Cultural Event

On saturday night I went with my best friend to my last cultural event which happened to be a dance performance. I looked a lot but had a hard time finding a dance performance to go that would fit my schedule so I had to settle for a ballroom dance at UVU.
We were some of the first people there and noticed that there wasn't many people but seats started to fill in the closer we got for the dance to start and it looked like mostly family had shown up to for the dancers support. That kind of reminded me of being back in highschool but the crowd was loud and fun. For me personally, I have never been the biggest fan of ballroom dance and the opening scene didn't help me out that much. It started out when the spotlight was shown on a guy hoisted up, standing on the hands of all the other guys with a very serious and I guess he was going for sexy look on his face with his arms crossed. They brought him out more to the front where they put him down and his partner came out and they started to dance. Then the whole dance team came out and performed a latin medley, which I learned was a combination of all the dances in a time period of about 6 minutes. Two medley's were performed, a latin medley to begin and a standard medley to finish. In between those two dances were a series of fox trots, cha cha's, waltses and you everything you would expect at a ballrom dance. One of my favorite dances was a couple who came out together and started to do a series of lifts that were pretty good. On one of the lifts the guy dropped the girl he was holding above his head, grabbed her leg and arm and swung her around with the momentum they had created and I swear her face got to about an inch above the ground. I did have a good time at the performance and I thought UVU did a good job. One thing I liked about it was that it showed so much variety from different cultures and backrounds and we never really got into ballrom dance in class, like where it started and how it has evolved. I would like to know that and will do some investigating on my own.

Cultural Event

This week I went to the University Chorale in summer concert presented by BYU's department of performing arts. The program was really good and you could tell they had been working really hard for this performance. A few of my favorite songs the choir sung were "The Moon is Distant from the Sea" by David Childs and also "John the Revelator" by Arr. Calwell/Ivory. Before each song they would switch out conductors and one of the members of the choir would come down to conduct. Before he did so he would briefly explain the meaning of the piece about to be sung. I really liked that because it helped me to focus more on the meaning of that piece and I was able to enjoy it that much more. "The Moon is Distant from the Sea" was all about the relationship between the earth and the moon and how that is depicted by the tides of the ocean being high and low. I thought the music did a good job to create that feeling. I will admitt though that if they didn't explain that beforehand I would have been a little lost. I thought the quality of the production was great and I enjoyed myself the whole time. Go BYU!

Classrom Discussion.

This last section, the film section, has been interesting and a lot of fun to learn. I had heard and knew some things about how moving picture all started but I didn't know that much and it has been great to learn about it in class. In class we have talked about and witnessed the advancements in film made throughout the 20th century from the earliest movies to the more recent and I couldn't help but think about how much film, The moving picture, has influenced so many in this past century. I enjoyed watching the trip to the moon in class where the first special effects were displayed and I imagined myself in that time going to see that movie for the first time and I bet I would have had a blast and wouldn't be able to stop talking about exploding aliens after they had been hit by an umbrella. It would have sparked my imagination as I thought about space and what was really out there which might even have eventually lead me down a certain carrer path. But today, I like just going out to a movie to be entertained by a great story which also spark the imagination but i think less than before because more is understood.

Reading

I was reading the video art article on blackboard and there was a part I really liked. I liked where it says, "This makes the video art form an apparatus by which the yet unfinished project of Modernism rolls forth. For if one of the impetus of Modernism in the arts was to create artistic forms responsive to the dynamic changes of industrialization, a celebration or critique, then video deeply internalizes this vocation. Video as an apparatus fundamentally prescribes modern technology and imbues it, thereby with meaningful use." That statement is meaningful to me because it is talking about the day we live in. So far in class we have gone over different art forms from many cultures from ancient times and throughout history. In our day we have so much technology and it is cool to see how we have created and adapted art to tell stories in the form of movies.

Class Chat

I have enjoyed studying music in humanities and talking about it in class. I've decided it is one of my favorite forms of art. I took piano lessons when I was 12 for couple of years and I did orchestra in highschool so I am a little familiar with it but not much so i'm glad that there are a lot of people in class that know a lot because i've learned a lot. I still think it is so cool that it is us that creates the sound from molecule waves in the air and how we can create music by organizing that sound into music with beats, rythems, keys and pitches. etc...
As we were listening to different types of classical music from different artists and different time periods I noticed a different reaction from me with every song and some of them I liked a lot more than others. I guess there are a lot of factors that go into that but long story short I think music really affects us.

Realism

As I started to read a little about realism I found a few neat facts. first, I didn't know this but realism theatre started in Russia and after that spread in Europe. A good description of realizm is " It is where people move and talk in a manner similar to that of our everyday behavior. The style has been dominant for the last 120 years. It holds the idea of the stage as an environment, rather than as an acting platform." This description really makes sense to me because as we studied realism types of paintings I enjoyed seeing the honest description displayed in them of how life was. It seems like maybe in the past people may have expressed themselves differently or not thought proper to focus on how we really are but realism is refresing in that it is down to earth and shows us how we really are. "Realism in the theatre was a general movement in the later 19th century that steered theatrical texts and performances toward greater fidelity to real life".

"This is your brain on music" Reading

I really like this book! I didn't realize how big of a influence music has in our lives and how our brains work to create it. I liked the question, when a tree falls in the woods and nobody is there to hear it, does it make a sound? the answer is no because our eardrums and brains are what create the sound from sound waves that move air molecules. That is pretty cool stuff. I also like how he explained the influence music has in our lives like when we are watching a scary movie different pitches and frequencies tones and rythems are used to create that nervous and scary feeling. That is powerful. Also, for example, in the advertising world music is used to make us feel that someones product is better than the others. The organized sound around us or "music" is so important and I think it might be the art that most influences us as humans.

cultural event West Side Story.

This week I decided to go to the play "West side Story" that was being put on at sierra's amphitheater. We showed up 5 minutes before the play started which is not a good idea. There was a long line of people who had shown up just before us and there was only one poor guy at the booth selling tickets so the line went really slow. After waiting through the line we got in about 20 minutes later allready knowing what scene was coming up because we were able to hear the whole thing from the ticket line. The theater is really nice. It is a half bowl shaped hill that is all grass. There was a section for people to sit on chairs and a section for people to sit down on blankets they had brought. We brought a blanket and sat down in that section where we began to enjoy the show. The acting was really good and the actors also had great voices. One of my dads favorite plays is west side story so I allready knew it well and I noticed that in the play they decided to change the sequence of a few scenes which was interesting and I liked. They also put in a few scenes that are not in the original, like a spirit world scene where Bernardo and Riff were seen after there death at the rumble and they had forgiven eachother and were friends. The actor that played Riff was my favorite. In the story Riff is the leader of the gang and this guy did a good job at being the leader and was everything Riff should be. I really enjoyed this show and was happy to have gone.

Cultural Event # 5 Family reunion

This past week I traveled up to Idaho with my family to get together with all of my extended family, which in number comes to about 80 people. This is a tradition we have always had and we get together every July. This is one of my absolutely favorite traditions because I have been able to see how important families are to everyone and I think it's so much fun to get together and strengthen those relationships. One of our favorite activities to do together is going to a lake where we can go fishing, wake boarding, water skiing and tubing all day so now that is what we do every year at a designated spot up in american falls idaho. Of course all those activities are fun but it's the programs we put together that are really the things we rememeber. As the sun was going down we got all the boats in and everyone got together and sat in a big circle with camp chairs. Every family had to come up with a camp song to share and teach to everyone else. My family sung singin in the rain where you give orders and everyone sings the song in various and funny ways. My uncle's family sung the kid favorite "we're going on a bear hunt" camp song. He pulled out his good old guitar and strummed a good toon, told a story in song one sentence at a time that we all had to repeat and at the end of the song we entered into the bears cave and my cousin who was sitting behind a truck started making bear noices with a twine and a bucket that made all the kids scream and run cause they thought it was real. Then my cousin came out and had to show all the kids it wasn't really a bear so they all calmed down. I think family reunions are the best!

classroom discussion #5

One of my favorite class periods this term was when we watched thriller and analyzed it together as a class after learning a few things about dance like what it means and the different types. I am really enjoying the performing arts section of humanities. As I first saw some videos of ballet in class I was very impressed at the ability of the dancers to be able to do the moves that ballet requires. I think one way to describe what makes art beautiful is to exam what kind of work went into it and when I see great art pieces or a ballet I know they have put great effort into it cause I can't get even close to doing what they can do. It is impressive and teaches many lessons. I also like how dance has changed over time and micheal Jackson is an example of someone who has given us great changes that make dance so much better for all of us today.

Dadaism

Sad Young Man in a Train

by Marcel Duchamp

Salvador Dalí Swans Reflecting Elephants

Dali employed his critical–paranoiac method to make elephants appear from the reflection in the water of the swans.

This is a cool picture I found as I was looking at Dada art. I also found a good definition and explination of dadaism on this website, http://www.artinthepicture.com/styles/Dadaism/

"What is Dadaism
Dadaism or Dada is a post-World War I cultural movement in visual art as well as literature (mainly poetry), theatre and graphic design. The movement was, among other things, a protest against the barbarism of the War and what Dadaists believed was an oppressive intellectual rigidity in both art and everyday society; its works were characterized by a deliberate irrationality and the rejection of the prevailing standards of art. It influenced later movements including Surrealism."

I remember sister Stokes telling us how intersting she thought dadaism was and that's why I decided to look into it a little more. I agree with the professor and found some pretty cool things. From what I understand Dadaism came from a lot of people who didn't like to be told what the standard and accepted things were in art from others and rebelled against that and started creating many different kinds of art to make a statement. I think that art has evolved that way from the beginning and it's interesting to see what that has done in our day to the art that is created today and how much variety there is.

Classroom Discussion # 4

In class on wednesday we reviewed the renaissance period all the way to post modernism and there was a lot of things that I saw that were interesting. I thought it was cool how we went all that history so fast because I think by doing so I was able to see the difference between the ages and how much things stayed the same, evolved and completely changed like the mediums used, styles and interests of the people at certain time periods. Even today there is so much interest in the past and we know so much and love learning about how the people thought back then. Which is what this humanities class is all about. It seemed to me though after seeing a lot of the slides and having things explained to me that as time has gone on things have got a lot more complicated and more chaotic. For example the futurism movie. That was just creepy and i'm interested to review and learn a little more about dadaism. There's got to be a good reason for someone to take a picture of an upside down urinal and call it art. I'm glad I am able to learn about all this kind of stuff because I didn't know much about it before and it's cool to see how people thought in the past and how all of that affects us today.

Drag me to Hell

Last night I drove up to talorsville with my best friend to watch the movie, "Drag me to hell". Pretty much if you were to ask me what I think of the movie I would tell you that it is the biggest waste of your time. First off the theater that we went needed a lot of work. As soon as we entered the room and were looking for seats the our shoes immediately started sticking to the floor and when I finally did find my seat and sat down there was a nice little popcorn surprize waiting for me as popcorn that had been left between the crack of the seat was squished. That was actually pretty funny. Then the movie started. The whole movie is about evil spirits and dark stuff which is definetly not my thing. The movie starts out with a sick boy being brought to this lady who seems to know a lot about evil spirits and curses who tries to save him. The evil spirit who has been tormenting the boy comes in, knocks out the parents and this lady after she just offers a prayer and throws the boy off the balcony. The boy gets up and all of the sudden the ground starts to break around him and he is literally dragged to hell. What a great start! not. After that the story begins to develop how a girl gets cursed by a nasty old gypsy lady and finds out from a fortune teller that she was cursed with a "powerful" evil spirit that torments its victims for three days and on the fourth day comes and drags them to hell to feast on their soul. So the whole time this girl is tormented by this evil spirit and tries many things to try and disuade it from taking her to hell like killing her kitten. The story just keeps getting better... Everything in her life starts to go wrong and then at the very end when it looks like she is going to be safe from the evil spirit and her life is all better the evil spirit comes and draggs her to hell right in front of her boyfriend and that is the last scene of the movie. So the movie finishes the same way it started, a hopeless mess. The whole movie was very predictable, not scary but dark and I did not like the focus of the whole movie. Pretty much it was lame! That's my experience of this cultural event.

Coming to your senses #3

I was reading in chapter 16 today in preparation for monday's class about sculptures. I liked the differences it talks about between painting and sculpture and the experience that you can have when comparing the two different styles. It says, " Painting has lots of advantages over sculpture. I mean, you can't represent the sky in sculpture; you can't represent a piece of liver on a plate, the color, the wetness. You can't do it. And yet, the big advantage that sculpture has over painting is that it can have innumerable, unending numbers of points of view. You stand dead in front of the middle of a painting; you don't go around to the side and the back to see." I agree with that, Sculptures are unique in that their physical reality is so apparent and immediate.
I also liked reading the section about Michelangelo Buonartti, "il divino". I think Benedetto Varchi shares with us well the general feeling that many had towards Michelangelo when he spoke at his funeral. He says, " This is a phenomenon so new, so unusual, so unheard of in all times, in all countries, in all history that... I am not only full of admiration, not only amazed, not only astonished and startled and like one reborn---but my pulse flutters, my blood runs cold, my mind rells, and my hair stand on end, so moved am I by... trepidations." The word terribilita, which describes his works means, "awesome mightiness". Michelangelo truly did amazing things with the talents he had and shared that with many people. As I was reading this section I thought about why he was so great and the idea came to me that a part of it was that he did things that nobody could. He was unique and valuable to many because his talents, which could help so many, were his and only his. I think thats kind of like an athlete who is so valuable and popular because of what he can do and no other. People like that and are drawn to that. I think that all of us have that great potential but may have to find that and connect with it.

Cultural Event #3

This week for my cultural event I went to the freedom festival art gallery at the covey center on center street in provo. They had just had a competition they had all the pictures or statues on display in a medium sized room with blue ribbon hanging on the art piece that had won. As I first walked in the room I saw a painting on the wall of a carnival. I felt that the subject being represented was "good times", having fun and anything related to that. It was an oil painting that left very thick brush strokes on the surface in a way that stood out to me. The painting had beautiful colors, if you can imagine a dark blue sky lit up with the lights from all the different rides including a merry go round and all the other excitement going on at the carnival. I think it would be considered mantic because of all the emotion that is involved. After examining that painting I moved ahead and saw another that I really liked. It was a leather framed picture. The whole picture was made out of leather and it had a normal brown leather backround with the american flag waving and a bald eagle perched on a tree branch right in front of it. It was very patriotic and it was so cool to see how they had created the picture out of leather. Another really good painting that was displayed was one of Christ. This piece actually won 1st place in the competition and had a blue ribbon hanging on it. In the very middle of the frame you see christ standing with his arms extended out. It looked just like the statue of christ in salt lake at the visiting center except this one was with color. Around Christ was a very bright light and from what I understood it was the second coming of christ. I didn't quite get that at first but after looking at the picture longer I noticed that on the right side of christ there brighter colors of blue and purple and others. On the left hand side of christ the colors seemed to be a little darker, like a darker greenish yellow. I thought it was cool to have learned more about what colors mean and then being able to understand that painting better. It was another great experience.

Classroom Discussion # 3

This week in class I liked learning the different ways of how to read art. For example when we were all shown the picture of the red chair I thought it was interesting hearing all the different responses from the class about what thoughts came to mind as they saw it and how many interpretations there were. One thing that came to mind as we were shown many different paintings, especially the ones of pure color, was what makes these paintings appealing to us. I mean all paintings are interesting but some seem to stand out more than others and become liked by a great population. What makes these kinds of paintings so popular. I guess the more we learn about art the more I will be able to find answers to these questions.

"Coming to your senses" #2

I liked the first part of chapter 14 where it talks a little about Vincent Van Gogh and what art reveals. It says "Seldom in the history of art has an artist revealed his artistic inner life with such honest and humanity as Vincent in letters to his older brother Theo. From these letters we see his beginning love affair with painting as well as his earnest ambition to touch others lives with his art. While his letters reveal his motives for painting, it is the paintings which document the inner nature of the man himself. Van Gogh's paintings are, quite literally, windows into his soul." I like this because we all have experiences in our lives which help us to learn and to progress and I think that the more honest we are with recognizing and dealing with ourselves and these experiences the more learning is done. It seems that many people like Van Gogh because they can relate to him. They can feel for him because they go through similar things and Van Gogh really was able to communicate with them because of his honesty. He didn't hide behind walls or conceal parts of the truth but shared with everyone what he was going through and in turn was able to provide relief to many that they may not be alone, that we are all in this together as we go throughout life, after all we are all brothers and sisters.

Classroom discussion #2

I learned a lot in class this last wednesday. I thought it was really cool to learn all the different meanings that colors, numbers, symbols, etc can have. It was also fun to relearn the stories of the greek gods for me because I remember I liked learning about greek mythology when I was younger. I thought it was interesting how these things have so many different meanings and can actually be used to comunicate clearly the thoughts ideas we have and also how so many people can relate to different paintings in various ways. I felt like I was really beginning to learn how to read art and it's something i've never really focused on before. It got me excited to keep on learning more because I think the things we learn in this class about art will be really applicable to life.

Cultural Event #2

For my second cultural event I went to the 4th of July parade this weekend. I went with my best friend the night before to join my family who was camping out overnight to save us a good spot to see the parade the next morning. This is a tradition my grandpa has started and has continued every year for as long as I can remember. When we showed up my grandpa was there with a bunch of my younger cousins and they allready had a card table set up and were having lots of fun. Me and my friend decided to go check out all the stuff at the farmers markert that were set up on center street in provo and maybe play some games at the carnival to win a stuffed animal or something. We saw some really cool things all around. A local artist was sitting in the middle of his art gallery with his wife and had all of his pictures he had painted hanging up on the walls all around him. I was amazed with the talent he had. His pictures were mostly paintings of the outdoors and cowboys working and riding their horses. I really related to that because I've done that work up in idaho and I love it! We also passed a little peruvian store that was selling all kinds of peruvian jewlery, clothes and souvenirs. I think that was my favorite booth because Peru is where I served my mission and everyday I saw those kinds of little stores and it brought back all kinds of memories. I also got to talk to the owner of the store who was a nice man from Lima Peru. Very cool!! We bought some jamba juice right after that and I recomend that nobody does that next year if they go because our strawberry drink tasted just like carbonated lemonade and I also recomend that nobody plays those little games they have for stuffed animals. I spent five bucks and made two baskets in basketball and won a stuffed animal that was smaller than my hand. We went back to our camp spot after that and spent hours playing lots of different card games and the favorite of the night was scum. After the card playing was done we all flooded into a motorhome and watched a movie which was a very good thing because it started to thunder outside and then rain hard! It didn't last to long though so after the movie we all went back outside and slept under the stars untill 4 in the morning when we got up and moved all our stuff right up to the side of center street because at that time the local authorities allow you to. We ejoyed watching the parade that morning as a family and with so many people from all around who come to share these moments together as we remember our founding fathers and all that they did to ensure the blessings that we enjoy today. I loved when the American flag came by at the beginning and all of us stood and put our hand over our hearts and quietly stood and pondered the meaning of it. It was a very great experience for me and i'm happy I was able to do it.

Tentative Plan of Cultural Events

July 3, 2009- Provo Gallery Stroll- Community Centered Activity

July 7, 2009- Student Recital- Live Music Event

July 8, 2009- Murder by Death- Film Screening

July 15, 2009- Twilight- Film Screening

July 18, 2009- West Side Story Theatrical Event

August 3, 2009- Lindon Days- Community Event

August 8, 2009- BYU dancesport- Dance Event

Cultural Event

Two days ago I went to Walter Wicks expo at the museum of arts at BYU. I enjoyed it so much that I went back today with a special someone who I knew would also enjoy it. I think one of the first things I noticed as I entered was the music that was playing as I saw a big painting of a robotic city and remembered how much I would have loved to see that kind of art as a child and I think its cool to see how interested of it I still am. As we walked around and looked at all the paintings we noticed that in almost all of them there was the same little robot hidden in all of them and what I really liked about Walter Wicks stuff is that he turns them into games and makes them fun for everyone as we try to figure out how things work on the paintings or just try to find hidden items. I recomend that everyone go and experience the fun.

Classroom discussion

Something that has been on my mind from today's discussion is about the talk by Spencer W. Kimball "The gospel vision of the arts". I like that the first presidency teaches us that we are going to have great composers and artists who are going to give us masterpieces in our time now and in the future. I think we have allready seen that since this talk was given. There is so much classical music that I personally enjoy and one of my favorite composers of today is John Williams. All of the music he has composed and that has been used in movies for our entertainment has captured my heart and imagination as i've seen dinasours come to life before my eyes in Jurassic park or two jedi's fighting somewhere in the galaxy in star wars. I also went to my first cultural event which was a Art exhibit at the MOA and I enjoyed the modern art thoroughly. I think that what we are seeing today has never been seen before in the history of the world and it will continue to move forward.

"Coming to your Senses"

As I was reading through the first chapters of the book I rather enjoyed the story of coach "Digger" Phelps. It was very amusing to me, it made me laugh to be honest. I love sports and I love art, that is part of being a well rounded person as we should strive to be but I don't have to take down all my trophies and replace them with art to be that kind of person. I'd say the book is being a little biased here.
I enjoyed reading chapter three where it talks about flesh vs. spirit, or the natural man. We all go through this personal struggle in life and I believe art can depict and teach this very well.