#11 | Module Reflection

First of all, I would like to say that I LOVE THIS MODULE THE MOST. Because of how this is the module that made us all talk to each other for the first time and how crazy our ideas are allowed to be. No one is going to tell you "No, this will not work". When we are stressing about the research and whatnot for other modules, this module is actually helped us relieve stress because I believe everyone genuinely had fun (thank god for a great lecturer). From thinking of 100 ways to squeeze a lemon to building the tallest structure out of spaghetti and drawing 12 emotions of an object. Oh and not to forget, weird food combinations! I also found a new friend, Myu from the group project. 

This module actually thought me a lot. It thought me to let my ideas run wild and not restrict myself. To not judge what another person's idea because we have not stand in their point of view. To understand that everyone has different things going on in their mind and be open to new ideas. 

I used to think that I could only do copy paintings and drawings because of my lack of imagination and I'm just not creative. But after going through this module, I realised that everybody has a creative side to them, it is held down most of the time because of the restrictions we give ourselves, being afraid how other people would judge us and not accept our ideas.

Quoting from Vincent Van Gogh,

"If you hear a voice within you say 'you cannot paint', then by all means paint and that voice will be silenced."

Greatest thing I learnt from this module is to be confident about my ideas. Do not afraid to be different because no matter how bad it sounds to others, someone somewhere will appreciate it.

#10 | Force Connection

Objects and emotions

This week's individual project is for us to choose from an object and draw it into 12 different emotions, which are passionate and dull, happy and sad, cowardly and brave, greedy and gracious, lazy and hardworking, creative and unimaginative. This is also our last project so I tried to make the drawings look as cute as possible! At first when I knew I had to do this assignment I was thinking "How am I suppose to draw out a unimaginative and passionate looking clock?!" So I was also amazed by how many expressions I can come up with!

Here is my take on it!

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Fun ways to floss

For this project, we have to think of a fun ways to make flossing fun. Our group consisted of Myu, Rita, Xiaolin and Sayidah. This was really difficult for us. But we still managed to come up with some logical and some ridiculous ones. Like making the yoyo strings into floss and flavoured floss so that we don't have to brush teeth but still able to make our mouth smell really good! And floss that is in your watch with an alarm to remind you to floss! Anytime, anywhere!

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Unique food combinations

This week's assignment is really fun because it's all about food! Everybody loves food! We were given a few kinds of food and we are supposed to combine the food to make weird snacks that are not sold in the market. Instead of just putting them together randomly, I tried to make mine to my liking. So everything below is snacks that I will actually try to create one day and eat them.

Doesn't Nasi Lemak bao sound delicious and so Singaporean? And I would really like to try the cappuccino flavoured bao with steak if it is sold in store one day. I might open a cafe just to sell all this weird food combination!

#9 | Oxygen Advertisement Poster & My Self Portrait.

This week's work is to create a poster to advertise the Coca Cola's new product, oxygen. My group consist of Xiao Lin, Myu and Rita. First of all, we went home to design how the container should look like and then met up at the library to discuss which was better. We then decide on the colours, the fonts and the price of the product. 
Our target market is the elderly, we did not want the poster to look overcrowded so we chose to keep it plain and simple. Less is more right? The bottle it designed to look like the Earth with the both side indented so it has a better grasp and it looks like you have the world in your hands. The straw is shaped into chemical formula of oxygen. We tried to keep it as simple as possible so our poster is inspired by perfume advertisements. We priced it at $67 because our group consisted of Chinese and Indian, 6 which is a lucky number for Chinese and 7, a lucky number for Indians. We also choose this price because we wanted it to be a luxury product like tonics. I gained a lot of things from this project because it felt like we have a real client. And this time everyone worked very well with each other. I used to think that doing a poster, it just have to look good aesthetically. After this project, I learnt that other than making it look good, we have to about other aspects too. Example, the target market, the price, the placement and the fonts etc. 
---------------------------------------------------------------------- This week, Ms Ho made us draw a portrait of ourselves with the stuffs we like and represents us. Initially, I didn't know where to start so I decided to do the easiest, which is drawing a face. Then adding the things I like to fit the different parts. I did not attempt to make it look pretty, think too much of the placement. Because if too much thought was put into it, I don't think it'll be who I really am, instead it'll be who I wish I am, does that make sense?



Let's start from the hair, it is tied this way because I believe there'll always still be a kid in me no matter how old I get. As for the colours, it is what it is, I LOVE COLOURS ON MY HAIR! The headband's a volleyball net and my eyeballs are volleyball, I don't think I need to elaborate any further for my love for that sport right? Brushes for eyebrows because I love to draw and paint! Should have draw pencil for one side... Eyeliner because I prefer myself made up. And those are not random scribbles on my cheeks, they're my horoscopes's logo, Aquarius! Yinyang for my mouth because I think I'm both extrovert and introvert, and a little of the other in each of them. The dollar sign choker is to show how I feel about our world. How everyone and everything is revolving around money, including myself. The hand is my favourite cartoon Stitch's. And I hope one day, all of us can pull ourselves out of the world that only cares about money.

#8 | Faces.

This week, our topic was Pareidolia which means seeing faces on things, skies or anywhere that was not intended to look like faces. I thought it was pretty difficult. I do see faces a lot because I'm someone that thinks a lot but when you're asked to do or in this case spot something, all of them just go hiding. But I still manage to get some interesting ones in school! Hopefully you guys can see the faces!!!  These are the 3 more interesting ones that I took.






I tried to spot faces that are not as obvious like the others which has the '_' and '.' face created by the windows and doors or walls. I hope the face is still visible though because it gets very interesting when you are able to spot them because they are not intentional! 
And this are some of the "faces" taken by my group mates, Myu and Xiao Lin.

#7 | Julie Burstein & The Marshmallow Challenge.

This week, our homework was to watch a video of Julie Burstein giving a talk on 4 lessons in creativity. I feel that creativity is born in everybody and it changes with the surrounding. Different people inspire me to use my creativity in different ways. And I learnt that creativity isn't always about art because people can use their creativity in their everyday lives. Nowadays, people don't appreciate what they have and we have a lot of things given to us. We don't use our creativity as much when it comes to solving problems. We don't realize that we are capable of thinking creatively and think of only logical ways.
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Rita and I was grouped with Samyu and Xiao Lin because we did not have enough group mates. Everyone was awkward at first but I'm glad the challenge made us closer as classmates. We started out wanting the spaghetti to be arranged like a campfire. The whole thing was strong until one of us taped the spaghetti too hard and it started breaking apart. We did not have the tallest and most stable one in the end but we were determined to make it work even after the time have stopped and the winner announced.  I was very glad we did not blame each other when spaghetti starts breaking instead we thought of ways to fix it. That's what we should do right? No point crying over spilled milk, just think of a way to fix everything and you might end up with better results!

#5 | 3 Artist/People That Inspired Me.

Peter Underhill

He is the creator of the collectable Bad Taste Bears. I came across them when I was browsing through a figurine shop and BTB immediately caught my eye. Teddy bears, something that little kids or maybe even adults love because they are just so adorable and cuddly. But Peter Underhill did not make them "adorable and cuddly". He was designing a range of cutesy bears to be printed onto little girl's pyjamas. To clear his head after becoming "all cuted out" he drew his first ever Bad Taste Bear, "Hey kiddies! Here's the chainsaw bear!" He enjoyed drawing it so much that he started putting a list together and drawing and painting bears in "interesting" situations and a distorted view of reality as a release for his twisted imagination.

I love how he has this crazy mind, as I would call it. Because of it, he came up with something that is different and one of a kind.

 

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Mark Ryden

He is an American painter, part of the Lowbrow (or Pop Surrealist) art movement. He was also dubbed "the god-father of pop surrealism" by Interview Magazine. I'm very inspired by him because firstly, he is a surrealist artist and because his artworks always have a certain sadness and mysterious vibe to them. I never like dolls because they look creepy but I especially love the eerie dolls in his artworks.

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Low Kay Hwa

The last one, is a Singaporean Novelist. I am not someone that particular love books, but his books caught my attention. The first story I read from him was "A Singapore Love Story", I remember myself finishing the book in 1 day when I was in Secondary 4. Teachers even had to confiscate the book because I couldn't stop reading it. The second book I read is "Lilith". I am looking forward to read more of his books after reading the summary of all of them in the bookstore. To me, there's always this "dark" feeling in his book. Like works of a crazy person. I love the twist he always have in his stories, the very "dark" feeling it gives and actually how true his stories are to reality.

The Perfect Story is the next book I want to read of his because I feel that he's talking about himself. This is the summary:

To create a convincing story, the writer has to detach himself from the real world.

The process of writing an outstanding story is frightening. In fact, frightening is too mild a word. Obsession would be an understatement as well. The accurate word to express the process will be severance. The writer severs all ties with reality and becomes a new person.

He talks to imaginary people. He acts out imaginary scenes. He walks in the dark to feel the fear. He cuts his hand to feel the character’s pain. He experiences the full flurry of emotions that the characters feel.

He lives a solitary life and teeters on the edge of sanity.

He grows up with the story. His only friends are the characters. His only foes are the characters. His only respite is to write the last word of the story.

Often, the writing reaches a stage where it possesses the writer’s entire being; scenes are constructed from his memories; the story becomes part of his life. He no longer writes the story; he lives in it.

All these sacrifices just to fulfil one desire. To write The Perfect Story.

#4 | 'Pursuit of Happiness' & 'Creativity and Innovation'.

No pictures available because we forgot to take photos. My group started out pretty good for the pursuit of happiness but we end up with only 3 points which is very very little. And soon, we found the problem. We were thinking of what the general audience would feel happy with and not how we felt. So that's when we started giving more ideas of what happiness means to each of us. Simple things like going to the theme park for a day with your love ones is happiness. As for creativity and innovation, we had problems because due to busy schedules and language barrier. I did not know how to explain to my group mate what the topic means in Mandarin. And after everything was made clear, we did half of it together and I went home to complete it myself because we were too busy with our own stuffs so we could not meet up to do. As there are only 3 of us in a group, it wasn't easy to complete 2 mind maps due to lesser ideas. I felt that this exercise allowed our creativity to run wild and relatively easy, the only thing difficult for me was the contribution part from every member because of different schedules.

#3 | Three Artist That Broke The Rules.

In my opinion, every artist have their own unique way of expressing themselves through art. But all of them share something in common, which is their passion for art. I don't know of much artists so I did quite a bit of research, so here are my "3 Artist That Broke The Rules".

#1. Vincent Van Gogh

Van Gogh was a self taught artist. He is known for his bold and dramatic brush strokes which he used to express himself. His bold palette is definitely the reason why even up till now, he is consider as one of the best artist. One of my favourite work of his is definitely "Starry Night". I even tried to do it when I was in Primary School. The technique that actually attracted me the most was the brush strokes because he did not do blending. 
Fun fact: My O' Level course work's artist reference was him because I was very attracted to his "Starry Night" ever since I knew about it and so I used the swirls for my background.






#2. Boerhanoedin Affandi Koesoema

Affandi was also a self taught artist just like Van Gogh. He was regarded as the Indonesian Van Gogh due to his similar techniques used, like his layering of paint, bold colours and brush strokes. He was always known for squeezing paint directly out of the tube and using his hands instead of paint brushes because he felt more freedom to express his feelings this way. I also did tried to do one of his works as my assignment and even when to his museum at Yogyakarta last year. I was very inspired by him because of how different his works are from other artists as it is more abstract. Below are a few of my favourite works by him.






#3. Pierre Bonnard

Like I said, I do not know much artists so I got to know about Pierre Bonard when I was researching for my IVA homework. He is recognised for his unique use of colour and his complex imagery. Unlike other artist, Bonnard did not paint from life. He drew his subject, sometimes photographing it and take notes on the colours. He then goes home, go through his notes and start to reflect and imagine. Like what Jed Perl said, his works are a combination of visual taste, psychological insight and poetic feeling which is why I'm in love with his paintings.

#2 | 100 Ways.

This week's homework is to think of 100 ways to do different things. I felt that this task was pretty good as it allows us to really think and get creative. Everyone in the group would come up with different ways and from there, it made me understand that everyone's has their own way of thinking. I can think of a way that completely did not cross their mind and vice versa. I also think that having group projects are great as we get to interact more with our classmates since we're still not very close with each other. I hope we get to do more of group projects with different classmates so we can get to understand and learn more from different classmates coming from different family background, having different interest etc.

#1 | The Journey.

Woke up to the sound of the rain hitting against my window. I had only 3 hours of sleep so I was pretty reluctant to leave my comfy bed but I still had to.
Grabbed my cardigan and headed out to meet my friend. The second I stepped out of my house, the cold wind immediately got me shivering even though I had my cardigan on.






I had shelter all the way to the bus stop but it still did not keep me dry. Hold on to the handrail to prevent me from slipping. It cold and obviously wet. Wet and cold limbs on the bus, brrr.
But then, rainy days are also great. The smell of the rain, the loudness of the rain splattering on the ground that drowns the surrounding noises, the busy street now becomes empty and the hot chocolate that warms you up.





And..... my friend got injured during the game. Getting hurt during competitions or practice is actually pretty normal for someone that play sports.
After her match, we went straight down to Hougang Mall for lunch at Ichiban Sushi because we could literally hear our tummy growling. On the way there, we almost got knocked down by a motorcycle. The loud honk and the tires screeching, it was crazy.
Alright, back to lunch. I don't know if it's because we're super hungry or their food is just simply good. They smelt and tasted great anyway!













Was so tempted to get fruits because honestly, I was attracted to the colours. Colourful fruits! Who wouldn't love this sight?! But I had to pass because of the real fulfilling meal I had.
Headed back to Hougang Sports Hall to watch the guy's matches because it's more exciting than the women's, obviously... You could literally hear the smacking sound produced by the contact of the hand and the ball. And look at the how high they're able to jump.










Alright, this pretty much sums up my Sunday. They have matches every Sunday and some times Saturday till end of August I think, because it's the open cup season. See you there next Sunday if you're heading down. (;