Representation Exercise -- 2

This is an exercise in translation. It raises questions about the operations of representation. Your task is to spend some time looking at the human made and human modified world. This observation might take place at home, on the walk to school or work, while sitting on the TTC or in a car or while sitting at a desk in the library. The point is that being in the world affords opportunities to look closely at the built and material environment. The task for you is that in the midst of looking and being open to seeing you are to find an object or structure that captures your attention. Once the object is determined and selected, you are to look very closely at it. You are to translate the process of observation into mental/visual knowledge. You are then to write a description of the thing (for want of a better term). The description must be detailed with the goal being to replicate/capture/account for the tangibility of the object (spatial reality, materiality, decorative aspects and so on). You are permitted to take a single picture of the selected object from the vantage point of your first encounter with it. The task here is to translate the tangible (and photographable) of an object into a textual representation of it. The essay must be five hundred words exactly. A word count must accompany the essay. For the Representation Exercise please describe your object exactly how you see it--basically set it down on your desk and write what you [login to view URL] assignment is an exercise in translation, plain and simple. You are asked to find an object. You are asked to look at it -- take it in i.e. it shapes, tone, coloration, texture and all the other characteristics that register with you -- and then you are to use words to describe it. Tell Alex and I what you see in front of you (the description is based on a single vantage point not a 360° view). This exercise is not a test of your drawing skills insofar as you should at the outset identify the object. The goal is to use words to render a tangible object as text.