Instructor: Christopher Garcia, Assistant Professor of Art
Antioch College
Department of Art
795 Livermore St.
Yellow Springs, OH, 45387
937/767-7331, ext 6211
Course Description:
This course is designed to offer students the opportunity to create works of art based on individual and global reactions to the natural world. The work will for the most part be temporary and symbiotic with the surroundings. Students will be able to experience the challenges and revelations of creating works of art with and about the environment that surrounds them.
Readings:
Students should research these titles before beginning this course. These are not required readings, so buying any of these titles is your choice.
Peck, Judith, Sculpture as Experience
Winter, Roger, On Drawing
Beardsley, Earthworks and Beyond
Pipenburg, Robert, Treasures of the Creative Spirit
Munsterberg, Hugo and Marjorie, World Ceramics
Baker, Kenneth, " Searching for the Window into Nature's Soul", Smithsonian, vol 27, Feb. 1997
Andreae, Christopher, " Fire and Ice", Artnews, vol 89, Sept. 1990.
Required Materials:
Sketchbook of acid free paper, 12x18", your choice of drawing tools, work gloves, utility knife, natural fiber twine, assortment of clay tools and other work tools you choose to bring.
Course Outline:
Week One:
This course will begin at La Suerte where we will start by doing preliminary drawings of the rainforest. As we acclimate ourselves to this rich and diverse environment, students will begin constructing small scale sculptures in clay based on their sketches. Demonstrations: Slide lecture on environment and cultural based art. Demonstration of drawing techniques and use of local and found materials in combined media drawing.
Week Two:
Students will submit proposals for an adobe group project that will be built in the pasture land. We will discuss each proposal, and select one ( or a re-designed combination of two or more) that we will build together. Students will then gather the necessary materials ( baled grass forms, sand, straw, and clay) and we will begin the construction. Demonstrations: Baling grass forms and adobe mixing.
Week Three:
Continue and complete group project.
Week Four:
The class will then travel to Ometepe, where we will see a different environment than the rainforest. Students will begin by exploring the combination of a contemporary community, vestiges of an ancient culture, and the way the volcanic landscape influenced/influences society and way of life. Students will create a series of drawings based on these perceptions. Demonstrations: Slide lecture on Central American ceramics, pictographs and sculpture (ancient and contemporary). We will visit a local pottery and observe and speak with several of the ceramists. Students will make a sculptural piece based on their impressions of experiencing the volcanic landscape and it's inhabitants. Group project, possibly including area school children, in adobe that draws from the myths and folklore surrounding the volcanoes.
For further information, please contact:
Chris Garcia
Department of Art
Antioch College
795 Livermore St., Yellow Springs, OH 45387
937/767-7189, ext 6211
chrisg@antioch-college.edu