Extra Credit Blogs

Last night I attended the Phantom of the Opera with my grandmother. I saw the performance about three years ago in New York but recently the show came to Las Vegas and I was excited to go again. The theatre in New York was older and more ornate, however both of them were proscenium stages framed by lavish stone work and curtains. I liked the seats better this time because I was off to the side and a little too close in New york. Its like in class we discussed how being too close can take away some of the magic. I didn't like seeing the little microphones attached to the performers' mouths, or their feet through the fog in a particular scene. My favorite part in both showing is when the chandelier shakes, swings, and literally lowers over the audience until it makes a final crash on the stage. It is an amazing thing to watch. So graceful but at the same time a little frightening! I like the music but I must admit it's not favorite. It's a little to opera-ish for me, though I realize it is clearly not an opera. I do however love the story line, the dark mixed with the love and passion, it really made me think because I have to pick a side and I chose the dark, the phantom. But the intriguing part is when you question yourself, is he really even bad, maybe he is really good? I found myself rooting for him the entire time, as do most people, though he is dark and actually a murderer if you recall the stagehand who dies and all the disasters he causes in the theatre. It's such a beautifully written piece and I really appreciate it and all the wonderful performers.  

Extra Credit Blogs

I just had to write about class on Monday! I loved learning about the British Punk Movement and Punk music. I hate what we consider punk today and so I have never bothered learning learning about it or listening to it at all. But my mind has really been opened and I think I'm going to look into original Punk, from the 1970s, and even start listening to some. It makes sense that it would come from "dissatisfied, lower class youths" as they rebel and raise cause for change. I feel that it is not so much about hatred as I though but more about anger, and channeling that anger into a cause for change because of negative results. I think that Punk dared to be frank and honest about issues that no one else would even bring up. For example the Sex Pistols if I remember correctly who sang about the British royalty in a very negative way. Perhaps many felt that way but were too afraid to express their opinions and anger, for them punk was an outlet. I found it so interesting that Punk is self destructive and therefore the goal is to destroy itself and begin with something new and innovative. I think this is a good concept, its healthy to do away with the old and begin something new!

I also wanted to say thank you for sharing your Heroine Chic photos with us. I loved seeing your creative work and expressions. It also inspired me to be creative and express some of my own ideas through art, I'm really excited!

I was completely unaware of all the people that make major decision in the forming of film. I guess I just always assumed that it was the director who had all power in every decision. But the cinematographer controls so much. It is his visions that actually come to life and the director approves or disapproves. What talent they must have to be able to see these movies as they will be scene by an audience. Me and my friends were just discussing how so many movies are filmed on sets but to us it looks so real. Actors also become more dramatic through certain aspects of the filming. It was also very interesting to learn that the editor has so much control. Not only do they put all the frames or scenes to together to actually make the movie, but they have control to make choices that are even out of the directors hands. Just imagine taking all of that footage and piecing it together smoothy.  Deciding what is effectual and important and what is not needed would be so difficult. I remember a friend and I making a video and it took us so long to go through what we had filmed and decide what was relevant and what wasn't and we only had about an hour of footage!  I learned about camera angles before and actually enjoyed reading about them again. I love watching movies now with that in mind. There is so much more to the meaning of the film and the relationship between the characters that someone without this knowledge would never see, I know that I didn't! Just a note I really hope we watch Citizen Kane that movie is brilliant and Orsen Welles is a genius!

I loved the discussion about film in class. I'm so interested in it because I took a a humanities class in high school and a film class which I loved! It's amazing the influence that film can have and points and criticisms that it can make about society or groups within it. There is so much art involved in movies, from the scenery and set, to the shots and actors. It also contains so much innovative technology which makes so many movies and ruins others. Film can be analyzed somewhat like paintings because the painting along with the film contains a point from the artist or director which isn't always spelled out for the viewer. Because of everything that we have learned about the analyzation of art I feel like I can apply that film and visa versa. After all a film is just a series of still frames.  

Cultural Event

This week I played to attend a film festival in Salt Lake put on by local high school students, but that just didn't work out. So this weekend when I went home I found out about a cultural exhibit at the Sahara West Library, which worked out perfect because I actually already attended a film event. The exhibit was about an Indian tribe and their culture. People who were actually from India were at the library, which I thought was really exciting. Some of them were at tables set up where they were selling native made items and asking for donations to improve a local school run by their religious leaders. I was thrilled by all the little trinkets and I bought a mini journal with ornate pink clothe around it and a cool keychain for my friend which kind of resembles a dream catcher. The best part of the exhibit however, was the art. In a circular room, perfect setting for what was being displayed, was a large table covered with a glass piece. Inside the glass was sand. It was formed into a partially done picture that was so detailed it took me a minute of analyzation to even realize that it was sand! That was already astonishing to me, but then some native entered the room, I assume they did it hourly, and began using hand crafted tools to blow and shape the sand into tiny rows and add to the existing picture. They would shake the sand to position it just right. The technique was so skillful and very tedious. But the sand was vibrant and breathtaking! 

Music

Music is so complex! It has no many scientific and mathematical aspects to it they I didn't know about. For example I was fascinated by the fact that sound is only really what our body creates. In class people were explaining that if a tree falls in the forest has no sound because no one is there to "hear" it. This is so hard for me to comprehend. I did not know that we as humans play such a huge role in sound and thus in music. I did however know that music has a huge affect on us. Music can completely change my mood! If I want to be motivated I play certain songs, if I want to cheer myself up I play certain songs, and if Im sad and want to stay sad there are songs for that too. But in all seriousness music really does affect me. If I hear something that, to me seems sad, I get this horrible homesick feeling and my mood completely changes. I'm glad we learned a little bit about why music can be so influencing. The tones provoke different emotions, like defeat and triumph. i think it also has something to do with association. Some sounds or songs force me to remember or think of a sad or happy time and then I form my opinion about the song. It really is so interesting, this is something that I would love to learn more about. I just have to add that I love the "virtuoso" and the fact that they are referred to as the first rock stars. I wish I could see them perform then, the music is so beautiful and they were so talented.     

World Folk Fest

Last night I had the opportunity to go to the the Wold Folk Fest in Springville. It's a celebration of numerous countries and their cultures through dance and music. The performance was held at the Arts Park on a large open stage that was in an outdoor amphitheater build into the small hill. The open stage really added to the overall atmosphere in this situation because it made the dancers and musicians so real. When I walked from the parking lot to the seating area I could see behind the stage and saw the dancers warming up or walking through their routines it was really neat. It made them real people, as if i were literally walking through their practice or dance in the country from which they came. It also helped to include the audience and allowed them to hear and clearly see all of the performers.  

The dancing was amazing! I especially loved the Korean and Chinese dancing as well as the Native American. The Korean dancing really blew me away because I had no idea it was so lively. The woman were jumping and using these gorgeous and gigantic fans to create frames and shapes across the stage. In their second number the woman came out playing drums that hung across their shoulder. They were actually playing really cool beats and rhythms. I found it really refreshing that the women had the drums, I guess I just assumed that would be something that only the men would do. At the end these two adorable little girls came out. They had the cutest costumes on, little white puffy pants with elaborate red blouses that spun like a dress around them. They were jumping so high, and in perfect unison! They were so young but so disciplined, it really said a lot about their culture and the respect that have for all that they do. The Chinese dancing was similar to the Korean, very bright and colorful and more bouncy than I thought it would be. What I noticed about the Chinese group though is that all of the woman, and there were about twenty, were the same height and shape. It made the dance look so professional and so clean. It must be a company that requires their dancers to be a certain weight and height. It really added to the lovely dance. It was as though they were flouting across the stage in perfect unison. The Native Americans did a traditional Hoop dance as their last number. I have heard about this dance before but have never seen it until last night, it was so beautiful and really like magic! The three male dancers would slowly add more hoops onto them, at first they were jumping through them as if they were ropes and contorting their bodies to go through the hoops. As they continued to add hoops they began making these absolutely beautiful shapes that mimicked birds flapping their wings and soaring through the sky. They each had at least fifteen or more hoops in their arms and interlinked all across their bodies, I have no idea how they did it!  

Though the event was to highlight dancing from around the world I felt that it was a musical performance as well. The different countries all had live bands that played for the performers. The Polynesian and Native American groups had a vocalist that would sing or chant in their own language. It was so beautiful to hear authentic music. The Chinese group put a real focus on their music. The band had many members, and i know it sounds cheesy, but I felt like I was in a movie, like i was literally in China all because of the recognizable sounds and music. One soloist played an instrument that looked like a clarinet. It was announced as the first free reed instrument. The musician came out onto the stage after the dancers with this instrument and another that looked similar but more like a trumpet. He traded of with the band as they echoed his rhythms. It was like a drummer and dancer trading off beats but with melodies. He kept switching from one to the other and in between he would whistle. This was not an ordinary whistle, I have never heard a sound so high come from a human. I don't know if he had something in his mouth or not but it was so loud and so high pitched! He continuously increased the tempo until it was so fast I was blown away and laughing because of the crazy sounds and speeds. He was remarkable. 

I loved the performance and give it a ten. The atmosphere was wonderful and the performances were so fulfilling and really beautiful. I believe that dance says so much about a culture. 

Post Modernism Theatre

"Postmodernism theatre  makes a presentation, not a representation." -Mick Walls

The Compact Oxford English Dictionary refers to postmodernism as "a style and concept in the arts characterized by distrust of theories and ideologies and by the drawing of attention to conventions." Postmodernism was introduced as a rebellion or escape from the modernist theatre. The postmodern style focuses on the idea that beliefs and rules are malleable. It stretches the viewer's mind and forces them to ask questions throughout the production rather than providing answers and resolution. Postmodernism theatre wants its audience to think. It was a movement away from "linearity" to plots with multiple story lines coming together or happening simultaneously provoking drama, known as "multiplicity." Both the narrative and characters can be split or fragmented with all the parts coming from one central idea, this also coincides with the gravitation towards multiplicity. It was less about the actual performance and more about the reflections of the audience. Postmodernism wanted the audience to create and form their own beliefs, there was no spoon feeding so to speak. It rejected high and low art and wanted the audience to be very much a part of the production and form their own opinions, and interpretations. Mele Yamomo said this is his article, "Defining Postmodernism," "To Elinor Fuchs, it is postmodern theatre that we witness the death of the character and eradication of the plot." If I understand correctly, the way that each individual interprets the production is the correct one, no further analyzation or pinpointed message is wanted. Postmodernism is a rejection of genre and style. There was even a rejection of formally scripted dialogue and improvisation was used. Postmodernism attempted to step out of reality "to create its own self conscious atmosphere" defines Wikipedia.  I think that this quote by Kerstin Schmidt really helps to explain and sum up what Postmodernism theatre is trying to achieve. "Postmodernism drama remains a theater of theory... with vital interest in the transformative processes of perception, that is, on how drama and theater are created and presented on stage." 

Here are few examples of Postmodernism productions listed by Wikipedia

Sam Shepard's "Buried Child"

Ozono Production's "Frueza Brut

Heiner Muller's "Hamletmachieche"

Ben Elton's "Popcorn"

 

Reading

In the reading for this week I found it so interesting that Levitin talks about the way singer's break up their words. He points out the close relationship between the lyrics and the beat. He also relates foot taps as a real idea. It's interesting that the way we feel the beat and the lyrics that are set to them have a real affect on the piece as a whole. Our foot tapping to the beat helps to determine how we feel towards the music without even noticing it. It also helps to distinguish the beat in our mind. I never thought the way I move to music or react to it can play a part in the actual beat. It relates a lot to dance as well. The way one moves can add to the feeling of the music and obviously to the beats. 

MUsical Event

This morning I went to a music event and competition. Some played accordions, some violins, some piano, it was really neat. I'm at a dance event in California and the night before there was a music competition and later and open session of playing. It was really interesting. It made me push myself to sit down and enjoy the music that I would normally never listen to. The room was large but the performers sat around in a small area while the audience either sat or stood around to see the musicians up close. It created a quite, almost family atmosphere, it was really sweet. It relates a little to dance in the way that people use their talents to express their emotions and to entertain people. It's a way for them to enjoy themselves while also bringing joy to others. I really do love music I think it can provoke so many different emotions.   

This week in class we talked about the performing arts, especially about dance. We focused on the fundamentals of ballet and its influence on modern dance and other art forms. I have done Irish step dancing since I was six and I know that ballet has had an influence on both the style and the techniques over time. The traditionally bent knees in leaps is now a straight leg which extends in one line, the higher the better. When my teacher was competing she cut her hard shoes so that she walk on her toes and was almost disqualified for her "ballet" movements. Now walking, and running on the toes is an essentials movement in steps. Many movements are also influenced and taken from ballet for example a version of the cabriole, called a cross over, and the entrechat which has many slightly different styles in Irish dance. 

we talked a lot about modern dance as well. I have a great appreciation for modern dance as an art. I feel that it is a different type of art than any other dance form in that it expresses an idea or statement. Dance is the expression of feeling and emotion, and in some cases of perfection and reform. It is used to tell stories. But modern dance, at least  originally, expressed something more. Some idea that made the audience think, that left the audience with room to analyze and dig into like a painting does. Even when we watched the clip in class there was so much to say about it, so many different ideas! I really think it is amazing!  

CLASS TIME

In class we talked a lot about the human body. I found it very interesting that during different time periods people viewed the body in completely different ways. During the Meidieval Period, or the Dark Ages, they thought of life as a negative thing. They believed that it was just a pasing period. I cannot imagine going through life like this, thinking that it was just a completely negative time of suffering that all ended eventually. The people of this time humbled themselves because of this belief and did not feel that the human body was of any importance. However, the periods surrounding it did. I guess that I really thought about why figures were nude, I just realized that they were. I now know that figures were nude because the attitude of the people of that specific time period admired and almost worshiped the human body, for example the statue David. They felt that it was the most perfect thing on earth, so they depicted it over and over. In the Medieval Period however, very rarely are figures nude because they did not celebrate the human body at all. It is so interesting to me the drastic changes fromone time to another and their enormouse affect on art. This is why we must look at art to know and better understand societies of the past as well as our own.

Drag Me to Hell

On Wednesday i went to see the movie Drag Me to Hell, the one we talked about in class. It was quite the movie. It's hard for me to explain how I feel about it. I was terrified in the begining, nauseous during some parts, and spent the rest of the time laughing! It was the most interesting movie I have ever seen. I will admit though that I am honestly really glad that I went. It was really entertaining! The movie was a good combination of humor because of the sarcasm and cheesy effects, and also scary. It had all the classic elements of a horror story, curse, creepy old lady, timid, torrmented girl, demons, graveyard during a thunderstorm, and posesed talking animlas. Quite the movie right? I thought the plot was really well written, the story line was odd yes, but intruiging. Thats where the affect of the "scary movie" sets in. Something about us, as humans, is so intrigued by whole horror film idea. We watch people be tortured by deamons, get thrown up on, be stalked by creepy ladies, and suffer from fear and paranoia and we laugh, or get frightened or feel suspense, whatever the case we don't stop watching, which is weird. For some reason we have got to watch! for that same reason I sat and watched this entire film!

This week in class I felt that I learned so much! Something that I honestly never realized that each time period had such a unique style of architecture. What amazed me, and what I kept thinking to myself during class, is the way that all these time period have come together into one. When we looked at the pictures from various cities around the world I noticed how all the styles blend and have been built side by side or even onto another style entirely. This is such a huge part of our history. All of the people blending together, Their work and creations adding to one another's. To me it seems like a timeline that continuously grows trough people of different beliefs and background. People who all want to accomplish a different goal through their architecture. Architecture can have such an overpowering affect. It can bring us up and lift our spirits like the gothic style or it bring us down and humble us like the many earlier styles. It can also make us feel small and almost overwhelmed like the baroque style.

It is so interesting the way that architects built worker housing when the workers wanted to live in homes in the suburbs while the apartment style housing slowly became trendy and a fad of the wealthy. Oh the irony! The difference between comfort/function and trendy is so great. Everyone wants what is new and up to date until they live amongst it. The gap is so great but the people most always come back to what is comfort, what is home. 

Today I had the opportunity to walk through the Richard MacDonald sculpture gallery. One my school teachers from high school told me about his work and current exhibit of sculptures based on the cirque du solei performers and dancers in general. I'm so glad that i finally went to see the exhibit, my family even has a small dancer playing a long horn in the family room but I have never seen the gallery of life sized work. Upon walking in a bronze sculpted man stands looking down on you, giving the feeling that you are really being watched. The figure was so powerful dominating that it gave me the chills. The dancers however are my favorite. He does such a good job of capturing the motion along the emotion that both the performance and audience feels. that breathtaking energy that  extends through the the performers limbs and into the viewers soul. I thought to myself, trying to apply what we learned in class, why use bronze? To me bronze is very human. Not too strong like stone or marble, but not too weak of a material either. It seems to fit the strength of a determined and powerful human being. The subject of humans really hit me. I began thinking that these replicas of the human body were amazing and absolutely gorgeous. They are so strong and so real. And then it came to me that they are models of us, of people. The human body can do amazing things, things that can  one can only attempt to create with material. 

I always loved the way an artist can take a hard substance, like bronze, and make it look so real and so full of movement and passion. MacDonald has actual dancers pose for each of his pieces. I love this because I feel somehow connected to this person. I feel their energy through the artwork. It's as if their dancing or performing, or simply standing right in front of me! 

I'm so sorry for the late post but I just got home from the Lion King at Mandalay bay. It was BRILLIANT! I loved it so much! In class we discussed why artists choose certain materials and the impact they have. This production was a perfect example of that concept. The costumes and the set were half of the excitement and emotion felt. The costumes were authetic and simple but at the same time extremely elaborate and magnificent. The animals looked so real and were so lively. Even more important than the materials used was the movement of the costumes. Some of the lions' headpieces were attachted with a large wire that allowed the head to swoop up and down when needed making it look so real. The female lions were stunning. They had beautiful headpieces and wore long sheet like material that draped from their sholders to the floor. This created a feminine like quality that truly breathtaking. In the final scene the animals were marching all around the stage. I thought it was so clever to have some performers in full costume as if they were the animals while others were part animal part human and could walk upright.
The dance was my favorite part. It was a comination of modern, ballet and athentic African stomp. Dance is so amazing. It was used as entertainment sometimes and other times used to portray an animal's movement. It is wonderful the way dance can be used to simulate a fight between two lions or the grazeful movemenet of another. The dance is what made it real. The performers became their characters through the movement of their bodies.
I also loved the music, I even purchased the soundtrack on the way out! If I can figure out how I will try to put it on my page for everyone to hear! It was such an emotional experience for me, it sounds cheesy but some of the songs were very beautiful. I was surprised by how fabulous their voices were especially the two little kids, even while they were dancing! Another neat thing about the theatre was the side boxes where the drummers sat and played. They were so close that the audience could see their every movement. They used so many different instruments to make the various nature sounds. Seeing them play added to the overall experience of the music and feeling.
The set was exquisite. It could have been a performance in and of itself. I kept noticing the lighting. Everytime the backdrop was a lighter shade there was a shadow of the characters or the birds flying around on sticks or the grass along the stage. It made everything seem so real. I loved the way that dancers were used as part of the setting. Some were elaborate bushes and flowers, while others simply leaved across the stage with leaves or palms in hand. My favorite were dancers in nude outfits with grass wrapped around their bodies. They layed on the ground as grass and then moved in coordination with the other charcters on stage. At one pont animals were shown on the screen then litterally rolling over one level of stage, then another and another, and two rows of animals were actually on the stage. The whole while each row of animals bacame larger making it look like stampead down the mountain.Toward the end the stage went black and little stars shown everywhere. They slowly formed a lion's head and then the end some how materialized into this magnificent piece, that slowly swayed and spoke. In the final scene I fell in love with the bright orange sun given a yellow glow by the lighting as it slowly rose up and into the ceiling.
I couldnt have been more happy with the show, I loved it and would see it a millions times!

CLASS TIME

In class we began dicussing architecture. I really never thought that I would have to know all the parts of a column, or that it had any significance at all. But after we began discussing their origins I began to see that knowing each small part was essential to analyzing the column and architecture as a whole. Once I have learned all of these terms I will hopefully be able to see a structure and know more about it instantly just by looking at the types of columns. Now that I have been exposed to this idea I'm actually fascinated with it and can't wait to use what I will learn.
I loved learning about symbolism in paintings. I was so excited to learn about the different symbols and what they meant. I now feel like I can look at a painting with more confidence and understanding. I had no idea that so much Greek/Roman mythology was used, and I knew the obviously color meanings but had no idea there were so many meaning to each, and so specific too. This new knowledge makes me want to rewind and re examine every painting I have ever seen! Two summers ago I went to Europe and was exposed to so many amazing artworks, particularily paintings and sculptures. I loved them at the time and thought they were so stunning and amazing. However, I wish Icould go back now with more knowledge of how to look at them and see the symbols and colors. I would have had an even greater appreciaton for them and gained a lot more from seeing them in person.
This is why I am so excited to be in the class. I realize its importance to understanding the arts and being able to critic them. A few days ago we discussed beauty and established that the trained eye is much more capable of identifying true beauty and defining what is it. Someday I hope to have a trained eye so that I may be able to have an even greater experience when viewing art.

No performer of this generation has redefined pop art the way Michael Jackson has. R.I.P.  MJ

In the reading it talks about the importance of the humanities in a persons life and the way they connect one with another. It even goes so far as to say that art is like a window which allows one to see into another's thoughts and emotions. It is a way to connect societies and time periods.  I think that the arts can bring people together more than even technology can, because it has an emotional element that technology cannot mimic. The reader gave an example of a basketball coach who was influenced by the arts and became a more professional and well rounded individual. I found it interesting that he hung up his sport jackets for suits. He found who he really wanted to be, and because of his open mind toward the arts he evolved into a more open minded person. This can apply to education in general. Being exposed to the study of humanities can aid a person studied any field and help them to know more about the society that they are trying to help whether it be through scientific formulas, or complex math equations. I feel that the humanities should be more encouraged in the high school and college levels of education. This will develop and produce more well rounded and connected individuals.

CLASS TIME - I found it very interesting that the Humanities can be broken up into three main historical definitions, the classical, the medieval and the modern. - Art can be divided into two parts Liberal Arts: history, philosophy, languages, literature Fine Arts: performing, visual, mix; including film and contemporary art - I learned what sophic and mantic mean and how they can be applied to describing art or a time period of art. I felt like these terms really helped to distinguish the style of art being produced during specific time periods. Sophic is analytic, while mantic is innovative. - In "A Brief History of the World" notes I realized that art really does reflect its people and the time period in which it was created. A discussion came up about pop art and its importance. I feel that pop art is not only the most relevant to a generation but the most reflective as well. I am obviously impressed and moved when I see a piece of fine art, however, I feel just as moved when I see works of more relevance. When I was in New York a few weeks ago I was so intrigued by the sidewalk murals and wall paintings. They are the works of the people. They reflect the ideas and express the problems or joy felt by a group of individuals and therefore for an entire generation. These types of art along with new and modern art help to shape society and voice its opinion for the people of tomorrow.

Bellagio Gallery of Fine Art 6/27/09

Bellagio Gallery of Fine Art On Saturday I had the opportunity to go to the exhibit at the Bellagio Gallery of Fine Art. Currently featured is Classic Contemporary: Lichtenstein, Warhol & Friends. I have been wanting to see this show since I first heard about it and my Humanities class gave me the perfect reason to attend, so this weekend when I went home to Vegas I made a point to go. When I walked into the room it was silent with only a few people strolling by admiring the artwork. Immediately to the left six enormous Campbell's Soup cans hung, framed in thin silver, three by three on the white wall. Though the image was repeated each can was a different variety of soup. The colors, though so commonly seen, seemed to pop out with such vibrance. The image as a whole made me wonder what it symbolized. Being around the 1960s when Warhol first introduced this theme it made me ask myself why? Was he expressing the unwanted coming of mass produced commercial items? Or the overwhelming picture of brand names? I really had no idea. Just then the audio tour guide explained that Warhol decided to use soup cans to avoid competing with more refined styles of comics. An abstraction, in a way, developed from the repeated images. Moving along through the divided rectangular room a large circular protracted image entitled Sinjerli I by Frank Stella was mounted on the wall. Its amazing the perfection that the piece had even though it was so large. My brilliant friend that went with me pointed out that the pencil marks were still visible down the middle. This struck me because it made it so real. I felt like I had a real connection with the artist, and could just see him at work in my mind. One of my favorites was the alphabet distorted and shaped into a popsicle with a bite taken out of it and a drip melting off the bottom. It was so creative and made me laugh. It was like the intestines of a someone stomach shaped into a tasty summer treat!