Month: November 2018

Art Conceptual Understandings

by sohan75105@gapps.uwcsea.edu.sg

The Arts allows us to gain a deeper understanding of other people’s interpretations and perceptions of the world and it’s events in a way that Maths and Science would never be able to.

Believe that all 3 of these subjects serve distinct separate purposes where Art is to entertain, shock and generally both display and invoke emotions, Maths is to make sense of the world around us intern of numbers whereas Science is to explore and understand everything we see in our lives and everything we don’t. This is not to say that the areas don’t overlap; one can easily find beauty in Science and Maths especially as it studies the natural world something which the majority of people find beautiful, however, Art doesn’t have to be beautiful or pleasant at times it displays the artist’s emotions and anguish through it not being visually appealing in the standard ways a startling representation of the realities of war and brutality such as Guernica would never occur when researching Science or Maths, unlike the simple beauty of a flower or a starry night sky.

What Scientist or Mathematicians study may be directly linked to current events, for example, chemical weapons or artillery during a war and Mathematicians may be dedication gather time to breaking down the enemies code, but other than the general if they are developing or combatting these aspects they must be pro-war or defending their country there is no interpretation or perception of the world or it’s events involved in the Scientific Method or the meticulous strategy Mathematicians use. In these subjects especially Science they function best when they are devoid of emotion and heavy influence from an individual. Art however or at least what I believe is good Art aims to invoke emotions in their viewer and display the artist or a factions perceptions of reality (Guernica for example if we’re sticking with the war example), filling in the gaps left behind by Science and Maths.

The Arts seek to make us reconsider the motives of and question authority and whether it’s values and ethics coincide with ours (particularly political Art).

This Conceptual Understanding is most relevant to political Art or pieces that aim to showcase the flaws or open people’s eyes to the realities of society as a whole. The purpose of this Art is not too please our eyes and brighten up the living room, its purpose is to shock us, to force us to think or as one of the videos we watched in the class said Art should “ rip away the scar tissue [of everyday life] and make us bleed”. An example I have for one of these pieces is the song Thoughts and Prayers by grandson which is in response to the Florida school shooting specifically and the lack of action taken by politicians and officials after any mass-shooting due to lobbyists and ties to the NRA or as the song says “money is the motive”. Another example of a song that aims to display the flaws and make people think instead of just  typing thoughts and prayers out of habit rather than anything else, and then letting the incident slip from the front of their minds would be This is America by Childish Gambino which is in protest to once again the shootings that have occurred and the racism felt by the African American community.

Through this Art forces us to at least on a subconscious level to consider if what we are being told, the action or lack of being taken or the legislation being passed etc. is really in line with our personal values and beliefs, and therefore can inspire change.

The Arts allows us to experience more of life than we ever would physically be able to without it, through the use of both personal and shared knowledge.

Physically, there are only so many places we can go to, only so many experiences we can have. Socially being born in one race or class generally means we cannot experience the trials and tribulations of other classes or races even if we know about them, Mentally there is only so much we are willing and capable of doing in our lives. All three of thee aspects form our lives and our experiences to some extent and all three of them limit us and our access to everything this world has to offer and our understanding of the people surrounding us. Art, however, can to some extent share the experiences of others, it is one thing to know racism exists it is another to see or get a sense of the emotions experienced by those who face these issues. For example A Tale of Two Hoodies by Michael D’Antuono. This experience not only broadens our horizons as individuals but helps foster change as it is a lot easier to understand others problems when you can follow their thought process and what has brought them to this point which is impossible with nothing but cold hard facts.

 

Nature of Mathematical Knowledge

by sohan75105@gapps.uwcsea.edu.sg

Within mathematics the concepts of true and certain are no longer synonyms, well carried out Maths without errors following all the rules or axioms that we have learnt and implemented would be 100% certain but does that make it true? You can be certain of your answer and can trace back the steps you followed to arrive at it and be absolutely certain that your answer is well certain but your answer being true is a completely separate concept.

 

All of Maths stems from axioms which are the ‘rules’ or ‘laws’ of Maths and all of our axioms make sense in the real world or at least on the plane they are supposed to serve their purpose; we can all go and test and see for ourselves that the rule ab=c means c/b=a we can be certain that this rule is accurate but does that mean it is true? Another concept we are all familiar with is the triangle; 3 straight sides, meeting at 3 vertices with all its interior angles adding up to 180 degrees, we now know that is wrong or at least wrong when you draw the triangle onto a sphere then the angles can add up to 270 degrees and other numbers that are a far cry from the 180 we grew up hearing. Yet the idea of 180 degrees is one we still use and apply and it has still brought us to many new formulae and concepts that we can prove our accurate and certain, which leaves the question how can something false yield provable accurate formulas for our reality, and if the base axiom is false isn’t everything derived from it also false?

 

Well no, for all our purposes as long as the triangle remains on a 2D plane it’s angles will add up to approximately 180 degrees and we can use other axioms to explain why for example the parallel lines which by following the axioms of corresponding angles and how angles in a straight line add up to 180 degrees we can easily prove this and it serves our purposes. This relates back to the concepts of truth and certainty within Maths we can be certain of our answers but whether they are true or not rests on the truth of the axioms we used to derive the answer. This sounds simple enough as long as we make sure our axioms are true then all our Maths will be true, but proving the truth of an axiom is incredibly difficult. For years and years, the belief of angles in a triangle adding up to 180 was absolute until Euclides (?) thought to put them on a sphere thus disproving the theory. Perhaps all of our axioms can be proven false in ways we simply haven’t devised yet but for now, they serve our purposes and have given us certain answers and concepts.

Kahaani – First Rehearsal

by sohan75105@gapps.uwcsea.edu.sg

After such an enjoyable experience with Culturama and the sense of togetherness and achievement that comes alongside I have decided to partake in Kahaani again (last year’s performance having been one of the highlights of my time here at UWC). Kahaani, which means story in Hindi, is an annual dance show run, organised and performed by students in support for Kolkata GC (which I am a member of) and Voice of World (the organisation my GC supports), it’s purpose is to help break down the stigma surrounding disabilities and the disabled as well as raising awareness to Voice of World’s cause.

I am by no means a dancer which oddly enough translates to me enjoying these school-wide dance performances, there is a unique form of achievement and confidence that arises after dancing in front of hundreds of people, especially when you are someone who struggles to dance in front of 5. I have found myself counting down the days till these performances which were a pleasant change from the nerves that began my first Kahaani performance last year. A particularly rewarding part of being in a dance performance and not being a “dancer” is the support I can draw from my fellow performers many of whom are in the same situation as me, the sense of ‘we’re all in this together’ and the sheer openness and friendliness has allowed me to craft some friendships that have lasted long after Kahaani and Culturama, and I can’t wait to experience that again.

Art As A Reality Check

by sohan75105@gapps.uwcsea.edu.sg

An art piece that has acted as a reality check of sorts for me is a song called Thoughts & Prayers by the artist grandson, it was written in response to the recent mass shootings throughout the United States specifically the Stoneman Douglas High shooting earlier this year. It is commonplace to post a variation of the phrase thoughts and prayers across social media after an incident such as this one, which in principle is an appropriate response however nowadays it seems to have become an alternative to actually discussing, combatting or taking action in any way, shape or form against this issue. This song shares the sentiment that although people saying thoughts and prayers is a nice gesture it is simply that, an empty gesture with no effect positive or negative or the events or as the chorus says; no thoughts, no prayers
can bring back what’s no longer there. This serves as a call of action of sorts as the singer also goes into detail about the corruption and how some politicians are more motivated by the money paid to them by the NRA (National Rifles Association) than protecting the lives of future victims of mass shootings.

I find this song particularly jarring as it opens with a chorus of children singing the chorus almost as a nursery of sorts, which to me highlights the fact that so many children have fallen victim to these shooting both directly and indirectly (through losing loved ones). The song also references a children’s lullaby ring a ring a roses with the line “ashes to ashes we all fall down”.This nursery rhyme on its own is rather morbid as it references the plague and the humongous death toll it had, and its use in this song, specifically the line about everybody dying, only furthers this.