Katie Hoyle Final Reflective Essay Page 1 of 7

Final Reflective Essay

This semester has definitely changed my view of art in a very drastic way. I never knew

how to respond to art or how to correctly understand the messages that art portrays. Also, I

learned how things I never thought could be art were actually art. Over the first couple of classes,

we really learned the basics of art, and then were able to go out and experience art for ourselves.

In class, we talked about how art is used to show expression of someone’s emotions or a way for

artists to connect with their audience. In our first reading, “What are the Arts and How do We

Respond to and Evaluate Them?,” I came to realize there were a lot of different forms of art. In

this reading it explained how art could be put into three subcategories such as: visual arts,

performing arts, or architecture. (Sporre, Page 6). Sporre then went on to describe types of each

of the arts, which helped me understand better. I started building my understanding of art while

in class and then was able to expand it when actually seeing the art right in front of me. It took

me a while to decide what exactly would be my definition of art. To me art is anything that can

be seen by others that portrays a certain message. Now even though I say it can be anything there

are still certain specifications. The art needs to actually be able to display some type of message

to an audience. An example of what I mean is that it cannot be like the couple of street artists in

the Exit Through the Gift Shop movie. Some of the artists just wrote things on the side of the

wall and thought that could be considered art. When you look at the other artists from the movie

you see that their pieces mean something and people can take something from them. Art can be

shown in a numerous amount of ways, so there is a wide array of pieces that could be created.

Everyone could create art or even be considered art, because we are all created in a unique way,

and no two people are exactly alike.

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Art plays a very big role in culture and society. I think art highly affects culture and the

way people perceive things. Artists are allowed to create a large variety of pieces which allow

them to display any message they want. Artistic pieces could be descriptive, persuasive, or just

responding to something going on in the world. I feel that art controls the way certain things go.

When there are protests on the war or bad things going on in the country, art is made to persuade

people to think a certain way. Modern art is slowly growing, and I feel that our culture is only

going to continue to grow when it comes to focusing on art and how it affects us.

All of the museums had some kind of different aspect to them, and they were all trying to

display different themes. A couple of my favorite ones were the McColl Center and the Harvey

B. Gantt Center. This was because I am in a Civil Rights class right now and all of the things I

am learning in there coincide with what I saw there. Art can be a voice for many different issues.

Race is a large problem that I support because I do not like racism. Since I enjoy that subject so

much, there were a couple of pieces from two different museums that displayed this. First was

the piece of Mammie by Dred Scott which is found in the McColl Center. I picked this piece,

because it depicted a voice against racial issues. There was a quote included on the picture that

said, “If white people didn’t invent air, what would we breathe?” I feel that Dred Scott created

this picture to show people that racism is a big problem, and we need to start fighting against it.

The next piece I chose dealt with race too. This piece was also by Dred Scott. Dred Scott was

holding a sign in front of him that said, “I AM NOT A MAN.” From this picture I felt that Scott

was trying to show the American population that people should not be classified a certain way,

and we should all be looked at as equal. The next piece of art came from the Harvey B. Gantt

center, and was a picture of a white and colored sign. This sign was a very simple sign but it also

gave voice to racial issues, because it was a sign from times where segregation was okay. The

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word white was on one side and the word colored was on the other. This shows how people think

one race is superior to the other which is not acceptable. The last piece actually creates the voice

from the gender issue. Back in the day women were seen as less superior and nothing they did

was equal to men. The picture from the Rowe Art Gallery was called The Industrial Woman. In

this picture a metal plaque was hanging from the neck of a very tattered and hard working

person. When you first look at it you cannot tell that it is a woman, but after looking at it for

longer you are able to see the woman. This picture shows the struggles women face when trying

to be accepted and seen as equals in society. Depicting this woman as a hard worker can show

citizens that no matter what gender or race you are, you can do the same thing as any other

person.

My three favorite written responses were about the McColl Center, the Harvey B. Gantt

Center, and the Exit Through the Gift Shop response. My response to the Harvey B. Gantt Center

was very significant, because it was the first art gallery where I really started appreciating art. I

connected with this museum, because it displayed pieces that really caught my eye. This museum

really connected with the information I had learned in my Civil Rights class. The Gantt Center

allowed me to see how art can affect the way people view the world, and the problems going on.

My next favorite was the McColl Center response, and the reason kind of goes along with the

Gantt center. This one was significant not only because it helped me see pieces that came from

the Civil Rights movement, I also was able to talk to the artists and see their work. I loved being

able to talk to the artists about their pieces, because I was able to get an explanation of what they

were trying to show their audience. My last response that I really enjoyed was the Exit Through

the Gift Shop response. This response was significant, because I had no prior knowledge about

street art, so I was able to learn a lot. It not only was an interesting movie that was easy to write

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about, it allowed me to see the different forms of street art. I now have a greater amount of

knowledge about street art, and I am interested in keeping up with street artists. This response

and movie showed me that street art should not be considered graffiti, because it is just a free

expression of artists. Artists do not put street art up to harm the communities, they want people

to be able to see their work.

Many of the galleries interested me, and made me think about how I would view things in

my life. When thinking of artistic responses for each of the six main museums, I had a little bit of

trouble. I then tried to connect either the types of art I saw to my life, or thought about how the

different aesthetic qualities I saw affected the way I saw things. My artistic responses were either

pictures that I have taken or something I created. For the Rowe gallery I really enjoyed the way

the lighting was and how it illuminated the features of the pieces. I chose a mountain picture I

took over fall break, because the sun made the mountains look so beautiful you would have

thought the picture was professionally taken. The next gallery I looked at was the Light Factory.

I made a collage of pictures of me and my best friend Shakia who passed away in March. In my

response for the factory, I chose a piece called April that when looking at the aesthetic qualities

you could tell she was distraught and upset. By looking at my collage, you can tell that I miss her

a lot and you would not have known that just by looking at me. The pieces in the McColl center

were all working towards equality and proving that people should be against racism. Since this is

what the art was trying to prove, I decided to make a collage that contained different races,

because honestly we are all the same and should not judge anyone. The Harvey B. Gantt center

also worked to prove that people should not be racist, and that there are many people that should

be remembered for their work during the time of the Civil Rights Movement. The Kinseys

included a quote at the entrance of part of their exhibit that I thoroughly enjoyed. Since this

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quote moved me so much, I decided to look up more quotes that went against racism and put

some of my favorites on a sheet together. Even though I used a free pass on the Bechtler, I still

did an artistic response. Since the museum contained many pieces of modern art I used a picture

of my grandmother trying to do a peace sign. I felt that this connected with the museum, because

the peace sign has been a trend in the world for a while and a lot of people have become

consumed by it. The last museum I did an artistic response for was the Mint. At the Mint we

went through the exhibit called the World’s Fair. In this exhibit, we saw a bunch of historical

things, so I decided to use the picture of the flag that covered the entire field from the first

UNCC football game. This is an event that will go down in the school’s history, and I feel

privileged to be able to be a part of this event. I am not the most artistic person, but having to do

artistic responses definitely got me thinking a lot about art.

My ability to understand art has grown drastically. At first, I would just look at art and

then turn right away. I never knew what to look for in a piece of art, so I never understood what

the artist was trying to display. Now after learning about different aesthetic qualities, I am able to

look at a piece of art and figure out what the artist is really trying to convey. Looking back on

my responses, I could tell that I was able to not only understand the pieces of art, I was able to

connect them on a personal level. Also, when I first started this class I knew that I did not enjoy

art so I was kind of dreading the class. That all changed after I started learning more about art,

and actually going to galleries to see art. I had never really been to art galleries before, because I

never was interested, now I find myself wanting to go to more galleries. I love not only looking

at art now, but also learning more about it. When I have taken art classes before, we never

looked at art to the depth we did in this class. Learning about all the different art movements was

interesting to me as well because I never realized how important art was in earlier years.

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The time I most connected with art was when I went to the McColl Center. Going

through the museum, I fell in love with Dred Scott’s pieces. His pieces are so surreal and made

me realize that I knew a lot more about the time of the Civil Rights then I thought. Before talking

to Dred Scott himself, I looked at a couple of pieces. After looking at the pieces, we were able to

talk to him and seeing how passionate he was about his work made me love it even more. He

took a different approach to the way he made his art which fascinated me. He made videos,

strings of pictures, and simple photographs that contained messages that were very life changing.

He made you look at things in a completely different way that you would think would not make

sense, but they made a huge impact on the world and reality. I picked out my two favorite pieces

from Scott, but all of his pieces affected me in a unique way.

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Cites Page

Sporre, Dennis J. What Are the Arts and How Do We Respond to and Evaluate Them? N.p.:

Pearson Education Inc, 2009. PDF