Name Alessia Sanchez

Class period/section 9:00 a.m.

1) Which museum did you visit? (check one) X Univ. of Utah ___ BYU 2) Describe at least one of the permanent collection exhibits on a theme, period, geographic region, or topic) within the museum. {150 words} The permanent exhibit I chose to spend the most time on and liked the most was the Pacific Island Art Exhibit. This exhibit had art from places in the Pacific Islands such as Southwest Pacific Ireland, Southwest Pacific Australia and others in similar regions. The reason I enjoyed this exhibit the most was because it was one of the bigger exhibits and you could definitely tell that the pieces it had belonged to that certain culture. This exhibit had a lot of pieces and sculptures made out of wood and fiber pigments, others were made of reptile skins, overall the art was very tribal. There were a lot of war shields that were from different tribes as well as helmet masks that had carvings on them. Some of the shields were known to protect against evil spirits and some of the masks were used in ceremonies to honor the dead. A lot of the people in the paintings and photographs and other works were wearing tropical or island style clothing, the women had hula skirts on and the men had on tribal skirts. The backgrounds in these paintings were also very tropical and showed a lot of nature, there were a lot of trees, plants, flowers and tribal items. I believe that all of these things showed a lot of their culture and how the area where they live looks like. 3) Give a brief, one paragraph description of a special, temporary exhibit (for help, ask museum staff what these are; they are usually in one of the first rooms). {100 words} The temporary exhibit that I chose to look at more closely was the exhibit called Under Pressure. This exhibit had Contemporary Prints from the Collections of

Jordan D. Schnitzer & his Family Foundation. In my opinion this exhibit had interesting art work that seemed more modern. A lot of the pieces expressed things that the world is dealing with today not only things from the past. There was a mixture of art work, there was not a specific topic that had the main focus. Most of the art works were all made of different materials and you could see a lot of color as soon as you walked into the exhibit. 4) What do you think the museum administration and/or exhibit curators want you to learn or gain from the exhibits you viewed? {100 word minimum} I believe that the museum administration wants me to learn more about different cultures and educate me on history as well. Most of the exhibits focused on a specific region or a specific culture and they all had pieces from the regions they focused on and the artists were from there as well. If you read the information that is given on each piece, which I did, it shows also the background and the history behind each piece. It shows how each art work relates to each culture and how some pieces were used through out time within each specific culture. 5) What kind of information is provided about the works? Where might you look for further information if you were interested? (Name three possibilities) There is a lot of information provided about the works, some of these things are the year the piece was made, the artists name, when he was born and when he died, his background and what might have inspired him to make the piece. It also tells you where the artist was born, where the piece was made and how the piece was purchased or who purchased it. If I wanted to look for more information I could look up the artist or the piece online and I could do some research on either of them. I can also ask the museum staff

and they could possibly give me some further information about the piece, I could also take a tour of the museum and I could definitely get further information there. 6) Choose several works that particularly appealed to you. Explain why you were drawn to these works. Comment on the subject, style, medium, time period, etc. Who were the artists? What message do you think the artists were trying to convey in the works you chose to discuss? This question must be answered in its entirety. {This should be at least 500 words} There were several works that I enjoyed more than others, one of these was a piece created in 1994 called Wigs by Lorena Simpson. The reason I was drawn to this specific piece was because the whole work was about hair or more specifically, wigs. It had different pieces of felt that had wigs painted on to them, the whole thing was black and white but it was a very big and interesting looking piece so it stands out. Under each big piece of felt there was a smaller piece of felt that told the story about each wig that was painted above them. Since some of the wigs were used more than once by different people, I believe that the artist was trying to show that a person can own something like a wig and experience something, they later pass it on to someone else to experience something new but the first experience/ story always stays imprinted on the object which creates a history within it. I really enjoyed this piece and reading all of the stories behind each wig, its interesting to know the journeys that they all went through and everything they experienced. I would have never thought of doing a piece about hair but now I understand the significance behind the whole piece and I believe it was necessary because it conveys a strong message. Another piece I enjoyed was a piece called Horus Coffin with Grain Mummy Effigy. This piece was from Ptolemaic, Egypt, it was made in 305-30 BCE

and it was made out of wood and pigment. The reason this piece stood out to me was because when I think of mummies I usually think of pharos or queens being mummified but never of a baby. The coffin had a colorful eagle carved on it but the colors look worn out as well as the whole coffin itself. The baby was completely wrapped in cloth that looked aged and dark brown, all of these things obviously showed that this piece was extremely old as well as delicate. Under the babys coffin there were some little amulets and scarabs, I read that these amulets would be placed in the linen wrappings because they were believed to protect the person who was mummified. Heart amulets were also used to hold the memories and thoughts of the person within them. From past history lessons I remember learning about mummies and how a person would usually be mummified if the person was very important or very wealthy. This makes me think that this baby must have been very loved and that he must have been very important to everyone in order for him to have been mummified. I really enjoyed this piece because I also got to learn some new things about the egyptian culture and got to see a mummified baby for the first time. Another piece that I liked was a piece called Pretty Lady Figure. This piece was made in the Early Pre- Classic Period, 1500-900 BCE in Mexico, and it was made out of earth weave. The reason this piece stood out to me was because it looked like a deformed, fat or pregnant woman with little arms and little legs and a really big defined head that was made out of mud or clay. It looked kind of tribal to me as well, maybe from the Mayans because she also had gaged ears and she had tribal style paint on her face, and I know that the Mayans used to do that. The

sculpture itself looked very old and worn out and since its small at first I thought that it might have been used as a decorative item, after reading the description I learned that this small sculpture was used for fertility rites. I really liked this sculpture especially reading about it because I had no further information about it other than what I had seen. Its story was very interesting to me and I am glad I got to learn about an ancient Mexican artifact that I did not know existed. 7) How did the artworks you looked at relate to material we have discussed in class? (They do relate in many ways, you just need to look for those relationships). {Minimum of 150 words} A lot of the pieces I saw did relate to materials we have discussed in class. Many pieces focused on religion, they showed some of the gods that we have learned about in class such as Ganesha, the god with the elephant head. I found most of the pieces that dealt with religion in the exhibits that dealt with a specific culture. Other pieces focused on self identity or showed self identity. In some works the artists made certain pieces because they were going through identity or gender issues and that is what inspired them to create the piece in the first place. There were some pieces that had to do with war as well, either the artists had experience war or they expressed their thoughts about war through their art, I saw many pieces dealing with war in the temporary exhibit. I also saw some pieces that had to do with freedom and responsibility, I saw this topic mainly in the temporary exhibit as well. There were pieces that expressed slavery or more specifically having a different skin color and I also saw a piece that had a picture of Martin Luther King Jr. in a coffin. This particular piece I believe was expressing all of the different things that are wrong in this world, and one of them was the death of MLK.

8) What was your personal reaction to this experience? Would you enjoy attending this type of event again? Why or why not? {Minimum 100 words} I really enjoyed this experience, I definitely feel a lot more educated about different cultures, history and the artists. I had never been to an art museum before so I did not think I was going to enjoy it as much as I did. I also liked the fact that we had to do an assignment on this because I think that if I would have ever gone on my own time, I would have not payed as much attention to everything like I did since I had to answer questions on the some of the pieces and exhibits. I will definitely go back to the art museum and I will recommend it to my friends.