Instructional Design
This unit of instruction is divided into three parts, to be interspersed through the year-long curriculum, creating a recurring theme. The first part, dealing with issues drawn from the work and history of Group f.64, addresses key issues of the research—the idea of an artistic revolution; the exercise of democracy in an artist collective; the problems of unequal status of the individual members of a collective and how social inequality influences the story of culture. In addition, each of the three collectives in the research produced photographic work—as pure aesthetic study (in the case of Group f. 64), as documentation of performance art (Fluxus), or incidentally, as part of the graphic design of posters and billboards (Guerrilla Girls). Students will produce photographs that reflect these expressive and functional possibilities of photography.
I do want to note that illustrated lecture is a crucial part of these units; it is indispensible to conveying the background knowledge students need in order to have substantive understanding of the questions. While lecture is not now fashionable as a teaching method, I, as a student, enjoyed and learned from lecture. As a teacher, I find that if I pair my talks with illustrations (slides or digital presentations) and keep my talks brief and focused, students are attentive and engaged.
Part I: America Through the Lens of The Artist Collective: Lessons of Group f. 64
A. Illustrated Lecture (Background): American painting at the dawn of photography; American photography in the 19th century—its uses, place in culture, attitudes towards. Illustrations: paintings by George Caleb Bingham and others; photographs by Mathew Brady (portaiture and Civil War work) and Carlton Watkins (images of the mountain west). Class discussion: What story of America is told by these images? Choose one painting and one or two photographs and ask for student observations and interpretation.
B. Class discussion (Small group then whole class): Organize students in groups of three to four and issue each group several unfamiliar reproductions of 19th century painting and photography. Discussion prompt: Compare photographs and paintings as a means of recording history and as means of personal expression. Instruct groups to record a t-chart of advantages and disadvantages of each medium for each purpose. Reconvene whole class to review the results of the small group discussions. Points to emphasize: painting demands skills that take a long time to develop; individual paintings take a long time to make; painting may be inaccurate but can be more obviously expressive of a point of view. Photography is an accurate record and (in the 19th century, somewhat) less technically demanding. Further questions to discuss: If pictures are easy to make and factual in content, can they be art? How does the artist put his point of view into a photograph?
C. Class discussion (Small group then whole class): Organize students in groups of three to four and issue each group several examples of both pictorialist photographs and straight photographs, labeled only with photographer and title. Instruct students to organize the images into two stylistic groups and create a t-chart to record the contrasting attributes of each style. Reconvene as a whole class and record student observations. Introduce vocabulary: pictorialism, straight photography, and review the salient attributes of each.
D. Individual Assignment: Students choose either pictorialism or straight photography as the style they will emulate to produce one fine print. Works will employ the design principle "emphasis" (dominance/subordination). Each photograph must have a title that reflects the selected style. Pictorialist works will be named after emotions or abstract nouns while titles of straight photographs will directly reflect the subject matter of the image. Straight photographs will employ accepted technical standards including proper exposure, full tonal range, and sharp focus. Pictorialist photographs may use any means to obscure the image and enhance the idea reflected in the image title, including using "improper" exposure, scratching the negative, and/or painting or drawing on the print.
E. Classroom Experience: On the day images are due, students are to gather in two large groups (collectives) according their chosen style. Each collective will be instructed to carefully consider and critique all of the photos created by their members and to create a democratic process by which they decide which images will be displayed on behalf of their group in order to best represent their stylistic point-of-view. Each collective may choose only three pictures to represent their group.
F. Discussion and Written Reflection: On the following day, students will find only the images they chose posted on the classroom gallery walls. Discuss the qualities of the posted photographs, the application of elements and/or principles of design, particularly dominance/subordination. Important questions: What does it feel like to be selected? What does it feel like to be excluded? Did your group's process seem fair? As Americans, should everyone who wants their work to be exhibited have that right? (Freedom of speech.) What function does exclusion or limited membership serve? Can originality be confused with bad work? Is full inclusion incompatible with nurturing excellence? Students will write a individual reflections.
G. Discussion: On the next day, students will find all assignments posted on the gallery wall. Class discussion will be focused on pointing out positive qualities of images that were not seen when most were excluded.
H. Illustrated Lecture: Pictorialism, straight photography, some history of the collective in America, and Group f.64. Motivations for the pictorialist style, influence of technology on painting, modernism, Alfred Stieglitz, Paul Strand, New York as center of gravity for culture. William Mortensen. Introduction to Edward Weston and other individual members of Group f.64; early examples of American collectivism; Benjamin Franklin's initiatives for a public library and fire department cooperative; the 19th century artisan collective. Group f.64, the manifesto, the exhibition at the DeYoung Museum, the different status of the members, the effect of the Depression in breaking up the group, the experience of the women photographers. Small Group followed by Class discussion: Issue copies of the Group f.64 manifesto and instruct small groups to read through and condense the manifesto into bullet points. What were the reasons for the founding of Group f. 64? In whole class discussion, emphasize social support; creating a cultural center of gravity on the west coast; consolidating a new theory of photographic art.
Part II: Freedom, Fluxus, Collaboration, and Fun
A. Illustrated Lecture: The history of Fluxus, including Fluxus today; examples of the work of Fluxus and an image of the original Fluxus manifesto. Examples of the work of other contemporary performance artists and analysis of what makes performance art differ from theater; the work of Chris Burden. Class discussion: read and interpret the original Fluxus manifesto.
B. Group Assignment: Assign students to groups of three or four to collaborate on putting together a "happening". The event must be planned out in advance as a written narrative or script prescribing an activity that comes to a predetermined conclusion and that takes no longer than 8 minutes to perform. The event may not be rehearsed and must contain an element of chance.
C. Class Activity/Individual Assignment: Groups will execute their performance art for the whole class. Students not performing will take turns as the photographers to document the works, possibly on their own phone-based cameras. Students will each produce one digital photograph with a written narrative describing the event they recorded.
D. Class Discussion: Post all student assignments in classroom gallery. Questions: Tell about the experience of collaboration. Which is the art, the performance or the photograph of the performance? Does art need to be an object or image? Do these images look like art? Are aesthetic or design considerations essential to an image being art?
Part III: Guerrilla Girls: Fighting for Economic Justice and Cultural Representation Behind Fake Fur
A. Illustrated Lecture: The history of Guerrilla Girls; their billboards and posters; the use of design principles, irony, and humor to create works that communicate effectively. Class discussion: Why are each of the following important to the group's longevity and effectiveness: anonymity, equality, mission, and the use of facts and statistics?
B. Group Assignment: Students will work in groups of three or four on the following project: choose a social ill that needs to be addressed and research the facts and statistics that describe the problem. Groups will use digital media to design a poster that advocates for change, using statistical facts and at least one photographic element. Works will employ the design principle "emphasis" (dominance/subordination).
C. Individual Critique and Group Discussion: Students will write a critique of their group's work, describing their collaboration. Each will analyze their design and explain their use of design principles. All assignments will be printed and posted in the classroom gallery, and class discussion will focus on the design of the most effective posters. Posters will be displayed on campus.
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