public domain photographs from decades ago? Are you living through the people being photographed? Are you living through the photographer? To what extent are you becoming the other person? To what extent are you changing? To what extent do you change back or return to the former you? Can you ever? To what extent can you live the life of the other person? How many people can you be? It is not a case where they are adding layers to you, rather, you are becoming them. --- 9/17/2001
Arts, visual arts. --- Photography. In the near future there will be billions of candid photographs and videos of real people online for anyone to look at. What is the relationship of the viewer to these people-pictures? One of equals? --- 9/17/2001
Arts, visual arts. --- Photography. It is an interesting development when people add word captions to photographs. One reason is because it changes nature of the final product, sort of like the way music-video is different from both music and video. Another reason is because it spins the photo by guiding the viewer on how the photograph should be perceived or interpreted. --- 3/5/2007
Arts, visual arts. --- Photography. Much of the power of photography comes from its direct depiction of reality. (1) That it captures reality directly makes photography perhaps the most Zen-like of all the arts. (2) That it captures reality directly makes photography perform the same function as the phrases "I am not kidding" and "I am not making this up." These phrases are often used in human conversations to make a claim to fact. "Seriously, literally, I swear". --- 2/24/2001
Arts, visual arts. --- Photography. Size of subject vs. size of background. Crop for background size. Blow-up or down for subject size. --- 1/1/1999
Arts, visual arts. --- Photography. The photograph is no longer a document of reality. Photographs are too easy to edit on a computer. --- 01/07/1997
Arts, visual arts. --- Photography. Traditional photography was a chemical disaster area because it requires chemicals to make photo film, chemicals to develop photo film, chemicals to make photo paper, and chemicals to develop photo paper. Digital photography requires fewer chemicals. --- 4/15/2007
Arts, visual arts. --- Pictures transcend the language barrier. The language barrier exists not only through space but also through time. That is to say, language barriers exist not only geographically from culture to culture, but also through time between today and the distant future because language changes drastically as the centuries pass. (2) How much can you communicate with pictures? How much can we convey to future generations using pictures alone without words (ex. Silent movies). Can we say everything we need to say by using pictures alone? If we can, then by all means let us put all our information in pictorial form because it will last much longer. (3) Film is a powerful medium, but it tends to be technology-bound or limited to high-tech transmission. The inhabitants of earth in the future, perhaps having survived a global catastrophe, may not have the technology available to project a movie. What is a low-tech solution for the pictorial display of information that is similar to movies? The movie storyboard is a low-tech functional equivalent to movies. What do you call a story-board for the masses? The comic book! So it is quite ironic that someday civilization may be saved by the lowly comic book. --- 2/27/2001
Arts, visual arts. --- Point of view of an object from anywhere in a sphere. Direction, closeness, size of background. --- 12/30/1992
Arts, visual arts. --- Portraits. Who cares what you look like? Portraits are the height of vanity. "Everybody look at me!", is what a portrait says. "All I have is my mug.", is what a portraits says. --- 10/25/2001
Arts, visual arts. --- Power of visual images. How much can and can't you say with pictures? A picture is worth a thousand words. --- 12/30/1992
Arts, visual arts. --- Printing. Techniques and methods. Onto what material, using what process? Black and white vs. color. By hand: wood block carved, metal cast, stone carved. Mass image reproduction (see technology, printing). --- 12/30/1992
Arts, visual arts. --- Questions for all specific visual arts. History, technology, styles, composition, criticism. Strengths, weaknesses vs. other visual arts. For all specific visual arts, just repeat above list and add the details. What can it do that nothing else can? What are its limits (what can't it do)? --- 12/30/1992
Arts, visual arts. --- Related subjects. (1) Psychology: what personality types become visual artists? Inarticulate? (2) Sociology: the artist - patron relationship. (3) Technology: development of mediums and methods. (4) Political: political art in totalitarian states. Political suppression of art. (5) Business: professional artists vs. amateur artists. Supplying the amateurs. --- 12/30/1992
Arts, visual arts. --- Related subjects. Psychological effects of elements of visual arts. --- 12/30/1992
Arts, visual arts. --- Related subjects. Psychology. Elements and emotion. Shape and emotion. Color and emotion. For humans in general, personality types, and specific individuals. For society in general, society types, and specific societies. --- 12/30/1992
Arts, visual arts. --- Reproduction of images is very important. Ways how, accuracy, cost, and speed. --- 12/30/1992
Arts, visual arts. --- Screen savers as visual art: (1) Fireplace with crackling sounds. (2) Falling snow. (3) Rain on window with sound of wind. (4) Waves on a beach with sound of waves. (5) Fish in the aquarium. (6) A walk down a shady lane. (7) Kaleidoscope. --- 1/1/2002
Arts, visual arts. --- Sculpture does not derive from painting and drawing, rather the reverse, painting and drawing come from sculpture. And sculpture itself is an exercise of our spatial skills. Due to stereoscopic vision we see the world in three dimensions, and we interact with the world spatially. The first works of art were the stone tools our ancestors sculpted. --- 3/4/2001
Arts, visual arts. --- Sculpture. Sand sculpture. Snow sculpture. Ice sculpture. Textile sculpture. Ephemeral. Sustainable. --- 5/1/2007
Arts, visual arts. --- Sculpture. Techniques and methods. Wood, stone, clay, metal, mixed, carved, assembled, cast. --- 12/30/1992
Arts, visual arts. --- Sculpture. Who sculpts? The blacksmith. The potter. The glass blower. The wood carver. Anyone who shapes matter sculpts. --- 6/9/2004
Arts, visual arts. --- See, think, do. See, think, doodle. --- 01/01/1993
Arts, visual arts. --- Shape does not have to be representational. Color does not have to be representational. --- 12/30/1992
Arts, visual arts. --- Similarities and differences of the visual arts to the non-visual arts. Similarities and differences within the visual arts. Strengths and weaknesses too. --- 12/30/1992
Arts, visual arts. --- Soft, rounded features. Hard, angular features. Curved lines and straight lines. Curved planes and straight planes. --- 7/25/2006
Arts, visual arts. --- Some of the many ways of seeing yourself today. PART ONE. Today we have more ways of seeing oneself than in the past. (1) Seeing yourself in a mirror, which is like seeing yourself in a pool of water like the ancients did. This is real time in the present. Time flows. (2) Seeing yourself in a photograph. This is in the past. This is static. Time stops. A frozen moment. (3) Seeing yourself on a video tape. This is in the past. A video is a longer slice of time than a photo. It also include your voice. (4) Seeing yourself on a live video camera. This is real time. It is in the present. Time flows. The angle may vary from the typical front facing "mirror" angle. PART TWO. (1) Even in a photo do you really see yourself as others see you? (2) Even in a photo do you really see yourself as the camera sees you? (3) Your view, someone else's view and the camera's view are three different views. PART THREE. It used to be that only movie stars saw themselves on camera. Today we are all on camera because there are cameras everywhere, so we are all actors. And we almost all own cameras, so we are all directors. We have become a world of media-savvy, Hollywood moguls. Your life as a movie: storyboard your life and soundtrack your life. --- 8/15/2000
Arts, visual arts. --- Some say that all art is political or ethical. However, does non-representational art, like abstract-expressionism, make a statement (thought) or is it better described as mood (emotion)? If the latter is the case, and its a mood, then it is neither political nor ethical. --- 11/15/2001
Arts, visual arts. --- Sources of visual images: self made, visual media, libraries. --- 12/30/1992
Arts, visual arts. --- Strengths. Weaknesses. Of visual arts vs. other arts. Of one visual art vs. another visual art. --- 12/30/1992
Arts, visual arts. --- Style. What can one say about the abundance of visual art styles in the twentieth century? Were the styles a logical progression toward an inevitable conclusion? Or were the styles a sales tactic, much like the fads of fashion? --- 10/28/2001
Arts, visual arts. --- Styles. (1) Representational: realism vs. distortion, impressionism. (2) Nonrepresentational. --- 12/30/1992
Arts, visual arts. --- Styles. Narrative vs. non-narrative. Impressionistic vs. expressionistic. Abstract expressionism. Op art and pop art. Cubism, Surrealism, and Dada. --- 12/30/1992
Arts, visual arts. --- Subtractive sculpture (ex. Carving) vs. additive sculpture (ex. Welding). --- 12/29/2003
Arts, visual arts. --- Symbol. Western pictorial symbols and associated meanings. Heart, arrow, flower, rocket, lips, coffin. --- 02/07/1994
Arts, visual arts. --- Symbols are types of code. Symbolic information is essentially codified information. In order to understand symbolic information you have to crack or decipher the code. Non-symbolic information is just a whole lot easier to understand. If you can say it non-symbolically then by all means do so. Were it only possible to say everything non-symbolically. Where are the mimes when we need them? --- 2/27/2001
Arts, visual arts. --- Symbols. (1) Symbols: what associated meanings do they carry? For an individual, for a society, for mankind. The heart, the arrow, the flower, the red rose, the lips, the skull. (2) Color symbolism. Women can wear blue but men cannot wear pink. Pink is a strange and loaded color in our society (8/24/94). Black: death, mourning. White: virginity, pureness, cleanliness. Green: environment, liberal. --- 01/01/1993
Arts, visual arts. --- Symbols. Objects and their symbolism. Clock. Pistol. Tombstone. Airplane. Train. Car. Etc. --- 5/22/2000
Arts, visual arts. --- Symbols. Representation and symbolism. Single objects vs. groups of objects (groups of objects imply a vocabulary and a syntax). Examples: Dollar bill. Pack of cigarettes. Automobile. Bicycle. Hamburger. American Flag (USA). Statue of Liberty (freedom). Plants. Animals. People. --- 5/25/2000
Arts, visual arts. --- The "pussy, cock, tit, asshole" theory of art. Everything visually depicted is subliminally one of the above four. --- 12/30/1992
Arts, visual arts. --- The artist converts a three dimensional landscape to a two dimensional painting. The viewer converts a two dimensional painting to a three dimensional mental landscape. --- 10/19/2005
Arts, visual arts. --- The horizon line separates land and air, and the horizon also separates water and air. The shoreline, the waterline, separates the land and water. A canvas divided into thirds by two horizontal lines, one line being the shoreline, and the other line being the horizon. --- 6/5/2006
Arts, visual arts. --- The slanting afternoon light turned everything gold. --- 04/01/1988
Arts, visual arts. --- The visual arts are beyond words only when the depicted cannot be described with words. --- 11/15/2001
Arts, visual arts. --- The visual arts are closely related to the psychology of visual perception. Four cases of visual perception. How do we accomplish each? (1) Stationary viewer viewing a stationary object. (2) Stationary viewer viewing a moving object. (3) Moving viewer viewing a stationary object. (4) Moving viewer viewing a moving object. --- 3/29/2002
Arts, visual arts. --- Three simple shapes. Circle, square, triangle. --- 10/2/1998
Arts, visual arts. --- Unity, pattern, coherence, congruence, continuation. --- 12/30/1992
Arts, visual arts. --- Variation vs. repetition. --- 12/30/1992
Arts, visual arts. --- Various dimensions of visual arts. (The "+" symbol indicates changing shape or moving through time). 1D (ex. drawing, which uses line). 1D+ (ex. a moving string). 2D (ex. painting, which uses shapes and planes). 2D+ (ex. silent film). 3D (ex. sculpture, which uses solids). 3D+ (ex. lava lamp or moving holography). 4D ? 4D+ ? --- 4/16/2000
Arts, visual arts. --- Visual art works. Simple vs. complex. True vs. false. Powerful vs. not. Effective vs. not. Explicit vs. vague or ambiguous. --- 12/30/1992
Arts, visual arts. --- Visual arts vs. words. (1) If you make a work of art, and then spend five minutes verbally explaining the subject matter, issue, your view, etc. ("What I was trying to say in this piece was..."), then you are using words to say what your art could not say. You are defeating the purpose of the artwork. You are saying that the artwork could not communicate what it was supposed to communicate. The best artists realize this and do not bother to try to explain their work. They say "It means whatever you think it means. It means what it means, etc." (2) The main strength of visual and aural (music) arts is to deal with pre-verbal, unarticulated states of mind. To be able to hint at the "unsayable". It is not literature's place to try to say the unsayable, despite what the Beats thought. --- 04/24/1997
Arts, visual arts. --- Visual arts vs. words. To give a visual artwork a verbal title is to say it cannot do its job. If it can stand on its own two feet then you can call it "Untitled". --- 05/10/1997
Arts, visual arts. --- Visual images. Symbols, images and pictures, letters, icons. In communication and art. --- 12/30/1992
Arts, visual arts. --- What are the visual arts about? Two views (pun) of the visual arts. (1) Pictures. Depiction. Representation. (2) Vision. Seeing. Sight. --- 6/9/2004
Arts, visual arts. --- What are the visual arts? (1) Its about the image. Picture as opposed to word. (2) Examples of visual arts: Visual patterns, illustrations, technical art, graphic arts, and great art. --- 12/30/1992
Arts, visual arts. --- What does the ubiquitous stick figure show? The stick figure shows that everyone wants to be thin, and it shows that everyone sees themselves as thinner than they actually are. --- 10/28/2001
Arts, visual arts. --- What good are the visual arts? When people refuse to read, you have to slap them in the face with the visual arts. Visual arts are quick (perceived as a whole, all at once) and unavoidable (in your face all at once). Words and music are temporal, and today people just don't have the time or inclination to devote to them. If you have a message to get out, the visual arts can be very effective. --- 07/18/1997
Arts, visual arts. --- What is an image? What is a picture? --- 12/30/1992
Arts, visual arts. --- What is the meaning of a picture? What does a picture say? --- 12/30/1992
Arts, visual arts. --- What. Pictures are better than words at concrete description. Words are better than pictures at abstract concepts. --- 12/30/1992
Arts, visual arts. --- When we say that a visual artwork "says something to us" we are denigrating the visual by couching it in terms of the verbal. The visual arts and musical arts do not "say" anything. To use "say" in this context is a poor, inaccurate, limiting metaphor. We need to widen our vocabulary. And we need to recognize phenomena that words do not adequately describe. --- 4/11/2001
Arts, visual arts. --- Why did I give up on visual arts? Because I don't believe in code, metaphor, or wasted words. --- 12/30/1992
Arts, visual arts. --- Why do it? Why study it? How do it? How study it? --- 12/30/1992
Arts, visual arts. --- Why people like landscapes: because there are no people to be seen. --- 4/11/2000
Arts, visual arts. --- Why. (1) The power of the visual arts is this: For millions of years, before we developed spoken language or writing, humans and pre-humans experienced the world primarily visually. It was only a hundred thousand years ago that humans developed spoken language, and it was only five thousand years ago that humans developed written language. Even today, most people find a picture more compelling than a page of text. (2) It may be that life really is a movie. We experience the world as a series of still pictures, much the way a movie is composed of twenty-four images per second. (A) When you stand still and look at a still object, you are looking at a picture. (B) Only when you or the object is moving does the situation become analogous to moving pictures or film. (3) Thus, the phrase "a picture is worth a thousand words" applies not just to drawings, paintings, photographs and movies, it also applies to real life and the way we experience real life as a picture. (4) So where does this leave writing? Where does this leave the writers (moi)? Good question. (5) Humans have been watching images (i.e., real life) for millions of years. Humans have only been creating images (i.e., visual art) for about fifty thousand years. (6) People say the world is becoming more graphics oriented. The reasons for this may be, (A) Our technological ability to make graphic images is increasing due to the computer. (B) Graphics cross the spoken language barrier. Graphics are an international language in an increasingly globally connected world. (C) Graphic processing ability (i.e., sight) is a well-developed hard-wired ability in humans that we have been using for millions of years. --- 10/31/2000
Arts, visual arts. --- Why. Images can say things quicker and in less space than words. --- 12/30/1992
Arts, visual arts. --- Why. Visual arts to convey ideas and emotions. Conveying ideas beyond using words. Conveying emotions beyond showing people's faces. --- 12/30/1992
Arts, visual arts. --- Why. When photography took over realism, the function of the other visual arts began to be to capture dreams, the imagination, the unreal, and the nonphysical. --- 05/22/1993
Arts, visual arts. --- Works (actual historical works, conceptual ideas for works, or otherwise). --- 01/01/1993
Arts, visual arts. --- You can paint a picture OF something (realism, impressionism), or you can paint of picture ABOUT something (expressionism). --- 7/18/1998