Globalization Project
Education Autobiography
Vietnam Project
Artist Statement/ First Rough Draft
I decided to do my artist statement as my first rough draft because it allowed me to put my feelings down and ideas. I edited this paper three times.
In this piece I’m trying to convey the loss of words that war causes. I believe that in a war there is nothing to say. I found this idea in the three war novels that we read in my humanities class, All Quiet on the Western Front, Slaughterhouse 5, and The Things That They Carried. From these books I realized that the authors can’t really tell you what war feels like, so they try to show it, using stories of their experiences. I find this especially true in Slaughterhouse 5. The book has a repeating phrase “Poo-twee-tweet”, that I believe is a metaphor for the lack of words. In this project I decided to do a dance for multiple reasons. For me, dance is the best way to communicate. I believe that in dance you can show a story, instead of telling and I though thought it could be a special element in my perspective statement. The song I used is called “This Place is A Shelter” by Olafur Arnalds. I choose it because of the sad, tranquil tone it gives to the listen. I also thought this song had the right sound and rhythm for choreographing a contemporary dance. From here I was able to find movements. My knowledge of contemporary dance, which is a fairly new style of dance, incorporating jazz, ballet, and modern, was slightly limited because of my primary ballet training. I went to Youtube and watched contemporary choreography and tried to learn new things, new movement, then what I had from my basic contemporary knowledge. Some movements that I got and used in my choreography is dramatic falls, hand movements, running and static poses. I also used some ballet movements to add some movement I’m comfortable with. This lead to a unique combination of movements and feeling.
In this piece I’m trying to convey the loss of words that war causes. I believe that in a war there is nothing to say. I found this idea in the three war novels that we read in my humanities class, All Quiet on the Western Front, Slaughterhouse 5, and The Things That They Carried. From these books I realized that the authors can’t really tell you what war feels like, so they try to show it, using stories of their experiences. I find this especially true in Slaughterhouse 5. The book has a repeating phrase “Poo-twee-tweet”, that I believe is a metaphor for the lack of words. In this project I decided to do a dance for multiple reasons. For me, dance is the best way to communicate. I believe that in dance you can show a story, instead of telling and I though thought it could be a special element in my perspective statement. The song I used is called “This Place is A Shelter” by Olafur Arnalds. I choose it because of the sad, tranquil tone it gives to the listen. I also thought this song had the right sound and rhythm for choreographing a contemporary dance. From here I was able to find movements. My knowledge of contemporary dance, which is a fairly new style of dance, incorporating jazz, ballet, and modern, was slightly limited because of my primary ballet training. I went to Youtube and watched contemporary choreography and tried to learn new things, new movement, then what I had from my basic contemporary knowledge. Some movements that I got and used in my choreography is dramatic falls, hand movements, running and static poses. I also used some ballet movements to add some movement I’m comfortable with. This lead to a unique combination of movements and feeling.
Rough Draft 2
Here is my second draft of my project. This is chorography that I wrote and worked on.
Third Draft
This is a video of me 'marking' my dance. Marking means doing only half the movements of dance and not fully dancing.
Final Draft
This is my final draft of my choreography.
Creative Historians Project
Project Reflection
We began this project soon after we arrived here at school in August. We first began to gain knowledge about WW1 by reading the literary classic All Quiet on the Western Front. Then we learned some more from Stephen. After finishing AQotWF and taking a test on the events and dates of WW1, we then moved on to WW2. For this topic we read more and Stephen did not lecture us too much on WW2. After finishing all of this we began to learn about short stories. Things like plot, round characters, setting, historical integration and showing, not telling were introduced to us. From here we began to write our stories. We spent a week and half on our stories. We wrote at least four drafts, and had our teachers, peers and parent edit them, after we had edited them ourselves. After we had edited the papers we choose a excerpt from our story to read out during exhibition.
Of the literary elements that we studied, my paper bests shows the idea of showing not telling. I did a great job of showing the reader the scene, but not telling them. “Silent tears flooded from Kathleen’s eyes as peppermint and pipe smoke enveloped her.” Its strong because I use verbs to describe the scene and don’t tell the reader that “Kathleen cried and her dad hugged her” instead I used more interesting words. This specific sentence is important to the story because it is the last and it leaves the reading, hanging on, but just enough to not annoy them.
Of the literary elements we studied I was not very good at adding historical context. I didn’t put much detail in the clothes that they wore or the entertainment. I feel that I struggled with this because my research notes were very in depth about was it fit in the story. I could of also picked different research topics. I did try to add some historical context by adding small details about the food and the entertainment that was provided. I really tried to look at my notes so that it was accurate. I feel that I could've used my elements more in my center plot.
Two substantial revisions that I made in my paper is my incorrect use of commas and my incorrect grammar. To work on both my grammar and commas I had my mother help me find where the commas goes and correcting my grammar. I also used Microsoft Word to find any grammatical errors. This made my paper easier to read because it flowed better. Reader could tell where to pause in their readings and understand the story more. I think this made my paper higher quality and easier to read.
Of the literary elements that we studied, my paper bests shows the idea of showing not telling. I did a great job of showing the reader the scene, but not telling them. “Silent tears flooded from Kathleen’s eyes as peppermint and pipe smoke enveloped her.” Its strong because I use verbs to describe the scene and don’t tell the reader that “Kathleen cried and her dad hugged her” instead I used more interesting words. This specific sentence is important to the story because it is the last and it leaves the reading, hanging on, but just enough to not annoy them.
Of the literary elements we studied I was not very good at adding historical context. I didn’t put much detail in the clothes that they wore or the entertainment. I feel that I struggled with this because my research notes were very in depth about was it fit in the story. I could of also picked different research topics. I did try to add some historical context by adding small details about the food and the entertainment that was provided. I really tried to look at my notes so that it was accurate. I feel that I could've used my elements more in my center plot.
Two substantial revisions that I made in my paper is my incorrect use of commas and my incorrect grammar. To work on both my grammar and commas I had my mother help me find where the commas goes and correcting my grammar. I also used Microsoft Word to find any grammatical errors. This made my paper easier to read because it flowed better. Reader could tell where to pause in their readings and understand the story more. I think this made my paper higher quality and easier to read.