Chapter 13 - Lecture notes 13 PDF

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lecture notes from prof Betty Alvarez...

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Chapter 13 Craft Media in Useful Objects Learning Objectives - Identify the three general categories of clay and describe their characteristics. - Discuss some of the techniques used by artists working with glass. - Describe metalworking techniques used in the creation of functional objects. - Identify directional forces in a work of art and explain how artists use them. - Discuss how artists use repetition and rhythm in their designs. Introduction William Morris, Windrush - Well-crafted, repeatable woodblock print - Can serve as textile or wallpaper pattern - Interior art improving public’s lives Separation of art from “craft” in the Western world - Craft as “useful” objects - Artists challenging the notion of function Clay - Soil with a heavily volcanic makeup mixed with water - Ceramics - The art and science of making objects from clay - Ceramists make any work with clay. - Potters specialize in making dishes. - Must fire a clay object at high temperatures in a kiln oven - Types of clay Earthenware - Porous, low-temperature firing Stoneware - Heavier, high-temperature firing Porcelain - Rarest, most expensive - Throwing - Shaping clay on a revolving wheel - Process Shape clay on potter’s wheel Air dry piece Fire in kiln - Decorating ceramics Slip - Mixture of clay and water Glaze - A liquid paint with silica base - Ancient Greece a center of pottery production - Usually made from terra cotta Earthenware that can be fired at low temperature - Each step done by a different person - Chinese ceramists perfected blue decoration on white porcelain body - Known nearly worldwide in seventeenth and eighteenth centuries

- Blue only color of glaze that could withstand high firing temperatures - Octagonal - Hand-built, not thrown on a wheel - Recent works with divergent styles - Betty Woodman, Divided Vases: cubist Earthenware with a free-form lock Flat perforated panels in handles - Grayson Perry, Quotes from the Internet - Iron sensibility Resembles jug of whiskey Used stoneware Threw on a wheel - Casual approach parallels views about art Glass - Chemically related to ceramic glaze - Wide range of manipulation - Stained glass - Blown glass - Inlays in various objects - Sensitive and amorphous when hot - Solidifies when it cools without crystallizing - Fluid nature producing line and volume - Stained glass - reached peak in middle ages - technique little changed since - Resurgence in Europe and United States in late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries - Mary Lowndes, Resurrection Widow - painted liberally - adventurous, unbalanced - Daly Chihuly, Citron Basket Set - Inspired by Native American baskets Older baskets tended to sag Long series of glass works to capture some of those shapes - Blew round piece of molten glass - Spinning it to open at one end and slump slightly - Mona Hatoum, Nature morte aux grenades - Researched explosive devices and recreated them in colorful pieces - “Specimens” placed in gurney - Used beauty of glass to represent lethal objects Metal - strong and formidable - can be hammered, cut, inlayed, drawn out, welded, joined with rivets, or cast - early metalsmith created tools, vessels, armor, and weapons - Muslim traditions in 13th/14th centuries Unparalleled sophistication d’Arenberg Basin - Made for last ruler of Ayyubid dynasty - Body first cast in brass then inlaid with precisely cut pieces of silver - Highly detailed, even panels

- Metal can be hammered or molded into elegant, useful shapes - Margaret De Patta, flatware - Believed daily objects should keep pace with modern art innovations - Simple shapes that do not sacrifice utility Wood - Living spirit of wood offers vitality - Abundant, versatile, and warm qualities - Movement toward sustainability - Marquetry Small pieces laid down Unlike inlay, no bounding wall between the pieces of wood Artist creates a cartoon, lays it on prepared wood, pricks holes Artist cuts wood pieces and glues them into place - Peter Glass - Brought marquetry to United States - Octagonal folding table Highly ornate 30,000 pieces of wood used - Most wood is flexible when wet Retains shape when dry - Nina Bruun, Nest Chair Long, thin strips of flexed birch Central cushion recalls where birds lay eggs Arrived at design by trial and error Textiles - Mixing heritage of traditional practices with new avenues of expression - Two classes Work made with loom Work made off-loom - Weaving Interlacing of fibers Warp fibers - Long fibers in place on a loom Loom - Device holding fibers in place Weft fibers - Cross warp fibers at a right angle Can be sophisticated, complex Lara Baladi, Sandouk el Dounia (The World in a Box) - Large-scale tapestry - Created a huge collage of about 900 photographs Programmed a digitally operated loom Weaving - Ardabil Carpet - Sunburst surrounded by 16 oval shapes - Originally covered floor of prayer chapel - Required approximately 25 million knots - Embroidery and Quilt Making - Embroidery

Artists stitch decorative colored threads into and over a base of woven fabric - Peru produced impressive textiles Funerary cape - Some African-American communities have long tradition of quilt making Gees Bend, Alabama Jessie Pettway, Bars and String-Piece Columns - Made from leftover pieces - Resembles some African textiles - Faith Ringgold: Stitching History “Story quilts” - Stories from her own life - Tradition in family as far back as great-great-grandmother Quilting as an art form used by slave women - Depictions of African-American culture Tar Beach later became children's book...