Introduction This can be a week-long lesson or you can do this in one day. Ask the students to choose a song that they think is beautiful and write down why they think it is beautiful. (You can also ask students to choose a song they think is ugly.) Longer Assignment: Ask students to choose … What Do We Find Beautiful?
Lesson plan that explores the philosophy of art and music using 4’33” by John Cage. Students explore the question “What is music?”
Have each student draw two pictures. One drawing must be a drawing they would call art, and the other one they would not call art. Ask the students who want to do so to share their drawings. Some questions you can consider include: What makes one art and the other not? Does the intention of … What is Art?
We all love music. Some of us sing daily, if just to ourselves. It could be our favorite tune from Frozen or simply a tune we made up ourselves. What makes sound music? Let’s start with ourselves. The teacher/facilitator may wish to share this video and have the children sing along, or you may choose … Can animals make music?
The Gaze: Power and Resistance in Film Read “The Oppositional Gaze” for homework (see below) the day before class. It’s fairly long and challenging. Watch the 19-minute video. This material explores the way what Sartre calls “the gaze” operates in films and how the perspective of the camera and of the implied audience affect the … The Gaze: Power and Resistance in Flim
In 2007 an independent film came out entitled “My Kid Could Paint That.” It followed the art career of a four year old, Marla Olmstead, living in Binghamton, NY, who took the art world by storm. Many of her canvases sold for five figures and presented beautiful and engaging abstract images. The film began as … Can anyone make art?
Beauty: In the eye of the beholder or is there something more to it? This unit invites high school students to explore the meaning of “beauty.” Source Materials: Plato’s Symposium (available in many editions) Crispin Sartwell’s Six Names of Beauty (Routledge, 2004) Puzzles About Art-an Aesthetics Casebook, by Battin, Fisher, Moore, and Silvers (Bedford/St. Martin’s, … Thinking About Beauty
This is a photo of leaves on rocks. One can look at the content, nature, or the photographic composition, its artifice. The leaves and the rocks: the veins run through the dominant maple leaf, staining it deep green and betraying both its strength and fragility; the rocks offer a range of textures, shapes, and commentary … Aesthetics is for the Birds
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