Discipline.

Systems and Models is the 2nd STEAM course of my senior year. This class focuses on understanding the different ways of thinking with ourselves, within groups, and within organizations. We watched and learned about certain social experiments that would help us get a better understanding about what this class is about. The last unit is called Organization. It focused on people, groups and organizations. For the last action project, we were assigned to think like a organizational consultant and perform a SWOT on GCE. I really enjoy being a student here, so it was sort of difficult looking for flaws. Overall though, I really enjoyed completing this, and I hope you enjoy reading through it.

                                                                                                                      

 

We're Friends With Mexico!

The last unit of my Equality class was called HerStory. This unit focused on possible equality with gender, class, and race. We read articles, watched short videos, and had discussions about feminism, inequality with race and class. For the last action project,we were assigned to predict the future of equality by creating a time capsule 100 years into the future. I decided to focus my project on the issue between the United States and Mexico. Right now, the relationship isn't all that great. Donald Trump is our president, so that explains a lot. In the beginning, it was difficult to pick which civil rights event I would pick. I sat and thought about which event was the most important, but there's no such thing. Every civil rights event is important. But I did choose the topic I know most about, and that's about the relationship between Trump and Mexicans. I hope you enjoy reading below!
 

Are You Lost?

The second STEAM course of my senior year, I'm taking a class called Systems and Models. This class teaches us how to study people from the outside, inside and between. The second unit is called Group. This unit focuses on how people's behavior changes while around other people. For the action project, we had to conduct a social experiment. I worked with a partner and wanted to see how different stores reacted when it came to us wanting help. I hope you enjoy our project!

                                                                                                                    

Remembering 9/11

This is the second Humanities course of my senior year. This course is called Equality, and we discuss issues about inequality. The first unit is named History and during it we discussed the historical background of gender, race, and class. For the action project we were assigned to recount a historical event with some research and a voice. It was really cool to look back at certain events, but it was also hard to choose because they're all super interesting. I eventually chose researching 9/11. I hope you enjoy reading below!

Out With The Old, In With The New.

The second course of my senior STEAM class is called Systems and Models. This class teaches us how to study ourselves, as well as other people and groups.The first unit of this class is called Individual. This unit focused on studying ourselves through psychology. To do this, we looked at a lot of different personality tests, which I talk about a lot in my project. For the action project, we were assigned to take all the information we learned about ourselves, and present it in a artistic way. The art could be whatever we consider art to be. I liked that a lot because many people have different views on what could be considered art, and it's good to have an open mind and see the differences. I enjoyed learning a lot about myself through these different tests, and it was fun to make that into art. I hope you enjoy reading below!

During this class, we were assigned to take a few personality tests to see if they would help us identify ourselves, as well as to see how we handle certain situations. The one that I think best connected with me was the Myers Briggs test. The point of this test was to figure out how I perceive the world and how I make decisions. At the end, my results were INFP. Those letters stand for introversion, intuition, feeling, and perception. Introversion means that I am energized by having some time to myself. Intuition means that I can recognize patterns and possibilities. Feeling means that I take other people’s feelings seriously. Perceiving means that I enjoy freedom and flexibility. All this can also be described as the “mediator”. This made sense to me because people describe me as being reserved, gentle, and understanding. Once I knew all this information, I thought my result for the TKI test, which describes how we handle a conflict, was pretty accurate. The number one word I got was avoider. This means that I shy away from a conflict or that I’d rather not face it at all.

Out with the old, in with the new. (RD). 2017.

The name of my art piece is called "Out with the old, in with the new". I traced out both of my hands with pencil and marker and added details into them with colored pencils and markers. All this was done on regular printer paper. The size is 8.5x11in. The little details included aren’t actually little in my life, but since there’s a lot going on, they had to be a certain size. One hand represents all the things in life that I want and want to pull in. On the other is stuff that I avoid or push away, and don’t want to include in my life. The hand that wants to push things away is colored in darker, while the hand that wants to bring in things is lighter. The things I want to bring in includes peace, kindness, friendships, and adventure. I represented that through hearts, flowers, peace signs, and a lot of green to represent adventure and nature. I also drew tiny stars to represent the very dreamy personality that I have. When it comes to things that I want to push away I include stress, conflict, criticism ,and decisions. I represented that with a lot of question marks because all those things leave me feeling very unsure. I also drew clouds and a thunderstorm that represent all the stress that clumps together and eventually destroys all my inspiration.

Apart from the 2 tests that I talked about earlier, I also took the Enneagram personality test. The result I got for this one was type 4. This is also known as the "Individualist". Some of the words that are used to describe this type include, expressive, dramatic, self-absorbed, and temperamental. It's also known as the sensitive, introspective type. Most of this is pretty accurate. I've always been quiet, and I find myself sometimes stuck in my own head, and constantly daydreaming. Although this happens, I still like to branch out and connect with others. I represented that in my drawing by the leaves that are outside of the fingers. With this result in mind, I also thought that the result that I got from the DISC personality test was accurate. I got C for compliance. Again, this describes people who are a bit more reserved, people who would rather stay behind the scenes of anything, and those who hate pressure. I think it's cool how I can see a connection with all these different tests.

Throughout this class, we watched a few videos that studied certain behaviors. I thought the "Slap her" experiment was super interesting. The young boys knew it was wrong to slap a girl, so they didn't do it. I also really loved it because I also take other people's feelings seriously, and I could never imagine myself hurting someone else.

In order to fully understand the whole process of creating an artist statement, I talked to Hiu, who is an art teacher. I was curious about which elements she considered as the most important. I liked when she talked about how important it is to explain the story behind the art piece. “I also really love when an artist statement gives instructions on how the audience should interact with or view the piece of artwork. This really gives the artist the chance to immerse the audience into their work and not only view the piece, but also to experience it”. That’s what I hope for when people view my artwork.


Work cited:

"Type Four." The Enneagram Institute. The Enneagram Institute., n.d. Web. 18 Jan. 2017

"C for Compliance." Discus Online. N.p., n.d. Web. 22 Jan. 2017.

"Free Personality Test." 16Personalities. N.p., n.d. Web. 22 Jan. 2017.

"The Use and Misuse of an Avoiding Style in Conflict Management." Mediate.com - Find Mediators - World's Leading Mediation Information Site. Mediate.com, Sept. 2006. Web. 22 Jan. 2017.

To, Hiu. Email interview. 18. Jan. 2017

Ocean Beats

I'm taking a class called Radio-Rithmetic. In this class we studied the relationship between math, science, and music. In the second unit, the class went over topics like pitch, frequency, notation,waves, intervals, scales, and many other effects in of music. The FE's for this unit were super fun. We were able to take a tour of a radio station and a recording studio. Both were very helpful to this unit. For the action project, the class was assigned to make a musical collage with existing samples, and see how we could change them with some of the effects we learned about.  I hope you enjoy listening!

This project took some time, especially when it came to picking the right sample songs. I looked at my own playlist to find some inspiration, and it worked. I really like the vocals to Ocean Eyes by Billie Ellish. Her voice is very dreamy, and I knew I wanted to include her voice in my project. I also really like the melody. I did some searching and found a piano cover of it. Even though both samples are from the same song, they sound really different, and I had a lot of fun mixing and playing around with them.



 In the beginning of this piece, I added a little drum beat. The notation is below.

Drum beat notation (RD)

For the interval, I decided to pick the piano piece at the end. It's a long G and B.

Interval (RD)

To make this track a bit more interesting, I added some cool effects. I included a reverse tape sound effect to highlight the differences in the quality of sound. I added a delay on that reverse tape, which means that the same sound is repeated quietly after it’s done playing. And as I stated before, I added my own little drum beat to the beginning, fading into the the first piano solo. I added the wah-wah effect to the first vocals that are featured. The wah-wah effect is when the resonance of musical notes are altered, to extend expressiveness, which makes it sound like a voice saying “wah”. I think the vocals are dreamy, so I added a solo with vocals. I really enjoyed the reverse tape sound effect, so I added that again to fade into the vocal and piano solo towards the end. 

Labeled Piece. (RD)

In this class we discussed consonance and dissonance, which means what does or doesn't sound good together. In the beginning, there was probably a hint of consonance with the drums and piano, but it doesn't sound horrible. The form of this piece is ABCD. It's sort of choppy but it starts off with an instrumental break, and then goes into the first verse. After that verse it cuts off to another verse and then ends with an instrumental. 

Although this project was kind of difficult and time consuming, I had a lot of fun completing it. I enjoyed exploring and learning about the cool effects that can be done to music and sounds. I also had fun mashing some sounds together, and trying to figure out which sounds sounded good with which.

Citations:
"Billie Eilish - Ocean Eyes (Official Music Video)." YouTube. YouTube, 24 Mar. 2016. Web. 15 Dec. 2016.

"Ocean Eyes" by Billie Eilish-easy Piano Arrangement." YouTube. YouTube, 15 Jan. 2016. Web. 15 Dec. 2016.

My Favorite Song :)

For the elective term in my senior year I’m taking a class called Radio-Rithmetic. In this class I’m learning about the relationship between math, science, and music. The first unit focused on rhythm. During this first unit we learned about how music is formed, how it keeps its time, how the beats are notated, and learning about how the Fibonacci Series and Golden Ratio can figure out patterns in music. For the action project the class was assigned to each pick a song and analyze it. I hope you enjoy watching below!