Hi all,
I got a little behind in posting the class blogs, so here's a list:
Chris' Classblog - 10/29
Austin's Class Blog 10/31
Matt's Class Blog 11/3
Derek's Class Blog - 11/5
Allie's Class Blog - 11/7
Caroline's Classblog - 11/14
Patrick's Classblog - 11/14
Sunday, November 18, 2012
Paper 3 Rubric
Hi all,
Here's the link to the paper 3 rubric. I'll copy and paste it here in case you have difficulty opening the document. Please let me know ASAP if you have any questions or concerns about the rubric.
Thanks,
HL
Student Name:__________________________________ Final Grade: ___________/250
1. Advertisement Analysis (70 points)
Through visual and textual analysis, the writer identifies strategies that the advertisement uses to manipulate or persuade consumers. Analysis demonstrates how the ad alters the image of the product and targets a specific audience through discussion of images, color, typography, layout, tone, word choice, symbols, and other visual/textual characteristics.
4: did it 3: mostly did it 2: mostly didn’t do it 1: didn’t do it
2. Anti-Advertisement Creation, Reflection & Analysis (60 points)The writer carefully analyzes and reflects on her own work to show how her anti-advertisement targets a specific audience. Writer provides a rationale for design choices made based on audience needs and purpose of the anti-ad.
4: did it 3: mostly did it 2: mostly didn’t do it 1: didn’t do it
3. Exposing the Truth & Integration of Research (50 points)
Writer uses credible and reliable research to demonstrate the truth or reality being hidden by the original advertisement. Research is integrated thoughtfully with the use of signal phrases (According to…. The authors state… etc) and in-text citations.
4: did it 3: mostly did it 2: mostly didn’t do it 1: didn’t do it
4. Organization and Focus (40 points)
Writing progresses logically and smoothly with the use of transitional phrases and sentences. The paper is also organized at the paragraph level, with coherent topics presented in each. The paper maintains focus on advertising, rather than social issues.
4: did it 3: mostly did it 2: mostly didn’t do it 1: didn’t do it
5. Format and Assignment Requirements (30 points)
Final draft is 6-7 pages in length, double-spaced with size 12 font, one-inch margins on all sides with all appropriate MLA headings. Includes Works Cited page.
4: did it 3: mostly did it 2: mostly didn’t do it 1: didn’t do it
6. Writer completed first draft peer review.
Yes No (-25 points)
7. Writer turned in a rough draft to instructor
Yes No (-25 points)
Here's the link to the paper 3 rubric. I'll copy and paste it here in case you have difficulty opening the document. Please let me know ASAP if you have any questions or concerns about the rubric.
Thanks,
HL
Exposing Advertisements and Uncovering Truths Rubric ENC1101
Student Name:__________________________________ Final Grade: ___________/250
1. Advertisement Analysis (70 points)
Through visual and textual analysis, the writer identifies strategies that the advertisement uses to manipulate or persuade consumers. Analysis demonstrates how the ad alters the image of the product and targets a specific audience through discussion of images, color, typography, layout, tone, word choice, symbols, and other visual/textual characteristics.
4: did it 3: mostly did it 2: mostly didn’t do it 1: didn’t do it
2. Anti-Advertisement Creation, Reflection & Analysis (60 points)The writer carefully analyzes and reflects on her own work to show how her anti-advertisement targets a specific audience. Writer provides a rationale for design choices made based on audience needs and purpose of the anti-ad.
4: did it 3: mostly did it 2: mostly didn’t do it 1: didn’t do it
3. Exposing the Truth & Integration of Research (50 points)
Writer uses credible and reliable research to demonstrate the truth or reality being hidden by the original advertisement. Research is integrated thoughtfully with the use of signal phrases (According to…. The authors state… etc) and in-text citations.
4: did it 3: mostly did it 2: mostly didn’t do it 1: didn’t do it
4. Organization and Focus (40 points)
Writing progresses logically and smoothly with the use of transitional phrases and sentences. The paper is also organized at the paragraph level, with coherent topics presented in each. The paper maintains focus on advertising, rather than social issues.
4: did it 3: mostly did it 2: mostly didn’t do it 1: didn’t do it
5. Format and Assignment Requirements (30 points)
Final draft is 6-7 pages in length, double-spaced with size 12 font, one-inch margins on all sides with all appropriate MLA headings. Includes Works Cited page.
4: did it 3: mostly did it 2: mostly didn’t do it 1: didn’t do it
6. Writer completed first draft peer review.
Yes No (-25 points)
7. Writer turned in a rough draft to instructor
Yes No (-25 points)
Wednesday, November 14, 2012
Class Blogger Reflection
Hi all,
As a reminder, you'll need to complete a class blogger reflection after completing your classblogger post. Please see below for guidelines. Let me know if you have any questions.
Thanks,
HL
Class Blogger
Each student will sign up to be the “class blogger” for a particular day. The purpose of the classroom blogger is to record notes, summarize conversations, and narrate classroom action as best you can. You are invited to take photographs and video footage and use links or other multimedia in your blog entry. In essence, the class blogger is a reporter documenting classroom events. After your experience as class blogger, you will write a short reflection blog entry about your experience that answers the following questions: what aspects of the class did you focus on and why? If you chose to use other media, what did you use and why? How did occupying the role of “class blogger” change your perspective of the classroom?
Sunday, November 11, 2012
Optional Conferences
Want one? Check out the schedule here and let me know if there is a time you'd like to stop by. PLEASE DO NOT STOP BY UNANNOUNCED. Email me to let me know what time you'd like so I can make sure we'll have time to meet. Thanks,
HL
HL
Wednesday, October 31, 2012
My Style Writing
And A Half Inches (Original)
I'm the runt of my family. At 5'8" (and a half inches), I'm inches shorter than my younger sisters, a head shorter than a young cousin, and I have to crane my head to look my dad in the eye. Grandma, is actually two inches shorter than me in the real world, but lives in a world where I am still only 4'10". But I'm not. I'm 5'8 (and a half) inches.
Grandma used to measure our heights against the wall in the laundry room. The strip of wallpaper is still covered in pencil markings detailing my growth, alongside the rest of my family.
"Oh Heather," Grandma says every time she presses my back to the wall, carefully checking that my feet are flat, "When you were a baby, I thought for sure you'd be tall. But you're not. You just didn't grow."
Dad's pencil mark is the pinnacle. Followed closely by his younger brother, then his sister, then my grandfather (who I'm told used to be taller). Next is Emma, then Bre, then me, then grandma. Grandma swears I cheated when I marked hers even though Dad and Aunt Brenda witnessed it. Dad even had to stop her from standing on her toes.
Shopping with my sisters and my grandma, I am never allowed to buy "long" pants. They insist that I, at 5' 8 (and a half) inches do not need long pants. I am not tall, like them.
I realized, as I was walking to class this morning, that my pants are too short. I know Bre was with me when I bought them. I know she told me I didn't need the long cut. The average height for women in America is something like 5'6", so, comparatively, I am tall. Tall enough for long pants at least. The thing is, I keep buying pants that are too short at my family's insistence that I'm too short.
The thing is, I'm different they are, aside from being short. There are other things about me that are just too too for them. I'm too liberal. Too outspoken. Too masculine. Too sensitive. I try not to let these things bother me. I try to believe that I'm outside of their influence. But if that's true, why am I standing in front of my class today in high waters?
At my age, it's highly unlikely that I'll continue to grow anymore, so I'll probably always be the runt. But I don't always have to wear high waters.
And A Half Inches (Revised)
At 5'8" (and a half inches), I'm inches shorter than my younger sisters. I have to crane my head to look my dad in the eye. Grandma, who is actually two inches shorter than me in the real world, lives in a world where she is two inches taller, and measures our heights against the wall in the laundry room: a strip of wallpaper is a spatial family tree.
"Oh Heather," Grandma says every time she presses my back to the wall, carefully checking for flat feet, "When you were a baby, I thought for sure you'd be tall. You just didn't grow."
Dad's pencil mark is the pinnacle. Followed closely by his younger brother, his sister, then my grandfather (who I'm told used to be taller). Next is Emma, then Bre, then me, then grandma. I marked Grandma's height. She swears I cheated.
Shopping with my sisters and my grandma, I am never allowed to buy "long" pants. They insist that I, at 5' 8 (and a half) inches do not need long pants. They need long pants.They are tall. I am not tall.
I realized, as I was walking to class this morning, that my pants are too short. I know Bre was with me when I bought them. I know she told me I didn't need the long cut.
The average height for women in America is something like 5'6". In America, I am tall, or at the very least, above average. I'm definitely tall enough for long pants. But I keep buying pants that are too short at my family's insistence that I'm too short.
The thing is, I'm different they are, aside from being "short". I'm too too for them. I'm too liberal, too outspoken, too masculine, too sensitive. I try not to let these things bother me. I try to believe that I'm outside of their influence. But if that's true, why am I walking around today as if I am waiting for a flood?
Class Blogger 10/29
Hi all,
Here is Chris' account of class for 10/29. Check it out if you need a refresher or missed class.
http://www.cp111793.blogspot.com/2012/10/1029-class-blog-false-rules.html
Here is Chris' account of class for 10/29. Check it out if you need a refresher or missed class.
http://www.cp111793.blogspot.com/2012/10/1029-class-blog-false-rules.html
Wednesday, October 24, 2012
Paper 2 Assignment Sheet Plain Text Version
Paper Two: Visual/Textual Interaction
Requirements
7-8 pages, double-spaced
MLA Format
Hard copy turned in during class
Due Dates
Discovery Draft Due 10/3 – Must have a copy you can share with classmates
Rough Draft 1 Due At Conferences(10/8 - 10/12)
Final Draft Due 10/24 – Hardcopy in class
Goals Associated with Assignment
Focus on a purpose
Respond to the needs of different audiences
Respond appropriately to different kinds of rhetorical situations
Use conventions of format and structure appropriate to the rhetorical situation Adopt appropriate voice, tone, and level of formality
Use writing and reading for inquiry, learning, thinking, and communicating
Understand a writing assignment as a series of tasks, including finding, evaluating, analyzing, and synthesizing appropriate primary and secondary sources
Integrate their own ideas with those of others
Understand the relationships among language, knowledge, and power
Be aware that it usually takes multiple drafts to create and complete a successful text
Develop flexible strategies for generating, revising, editing, and proof-reading
Understand writing as an open process that permits writers to use later invention and re-thinking to revise their work
Understand the collaborative and social aspects of writing processes
The Assignment
For Paper Two, you will build on the observation and analytic skills employed in Paper One with the objective of exploring connections between written and visual texts. In achieving this goal, you will focus on how elements from both visual and written texts serve to interpret, emphasize, complicate, or mask one another. Think of your favorite magazine, for instance. Now imagine if it had no visuals in it whatsoever, no pictures or cartoons or ads. How different would your magazine be? The visuals that are included in your magazine serve a distinct purpose, and for this essay you will consider what that purpose is. You will be required to analyze elements of the visual text like image, layout, color, design, and lighting. You will also consider qualities of the written text, such as voice, tone, audience, and style. Through a comparison of the two texts and how they work with and/or against each other, you will make a specific claim about the media‘s ideas, values, and overall message and support this argument with details obtained through close observation and analysis.
Getting Started
Your first step should be to select a text with visual representations. Your choices are basically endless. If you are a fan of comic books/graphic novels, you might consider how the images in Art Spiegelman‘s Maus tell a story separate from that of the text, adding meaning to the relationship between father and son. Also significant is the choice to portray the characters as mice, which adds another layer of meaning to Spiegelman‘s memoir. In analyzing a text like this, you might consider elements of color, point of view, arrangement, movement, and style. Perhaps there is an illustrated storybook from your childhood that has always intrigued you, such as Green Eggs and Ham or Pat the Bunny. If this is the case, you could discuss the narrative and text alongside the book‘s images, looking again at the illustrator‘s use of things like color and style.
Options for approaching this topic:
Perhaps you could focus on one or more articles from magazines such as Newsweek or Time, examining the written texts and corresponding photos and illustrations. For example, you could look at the coverage of the war in Iraq or a primary election through the ―lens of writers and photojournalists. Or you might consider how ads in a magazine like Cosmopolitan typically compliment what is being said in an article. It‘s no coincidence that a shampoo ad would appear on the page next to an article about how to get great hair.
You might explore website text and graphics, observing sites such as college and university homepages and discussing things like mission statements and messages addressed to prospective students. You could then talk about the textual message in relation to corresponding graphics, layout, and design. Or you could consider how a particular movie or play deviates from its original screenplay (or perhaps from the book it was adapted from).
Another option is using a cultural icon as the visual element of your paper. An icon is an image, symbol, or idea that has become commonplace in a society. Cultural icons might be thought of as people, pictures, or events that have a powerful influence on our thinking. Often writers think of themselves as ―iconoclasts, which literally means to blow up icons or commonly held ideas. These writers cause us to see the world differently. All of the following are cultural icons: Seminoles, Bob Dylan, Meryl Streep, Hugh Heffner, Dr. Seuss, The Beatles, Alcoholics Anonymous, Woodstock, Pearl Harbor, Van Gogh, Shakespeare, and the Mona Lisa. Choose your own icon to write about (not necessarily from the above list). The idea of this paper is to write informatively about a cultural icon. As a byproduct of learning and thinking about this icon, you should also be able to analyze it. Make a specific claim or claims about the icon‘s ideas, values, and overall message. Support your claims as strongly as you can. In addition to writing about the icon, include a picture that helps readers understand the icon better. Don‘t just throw in any picture; choose one that goes well with your focus. Consider how elements from both visual and written texts serve to interpret, emphasize, complicate, or mask one another.
Some possible questions to consider while drafting:
Do I have a clear message, argument, or thesis? Do I need one?
What role does this icon play in our culture?
What effects does this icon have on the way we think?
What kind of readers do you envision? What would they want to know?
Include at least one primary source (the textual component). Feel free to also incorporate secondary sources; for example, the controversy surrounding media‘s manipulation of how its viewers understand the Iraq war.
Rough Drafts, Workshop and Revision
For this paper, we will complete a discovery draft, rough draft, and final draft. The final draft will be graded as-is, with the opportunity for revision. If you do not turn in a draft, your final grade will be penalized 10 percent for each missing draft. Likewise, missing peer review will cost your final grade 10 percent. This means that a paper missing a draft can receive, at most, 90 percent. A paper that misses a workshop will also receive, at most, 90 percent.
If you choose to revise your paper, you’ll need to draft a revision memo to accompany your new draft. The memo should detail the changes you made and why and, perhaps more importantly, the changes you chose not to make and why you chose not to make those changes. Remember: this is your work. Own it and take the opportunity to defend your writing choices and to recognize weaknesses and engage in self-critique. While you are not guaranteed a better grade after a revision, your grade will never be lowered after revision.
Image from http://harlotofthearts.org/issues/issue_2/mccorkle/obama-poster/
Rubric Building for Paper 2
Second verse, same as the first. But this time, we'll be coming up with 10 criteria for grading. Once your groups have completed their lists, please type them into the document here.
Class Blogger 10/22
Hi all,
Here is the link to Jackie's class blogger entry for 10/22. In includes important dates and information, so be sure to check it out.
http://jacquelinemoreda.blogspot.com/2012/10/class-blogger-1022.html
Here is the link to Jackie's class blogger entry for 10/22. In includes important dates and information, so be sure to check it out.
http://jacquelinemoreda.blogspot.com/2012/10/class-blogger-1022.html
Tuesday, October 23, 2012
Mid Semester Evaluation
Hi all,
Today we're going to be doing a mid-semester evaluation. Please follow the link at the bottom to get started.
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/viewform?formkey=dFpxa3VzZ28ydF85YnF1SXBkeEpmYVE6MA#gid=0
Today we're going to be doing a mid-semester evaluation. Please follow the link at the bottom to get started.
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/viewform?formkey=dFpxa3VzZ28ydF85YnF1SXBkeEpmYVE6MA#gid=0
Monday, October 22, 2012
Class blog 10/15
Hi all,
Here is the link to Marisa's class blog for 10/15. Because she's awesome, she wrote it like a pirate and included pictures of the fabulous Johnny Depp.
Check it out; it's a lot of fun.
http://www.marisastokers1101.blogspot.com/2012/10/october-15th-class-blog-cinderella.html
Here is the link to Marisa's class blog for 10/15. Because she's awesome, she wrote it like a pirate and included pictures of the fabulous Johnny Depp.
Check it out; it's a lot of fun.
http://www.marisastokers1101.blogspot.com/2012/10/october-15th-class-blog-cinderella.html
Thursday, October 18, 2012
Class Cancelled for 10/19
Hi all,
Sorry to do this, but I need to cancel class tomorrow (10/19). I was in a car accident this afternoon. I'm ok, but sore and a little beat up. I'll email you feedback on your papers tomorrow so you can continue working on them for your peer review on Monday. Please let me know if you have any questions.
Thanks,
HL
Tuesday, October 16, 2012
Reading for 10/17
Hi all,
I have received some questions about the reading for tomorrow. Please read pg. 55-71 in the Handbook.
Thanks and sorry for the mix-up,
HL
Saturday, October 6, 2012
Conference Schedule
Hi all,
Here is the conference schedule for this week. Please remember a missed conference counts as a missed class and failure to turn in a rough draft of your assignment will result in an automatic 10 percent deduction from your final grade. If you can’t find your name on this list, please email me at hl12d@my.fsu.edu as soon as possible.
Thanks,
HL
Monday
|
Wednesday
|
Friday
| |||
10:45
AM
|
Kalie Godwin
| ||||
11:00 AM
|
Andrew Mazzarella
|
11:00 AM
|
Stephanie Roman
|
11:00 AM
|
Max del Monte
|
11:15 AM
|
Connor Capes
|
11:15 AM
|
Sam Lemelman
|
11:15 AM
|
Patrick Stebler
|
11:30 AM
|
Pascal Kolb
|
11:30 AM
|
Jake Najjar
|
11:30 AM
|
Sharon Scarlett
|
11:45 AM
|
Alex O’Daniel
|
11:45 AM
|
Kelsey Buckley
|
11:45 AM
|
Ali Mondini
|
12:00 PM
|
Jen Cheslock
|
12:00 PM
|
Andy Elovic
|
12:00 PM
|
Matt Gourges
|
12:15 PM
|
12:15 PM
|
Kole Buchanan
|
12:15 PM
|
Alexis Cornejo
| |
12:30 PM
|
12:30 PM
|
Samantha Klein
|
12:30 PM
|
Allie Clark
| |
12:45 PM
|
12:45 PM
|
Abby Richardson
|
12:45 PM
|
Caroline Ellis
| |
1:00 PM
|
1:00 PM
|
Vicky Kopecky
|
1:00 PM
|
Chris Peppy
| |
1:15 PM
|
1:15 PM
|
Shone Joseph
|
1:15 PM
|
Jeffrey Perez
| |
1:30 PM
|
Marisa Stoker
|
1:30 PM
|
Austin Cunningham
|
1:30 PM
|
Morgan O’Rourke
|
1:45 PM
|
Patrick Hahne
|
1:45 PM
|
Kelly Kalich
|
1:45 PM
|
Lanie Miranda
|
2:00 PM
|
Layne Deshong
|
2:00 PM
|
Alexis Brailsford
|
2:00 PM
|
Jackie Moreda
|
2:15
PM
|
Derek Torres
|
2:15
PM
|
Mitchell Gotleib
|
2:15 PM
|
Chris Benjamin
|
Thursday, October 4, 2012
Starry Night
For this activity, you will analyze
a poem or song in tandem with Starry Night, Vincent Van Gogh’s famous painting.
Each group will have their own poem or song and will be responsible for
developing a thesis to fit their analysis. Focus on the similarities between the words of the poem and the visuals
in the painting. Have any images in the painting inspired certain parts of the
poem? What image/color in the painting struck the author of the poem/song? What
first strikes each student? Has the author altered anything in the painting?
What details are lost or added in these “translations”? Do these textual
“translations” convey a different meaning or evoke another emotion?
After you’ve discussed the questions
above, write a paragraph and thesis together to share with the class. Remember
to keep the following in mind when crafting your thesis:
- · An aspect of the painting/poem/song that is meaningful to your group
- · Developing a thoughtful stance
- · Anticipate a “so what” question
Post it to one blog and email me
the link and your group number. Hopefully, we will have enough time in class to
present and discuss our analyses as a whole.
1. 1. The
Starry Night by Anne Sexton
That does not keep me
from having a terrible need of—shall I say the word—religion. Then I go out at
night to paint the stars.Vincent Van Gogh in a letter to his brother
The town does not exist
except where one
black-haired tree slips
up like a drowned woman
into the hot sky.
The town is silent. The
night boils with eleven stars.
Oh starry starry night!
This is how
I want to die.
It moves. They are all
alive.
Even the moon bulges in
its orange irons
to push children, like
a god, from its eye.
The old unseen serpent
swallows up the stars.
Oh starry starry night!
This is how
I want to die:
into that rushing beast
of the night,
sucked up by that great
dragon, to split
from my life with no
flag,
no belly,
no cry.
2. 2. Starry
Night by Tupac Shakur (poem)
A creative heart,
obsessed with satisfying
this dormant and
uncaring society
you have given them the
stars at night
and you have given them
Bountiful Bouquets of
Sunflowers
but 4 u there is only
contempt
and though you pour
yourself into that fame
and present it so
proudly this world
could not accept your
masterpieces
from the heart.
So on that starry night
you gave to us
and you took away from
us
the one thing we never
acknowledged
your life.
3.
3. 3. “Vincent (Starry Starry Night)” by Don Mclean
(song)
Starry, starry night
Paint your palette blue
and gray
Look out on a summer's
day
With eyes that know the
darkness in my soul
Shadows on the hills
Sketch the trees and
the daffodils
Catch the breeze and
the winter chills
In colors on the snowy
linen land
Now I understand
What you tried to say
to me
And how you suffered
for your sanity
And how you tried to
set them free
They would not listen,
they did not know how
Perhaps they'll listen
now
Starry, starry night
Flaming flowers that
brightly blaze
Swirling clouds in
violet haze
Reflect in Vincent's
eyes of china blue
Colors changing hue
Morning fields of amber
grain
Weathered faces lined
in pain
Are soothed beneath the
artist's loving hand
Now I understand
What you tried to say
to me
And how you suffered
for your sanity
And how you tried to
set them free
They would not listen,
they did not know how
Perhaps they'll listen
now
For they could not love
you
But still your love was
true
And when no hope was
left in sight
On that starry, starry
night
You took your life, as
lovers often do
But I could've told you
Vincent
This world was never
meant for
One as beautiful as you
Starry, starry night
Portraits hung in empty
halls
Frame-less heads on
nameless walls
With eyes that watch
the world and can't forget
Like the strangers that
you've met
The ragged men in
ragged clothes
The silver thorn of
bloody rose
Lie crushed and broken
on the virgin snow
Now I think I know
What you tried to say
to me
And how you suffered
for your sanity
And how you tried to
set them free
They would not listen,
they're not listening still
Perhaps they never will
4. 4. "The
Starry Night" by Robert Fagles
Long as I paint
I feel myself
less mad
the brush in my hand
a lightning rod to
madness
But never ground that
madness
execute it ride the
lightning up
from these benighted
streets and steeple up
with the cypress look
its black is burning green
I am that I am it cries
it lifts me up the
nightfall up
the cloudrack coiling
like a dragon's flanks
a third of the stars in
heaven wheeling in its wake
wheels in wheels around
the moon that cradles round the sun
and if I can only trail
these whirling eternal stars
with one sweep of the
brush like Michael's sword if I can
cut the life out of the
beast - safeguard the mother and the son
all heaven will hymn in
conflagration blazing down
the night the mountain
ranges down
the claustrophobic
valleys of the mad
Madness
is what I have instead
of heaven
God deliver me - help
me now deliver
all this frenzy back
into your hands
our brushstrokes burning
clearer into dawn.
5. 5. From “Van Gogh in Moods, Both Dark and
Light” by Benjamin Genocchio (art review)
The cypresses stand tall and
unbudgeable in the blustery wind as, perhaps, a symbol of strength and
fortitude.
The sky, by contrast, is speckled
and swirling. Clouds spiral and whorl, or twist into tight knots, rising up
from behind a mountain range that slopes gently downward to where it joins the
land. Foul weather is on the way.
An explosion of wheat grass,
golden and yellow, carpets the foreground of the painting. The grass leaps high
into the air like flames, mimicking the elegant, vertical, slender shape of the
cypresses.
This work, “Cypresses,” by
Vincent van Gogh, was painted in June 1889 during his confinement at the asylum
in Saint-Rémy in the south of France. Until September it will be hanging at the
Yale University Art Gallery, on loan from the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New
York City as part of a two-work show organized by Jennifer Gross, the museum’s
curator of modern and contemporary art.
The other painting is van Gogh’s
“Starry Night,” on loan from the Museum of Modern Art in New York City. Also
painted in June 1889, it provides a very different view of the southern French
countryside.
Perspective is the most obvious
difference between them. The cropping and closeness of “Cypresses” convey an
immediacy and almost tactile relationship to nature, immersing you there in the
grasses beneath the grinding sun. “The Starry Night,” by contrast, is painted
from up high, the town off in the distance and possibly observed from the
artist’s window at the asylum. You get a feeling of detachment.
…
Then there is that incredible sky
in “The Starry Night.” The moon and stars are balls of orange-yellow light
verging on the radioactive. Meanwhile, the clouds have begun to coil, twist or
whirl into atmospheric surf. An unearthly glow confers a further intensity to
the picture. It is manic and tripped-out.
All this neatly equates with the
madman of legend. But the idea that van Gogh’s paintings are the expression of
his illness and thus somehow “mad” is so wrong-headed that it requires
immediate refutation. It was van Gogh’s illness that stopped him from painting.
His paintings are the product of his moments of lucidity, his efforts to stay
in touch with reality. They couldn’t be saner.
In both paintings there is ample
evidence of the artist’s concision, exactness of judgment and remarkable powers
of visual analysis. And how brilliantly he assimilates color opposites, mixing
together hot colors like orange, yellow and red with cold whites and blues to
give the paintings added zing.
He is also looking closely at
nature. Although some of van Gogh’s paintings were spontaneous outpourings of
creative energy, in many cases he plotted out his pictures. He made countless
drawings, impassioned sketches in which he worked out compositional elements.
His paintings are mindful and premeditated.
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)