Nerf Guns & Mud Fights!

My daily walks to and from class puts me behind the HUB around 3 times a day. Behind the HUB there’s a crude backdrop of the shell building, a work in progress. Other than this there is a luscious green field that many of the Penn State’s students enjoy after class or in between classes. Students can be seen lounging on the grass catching some rays, conversing with friends, eating a quick meal, or (most importantly) studying. But the most interesting things usually occur around 4-6 in the evening after most classes are over. Thursday evening of last week I saw about eight people running around bare foot, wearing t-shirts, and shorts slinging mud at each other! As if this wasn’t odd enough, just yesterday as I was walking back from dinner I saw around 40 people wearing orange and green bandanas carrying nerf guns! Unfortunately I didn’t stick around long enough to see the end result of what appeared to be a nerf gun war for the ages. But some more normal events that usually occur are people throwing around a Frisbee, football, or going for a run. Next time you walk behind the HUB take a few seconds to look around and notice all of the little oddities that happen on our campus because you never know what you might stumble upon!

The Hidden Picture (Journal 2)

Martin Lewis

Passing Storm (1919)

Mezzotint

            As I wandered around through the Palmer Museum of Art I observed all the different pieces of artwork that lined the walls but none of them particularly jumped out at me. As I was about to leave I spotted a “dresser” containing even more works of art within its drawers. These works were almost hidden because, who honestly puts pictures in drawers? But inside was, what looks to be a painting, called Passing Storm and as soon as I saw it I knew that this picture was the one I wanted to write about.  This particular work was done by a Mr. Martin Lewis in 1919 in a style known as mezzotint. After looking at the way this work was created I wondered what mezzotint was because it looked like a simple drawling or painting, but it was not a drawling at all. Mezzotint is when an artist etches an image onto a copper plate and then wipes the plate with ink. The darker parts of the image contain deeper grooves in which the artist filled with ink while the lighter parts have less ink or no ink at all. The image is then printed onto a surface and the “drawing” in born.

This image depicts a storm over what looks like an early 1900’s industrial city near the water. My first thought when I saw this paint was that this city looks like New York City from a boat or dock on the Hudson River! The main colors used in this work are gray, white, and black depending on the amount of ink used. The grays and blacks help to better depict dark and stormy weather, while the white helps to bring a lighter more airy feel to the work. The white is used to show the foaming of the water below but also in the top left cornering showing that the sun is coming right behind the storm as it passes over. The whites used in this image also show the brightness from the lightning and also what looks like birds flying through the storm. The darker grays and blacks show the shadows that the clouds are casting over the water and onto the buildings in the background. There are even shadows on different parts of the water that show the position of the clouds. As the storm moves eastward the buildings on the far left are brighter and less dark. There are also two boats that seem to be weathering the storm the boat on the right is quite bright possibly because it was closer to the artist, while the boat on the left is dark and covered in shadow.

There does not appear to be any significant historical scene depicted in this image other than a common storm churning up the waters of this body of water and bringing rain. Simply put, I think Martin Lewis found inspiration in nature’s wrath and the “new world” of technology and modern cities so he found this scene to be quite rousing. When I look at this piece I see a developing city that still must deal with the natural world because you can never avoid nature. I feel as though in today’s world people see nature as more of a bother than as the beautiful entity that it is. In today’s world nature is overlooked and Martin Lewis may have been attempting to hint at this even early on in the “technological revolution.” I do not think that this painting is not trying to persuade the onlooker into believing anything, but it is there to remind them of the balance between technology and nature.

After researching more about Martin Lewis I found that he often depicted scenes in New York City because by 1905 he actually lived in there. So the scene that is shown in this piece of art is most likely the Hudson River and an early New York City skyline. Martin Lewis also used mezzotint in other works of art so this was not his only attempt at it.

After seeing the entire museum for the first time, I would definitely go back even though I am not really a fan of museums. I more so enjoyed the more modern art because I felt that I could relate to it more and understand it better but I could also appreciate the older works. I would recommend that everyone should go at least once because it is a small museum so you don’t have to worry about being overwhelmed by all the works and not seeing all of the works. Overall I enjoyed the trip and I think that this was something that every Penn State student should experience at least once.

Citations

"Whatismezzotint." Welcome to Lewis & Clark in Beautiful Portland, Oregon. Web. 05 Sept. 2011. <http://legacy.lclark.edu/~jhart/whatismezzotint.html>.

"Martin Lewis (1881-1962)." The Old Print Shop. Web. 05 Sept. 2011. <http://www.oldprintshop.com/cgi-bin/gallery.pl?action=bio&creator_id=9>.