Introduction
My grandmother lived to age 97. She was the youngest girl of six children. Born in Perguia, Italy, she was beautiful in every way. To this day I have a kind of romantic, dreamy, nostalgic vision of the things that happened to her during her life. I have an idealized image of her life in a small hillside town in Tuscany, her immigration to the United States as a twelve-year-old girl, and the 'scandalous' courtship with my grandfather. I sometimes think of her life as if it were a grand and wonderful story.
There is a beautiful photograph I have of her in which she is sitting on the stoop of the house my father was born and raised in, surrounded by some sort of blooming tree, smiling directly into the camera. I can spend hours on end looking at that picture. Of course I am aware of much of her personal history that in fact, brought her to that stoop; but staring at that image I can't help but wonder about the stories I don't know. I suppose that's part of the ambiguity of pictures. We can look at them knowingly as we recollect what we know, but there is an ever-lingering mystery about what we do not. And I think this is precisely the point where my idea for this unit begins.
A portrait can contain a myriad stories. This unit is designed to explore the characters in our world, both real and imaginary, in an attempt to deepen our understanding of history and in some cases, bring us literally face to face with those who have lived, loved, and died. It is my hope that this unit also brings into question for my students other concepts for understanding the function of art in our world. Is it l'art pour l'art, or must art serve a more severe moral or didactic purpose? Where does portraiture fit within this quandary? Clearly, portraiture preserves for us features and expression. Most of us are as familiar with Albert Einstein's wild white head of hair as we are with his influence on the modern scientific community. What else can it do? Portraits can/have preserved the wealth and personality of kings, the costumes of Pharaohs and Sultans, and of heroes whose swords have slain dragons. Portraits allow us to discover and interpret a seen and an unseen story.
Portraiture exists in history as a way of memorializing, but in the case of the ancient Egyptians, an added value was the practical matter of serving as a vessel for the 'Ka' (the soul or spirit of a person) to pass through. The portrait can have a very pragmatic function, to achieve a specific result. Think, for example, of religious art (like devotional items or pictures of saints intended to be used in religious acts) and print ads (intended to sell a product rely). In all cases, it may be wise to consider carefully who dictates those desired results. The patrons of much of the early Christian art produced were careful to select images that would help teach a mostly illiterate population about a kind of faith where salvation was the rule rather than a much later, Gothic theme of judgment. In the case of print ads there are an overwhelming amount of images and themes to select from. The 'campaign for real beauty' from the makers of Dove soap comes to mind. Here we see portraits of 'real' women as seen and defined by the advertisers. On the one hand, they are providing us an alternative definition of beauty and seeking to unite women through this shared concept of "real beauty," but is this not also a construct for the company's own corporate benefit?
In this unit we will focus on the mystery of trying to understand characters in literature and apply some of the methods we develop to create portraits in the visual arts. I believe there are some intrinsically natural and subtle ways we respond to characters in literature and that we recreate some of those same instincts when we look portraits. This unit is intended to help weave together these two kinds of study and ultimately produce the kind of portrait that allows for that mystery to be revealed with the subtlety that the written word so often creates.
How exactly do we come to know and interpret literary characters? When we look at portraits, there is generally a recognition and familiarity of self: a sense that in some way the person whom we are looking at may be like us. As in the beautiful picture of my grandmother, physical appearance, environment, and symbols are all things that we can physically see that provide clues to her identity. How do we 'see' those same familiar and physical clues in literary characters? Analyzing metaphors, tone, identity, place, and point of view is common practice in beginning to think about how we approach character studies in literature. When we read literature we often identify characters that are 'like us' in any number of ways. This can take us on a broad path of understanding ourselves and others if we consider closely the various devices the author may have (very cleverly) used to set this up. How do we best explore this mystery of what we know about a character and what we do not?
Artists creating portraits must be able to move back and forth cognitively from the obvious physical characteristics to more abstract conclusions about what is observed (strength, intelligence, insecurity); and back again to the detailed observations that yield the abstraction (strained muscles, furrowed brow, slouching posture). It will be the goal of each assignment within this unit to capture (and communicate) the essences of a character students have met in a literary work through a drawing or painting.
We can look at contemporary portraits as well as portraits throughout history and begin to understand what ideals people wanted to share. Patrons commissioned portraits that reflected personal beliefs and cultural traditions as well as contemporary social, economic, and political interests. Our interpretation of the image is based on details given to us through the artist's hand. We grasp the basic idea or nature of an individual not only in the physical gesture portrayed, but also in the subtle details, the finer aspects of expression that might give us a deeper insight into the person. A wayward glance or direct gaze, the setting or props used, can be indicators along with the artist's manipulation of contrast, line, and color. Students will be reviewing these elements and principles of art as they are used by the artist and, in a series of studio activities, produce their own interpretation of how they can manipulate them to communicate these ideas of character to the viewer.
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