symmetry, economy, flatness, transparency, intricacy, stasis



economy, unity, depth, asymmetry, irregularity, simplicity, activity

The most obvious similarities between these two pictures are their transparency and randomness - not only by how the subject matter is interpreted but also by the imagery itself.  While the second image has a colored background, both images mostly use black and white basic lines to show some depth and distance but are mostly two dimensional.  The biggest difference can be seen between the stasis of the top image and the activity present in the lower image.  The top image shows no signs of movement in the main image itself and its lack of a background makes it unclear whether the subject of the image is moving or not.  In the lower image, however, movement can clearly be seen.  It is most obvious with the stein in the driver's hand which is overflowing as it is being rocked forward.  While we cannot see the subject moving in relation to anything behind it, we can still tell that it is moving.

Contrast:

When people build cars from the 'ground up' it is more than just a figure of speech.  The fact is, most builds really do start with the wheels, tires, and stance as a foundation for the final look of a car.  In the case of this 1933 Ford, Divco high-clearance 18" wheels were chosen and wrapped in Excelsior tires.  While the wheels are the same diameter front and rear, the tires in the back are considerably taller in order rake the coupe's stance forward.  These contrasting sizes are used to angle the entire chassis to match the chop and channel of the body.  Additionally, the wheels are taller than the stock wheels which adds to the aggressiveness of the stance for anybody that is familiar with the car's stock wire wheels.




When I think of bad wheel and tire combinations on cars, images like this haunt my dreams.  What makes this car stand out is the contrast of what we expect versus what we see.  While we have seen cars like this Oldsmobile on wire wheels before, it is the gigantic size of these wheels that make this car really stand out to us.  For this example, it is the contrast of what we see versus what we expect that really makes the car stand out to us.

A bit over a decade ago the 'rat rod' movement was started in the hot rod community and it as been the scourge of the traditionalists ever since.

Above is a beautifully built, traditional hot rod.  It was built by Vern Tardel for Ryan Cochran of the HAMB - both of which have literally written books on how to build a traditional hot rod.  What makes this car really work well is the the perception of its balance, grouping, and use of positive and negative space.  From the 3/4 view it is easy to see that the vertical line is consistent from the front to back and all of the lines line up parallel.  It starts with the back of the grill shell lining up with the cowl, A and B pillars, and even the seems of the doors.  This consistent grouping allows the car to be seen in its entirety instead of your eyes focusing on one aspect in particular.  The headers hang below the car and leave a gap between them and the ground that is equal to the height of the windows between the chopped top and the belt line.  This allows for a sense of horizontal balance.  Finally, the use of contrasting colors between matte black and chrome allows the car to be broken up a bit and not too boring while still maintaining a central idea and theme.

The car above is considered to be a 'rat rod'.  While they have gained a large following, usually with amateur and budget-oriented builders, most professionals have a deep seated loathing for them.  For starters, the complete lack of balance and grouping causes an undue about of stress to the viewer.  No two parts of the car have any common lines to tie them together.  The body and grill both have curves, but the curves have completely different radiuses and are mounted at different angles.  While there are no flat panels anywhere on the car, the frame juts out from an arbitrary point on the front of the body and runs totally flat to the front of the car.  The frame is a rectangle framed by the curved firewall, curved grill shell, and rounded headlights.  Furthermore, it does not even line up parallel with the ground.  The car is also disproportionately balanced towards the front, giving is a sluggish and offset look.  This is the result of jamming as much as possible into the engine compartment and leaving nothing behind the car except for the tires and axle.

Both of these paintings are by the artist Keith Weesner.  He is a current artist who specializes in hot rod and pinup style paintings.


This painting implies motion by using the jet trails behind the 'space ship'.  The trails not only show motion, but additionally show the path that she took in order to get where she is pictured, centered in the frame.  The trails get smaller on the way back to behind the building showing that a distance has been traveled and that she has come closer to the frame than where she originally began.  The spaceship/ car she has is also canted at an angle as she continues to go around a turn.  This banking angle implies that she is going at enough of a speed that her car is tilted as the result of it's momentum.


This painting essentially has eight different moving object each moving independently in the frame.  Centered in the painting is the flag-girl leaping from the ground.  The small distance between where her foot ends and her shadow begins implies that she is off of the ground and basic rules of gravity imply the movement involved in doing so.  At the front of the image is a roadster sliding out around a turn.  Though his car is in focus, his wheels are tires are somewhat blurred which makes it looks as though they are spinning.  Behind each tire is dirt and gravel being kicked up in the air from his movement.  Finally, the back of his car is kicked out at an angle and his front tires are turned in to compensate around the turn.  This implies that the car is traveling at a high enough rate of speed that he would slide out around the turn.  The cars behind him each have their own clouds of smoke and dust showing that they are maintaining speed with the main focus of the painting.

test 11

test 10

I think that the first puzzle was interesting for us because even though we both read the same directions, we not only interpreted them totally differently but we also both got them wrong.  While James looked at the puzzle, ht was under the impression that not only did they have to be concentric squares, but they would also have to have each corner placed on a dot.  I, on the other hand, did not understand that the squares would have to take place within the plane of the dots, and therefor I just drew my squares big enough that I could fit three of them on the page and still cover all of the dots.  Neither of us got the correct answer, but it was interesting to see how we both interpreted it.

The second puzzle called for use to could how many 'E' shapes we could make out of the area given.  James counted his in a circular pattern in a clockwise fashion, going from biggest to smallest and ended up with 35 (he disagrees, but I am convinced he counted two of them twice).  I on the other hand figured there could only be 4 different sizes of 'E's and once I had figured that out, I went from left to right and top to bottom to count how many times I could fit each size in the image.  Neither of us got the correct answer because we did not take into account the fact that they could be backwards.  This is probably because neither of us saw it as a shape but rather a letter.  Since it was a letter and not a shape, in our minds it could only face one direction.

This image is originally from the 1928-1948 Ford Chassis Manual, otherwise known as the "Green Bible" to early Ford enthusiasts.  These diagrams gained a lot of popularity in the early Victor Page manuals because they were helpful for the view to see and understand the complete assembly of a part of the car from a single image.  In this image, we see the 59AB flathead engine.  From the location of parts in the image and the numbered tags we are able to discern three very key pieces of information.  The first is the part numbers: each part is individually labeled with a number corresponding to the numbers in the parts books.  This is key because it identifies parts visually for people that may not know the factory name for them.  Second is that is shows the parts in the order in which they are assembled.  This is helpful to the builder who is not sure in which order parts need to be assembled.  Lastly, it shows the final, completed product.  By showing one side of the engine 'exploded' and the other side assembled they are able to illustrate what the final product should look like.

This image is a photograph taken for the advertising campaign behind the 1957 Pontiac Thunderbird II Concept Car.  The car was never put into production, but the image evokes an era of automotive design that has been mostly forgotten.

Representational:  The image is of a car built during the time of space-age design when American was at the forefront of design and ingenuity.  The picture shows two young, dapper men taking their (most likely) girlfriends out for a nice drive.  The car is positioned on a runway in order to evoke an even more jet-like feel and approach.  While on one hand this is just a photograph of a car, it was much more than that for proud Americans in 1957 as it represented the future.

Abstraction:  The abstraction is visible not necessarily in the medium used but rather in the car photographed.  While it has four wheels, headlights, a steering wheel, and other basics that allow it to arguably fit our standard definition of an automobile, it has been melded with the design cues of a jet aircraft to make it look like it was delivered out of the future.  The fact is, that this 'car' is more aircraft than car at all.  It is only a car by using an abstract sense of the definition and that was obviously the entire purpose of its design: to link the gap between the automotive age and the space age.

Symbolic:  The styling cues of the car are obviously used in an effort to evoke space age fantasies.  But these are not done through functionality but rather parts and pieces that represent something else to us.  When you view the rear of the car you immediately see a large vertical fin along the back of the trunk as well as taillights on either side designed to mimic jet engines.  The large, glass bubble-top covering the passengers allows its occupants to opportunity to look up and around in space and the sleek design makes it appear ready for take-off.  All of these styling cues are used not in an effort to fool the onlooker into thinking it is an actual spacecraft, but rather to symbolize the signs of the time.  With them, this image is able to show the past as well as the future of automotive design and Pontiac's willingness to adapt to a futuristic world.

I chose this image of a 1927 Ford RPU because its is very obviously a photo-graphical representation of an actual car.  The photographer separated the image from the rest of the background to balance the image and to avoid the observer from being distracted by an unnecessary setting.  In doing this, the viewer is able to notice details of the car which make it obvious that it is an actual car and not a drawing or 3D representation.  The large shadows allow for the size to become apparent so that it is not confused with a small but physical model.  The image is succinct but efficient and expressive.

For my abstraction I chose a painting of a very similar 1929 Ford RPU by Keith Weesner.  The artist has obviously taken the time to include details to make it appear somewhat realistic and life-like, but at the same time has been liberal with his artistic expression in order to make it his own.  The basic dimensions of the car are obviously modified and changed in order to make it appear more sleek and aggressive.  Furthermore, items like the wheels are tires have been painted as more elliptical shapes rather that rounds ones.  The view can still appreciate the fact that it is a tire, but the ellipse gives the viewer the feeling of forward movement.  The almost cartoonish proportions of the rest of the car allow us to see the woman in the passenger seat as more of a character than a person as she as similarly awkward angles and features once she is closely examined.  Although this image would fall short as a technical sketch, it works great as an abstraction because the liberation taken flows throughout the entire image.

 As my symbolic image, I chose to use an image that was created as a thought provoking backlash towards to over-used 'Coexist' bumper stickers.  The coexist bumper stickers had the word spelled out using a multitude of religious symbols.  This allowed the original creator to express the image of coexisting not only through word-play but also through visual cues by showing the view religious signs shown together when they are usually independent of one another.  This artist, in order to mock the original, did the same thing but used emblems from firearm manufactures.  It uses symbolism in three ways to get it's point across.  The first is simply by putting logos that use or resemble letters of the alphabet together in order to make the view see them as a word.  The second, is to assemble it in such a fashion that the viewer sees it and initially recognizes it as the bumper sticker using religious symbols before realizing what has changed.  The third way is just the mere fact that he or she used logos from firearms manufactures to spell out a word like "coexist" creates a certain amount of irony since anybody that recognizes the logos will inevitably know that they brands they represent are not in the business of selling coexistence.