Voices

Source: wings.buffalo.edu

Metric is a little tricky. Unconventionally, is is the sum of the parts of a whole, working together under a certain function. "In the baths of Caracalla, the largest in Rome, more than 1,600 bathers of one gender could be accommodated at one time in its sprawling 33 acres"(Roth, 267) Bathhouses are made up of many rooms: frigidariums, calidariums, tepidariums, changing rooms, exercise rooms, etc.
In class, I feel that the metric that we are working with is our eventual portfolios. With every project we finish, we add one more piece to our collection. Our portfolios will show off our work, with all of the BLOOD, SWEAT, and TEARS that we put into it.

Filling up my Brita pitcher

Column of Ste. Madeline

Moments occur everywhere and at all times. They are the still-lives that make up our existence. In our drawing class, capturing these moments has been the focus of our assignments. As part of the group that I have been working with, I have been drawing different moments inside of the Elliot University Center on campus. Stationed on the third floor, I have sought out places in the building that are unique and offer an interesting view of the site and the people utilizing it. The image that I drew above is another moment that I captured. Something as simple as filling a water pitcher is considered a moment because it is a single act that occurs in a certain environment.
Patrick has also been sharing moments with us via historical buildings. One moment that I found to be interesting took place on the capital of a column in the church of Ste. Madeline. It was an intricate carving of people fighting with a snake. "...Movement away from structural directness in favor of ornamental embellishment occurred in the late Gothic Period. In France, this attention to ornament appeared in decorative forms...", (Roth 342)Details such as this are defining moments in a space.

Before and after for our concrete idea
Wu-Wu

Presence is all about impression. What you feel when you first see or hear something. For studio, my PEB group has struggled to find an appropriate form for our concrete structures. We had decided on large, donut shaped pieces that would come out of the ground two feet. They would have a strong presence due to their verticality. However, due to some factors (Stoel) we have changed our plan. We (Stoel) have decided to give the forms a more horizontal presence and to focus more with the ground plane. This way, viewers will not feel as if their pathway is obstructed and they will not be as visually distracted by the objects that they are to be walking alongside.
The Ancient Romans were also very aware of the idea of presence. Unlike their Greek counterparts, they were focused on the façade of their buildings rather than the 360 degree effects. "Roman life focused on temporal comforts and pleasures, as the Roman bath well illustrates" (Roth 2007). Perhaps, though, one artifact that had the most impressive presence in ancient Rome was the wu-wu. These freestanding structures were placed in spots that were highly publicly visited and seen. They were massive columns that were made to represent regional leaders or figure-heads.

Positive/Negative space model
General basilica/cathedral shape

Duality is similar to the zodiacal sign, Gemini. It is like two unlike personalities merging into one unit. Excited and apathetic, black and white, toothpaste and orange juice… they all seem to be opposites yet one can find a happy medium if one were to look for one. With the many black & white projects that we have been making in studio, duality has been playing a large role. For mine, I have been unifying these unlike colors through texture, form and function. My most recent model was based off the ideas of positive and negative spaces. These two ideas share a great duality because you cannot have one without the other.
In architecture, duality is a common theme when trying to combine ideas. In many church structures, the shape of a cross is a very common theme. It has many geometric conventions, which make it a prime form to build. The cross also has many Christian implications, which supposedly bring the architecture closer to heaven. Another form common to Christian cathedrals it the dome. A "building type favored by the early Christians had a centralized plan, whether round, octagonal, or square" (Roth 280). Domes are often placed at the crux of the cross form where there is generally a square area. Squares and circles are obviously different and don’t obviously fit together. But the dome shape acts as a symbol of the heavens, the eye of god watching as he embraces the congregation. This ideal combined with the cross structure creates a great duality that turns the building into a religious icon of its environment.

Groin vaults of bathhouse
Cathedral
Kristina and my pic.

Precedents are what people use when they need an idea or else need to know how to develop their idea. Last semester, our studio class used many precedents for our projects. They allow you to look at things that you like and give you a learning chance to improve on the idea and make it unique to yourself. For the PEB project, Kristina and I researched precedents for the class to help with making concrete molds.
Historically, "it is clear that the Romans relied on Greek prototypes... for their inspiration," (Blakemore 61). They used Greek structures for their temples, Greek columns for their facades, and Greek gods for their religion. Using some of their own technology, though, they developed arches and, later, domes. Barrel vaults and groin vaults became their precedent for their many public bathhouses. Christian architects actually borrowed from the Romans, using the layout of a basilica for the basis of their cathedrals.

New Drink!

You might not think so at first, but this drink is soooo good! It has carbonated water, grape juice and lemon juice. It really tastes like lemon juice but in a good way! The only drawback is that it costs two dollars and it isn't a lot of liquid. It is definitely worth trying, though. Link!

Dance Rehearsal and Logos

Black and White

These are some of thumbnails and photos from pieces of the models I made. One is of negative/positive space, one shows gradient and the last is part of a model that shows balance.

Project Analysis Proposal

Jack E. Boucher

Jeff Dean

Johnson Wax Building, aka, Administrative Building, 1936-1939
14th and Franklin St., Racine, Wisconsin, USA
Frank Lloyd Wright

The Johnson Wax building utilizes a unique and innovative selection of materials. [delight] Windows comprised of several layers of Pyrex glass tubing sealed with rubber gaskets fill the space with natural light while retaining privacy. The rest of the building is made of precast concrete and bricks that were made in over two hundred different shapes and sizes. The building is a fourteen story tall tower with curved corners. [commodity] It was intended for corporate offices and a research laboratory, though the research lab no longer meets required fire safety codes.
One defining feature of the Johnson Wax building is the use of dendriform columns. [firmness] These steel-reinforced concrete columns are nine inches wide at their base and tapir upwards into a “lily pad” top, which spans eighteen feet. Due to the precariousness of this design, Frank Lloyd Wright was required to demonstrate how much weight a single column could carry before he received a building permit. It was determined that the columns could hold up to sixty tons before cracking, forty-eight more tons than was required.
“This building, with its transparency between floors and the activities on them, along with the whole idea of blocking out the outside is said to have a strong influence in the design of casinos.”

Sources:
1 2 3

Sleeping Beauty

Pencil Drawing

Spur of the Moment

Parts:Whole, week 4

Heirarchy
Heirarchy has been playing a huge role in all of our classes. It deals with a transition from important items to less important items. With drafting, a thick, solid lineweight indicates a higher importance than a thin and/or broken line. With other drawings, objects that are closer, or otherwise have more significance, might have bolder lines or color, or more detail than other areas. Heirarchy often puts into mind a triangle with the few elite on top and the common mundane at the bottom. In societies, there is usually a sense of social class, with the richest being on top and the poorest at the bottom and as you go down in status, the more company you have. Patrick talks constantly of the importance of heirarchy. In architecture, the idea of a centralized plan is very common. Stonehenge is a series of concentric circles with the smallest, center circle leaving room for only the most important participants of ceremonies. Pyramids have large bases that come upward into a point, where pharoes and priests would inhabit.
I kept all of these ideas in mind when I designed my tattoo last week. I decided on three rings of concentric dots which get small towards the center. In the middle of the center circle I included my artist symbol just like a Greek artifact/statue in the middle of a temple.


[My image is a sketch of the Roman Colosseum which implements the use of three types of columns developed by the Greeks: Doric on the bottom, Ionic in the middle and Corinthian on top.]
Source
Noting citations is very crucial to giving people credit for their work. We have been told time and time again to cite our sources whenever using images from the internet and other places. When referencing the work of someone else it is important that you don't seem to take the credit for the image or information.
In ancient Rome, it was well known that ideas were taken from Greek and Egyptian designs. The ever popular Wu-Wu form used in Rome as a symbol of masculinity and victory is actually a hybrid idea that came directly from Egyptian obelisks. Greek-inspired columns are found adorning facades of Roman structures, though in Greece columns were used more structurally. The Romans even borrowed the idea of orthographic planning, "and they soon made this the basis of laying out army camps," (Roth, 219).


Order
Orders are frequently associated with certain types of columns. Doric columns are the earliest and simplest order. They were slightly curved and were fluted. Their capitals had "annulets, an echinus and and abacus," (Blakemore, 26) Ionic columns were more slender than Doric columns and rested on a pedestal. These capitals had "pairs of volutes which were deeply furrowed and ribbed," (Blakemore, 27) and were spaced by a carved echinus. Corinthian columns were very ornate and were the most slender. They are most easily distinguished by their large capitals which were adorned by carved acanthus leaves and volutes which stem from the center of the column and are positioned on the corners.


Entourage
We have been working for a while on drawing vignettes. Vignettes show a moment in time. A brief glimpse of a space. Entourages take it a step further. These last few weeks, our class has been drawing scenes that take a step back from the moment and capture the setting of the moment. This is a sketch that I did while in one of the dance studios on campus. The moment I included was the three dancers watching the television. Stepping back I created a setting by including surroundings like the wall, windows, light reflections, chalkboard, etc. The Romans had a great understanding of entourages.


[This is a sketch of a Composite style column which is a hybrid of Ionic and Corinthian styled columns.]
Prototype, Archetype and Hybrid
The idea of a prototype is that it is something which is the first of its kind. A prototype becomes an archetype when the idea is reused and recreated. A hybrid combines both new and old ideas and technologies, or ideas from different sources, to fit the commodity of the user. Greek architecture is considered the prototype of all architecture. They felt that "Measure and [reason] [were] firm in a changing world," (Roth, 188). They sought balance and symmetry in every aspect of their lives (e.g., hot and cold, light and dark, health and sickness, left and right.) The archetype of Greek architecture has influenced all periods of design. They have provided us with marble columns for our legislative buildings as well as temple layouts. We have also carried on the ideas of symmetry and balance.

The EUC

These are the thumbnail sketches that I did of the third floor of the EUC.

Words of the Week, week 3

Scale is not just a woman's worst enemy. It deals with the size of an object in relationship to another object. With architecture, scale is a comparison between the size of the building and a person. On paper, it compares a drawing to an actual object. In Stoel's class, drafting is making me crazy. We have been making different views of the furniture we designed and we have been doing them in different scales, such as 1":1' and 1.5":1". Possibly more importantly, though, is what we've been learning in Patrick's class. In ancient civilizations, large scales were often used in buildings to induce a feeling of unworthiness in commoners and an ego boost in aristocrats. Egyptians created hypostyles which consisted of sometimes hundreds of massive columns. Their large size and number dwarf inhabitants as the make their way into sacred areas of the temples in which they were in. In Greece, architects strived to achieve perfect scale. As Blakemore (30) says, “The module for heights of the parts was determined by the diameter of the columns.”


Unity is essential to design. It is the relationship of all parts to a whole. I feel that our teachers are trying to get us as students to discover how everything is unified at some point. Not only, as is obvious, do my IARC classes have similar themes and messages. In my other classes, I can pull pieces of information into something that can be used elsewhere. For instance, Suzanne is having us draw vignettes and figures and entourages. While in classes, I've drawn my teachers and classmates and lightfixtures, etc.



Boundaries have once again been set in our class. The Pathways, Edges and Boundaries project has been reintroduced as a way to influence traffic patterns in the parking lot. My group plans to install six concrete shapes along the side of the Studio Arts Center that will accent the existing plants. In history, boundaries were used to keep people both in and out of areas. The Great Wall of China spans many, many miles in the effort to keep out invaders. The Acropolis in Greece is another walled environment. It acts as a veil to outsiders to encourage them to enter the plateau and see the marvels it has. Features such as columns help to guide foot traffic so that people go to certain points in order. Other areas in Greece had more vague boundaries such as town markets. Roth (222) says that these " boundaries were defined by surrounding houses and public buildings."



Section was very important to the ancient Greeks. They strived to reach their ideals in architecture and each step they took in achieving it spawned its own style. With columns, Doric columns are among the simplest. They serve their basic function of supporting a roof structure but only offer minimal aesthetics. Composite columns, however, take ideas from the other previous styles of columns and emphasize the best features of each.



Vignettes are everywhere. I have certainly adopted vignettes as a great compositional format, capturing key elements to any setting. A vignette could easily be defined as an object and its immediate surroundings. Working with them has helped me make more interesting sketches because it helps me to find a balance with what all is important to the pieces that I'm drawing.

Entourages

The Wall

These are two views of the wall that I built. I used chip board to cover the exterior and used black correagated paper on the interior Then I ripped holes in the paper, covered it with "wall paper" then ripped that as well to expose the wood work. I also added an image of an over-used outlet for graphic interest. For my artifact, I decided to convert my jacket into a more functional trash can.

Pat's Chair

These are three of the sides of the chair/table I designed for Pat.

Neal's Dead Fish

I've always had an undeveloped fascination for drawing fish. When I happened across Neal's dead fish bagged on his table, I though it was a perfect time to capture something I've always loved without having to worry about them moving!
I also drew what they might look like if they were still alive and in their jar.

Just ignore Dr, Count Frankenstomache, if you will.

Forney I05

For months now I have been searching for an excuse to check out the Forney building since it has been remodeled. When I got my computer last week, I discovered that I had to go there to have the people in there do something to it. Apparently the ITS people have claimed the once-dilapidated building as their new headquarters. Inside it is very nice and I loved the barrel ceiling! While I was waiting for them to download stuff to my laptop I drew the interior of the room. (Notice that I included a person in the space!)

Suzanne! Look what you've done to me!!!

Center Table Vignette

I had actually done a thumbnail sized drawing of the TA's before this assignment was given so I thought it was funny when Suzanne gave directions to draw the table. I think my quick drawings turn out really well, but I hope to learn how to stop dog-hairing my lines.

Foreshortening

I liked the foreshortening exercise that we did, but I don't feel like it gave enough experience. I hope to practice more with it because I feel that it is a very important technique to understand.

Gesture Drawings: Bootcamp Cabrera Style

When we did the gesture drawings in class I was pleased how they turned out. Like Suzanne suggests, I tend to start with the head, go to shoulders and arms and work down from there. I try to add in hair detail when I do the head and I draw the contour of the clothing when I do the body. If I have the time afterwards I try to go back and add clothing details (e.g. folds, pockets, prints, etc.). If I feel it is necessary because I know that I'll later develop the picture, I'll draw in a quick stick-man face to remind me of certain facial features and emotions.
For part of the homework, I used my roommate's Maxim calendar. I couldn't resist! I felt that it was a good opportunity to draw people who weren't wearing much as opposed to what I'm used to. Many of my other drawings came from observations in the dance studios here at UNCG and cheerleading practice at Greensboro All Stars gym.