In today's class session, we viewed and, to a certain extent, participated in renditions of John Cage's piece 4'33'', as seen below:
To a large extent, Cage's composition challenges our accepted notions of what constitutes music by forcing us to examine a) sound, b) "silence," and c) our expectations for a performance within a particular context. The composer says as much in the following interview:
Likewise, today's class session, I would hope, challenges us to reconsider our accepted notions of what constitutes a class session, writing instruction, teacher-student dynamics, etc. By creating a space in which the instructor remains silent and leaves the "music" of the class session up to the students, how are traditional instructional and institutional roles altered? Furthermore, how does the performative aspect of today's session change our perspectives? While, no doubt, every class session is its own type of performance, how does the hyperbolic use of performance re-align the educational space in-and-of-itself?
With these questions in mind, your next pre-writing assignment will ask you to think through these issues with regard to your sculpture. For example, how does the fact that your art-objects are located outside of the museum's confines ask us to approach the pieces differently than those inside the museum? Or, perhaps more curious, how does the fact that these art-objects are found outside force us to reconsider the "natural" (outdoors) environment? Additionally, many of your sculptures are representations of animated objects or re-creations of other art-objects; as such, how can we determine the rhetorical effects and affects of our pieces by thinking through what they are not? Or to state this differently, Cage asks us to reconsider music through silence (i.e. "what it is not"); by the same token, how can we reconsider sculpture through animated matter, non-sculpted art-objects, or art-objects found within the confines of galleries or museums? In response to these questions, compose a 500 word blog post that contains 1 mutlimedia element and 2 relevant hyperlinks. DUE: Tuesday, November 24th @ 12:30PM.
NOTE: This weekend, I will email all of you a link to one of the images I took during Tuesday's session. I would like for this to be the multimedia element you use in your post. The remainder of the images will be sent to you over Thanksgiving break.
With these questions in mind, your next pre-writing assignment will ask you to think through these issues with regard to your sculpture. For example, how does the fact that your art-objects are located outside of the museum's confines ask us to approach the pieces differently than those inside the museum? Or, perhaps more curious, how does the fact that these art-objects are found outside force us to reconsider the "natural" (outdoors) environment? Additionally, many of your sculptures are representations of animated objects or re-creations of other art-objects; as such, how can we determine the rhetorical effects and affects of our pieces by thinking through what they are not? Or to state this differently, Cage asks us to reconsider music through silence (i.e. "what it is not"); by the same token, how can we reconsider sculpture through animated matter, non-sculpted art-objects, or art-objects found within the confines of galleries or museums? In response to these questions, compose a 500 word blog post that contains 1 mutlimedia element and 2 relevant hyperlinks. DUE: Tuesday, November 24th @ 12:30PM.
NOTE: This weekend, I will email all of you a link to one of the images I took during Tuesday's session. I would like for this to be the multimedia element you use in your post. The remainder of the images will be sent to you over Thanksgiving break.
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