Tuesday, January 29, 2013

Summary (Jingyi Wu)

Summary 1: Jaime Lerner uses a  funny tone to explain how to solute practical problems in city. Because a city is a complicated system, he mentions combining automobiles with other elements is a good way to improve people's life.

Summary 2: Vik Muniz show audiences how he use his creativity to make his artwork with normal and daily materials.

Summary 3: Doris Sung introduce the process of  his sculptures. She crisscrosses metal trips to imitate personal skin, which would create a new type of architecture.

Monday, January 28, 2013

After watching TED (Seyoung)


Those three presentations were interesting.

Jaime Lerner talked about city planning by showing quick drawing, which helps views understand quickly. I liked, especially, turtle one. He also explain cars, as if they are human, which is very interesting way.

                Vik Muniz presented his work. In the intro, he captured audience attention by changing his mood from awkward to funny and informal conversation way. Showing his works by using photographs and videos with narrative explain leads audience to focus on his work.

                Doris Sung Kim explained her personal experience, which is related with her presentation, at begin part. This make views feel comfortable for me to listen to her. Showing specific image helped me to understand her presentation clear.  

Presentation skills--Renee


 

A good presentation should be attractive. How to make an attractive presentation? I think it could concert in different aspects: Strategy, context of talk, and visuals .

In terms of strategies, good speakers always start with jokes, stories, or common questions.  Speakers attract people’s attention directly.

In terms of context, as the same strategy of personal statement, speakers should use the simple language everybody could understand and have similar feelings easily. Using the simple words to explain a complicated topic is not an easy thing.

Finally, in visual aspect, we can combine pictures and videos together, and express our topic in visual way. All the visual stuff should serve our main idea directly.  We can also talk when we show those medias.

Public Speaking

Before to do a presentation, I think that it's very important to analyze the audience you are going to speak to.
There are several techniques to speak in public, for example speakers can use metaphors, jokes, comparisons, or just they can go directly to the point.
The corporal expression and the personal presentation are very important.  Personal experiences are valuable to show your own work and to express your points of view to the audience.
Throughout images you can capture the audiences' attention. The use of text could be a bad idea; the audience could be bored.They wont read.
It is important to have a kind of a conversation with the audience. If you seem relax and have the correct arguments to talk about a subject the audience could understand the main idea of your presentation.


Public Speaking - Violeta Trinidad

One of the lessons I have learned from Ted regarding public speaking is the content of the talk. The content of the talk has to be clear and it should cought up the attention of the audience; it doesn't matter if they make it serious, or funny, critical or maybe informal, the information they use, has to be quality information. They can talk about personal experiences in the past, about their own work, they can explain certain analysis, use metaphors and even talk about their future plans, in order to link their experiences with the main point of the talk. Additionally, the speakers must use some visuals to help the audience understand what they are talking about, mostly speakers use images, photos, sketches, videos and props of their own work.

Lessons from TED

We watched the beginning of three talks on TED today:
Jaime Lerner
Vik Muniz
Doris Sung Kim

Jaime Lerner was speaking about city design.  He seemed very comfortable and earnest, but he was also not afraid to joke around.  He began with very beautiful photos of cityscapes and he also used slides of basic drawings, city plans, and text outlines.  He spoke about cars and cities not just factually but also metaphorically to engage the audience.

Vik Muniz had an interesting opening strategy: he appeared to be somewhat nervous and began by talking about a very serious subject (creation v. creativity) and then turned the seriousness on its head by showing a slide of a dog with a chicken pattern on its fur.  Through his introduction, which was a series of jokes, we learned that he was born in Brazil, he loved media, his first job was is advertising, and he was shot!  He then talked about his own work.  Some of his slides used text which introduced different categories of his work.

Doris Sung Kim was the most straightforward of the three speakers.  She began with a slide of girl with her out of the window and a personal story, which she then linked to a discussion about the energy that buildings consume.  She showed the special energy sensing metal she uses in her work as a prop and in a video.

TED Summarize (Catherine)

After I listened three person's presentation, I learned a lot skills and experience from them. It's a good way to begin with a joke with confidence and tell the audience directly with my opinions. Besides, it can be started seriously and more formal, but it maybe less a little bit interesting. The good presentaiton should be has a good organization and clear content through their talking. They can show their life experience either. There is another important thing is visual languages. More specific is display some sketches, photographs, videos and even some props.

A1: Personal Statement - Violeta Trinidad

In my opinion, an artist statement should be a concise two-three paragraph with the most relevant work an artist have done. The statement must contain names, dates or periods and places their work was accomplish and why the pieces should be important for the reader.

 
As well, the writter of the statement should include the relationship that has between their work and the environment, and should analyze the target readers in order to accomplish a usefull statement. Besides, the statement should be clear and must be written in a way the reader understands.
 
The personal statement should include the experience the author have had and what they are expecting to do in the future (their plans).
 
Finally, I think the artist must show their own style, so the reader or audience can get an idea of how the author thinks and expresses their work.
 
You can find a few examples at the links below:
 

Art Statement for planner (Jingyi Wu)


       When I was young, I was very active child. It is hard to be quiet for a minute. Since I started to learn how to draw a picture, my mother found I gradually focus on drawing and painting.
    With my knowledge growing, I opened eyes to different types and styles of painting and design. But, for me, the most attractive thing is design in three dimensions. Therefore I choose to learn landscape architecture.
Compared with architecture, landscape has fewer limitations. It can be a combination of more options, like plants, sculptures, rivers or bridges. It provides more possibility to create my artwork.
After working, I found no mater architecture or landscape architecture have a close relationship with a planning of related cities. They are a part of city and regional planning.
Planning is a subject of the direction of urban development and future of cities. It reflect all aspects of a country, which is based on politics, economics,  culture, history, population , transportation, technology, education and also depend on geography, climate, and environment. Sometime, a planner should even consider about race, religion, moral, law, safety, hygiene, convenience and more.

Wednesday, January 23, 2013

Mon. 1/28 Assignment: 15-20 Images

Thank you all for a great class today!  I enjoyed learning about what you all are doing and look forward to working together this semester.

For Monday's class, please select 15-20 images that you would like to use in your PowerPoint presentation about your own work.  You will use these images to give a presentation on Wednesday.  You should be able to talk about each image for about 1 minute.  Think about how to define your philosophy towards your career choice through images.  This is not a research project, but should be based on what you already know.   

Ideally, the images will all be of your work or be photographed or created by you.  However, as "your work" may be in development, you may also use outside source images to talk about your inspirations, ideas, and dreams for the future.  Be sensitive about plagiarism, however (let's talk more about this on Monday!).  If you find images online, be sure to note the URL.

Personal Statement (Seyoung)

    An artist’s personal statement is an essay that focuses on her and her art, addressing goals, interests and background experiences that relate to art. You’ll need to write a personal statement if you are an artist who is applying for a grant or to an art school. The personal statement should not be confused with an artist’s statement, as the personal statement is much more comprehensive than an artist's statement, which is often used only for marketing

  Link:
http://www.ehow.com/how_6603253_write-personal-statement-art.html#ixzz2Ip262HHn


     I think the Personal Statement should explain the reason why artist did his or her work, where those from, what influence artist take, and the connection between the work and your main theme in the works.

Sample of some artist statement:
http://registry.whitecolumns.org/view_artist.php?artist=13925

Tuesday, January 22, 2013

Artist Statement(Catherine)


I understand that an artist statement is a two or three paragraph description about art work that provides the reader with information about artists’ sources, ideas, and inspiration. It should be present insightful information about process and answer questions viewers might have when looking at artists’ work. It is a valuable tool providing an additional connection between artist and audience, it also creates the opportunity for art work to be more fully considered and appreciated. The artist statement will become a page of text on website or accompany an exhibition of work. It should be use formal languages and specific opinions to support your art works.
http://www.sarahschmerler.com/work-samples/
http://www.sarahschmerler.com/artist-resources/
http://www.studential.com/bio/getps.asp?ps=1525&view=subject

Personal statement

Why artist need artist statement? I think it is for two reasons: Express and understanding. In my opinion, artist statement is not about teaching how to feel, or what to act. It is about using simple words to  help artists to have a better express their words, and help audiences to have a better understanding arts. Write artist statement in language that anyone can understand is the core.

In terms of personal statement,  beside regular conventions, the primary  thing is about expressing  your passion. A passionate person is very attractive naturally. Meanwhile, in those passionate stories, you can express your style of design.

Those are some examples of personal statement for interior design.





I  attached my pervious  personal statement for Pratt. Because I am career switcher, so I explained more in reasons. I know this is not what we need use in further. However, it is the experience I wanna share with you guys. 
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ConceptIf a man can do something he is fond of and good at, he is happy; if it happens to bring him satisfying economic return, he is lucky indeed.

Part 1: A bold but prudent decision: 
I acknowledge that, in the eyes of others, I am an adventurous girl, because I am a female who is not very young, and I resigned a favorable post and came to a foreign country to study for a master’s degree in a research area that is totally new to me. However, in my opinion, if the several-year period is compared to my whole lifetime, I think it is worthwhile to spend the time doing what I like to do and what is suitable for me to do. Personally speaking, if a man can do something he is fond of and good at, he is happy; if it happens to bring him satisfying economic return, he is lucky indeed. In fact, most young people fail to find what they really like and what is suitable for them, as did I before. What’s more, some people even spend time on things they dislike and are not skilled in. Consequently, it seems that they are always on the run, but they accomplish nothing. I don’t want to be such a person; rather, I want to be the lucky one. 

Part 2:Smooth-going learning and job hunting: 
In my opinion, when I am still young, I'd better be brave enough to undergo many hardships, if necessary, and to perform a critical self-analysis and develop my potentials. I was born into a merchant's family. In my teens, I majored in Commercial Economy at one of the top ten business schools in Britain, according to the wishes of my family. I was bold and adventurous even when I was a little girl. I chose Britain because I wanted to participate in an interesting civilization that is different from China. I gained a lot during my five years of learning abroad. 

After I came back to China, though the world was troubled with an economic crisis at that time, I was lucky enough to find a job without too many difficulties at Citic Securities, the biggest investment bank in Asia, where I became a Stock Index Futures Analyst. I worked in the financial industry there for three years, which offered me a good chance to use what I learned before and enabled me to thoroughly comprehend the ups and downs of the industry. All in all, I would like to express my sincere gratitude to the finance industry as it provided me with a platform to significantly enlarge my scope of knowledge and made me grow up rapidly. Comparing to many people, my learning and job hunting seem to occur with no problems at all. 

Part 3:Unusual experience of investment: During my three years of work at Citic Securities, I allowed my commerce and investment genes to express themselves freely.

In early 2009, I began to invest in the real estate sector. At first, I only intended to meet my own living needs. I bought a small studio in the core area of Shenzhen’s Central Business District. This was at the worst point of the economic crisis, but I was lucky enough to purchase the studio at the lowest price. This was my first house in my life. Because of limitations of cost and time, I performed all the designing, purchasing and supervising work myself. I hired a worker to assist me. Though it was my first time to decorate, I had many inspirations because I had read magazines on interior decoration from time to time since I was very young. When the project was finished, I was satisfied with my “first try”. 

Four months later, thanks to the loose economic policies, the price of houses in my area increased by 20% compared to the price at the time when I bought my house. What’s more, the decorations increased the value of my house even more, or nearly 110% of the market price. I bought the house with loans of 1 million RMBand the down payment was 20% of the total price. After I sold the house, I enjoyed a rate of return of 150%. I expected that the house price would be rising dramatically. What I did not expect was that I could beautify my house at low cost but with high efficiency. House prices varied substantially before and after decoration. The cash cost of my first try was 10 thousand RMB and the time required was two days. As a result, the sale of my “first try” brought me an additional 70 thousand RMB compared with similar, but undecorated houses in the area. 

While real estate prices were rising, I decisively sold my house and began to seek another “bamboo shoot premise (a very profitable one)” whenever I was free. I wanted to build an impressive personal space by strictly controlling the cost. During the day, I was an eye-catching girl engaged in finance; while in the evening, I turned into a “dusty laborer”. I was thrown into a sea of fatigue at the end of a day, but my joy surpassed the fatigue when I relived the experience of this role shift and watched the empty house gradually change into an admirable personal space. 

Part 4: Discovering new highlights in my life: 

In a short two and a half years, I decorated five houses on my own during my spare time. In such an “arbitrage”, not only did I gain a lot (the money I earned was enough to support my three years of learning in America), but also, I discovered another potential of mine in the unprecedented experience of interior design. I enjoyed selecting compatible furniture on the internet, and ordering suitable paints and floor boards at B&Q and discussing design plans with workers more than simply making money. I spent only limited time on the decoration of each house, but each visitor witnessed at first glance my absorption in the design and my delight after realizing one of my ideas. Through two odd years of practice and self-examination, I finally made up my mind to apply to study for the major of Interior Design at your university. I sincerely hope that in the future I could be an interior designer to which I’ll contribute all of my enthusiasm for the rest of my life.   

Part 5: Possibility of turning hobby into productivity: 

With my previous buying and selling experiences, I often ponder over the questions mentioned above. China's market for second-hand houses is still immature compared with those of developed countries. Eighty percent of second hand houses are ill-decorated or are equipped with broken furniture. Most second-hand house owners are eager to rent out or sell their houses. Though some are aware that fine renovation will bring them more profit, they have difficulty designing it themselves due to their limited energy and ability. If they hire a decoration engineering company, the design cost is significant, which raises the rent or selling price that must be charged. 

The experience of living abroad enables me to believe this is a market with great potential. If there were a professional company capable of optimizing the rough and primitive arbitrage method and bring a new appearance to an old house with high efficiency and low cost, such a company would be warmly welcomed by customers in both the bull and bear markets of the real estate sector. Most people would be glad to purchase affordable houses that are both beautiful and comfortable. In addition, renovating old houses restrains the demand for new houses, which contributes to environment conservation. Above all, for me, I’m happy to turn my hobby into productivity.  

Part 6: Works of a non-professional-“old house but new appearance”:

I am not an expert on interior decoration, and I am also curbed by the limited cost and time. All work is performed by me and a worker. I am the designer, supervisor, purchaser, carrier, painter and furniture fitter. Though the work is toilsome, it’s my honor to share with you my “works”, the theme of which is “Old House but New Appearance”. They are not exquisite, but what I want to highlight is a modern young person’s efforts to bring simple but creative new looks to old houses, which is also my contribution to interior design on a limited budget of both money and time. 

It's a great joy for me to see that I have turned an empty old house into what I desire it to be. As for my works, I demonstrate them mainly with the pictures in my diary at my blog (http://blog.sina.com.cn/u/1738746143H). Because I am fond of photography, I also present some pictures that I took. I like photography because I can capture trifles in daily life that are capable of moving people and I like the means of quickly and eternally recording these scenes. It’s very important for a designer to have a pair of eyes good at discovering the beauty of life and a heart that is easily touched by the details that others tend to neglect. I sincerely hope you will like those works made by a non-professional.  

Respected members of the enrollment office, this Personal Statement is the result of a prudent decision about which I have thought for a long time and which finally I have made. I deeply appreciate the time you spend considering this Statement and I sincerely hope to have the chance to study in your university and explore the area of which we are all fond: Interior Design.

Saturday, January 19, 2013

Personal Statement: 1/23 Assignment

In the last class, we discussed personal statements and looked at a few examples on the White Columns website.  In the next class on Wednesday, please address the following questions by doing some brief online research or by speaking with your professors or other professionals you know.
  • How and why is the personal statement used in your field?
  • How long should it be?
  • What should be included in the personal statement?
  • What kind of language is used?  Is it formal or casual?  How 'smart' should it be?
  • Should a personal statement reflect a consistent style? Can you talk about different types of work in the personal statement?
  • Have you written a personal statement before?  Was is successful?
Create a brief post on this blog with a summary of your ideas on the personal statement and links to examples if you found them (Great work Paola!)

I handed out a reading titled Explaining Your Art with suggestions about writing an artist statement.  Please look through this and let us know what you think.  Do you agree with the author?  Any questions?

See you Wednesday!

Thursday, January 17, 2013

Personal Statement

A statement is used  in political science or urban planning field for:

To apply for a university degree, to express why do you want to pursue a Master’s degree or a PHD program.
To apply for a job
To introduce yourself.
The statement must not exceed one page.
In the Statement must include your skills, educational and professional background (briefly explained)
The language is formal, but simple.
I wrote a personal statement to complete my Master's degree application. It was very difficult to write but I think it works. I explained my reasons to purse the Master and my qualifications. 


In Colombia the statement is only use it to educational purposes.
To introduce yourself in Colombia is use the cover letter.

These are two examples of statements in order to apply a to a Master's Degree in the Urban Planning Field


Tuesday, January 15, 2013

Introduction Renee Liu



This Picture was took in Sipadan( Malaysia) which is one of  the best diving center in the world. I am the one in the center of fishes. That is a very special phenomena only could be seen in few places in the world. I called the phenomena that "Barracuda". The other one is "shark with me" . There are all gifts from the nature. The more you touch with nature, the more you appreciate her.



Monday, January 14, 2013

Introduction – Seyoung

Hello everyone, I am Seyoung. Nice to meet you guys. I am from Seoul, a capital city of Korea. My major is painting and drawing in Fine Arts. I’ve been in here for half of a year. I am interested in drawing human figures. Actually, Military experience was my main theme of works. I did serve in front line, called DMZ, on east side for 2 years. Now, I release from there around 3 years ago and am here. I am happy to finish it. During break time, I usually listen to some music or TV show to relax myself. If the weather is nice, I like to take a walk. Anyway, I will do my best improving my English ability in this program. Thank you.

Introduction Paola Duran

San Andres Islands. Colombia

I'm from Bogota, the capital of Colombia. I'm a Political Scientist.
I decided to move to New York to live my dream. I'm here to study, learn, work and make some friends.

I'm living with my boyfriend he is also Colombian and he is a musician, who is studying Media Studies at The New School University.

I love to work for the community, especially on children and women issues.

I am at Pratt because is one of the best universities to study planning and I want to focus my studies on community development.

Finally I love to spend time on the beach, that's why I posted the picture.

Steve's final masterpiece


Headquarter of Apple

Steve Jobs is not only a great technological man for me, but also a icon desiger. His style is my favorite: simple, but not too simple. Here is "one more thing" he designed by himself in every single detail: Apple's Headquarter.

Apple’s planned HQ appears to have round wall, and is  scheduled to be completed mid-2016. The late Steve Jobs designed the whole thing himself,.

"Speaking of nature, around 7000 trees are supposedly going to be planted, with the amount of landscaping being done being estimated at an amazing 80% of the whole campus! The HQ will take up an amazing 2.8 million sq. ft, and hold somewhere in the region of 14,200 employees. The reason for the delay? The city of Cupertino won’t be done its Environmental Impact Survey until summer of 2014, pushing back ground-breaking formalities quite a bit."

Introduction-Chengcheng Feng(Catherine)


Hello everyone. My name is Chengcheng Feng and you can call me Catherine if you like. I come from China and my major is animation. How time flies, I came here almost half a year. I really love here, including environment and people. I hope I can make more friends here.

In terms of my major animation. I'm focus on 3d animation most of my time. Besides, I also can do 2d animation and stop-motion animation too. I have done six animation works in my past time.The reason that I chose this major is my major in my undergradute is animation too. So I hope to learn more about it and do more wonderful animation works in the future. We all known being a good animator need a long process practice and a lot of experiences. I will try my best to realize my dream. :)

Introduction - Nichole

Neither Art Nor Part, 2010.  

Nichole van Beek

Hello everyone! Great to meet you today.  Here is a link to my website.  As you know, I am an English teacher, but I am also an artist.  I mainly make paintings, but I also occasionally work three-dimensionally.  I have a studio in Dumbo and hopefully sometime this semester we'll have some time to stop by there and I can show you what I'm working on.

I'm looking forward to working with you this semester! 

Please take a minute to make an introductory post for yourself.  Include a link and an image.  It can be about your work or just something you are interested in.  Don't forget to label the post with your name.

Sunday, January 13, 2013

Inventing Abstraction

MacDonald-Wright.  Conception Synchromy, 1914
Saltz on Inventing Abstraction 

This review by Jerry Saltz of the "Inventing Abstraction" show at the MOMA is right on.  He gives a frolicking run through the developments that led to abstraction in Western art from 1910-1925.  His main criticism of the show is that abstraction was not "invented" in 1910:

"Yet even with much to love, there’s something demented, even dangerous about this show... Abstraction wasn’t invented in the West in those years...[It] is there in the caves."

I saw the show this week and was bowled over by so many amazing works of art, but similar to Saltz, I felt that the language framing the show was oversimplified and gave too much credence to White men.  I'm sure these artists were exposed to abstract art that was made in other non-Western cultures.  For example, Picasso owed a great debt to African masks and basic abstracted human forms in African art in general.  The show is definitely worth seeing, but take the history with a grain of Saltz.

Check out this amazing interactive graphic of the artist network:
Inventing Abstraction at MOMA

New words:
demented; synonymous with mad, crazy, insane, lunatic, daft
to take something with a grain of salt; to view something skeptically, to not take something literally