This is a Commitment - Emilee Thomas

     The thirty-day commitment I decided to undertake is to "connect to others in a selfless way."  Upon evaluating my current goals to focus less on me and look to others, along with doing small acts of service for others daily, I felt this would be a great way to accomplish both.

• Feb. 20, 2021 (Day 1):  I helped a roommate frost and decorate cupcakes that she was planning to give away to others.  I talked with my brother on the phone and asked him about his life, schoolwork, wife, and other things that are going on in his life.  Later, despite being tired, my roommate asked me to exercise with her and so I agreed so that she wouldn't have to exercise alone.
  
  
• Feb. 21 (Day 2):  I helped cook soup for my roommates and their friends who were coming over for dinner.  Later I asked a roommate who seemed down if she was okay, listened, and helped comfort her.  

This is a Commitment UPDATE - Calli Sumsion

 I want to draw or create something every single day that doesn't involve school assignments. Some days I might be adding on to a work I've already started or starting something completely new. In general I want to get my "creative juices" flowing without the stress for school (even though this is technically an assignment, haha.)

This is a Commitment - Andrea Martinez

 

My goal is to post every Sunday a picture of my art on my art page. During the week I will think, draw, and on Saturday do the final piece and then post it on my art page. 

(Sunday) Feb.21, 2021:

"This is a Commitment" - Allison Ipson

 Goal: Title at least one artwork a day for a month.

Day 1: Thursday, February 18th, 2021

"Foreboding"

"Altered"

Day 2: Friday, February 19th, 2021

"Heavy Laden"

Day 3: Saturday, February 20th, 2021

"Antiqued Identity"

 Sensory Deprivation Experiment

I was curious how I would approach visual arts if I suddenly lost my sight. I have done blind contours before in class, but this was a first since I was doing this by myself with a blindfold. I wouldn't be basing the contour off of lines that I saw, but rather lines that I felt.

I would like to experiment with this again with different mediums (clay, paint) to see what might be more friendly to the sightless. I was frustrated by not being able to tell where the lines were that I had already laid down, but it was interesting to see what I could observe by touch. Although I didn't depict it as well, I thought it was interesting taking time to notice the intricate curves and bends in the objects I used.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lCVoQqnmCQw

Sensory Deprivation - Allison Ipson

 https://vimeo.com/513576706

https://vimeo.com/513579968

EXPERIMENT OUTLINE:

Test if eliminating the senses of touch, sight, and smell affect our ability to taste or sense texture when trying foods:

- Subject wears blindfold, is not allowed to touch the food, and plugs nose while eating

- Subject is given small pieces of 12 foods

- Foods are grouped in pairs of 2 according to similar textures in order to ensure experiment works off of taste as much as texture

- Subject will eat the food and see if he can identify it

- If unable to identify, subject may unplug nose and try identifying the food again

- Subject will then eat the second food in the group that is similar without receiving verification on the identification of the first and see it they can identify it

- Subject continues experiment for all 6 food groups 

 

EXPERIMENT RESULTS:

Test 1: Frito vs. Tortilla Chip

            Frito: Wheat thin… no, tortilla chip. Unplugged nose: Frito

            Tortilla Chip: No idea. Unplugged nose: Tortilla Chip

Test 2: Almond vs. Granola

Almond: (Off of Texture)… Nut… No clue what kind. Unplugged nose: Definitely in trail mix… cashew?

            Granola: No clue. Unplugged nose: No clue, but can taste it now. 

Test 3: White Bread vs. Zucchini Bread

White Bread: (Off of texture)… bread, but can’t taste it. Unplugged nose: Bread.

Zucchini Bread: What could possibly be that soft? No idea. Unplugged nose: Zucchini Bread. 

Test 4: Carrot vs. Celery

            Carrot: (Off of texture) Carrot, but can’t taste it. Unplugged nose: Carrot.

Celery: (Off of texture and sound) Celery, but can’t taste it. Unplugged nose: Instantly taste celery.

Test 5: Tomato vs. Grape

            Tomato: (Off of texture) Grape, but can’t taste it. Unplugged nose: *shutter* Tomato.

            Grape: (Off of texture) Grape, but can’t taste it. Unplugged nose: Grape.

Test 6: Pepperoni vs. Cheese

Pepperoni: Salty… nasty w/o smell. No idea. Unplugged nose: Good!... Jerky? No, pepperoni. 

Cheese: (Off of texture) Cheese… Once I said that I could sort of taste it. Unplugged nose: Cheese. 

 

EXPERIMENT ANALYSIS:

- Not being able to smell did seem to inhibit the taste of the foods, however most of them he was able to still identify them off of the texture.

            - When he unplugged his nose, he could identify almost all of the foods. 

- He had tried this before while being able to see the food, but it didn’t work. This time it did work, so we have a theory that seeing something before-hand gives us a preconceived notion of how something tastes. 

- Sometimes once he figured it out by the texture, he could almost start to taste it. We think supplying the name allowed his brain to start filling in for what he should be tasting. 

- Some things that he doesn’t like normally were fine without all of his senses, while some things he normally loves were gross without all the senses. 

- If doing this for a future assignment, I would buy different foods, because some stuff he was able to guess combined off of the texture and knowing what we had at home.  

Sensory Deprivation - Emilee Thomas

    For this experiment, I decided to eat with a blindfold and "nose plugs" in an attempt to take away sight and smell.  This decreased my ability to easily perform this task, as well as increase my reliance on texture/touch.  I had predicted that the lack of smell would also decrease my sense of taste, however, in this experiment, I found that it did not (probably because of the poor quality of the nose plugs haha).

    I wasn't expecting the lost and slightly frustrated feelings that came as I tried to eat.  I didn't know where the food was, how big of a portion was on the end of the fork, and when the meal would be complete.  It made me feel a deeper appreciation for my senses.  

 

Sensory Deprivation - Melissa May Beutler

 For my experiment I had my family help me. I wanted to do something similar to a blind contour drawing and the game telephone. while I didn't impair their hearing, I wanted the drawing to pass along as the word in the game telephone. I had one of my siblings start with a blind contour drawing, and then I had another sibling take that drawing and try to replicate it while not looking at their own drawing. Then that person passed their drawing to another person and they had to try and replicate that drawing without looking. I did this a few more times until the drawing was unrecognizable.

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Sensory Deprivation-Jess Hebertson

For my experiment I blindfolded myself and started to doodle. I was planning to do some sort of blind contour drawing but I realized that without something to actually look at while doing this drawing, my mind began to wander. I started to think about the times in my daily life when my senses are taken away or limited. I have pretty bad eyesight without my glasses, so waking up in the morning, taking showers, and going swimming are all activities that force me to see the world as a sort of blurry haze. I especially thought about how shaving my legs is a struggle because I can’t see my legs very well, let alone the hair on them.

When I finished, what I ended up with was a sort of mess of lines, it just looked like a scribble, but I had come up with an idea for a piece. I had intended for this experiment to create a finished piece but it ended up being more of a brainstorming activity. Here is a really rough version of the pieces I want to make. The second picture shows what I see in the shower (I kept looking at the first one with my glasses off then adjusting the blur).