Portraits Tour - Grades 4-12 Surveillance Addition

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Roberta O’Connor’
5 years ago
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1 Intro (in Great Hall or first gallery) Welcome to the Wichita Art Museum! Each group: Introduce yourself and go over expectations. Give a short overview/intro for what they can expect from the tour. Address basic needs: make sure students/chaperones know where restrooms and water fountains are, when they can sit down and where, how to let you know if they need something. Setting the stage/getting input Portraiture has long played an important role in American art. From early colonial times to the present, portraiture evolved from a purely documentary art form to a means of addressing complex social and cultural issues. Portraiture is the art of representing the physical or psychological likeness of a real or imaginary individual. Background on Portraiture The purpose of portraiture has continually changed over time. In early times, portraits exposed the beliefs and values of society or showed a person s social status, rather than how he or she actually looked. As centuries passed, portraiture evolved, and artists began to express more of the subject s individuality. During the Renaissance (15 th and 16 th centuries) artists began to paint and sculpt more realistically and portraits began to look more like the person represented and to express his or her personality. When the camera was invented in the 19 th century, it became possible for everyone, not just artists, to make realistic portraits. Artists came to believe that portraits did not have to be realistic in order to be good representations of a person. They began to experiment with the expressive qualities of color, line, and shape in portraits. Today artists continue to experiment with the portraiture to explore personality, express identity, and speak to social and political issues. The Relationship between Surveillance & Portraiture This exhibition will require us to think about portraiture in an unconventional way. When being painted or photographed for a portrait, the sitter is almost always aware of the presence of the artist. However the photographs for the Surveillance exhibition are, for the most part, taken without the subject s knowledge. This will likely change some of the conversations to be centered on the group s own personal feelings of having photos taken without their consent. What does that mean to them?

2 Key Ideas Portraits contain clues about the people pictured in them that tell us things about the subject s cultures, identities, traditions, and roles in society. Portraits can express how people think about themselves and their world. Portraits can include symbols that reference interesting aspects of the people in them. When creating a portrait, an artist makes many artistic choices that affect how we understand the image. Artists make choices about media, style, background, and embellishments to visually describe themselves or others. Identify parts of a portrait and use art terms to describe them Explore ways artists express identity in portraits Interpret a portrait through observation and discussion

3 Stop Area: Ross/Ritchie Surveillance: Who s Watching You? (November 11th March 4 th, 2018)

Brussels Henri Cartier-Bresson Gelatin Silver Print 1932 Photographers can infuse images with mystery by alluding to a space that is hidden from the viewer.

Both the photographer and the viewer may sympathize with the men s curiosity.

4 Brussels Henri Cartier-Bresson Gelatin Silver Print 1932 Photographers can infuse images with mystery by alluding to a space that is hidden from the viewer. In Henri Cartier-Bresson s image, one man peeks through a gap in a cloth while the other furtively glances to the side as if caught in the act, or standing as lookout. What could they be looking at? Both the photographer and the viewer may sympathize with the men s curiosity. This image was one of the first Cartier-Bresson took with a handheld camera, allowing him to operate undetected by his subjects. What do you see What do you think is happening in this photograph? What comparisons can you make What would make them stand like this? Against a wall? What does it mean to you Have you ever been caught when you were trying to sneak around? Is it easy to act normal if you ve got something else on the brain? Sometimes we have photos taken of us that we aren t ready for, has this happened to you? Marilyn Monroe in Reno Henri Cartier-Bresson Gelatin Silver Print 1961, printed 1980 s-90 s This photograph of Marilyn Monroe was taken while she was on location in Reno, shooting The Misfits (1961), her last completed film. Celebrities are under constant surveillance and often forfeit any right to privacy because they are owned by the public. Here, although Monroe is off set, she seems resigned to the fact that she will never escape the gaze of the prying public. Cartier-Bresson astutely captures this moment. Monroe belongs to everyone and to no one, at once the center of attention and poignantly alone. What do you see What do you see? What comparisons can you make What do you think about her expression? What does it tell you? What does it mean to you How would you feel to be constantly surrounded by people, cameras, and lights? To be watched on a constant basis like a celebrity?

Photographing in this way allowed Evans to catch his subject unware when the guard is down and the mask is off... even more than when in lone bedrooms (where there are mirrors).

5 After documenting the Depression-era South, Walker Evans turned his attention to city life the subway riders in New York City. Over three years, he photographed passengers with a camera hidden under his coat and the lens peeking out between two buttons. Photographing in this way allowed Evans to catch his subject unware when the guard is down and the mask is off... even more than when in lone bedrooms (where there are mirrors). Despite the public setting, Evans portraits catch people lost in their own thoughts and moods. Untitled (subway portrait of man with hat) Walker Evans Gelatin Silver Print 1941 What do you see What do you see in this photograph? What comparisons can you make How does the man look, compared to other portraits you have seen today? Similarities? Differences? What does it mean to you Are you ever lost in thought and wonder what you would look like if someone snapped a photo without you knowing? Has this happened before? Blind Woman, New York Paul Strand Photogravure 1916 After working in a soft-focused Pictorialist style, Paul Strand turned his attention to the poor and elderly living on the streets of New York City. He wanted to candidly capture his subjects faces, which to him expressed the strain of living in such a harsh environment. Strand s solution was to take the brass lens from an old view camera and attach it to one side of his modern one. He held the camera so that the false lens pointed straight ahead and the real lens stuck out, partly concealed by his sleeve. He photographed this blind newspaper dealer in this way. What do you see What do you see in this photo? What comparisons can you make What can you guess about this woman and her life? What makes you say that? What does it mean to you Where do you think you would find this woman, in your own life? How would you feel if you saw her on the street?

This can be a useful tool on social media sites like Facebook, where users can search an entire archive for one particular face.

6 CV Dazzle: Look 3 In collaboration with hair and makeup artists, Adam Harvey creates looks that block online facial-recognition software. By manipulating the contours of the face, his technique disrupts a computer s ability to identify a person. This can be a useful tool on social media sites like Facebook, where users can search an entire archive for one particular face. The title of this project is derived from the words CV, a common abbreviation for computer vision, and Dazzle, a type of camouflage used during WWI. CV Dazzle: Look 4 Adam Harvey Inkjet Prints 2013 What do you see What is happening in these portraits? What comparisons can you make How does this disrupt your normal idea of portraiture? How are they different from what we have looked at today? Why do they look different? What makes you say that? What does it mean to you Have you ever dressed up different to take a photo? Are these photographs different from how you would like your photo taken?

Still Moving Primary school worksheet. Name: School: Welcome to the exhibition, Still Moving, at the Singapore Art Museum at 8 Queen Street.

Still Moving Primary school worksheet. Name: School: Welcome to the exhibition, Still Moving, at the Singapore Art Museum at 8 Queen Street. Name: School: Welcome to the exhibition, Still Moving, at the Singapore Art Museum at 8 Queen Street. This exhibition, Still Moving, focuses on the nature of the image, as explored in the art of photography