ART 220 · Session 09 of 28 · Part I · Editorial
ART 220 09: Capturing a Drawing
Tuesday, September 22
Mark sheet first: twenty minutes, every mark you own. We scan a few and photograph a few and compare them. Then how to capture a drawing: scanner or phone, resolution, black and white points. Then Corita Kent, the artist of the day: a teacher in Los Angeles who made posters out of words, cut or written by hand, three colors at a time, and printed enough for everyone. Then thumbnails. This is the thinking part of the project. Fold a sheet into eight frames and work through your subject one way at a time: as an object, as a symbol, as a pattern, as words, and then as a scene. One page each. Then take the ones you liked and refine them on a fresh sheet. Saul Bass, Noma Bar, Shigeo Fukuda, Alexander Girard, Corita Kent and Tomer Hanuka show each page done all the way.
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Artist of the day
Corita Kent
1918 to 1986
Posters made of words, cut or written by hand, three colors at a time, printed so everyone could have one. Her Art Department Rules are the rules for today's sprint.
American artist and teacher, a nun at Immaculate Heart College in Los Angeles until 1968. Screenprinted posters where the words are written by hand, cut from the page, or lifted from a supermarket sign, and the writing is the picture: three or four colors, one sheet, made in quantity so anyone could own one. She taught with ten Art Department Rules and sent students out to look at signs. Studied in ART 220 for the words page, for how much a poster can say with lettering alone, and for the screenprint the poster project is set up for.
Look at
The collectionCorita Art Center, Los Angeles
Screenprints from the 1950s to the 1980s, most of them words. Look at how the writing is drawn or cut, never set, and how few colors each one uses.
How to Fight the Power with Joy, a Lesson From Corita KentEye on Design, AIGA
Theo Inglis on her posters, her classroom, and why she chose screenprint: it could, in her words, produce a quantity of original art for those who cannot afford to purchase high-priced art.
Corita Kent: 2016 AIGA MedalistPrint magazine
Callie Budrick's profile. She taught her students to find the novel and beautiful in magazines and supermarket packages, and the clue, as one print says, is in the signs.
Art Department RulesCorita Art Center
The ten rules from her classroom at Immaculate Heart. Rule 8: do not try to create and analyze at the same time. Read them before the thumbnail sprint.
Materials
Reference
- Corita Kent, the collectionThe Corita Art Center. Start in the 1960s.
- Corita Kent, Art Department RulesTen rules from her classroom. Rule 8 is the rule for today.
- How to Fight the Power with Joy, a Lesson From Corita KentEye on Design, AIGA. Theo Inglis on the posters, the classroom, and why screenprint.
- Corita Kent: 2016 AIGA MedalistPrint magazine. Callie Budrick's profile.
- Saul BassThe object page. A whole film as one arm, one body, one spiral.
- Noma BarThe symbol page. One shape and the picture hiding in the space around it.
- Shigeo FukudaThe pattern page. One leg repeated until the gaps are legs too.
- Tomer HanukaThe scene page. Film posters where many things share one idea and one color plan.
Materials
- The mark sheetTwelve boxes, one mark each. Fill it by hand, then scan it at 600 ppi. Print letter size, tall. Keep the scan: these marks become your poster's shading.