Art 111, Drawing and Perception SDSM&T, Spring 2009 M,W,F, 9:00 – 10:50 a.m., Classroom: CB 326 Text: Drawing to See by Nathan Goldstein and Harriet J. Fishman Instructor: Deborah Mitchell email: [email protected] Office: CB323 Phone: 394-1254 Office Hours: M/W 1:30 - 3:00 http://www.hpcnet.org/Drawing Introduction: This is a studio class which introduces students to a variety of drawing media, concepts, and technical skills related to drawing accurately from observation. Course Description: We will work from various sources such as still life to progressively more complex subjects, which may include interiors, the figure, and landscape. We will study, among other things, linear perspective, composition, simultaneous contrast, figure ground, how to model forms and pictorial space. Class Procedures: Class will start immediately with a demonstration of a specific media or technique, a slide presentation, a class discussion, or a group critique. You will explore these materials, concepts, or ideas as you draw in class. Once class has started I will not go over this material so it is vitally important that you are not late! Class work constitutes 40% of your grade. Your application to the process of drawing is more important than creating what you may consider the perfect drawing! You are here to learn, whether that might be how to draw or new ways to draw! I expect you to be engaged with the task at hand. Come prepared to work! Make sure you have the materials required! Make sure have done the reading or research assigned! Homework: Homework assignments, including presentations, research or reading of any kind and work completed for critiques are due on the designated day. I will give you a hand out for each homework assignment. This hand out will include the due date and project description. Make sure you read it thoroughly! I will make every effort to explain your assignments clearly. It is your responsibility to let me know if you don't understand an assignment. I will expect you to make notes or highlight points in the reading for class discussions! We will go over the assigned reading in class so be prepared by doing the reading, taking note of the author’s points, and thinking how it may apply to you and your drawings! Unless you are absent on the day an assignment is due, absolutely no late work will be accepted and will result in a failing grade for that particular assignment. If you are absent on the day an assignment is due, bring your completed assignment to class on the day of your return. Project solutions exhibiting sufficient effort may be reworked prior to grading based upon feedback received during critiques. All reworked assignments are due a week from the project due date. Critiques: Critiques of work will be held to provide both of us with feedback. The attention and participation of each class member is expected. Do not take this time to wash your hands or leave the room! Critiques will be specifically geared toward developing critical thinking skills with regard to technical, formal, and conceptual issues. Please keep in mind that this is not a critique of you as an individual. If you need me explain something further or would like to discuss your work prior to a critique please let me know. Sketchbook/ Journals: A sketchbook/journal will be kept outside of class by each student. In addition to sketchbook assignments your sketchbook should have ideas that are self generated and should contain drawings, sketches and relevant notations in relation to drawing and the class. This should show evidence of a minimum of two hours of work per week. All sketch book work should be dated along with a brief notation of the assignment and your intentions or concerns for that particular study. Re-exploring media, techniques, and concepts presented during class are good ways to get the creativity flowing. Sketch journals will be collected and graded periodically throughout the semester without advanced notice. Bring your sketchbook to class every day for note taking! No sketching or drawing from photographs, magazines or any two-dimensional sources with the exception of the work of historical masters. We will look at your sketchbook together several times throughout the semester so I can understand how you want your drawing to develop out of class. Grading: 90 -100 (A) Advanced: principles and skills are completely understood, mastered, and used inventively to create an image which visually expresses your own experience/vision of the world. Superbly crafted and finished displaying excellent ability with the media and technique. Conceptually coherent. 80 – 90 (B) Proficient: principles and skills understood and used for the most part. Beginning to show individual expression but not quite there. Soldily crafted but technique may not be perfected and work could be more polished. Could be more conceptually rigorous. 70 – 80 (C) Competent: Principles are basically understood but with some difficulty in applying them. Some effort is being made at by-passing the trite or merely descriptive. Craft good but technique could be refined, may not have chosen the best media for the idea or subject matter for the assignment. 60 – 70 (D) Substandard: Principals and skills are incompletely understood. Relying on description, with difficulties transcending trite and conventional solutions. Craft is of lower quality or disregarded. See me now! -6o (F) Failing large gaps in understanding of principals/skills and inability to use them. No effort toward craft. See me immediately! Grading policy: I will be evaluating your in class work throughout the semester and will be happy to meet with you at any time to discuss how you are doing. What I will be looking for is your engagement with the process, an application of effort over time, risk taking, and your ability to make changes in your drawing based upon feed back both from me and your fellow students. Your final portfolio, which will be your presentation for your grade should include a selection of drawings done in class as well as homework assignments and your sketchbook. In addition to overall progress and improvement, I will consider attitude, attendance, preparedness, class participation, creative endeavor, and risk taking in determining your final grade. Course requirements. You will be expected to: 1. Attend class and be on time! 2. Complete research projects on time and have homework assignments completed and ready for class critiques when due. 3. Participate in class critiques. 4. Work on the techniques or exercises presented in class. 5. Turn in homework and sketchbooks when due. 6. Purchase text, materials, and sketch journal and have them in class as requested for each class period. 7. Keep current with sketch journal assignments. 8. Complete assigned reading by date required. Your final grade will be calculated from the following: In class work 40 Homework assignments 40 Sketchbook 20

Portfolio: A portfolio of your work from class is due on May 1, along with a written statement reflecting on your work in the class. I will give you specific instructions for the format. Attendance: Since this is a studio class it is vitally important that you be here! Active course participation is a must! Outside of excused absences for school-sponsored events or legitimate emergencies, you are allowed three absences. If you exceed three absences, you will loose one- third of your final letter grade for each additional absence. You are responsible for homework assignments given on a day when you are not in attendance. You are responsible for assignments or work done in class on any day that you are absent. Work due on a day that you are absent is due the following class period or it will be considered an F. Coming to class fifteen minutes late or more is recorded as an absence. Materials and supplies: Preparedness is important in order for the classroom experience to be most effective. Keep all your materials well stocked. Don’t wait until you’ve run out of paper or drawing media during class before you decide to buy more. If special preparations in terms of materials or research are requested for a particular class session, come prepared! A general list of art supplies follows. There may be additional supplies to purchase as the class proceeds and I will inform you accordingly. I will try to keep purchases to a minimum.  drawing board, or Masonite with clips (18x24) get 2 extra clips for securing the pad  Portfolio  4 - 6 compressed charcoal sticks (soft)  a selection of vine charcoal sticks  selection of charcoal pencils (soft, medium, and hard)  Niji brush  white eraser and a kneaded rubber eraser  blending stomp  sketchbook, spiral bound (at least 8x10, no smaller! With at least 50 pages!)  pad of newsprint paper, rough! 18x24  pad of drawing paper, 18x24, (bond) Bright white, not natural white  chamois ( automotive section of Kmart or Walmart type stores)  Masking tape  Flat watercolor brush, size 10 or 5/8”  A selection of graphite pencils (2H, 2B, 4B, 6B, 8B)You will go through the softer ones more quickly so you may end up getting several 6 and 8 B pencils.  India ink and supplies for pen and ink.

You may go through more paper than you initially purchase so be prepared to buy more as the semester progresses. Additional paper by the sheet may be required for special projects

This web site has drawings by famous artists: http://www.wga.hu/index1.html

Course Goals and Outcomes: As required by the SD Board of Regents (BOR), here’s an outline of the General Education goal, student learning outcomes, and assessments this course fulfills: GenEd GOAL #4: Students will understand the diversity and complexity of the human experience through the study of the arts and humanities.

Student Learning Outcomes: As a result of taking courses meeting this goal, students will: 1) Demonstrate knowledge of diversity of values, beliefs and ideas embodied in the human experience Assessment: Students will:  Recognize the role of the arts in reflecting and defining personal values, beliefs, and ideas through creating, analyzing, and discussing drawings.  Improve their comprehension of diverse values, beliefs, and ideas through drawing exercises, homework assignments, instructor feed back, visiting artist lectures and projects, and the reading, analysis, and discussion of the text and assigned articles. 2) Identify and explain basic concepts of the selected disciplines within the arts and humanities Assessment: Student will:  Identify major artists in the art cannon, through reading, analysis, and discussion of historical and contemporary drawings.  Distinguish among the major art movements through analysis, and discussion of selected drawings and the text.  Improve their comprehension of drawing through exercises, instructor feedback, research of famous artists, written assignments, and essays, and the reading, analysis, and discussion of the text.

3) Identify and explain the contribution of other cultures from the perspective of the selected disciplines with the arts and humanities Assessment: Students will:  Recognize the role of the arts in reflecting and defining culture through research, reading, analysis, and discussion of the drawing text and selected articles.  Improve their comprehension of diverse cultures through research, exercises, quizzes, instructor feed back, drawing assignments, and the reading, analysis, and discussion of the text and selected articles. 4) Demonstrate creative and aesthetic understanding Assessment: Students will:  Recognize the aesthetic principals that shape art works through the application of elements of art and principals of design in the creation of their own artwork as well as the analysis, and discussion of the terminology of artistic principals through out history.  Improve their comprehension of aesthetic principals that shape artistic concepts through the application of these principal in drawing exercises, quizzes, instructor feed back, written assignments, and the creation, analysis, and discussion of works of art. 5) Explain and interpret formal and stylistic elements of the fine arts Assessment: Students will:  Recognize some of the formal and stylistic elements of art through studio exercises, reading, analysis, and discussion of student drawings, the text and selected articles.  Practice the art of design and the application of formal and stylistic elements of art using the appropriate media and technique to convey the intended content through the creation of drawings that meet an a assigned purpose.  Improve their comprehension of formal and stylistic elements of the visual arts through the application of drawing skills in assigned exercises, instructor feed back, and the discussion of drawings during class critiques.

Freedom in learning. Under Board of Regents and University policy student academic performance may be evaluated solely on an academic basis, not on opinions or conduct in matters unrelated to academic standards. Students should be free to take reasoned exception to the data or views offered in any course of study and to reserve judgment about matters of opinion, but they are responsible for learning the content of any course of study for which they are enrolled. Students who believe that an academic evaluation reflects prejudiced or capricious consideration of student opinions or conduct unrelated to academic standards should contact Dr. Hrncir to initiate a review of the evaluation. Note: Students with special needs or requiring special accommodations should contact me at 394-1254 and/or the campus ADA coordinator, Jolie Mc Coy at 394-1924 at the earliest opportunity.