Final Project: The Geometry of Life

UCONN School of Art • ART1020 • Fall 2008
Final Project: Eco-Aesthetic-Mediated-Perception (What is life?)
DUE: Thursday, December 4th

AIM: To learn how to measure the relative degrees of geometrical life or wholeness in a region of space or in an artifact.

REQUIREMENTS: 1. One day of silent exploration of the UCONN campus. 2. A landscape/ environmental image (or series of images, video or other expressive medium. 3. A 5-page essay which includes visual studies for your landscape. Note: If you wish your final project returned to you with comments, please include a self-addressed stamped envelope with it when you turn it in.

INSTRUCTIONS:

Part I • THE FEELING OF LIFE

The first step in your project is to spend ONE DAY (approx 8-24 hrs) in SILENT EXPLORATION of the UCONN campus (or somewhere else) as a PLACE of intersection between a human environment (a built environment within which humans do things, work, study, communicate, eat, etc. and the larger natural environment. Your objective will be to use your intuitive feelings to help you measure the contrasting degrees of LIFE in different places around campus. You are looking to find two places: (1) the PLACE-THAT-FEELS-MOST-ALIVE, and (2) the PLACE-THAT-FEELS-LEAST-ALIVE. What do I mean by “alive”? I do NOT mean the place that has the most biological beings living there, or the most natural place. I mean the place that makes you feel most alive, most at home in the world there, that is relaxing, that allows you to feel connected to the place and to yourself, and that gives you a feeling of living beauty. It is imperative that you DO NOT SPEAK OR VERBALLY COMMUNICATE during your search. Language (a feature of the left-brain) suppresses the feelings (created by the right-brain) and makes it more difficult for your intuitive FEELINGS to guide your perception of living form.

Part II • THE BEAUTY OF LIVING THINGS, THE LIFE OF BEAUTIFUL THINGS

During or after your silent exploration, prepare for creating your landscape image by creating at least two visual studies: one studying the liveliness of the Place that felt most alive, and the other studying the lack of life of the Place that felt least alive. Ask yourself: how do I express/represent life or the lack of life in this Place? Then create a landscape/ environmental artwork which explores, captures, articulates, expresses the life of the lively Place you found during your silent exploration. Use as many of the 15 properties of wholeness as you can in your project.

Part III • COMPOSTING YOUR PERCEPTION

During or after composition of your landscape, write a 5-page essay explaining and exploring your feelings of life and the lack of life. Relate your essay, as much as you can, to your prior three projects.