Virtual Gallery Visit and Art Critique

ARTH 100Writing Report: Virtual Gallery Visit and Art Critique

1. Jones

This writing assignment involves visiting a virtual art gallery, choosing an artwork and writing about the visit and the artwork. You are documenting your experience, your ideas and your research. There are two parts to the written report which will be submitted together as one document. Read carefully the instructions and criteria below.

Writing Report Due: The deadline to upload your report is Wednesday November 11^th, 5:00 pm. (You may submit it anytime after MondayNovember 9^th at 9:00 am. Do not attempt to upload your report in the last few minutes prior to the deadline in the event you have technical issues/internet delay etc. NO LATE REPORTS WILL BE ACCEPTED. THIS IS A FINAL DEADLINE.

Approximately 600-word(not including Bibliography/Works Cited page)

Font size 12/double-spaced

Your full name and student number must appear on the top left of the first page.

Part 1: Virtual Gallery Visit  (https://artsandculture.google.com )

Approximately 250 words (double space/PDF)

Using the Google Arts and Culture portal (link) find the “Museums” link. You will see an extensive list of museums and art galleries from all over the world. Begin to visit different galleries and museums to decide on the museum/gallery you want to focus on. Be aware that some sites are NOT galleries such as NASA, Time magazine etc.

Not every galley/museum will have the feature that allows you to make a virtual visit. Look for the icon of a stick person that should appear on the site’s homepage. You MUST choose a gallery/museum that has this feature. Next, you will choose an artwork in the gallery/museum that will be the focus of Part 2.

Part 1 of your report will document your virtual experience of “visiting” the gallery. Discuss your experience describing what you saw and as you moved through the gallery. This should not be simply descriptive, as it must include your thoughts and reflections. There is some room here for creativity. You are seeing the architecture, interior design, displays, and the layout and presentation of art. What makes an impression on you? Why? Lastly, you must discuss how the artwork you have chosen is displayed. Does it enhance the viewing of the work? Would it have an impact on how a viewer might interpret the art? It is essential that at the beginning of your report you identify the museum, its location and also the artist and title of the artwork you have chosen.

Part 2: Critique of Artwork

Approximately 350 words

(double space/PDF)

Bibliography (Work Cited page) and In-text citations required

Research will be required providing relevant contextual information. You are focusing on the artwork that chose in the virtual art gallery. Your intention is to better understand the artwork more fully by examining the relevant historical and context.

Two academic research sources arerequired. While you may review dictionaries, encyclopaedias, newspapers, magazine articles, blog entries and book reviews they are not academic sources. These sources will not count as fulfilling the requirement of twoacademic sources. On MyCC on the top left you will see a link to the college library (MyCC Library). JSTOR and Proquest E-library are two databases that you can use to begin to find scholarly articles related to your chosen artwork. Also, you may want to begin your search by using Google Scholar.It is fine to use Wikipedia in the early stage of your research. It is however, NOT an academic source and will not count in fulfilling the research criteria.Do not simply provide only biographical information about the artist. Instead, if you provide somebiographical information, state clearly why you think it is relevant to the meaning of the artwork.

Historical Information: This involves researching the time period in which the artist lived and produced their work. Are there important political, economic or social issues that you believe are relevant to understanding the artist and/or artwork? Do class and/or gender play a role? Have you learned anything about the artist that you consider important to your understanding of the meaning of the work?

Cultural Context: Is the artist associated with a movement or style of work? If so, how is this revealed in this work? Did other artists influence him/her?How were artists supported at this time? What values and beliefs were dominant in the cultural at that time (political, religious, economic etc.)?

While it is not necessary to answer every question listed above, your research should reveal your knowledge and demonstrate you have considered your subject closely.

Documentation

Documentation is written acknowledgement of the sources of information you have used in your paper.  In academic writing it is essential you acknowledge all your sources. This will take place in the body of your essay and after your essay (Works Cited or endnotes).Different academic disciplines use different documentation styles. The Chicago Manual of Style if most frequently used in art history. It is available online as The Chicago Manual of Style Online. You may also use MLA (Modern Language Association), which is used in the humanities. Purdue OWL is a good online resource.

Plagiarism

Using someone else’s words or ideas without acknowledging them is plagiarism. When the passage has been rewritten using your words you must still acknowledge the original source or you are plagiarizing. Plagiarism is a very serious issue in academia and will result in failure of the assignment, or worse, an entire course.  Make sure when you integrate your research to include in-text citations acknowledging your sources.