Art a Universal Language.

I’m late I’m late for a very important date! No, not really. What a way to start your morning when your alarm doesn't go off. It’s bittersweet knowing that this is the last Saturday seminar. All we have left to do is the San Francisco walk and then the competition is over, I have a lot of respect for all of the applicants that I have met in this competition. It’s been fun coming to the seminars and learning about stuff that is of a huge interest to you. Especially learning it from people who are so passionate about what they are teaching. Thank you Mrs. Everett, Mr. Dundov, and Mrs. White!

We were so ready to get started with our seminar that we set the school alarm off! At first I was scared that we weren't going to be able to proceed with our class, but thank goodness for Coach Doherty he was able to turn it off and restore hearing to all our ears. While we waited for everyone to arrive, Mrs. Everett had some books laid out on the tables that we could look at. I immediately went to the book about Michelangelo because I wanted to see if he had any sketches inside of it. I've been really into my sketches lately and I've been trying different techniques, and I wanted to just look at the way he did his shading. I’m not going to lie I wanted to steal Mrs. Everett's book it had so much information and so many of his sketches.

Bernini "Apollo & Daphne"
Photo Credit : Google Images 

What I noticed during this session is that most Roman art is religious. With the legalization and spread of Christianity, artists developed new ways of doing art in order to represent religious figures and stories. Frescoes, Sculptures, and Mosaics were the most famous types of art. The most interesting to me were Frescoes, which are paintings on wet plaster with pigments that are layered on top of each other.  With this technique an artist needed to work quickly with the wet plaster to ensure that it didn't dry before they were done painting. I was then reminded of one the most talented sculptors known to man, Bernini. Pluto and Proserpina, Apollo and Daphne are the two most beautiful pieces of art I have ever seen in my life. I can’t imagine what they must look like in real life; I am just dying to find out. The way Bernini captured such emotion it looks like he just captures a specific moment and froze it forever. Just to think about how he got such detail in marble will drive a person insane. 

Michelangelo "Cardinal Carafa"
Photo Credit : Google Images 

Michelangelo
Photo Credit : Google Images

Michelangelo is such an interesting person to learn about. I wonder what he was like as a person. It’s funny to learn that after a dispute with Cardinal Carafa, because Michelangelo painted naked people in the last judgment, he was accused of immorality and obscenity. Well he sure got his revenge by painting Cardinal Carafa in the last judgement; Cardinal Carafa is depicted naked in hell while his “part” is getting bitten by a snake. Very dramatic! But I love it! I want to know why he painted himself as a drooping skin in between heaven and hell out of all 400 characters in his ceiling? Who was Michelangelo really behind the art?

Artemisia Gentileschi "Judith Slaying Holofernes"
Photo Credit : Google Images 

I learned a lot this seminar but what I enjoyed the most is when Mrs. Everett introduced us to Caravaggio and Artemisia Gentileschi. I don’t know what it is about these two artists but their use of chiaroscuro (use of light and dark elements in a work of art) made their paintings more appealing to me than any of the other paintings I have seen. It’s unbelievable that the talented Gentileschi was just a teenager when she was painting these magnificent pieces of art. I definitely am going to continue researching more about her and her art.

At the end of this seminar I realized that there are a lot of hidden meanings and interpretations that art has. I definitely want to study art and its many meanings. On my way home I was talking to my mom about some of the new things that I wanted to research and as I was looking out the window there was a billboard and Leonardo Da Vinci’s Mona Lisa was on it. Art is everywhere it is a way of life and it is a way of expression, it’s also a language that everybody understands and that’s what I love so much about it.

- Courtney Bucknor