See Part 1 where we noticed details in the painting here.
Welcome back and thanks for joining me again.
So far, weāve noticed a bunch of details about the painting.
Overall, we want to get a good understanding of the work, and practice looking at one artwork closely so that weāre ready to take on the museum.
The next step in advancing towards those goals is to figure out how the artwork makes you feel.
Weāll then take what we noticed and think about how the artist used those details to make us feel what we do.
Step 2 - How does the artwork make you feel?
Take a minute and see what feelings this work brings up in you.
I know this is very open-ended and hard for many, so try to be satisfied with anything that comes to mind. It takes practice to build your connection with art.
If youāre struggling, start from figuring out if the work makes you feel positive or negative. Does it feel happy or sad?
And then go from there to more complex emotions. Does it feel celebratory or stressful?
Join me back here after youāve looked for a minute, no matter what you came up with, and Iāll share what I thought!
Sharing our feelings
Everybody has different experiences with an artwork.
Iād love if you reply with what you felt. Iām really curious, whether itās the same or different, and will share some of the replies in another edition.
This painting made me feel a sense of urgency, like we needed to get something done very quickly.
I looked at some of the details we noticed before to try to see why I might feel that way.
Tying the details to the feelings
I find myself looking first at the guy on the left every time I look at the work.
His tired eyes and wrinkles make me feel a lot of empathy for him, and make me feel like heād be someone whose looking to get something done quickly.
The boxes are stacked a bit unsteadilyā one of them on the right seems like it could be falling down.
The transparent bubbles are also very precarious.
The Amazon āsmileā logo points many different directionsā the one on the left is upward, but the ones on the right are frowns and sideways, which feels a bit chaotic.
The packing tape has diagonal lines going in all different directions, disrupting the repeated, orderly vertical and horizontal linesĀ of the boxes, adding to the sense of chaos.
The box between the two men is being held up in an unstable way. The guy on the left is holding it up and the guy on the right is pushing his body weight against it to keep it up. This looks like a position that would be hard to sustain and one youād want to end soon.
The boxcutter with the open blade on top of the box makes this even more chaotic and urgent. If the box fell, one of them would likely get cut.
There are so many more details in here, I just know you all have interesting thoughts to share. I canāt wait to read them!
On Wednesday, weāll discuss the artistās background and the exhibition where this was shown.
This should give us the final puzzle pieces to feel like weāve really grasped the work.
Until next time!