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Fig. 1. Gismonda, Alphonse Mucha, 1894 (Art Renewal Center)

The huge poster created by Alphonse Mucha, Gismonda, appeared relatively interesting to me as it reminded me somewhat of the Byzantine art with its use of yellow and brown. (I, later on, found that Mucha came from Czech and was, therefore, very much inspired by the Byzantine art – he “regarded Byzantine civilization as the spiritual home of Slavic culture”.) (Mucha Foundation)

Gismonda poster was done using chromolithography and was commissioned by Sarah Barnhardt, a Parisian actress and director, to promote for the new production in early January 1895. Despite the lack of experience in poster design, Mucha created this in merely 6 days and this was what made him famous. That got me curious and therefore, I decided to research further.

            File:Vin mariani publicite156.jpg

Fig. 2. Eldorado Music Hall, Jules Cheret, 1894 (Victoria and Albert Museum) | Fig. 3. Vin Mariani, Jules Cheret, 1894 (Collection Angelo Mariani)

During that period, the colour schemes used in poster designs were bolder (Pound), as seen from the examples above by Jules Cheret, who was very much in demand then. (Jules Cheret Biography) Also, the figures that appeared in Cheret’s posters were dynamic.

Gismonda, on the other hand, stood out from the rest with its muted pastel palette and stillness of Barnhardt in character. This work was revolutionary as no other works had the same extremely narrow composition with an almost life-size figure. This format could likely be inspired by the Japanese scrolls which were heavily imported into France then. (Pound)

His partnership with Bernhardt after this provided him with more opportunities to develop artistically, alongside with more commissions and eventually, a commercial contract from Ferdinand Champenois, the Parisian printer. With roots from Czech, his works started to include Slavic motifs in the form of florals eventually. Those “natural motifs and flowing, organic lines” in his works, led to his association with Art Nouveau and its significance in the popularization of the movement’s aesthetics. (Pound)

References:

  1. “Biography of Jules Cheret.” Jules Cheret – The Complete Works – Biography, 2017, http://www.jules-cheret.org/biography.html.
  2. “Byzantine Heads (pair) (1897)”, Mucha Foundation, 2019, http://www.muchafoundation.org/gallery/browse-works/object/240.
  3. “Collection Angelo Mariani.” LA BIBLIOTHEQUE ELECTRONIQUE DE LISIEUX, http://www.bmlisieux.com/litterature/bibliogr/mariani.htm.
  4. “Eldorado Music Hall: Chéret, Jules.” Victoria and Albert Museum, 2017, https://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O1037601/eldorado-music-hall-print-cheret-jules/.
  5. “Gismonda by Alphonse Maria Mucha.” Art Renewal Center, 2019, https://www.artrenewal.org/Artwork/Index/4431.
  6. Pound, Cath. “How Alphonse Mucha’s Iconic Posters Came to Define Art Nouveau.” Artsy, 13 Nov. 2018, https://www.artsy.net/article/artsy-editorial-alphonse-muchas-iconic-posters-define-art-nouveau.

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Fig.1 The Rosetta Stone on display in Room 4. (The British Museum Blog)

The Rosetta Stone from 196 BCE particularly caught my attention during the lecture as it was an important discovery that helped with the decoding of hieroglyphs.

Hieroglyph, a character used in a system of pictorial writing, particularly that form used on ancient Egyptian monuments. Hieroglyphic symbols may represent the objects that they depict but usually stand for particular sounds or groups of sounds. (The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica)

After the 4th century CE, people could barely read and write hieroglyphs due to their lack of use. As such, the fact that it consisted of 3 different scripts, hieroglyphs, Demotic and Ancient Greek, all with the same content contributed to the understanding of the Egyptian pictorial writing when it was discovered in 1799. (The British Museum Blog)

In the early 19th century, scholars who were able to read Ancient Greek eventually decoded some of the hieroglyphs. An English physicist, named Thomas Young, discovered that some of the hieroglyphs on the Rosetta Stone resemble the sounds of “Ptolemy”, the king then. Jean-François Champollion, a French scholar also found that the hieroglyphs could relate to the sound of the Egyptian language. Through the study of the stone inscriptions, with reference to other texts as well, he made further breakthroughs in the understanding of hieroglyphs. (The British Museum Blog)

Just an extra note, I noticed Chinese characters started out as pictorial representation as well, from 甲骨文, the oracle bone script. Hence, I actually find it interesting to note how things have evolved differently in the East and the West to become the languages we have today.

 

Reference:

  1. “Everything You Ever Wanted to Know about the Rosetta Stone.” The British Museum Blog, 2 Aug. 2017, https://blog.britishmuseum.org/everything-you-ever-wanted-to-know-about-the-rosetta-stone/.
  2. The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica. “Hieroglyph.” Encyclopædia Britannica, Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc., https://www.britannica.com/topic/hieroglyph.

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< The Social Stage >

This social media project titled “Glitchy Glitchy” was done by Xue Ru, Whitney and Wan Hui.

 

To find out our narrative, click on our characters’ profile below to get to their Instagram accounts 🙂:

 

During interaction week, classmates were allowed to log in to @michluvsglitch to access hidden information (e.g. DMs between Mich & Steph)

(For access to Mich’s account, refer to XuanMing’s briefing slides for privacy reasons 🙃 heh)

An Instagram live by Steph also happened during the interaction week.

 

Following is our presentation slides:

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< Research & Process >

Through Project 2a, I have decided to focus on YELLOW COLOUR as the element of my zine.


Back cover (left) and cover (right) tryout

/ Initial idea /
Foodie adventure photozine

  • Empty stomach on page 1 (cover) to indicate the state before feasting the good food from Bedok
  • Filled tummy on page 8 (back cover) with checkpoints (food places intro) to indicate state after going through the recommended food places in Bedok

 

Image result for collage zine  
Reference (left) and Spread 1 tryout (right)

  • Initial spread 1 layout was referencing towards pop art cover layout instead of spread layout. Therefore, spread did not look appropriate.
  • Barely any visual hierarchy as the images appear to be of similar sizes.
  • Use of split complementary colors to make the spread look more harmonious.

 

/ Comments /

  1. Zine is about food so cover page should include the food that will be featured instead for anatomy.
  2. Photo angles can be limiting when shooting food stores, like the bakery. Illustrations of more interesting angles can be included.

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Day 1:

I was awoken by the chitty-chatty noises around me. However, I tend to keep my eyes close even when my mind is awake as I wait for the very minute my alarm rings. As you guys know, the bed has this magic attraction that draws you to it every morning when you have to get up for work.

“WAIT. My alarm is not going to ring. I AM ON A MISSION RIGHT NOW,”  The thought came across my mind and suddenly I was wide awake. Immediately, I opened my eyes.

OH  W O W.

My belongings and the size of my room seems to have enlarged GREAAAAAATLY. I think I have successfully reduced to the size of an ant. The effort all these while to solve the overcrowding problem in this current society seemed to have paid off as we see this little improvement.

As I looked and wondered around my strangely familiar surrounding, I seemed to have found out the source of the chitty-chatty noises: the black computer monitor screen. I stuck my ears close to the screen for verification.

I wondered who could be talking behind the screen… The little RGB pixels…? I decided to start up the computer to find out.

I forgot the fact that I am now very very small and no matter how hard I press the start button, it just does not seem to work!!! Out of frustration, I jumped on the button REALLY REALLY HARD. Then, I felt the vibration coming from the drive start-up. I saw a glimpse of hope.

The familiar sound coming from the system suddenly sounded so deafening to my teeny-weeny body now. I regretted not turning down the volume of the speaker before I consumed the pill to embark on my mission. 🙃😑

Deep in my thoughts, I was brought back to reality by many pairs of eyes staring right at me. WOAH WAIT WHAT.

Those pairs of eyes are…..