It was exciting to shape a YouTube video that introduces the new SOS classroom! In setting out to create this presentation, my first intention was to communicate both the background story of LAUSD school closures and concern for children that fueled the initial creation of the SOS Classroom Project. Using Microsoft PowerPoint, I wanted to capture something of the importance of the SOS website’s focus and rationale in introducing how people can contribute to the site and how kids can easily use it as a Web 2.0 learning resource. Indeed, besides communicating the drama of the story behind the site’s development, my goal was to preview the SOS Classroom’s technology and distinguishing qualities as a learning portal. My goal was to speak to a universal audience of both children and adults.
I strongly felt the presentation should be a kaleidoscope of moods and factual content based upon visuals rather than text. I first wrote my text and then made an album of printed pictures which served as my hard-copy story board in anticipation of posting my content on PowerPoint. I re-wrote the story and arranged the images in a kind of function outline that opened with a “universal statement” to establish the mood, moving on to observations that would serve in getting the audience onto the same emotional page. I began moving the mood through pictures that conveyed sympathy and pathos, moving forward to concern for the problem before formally introducing the site. The text moved on to disclosing information about site’s rationale, making brief statements about distinguishing SOS advantages as well as how the site is being built through on-going postings. The presentation finally moves on to an appeal to kids through animating the Sosie character as a brand image. Ultimately, the PowerPoint moves back to the first “universal statement” frame in a bookend film making technique. Recapping, the PowerPoint starts out as an address to the “world,” speaking to adults and ends by appealing to kids, coming full circle back to the “world.”
I combed the internet for photographs and downloaded music from Germany whose rhythm serves as an engine that drives the pictures forward. It was exciting to put the pieces together, timing the frames and arranging their sequence against the text and beat of the music. As stated, I wanted to tell the SOS Classroom story primarily as a visual display highlighted with sparse but informative text. I wanted to Communicate drama, information, and conclude with cute kid appeal - these were my goals in designing an introduction to the SOS!
Tuesday, August 4, 2009
Making a Difference - The Why: Why We Need the SOS Classroom Project (Paper #4)
From the moment I became involved with contributing to the SOS Classroom Project, the need for such a project gripped my attention. It was clear that the SOS would be a lifeline in offering an alternative solution to the Los Angeles Unified School District’s closure of its summer school classrooms. Being involved in the SOS project with my fellow students has felt like working in an academic ambulance. Our job has been a kind of rescue mission to get this much needed project up and running in time to stem the hardship and pain hemorrhaging from thousands of children who have been shut out of their schools. In many ways, the SOS Classroom Project can’t arrive fast enough.The educational crisis has taken a serious toll in diminishing children’s opportunities to learn, thus diminishing their potential to build a better future. Summer school closure is not only a setback for our children, but a setback for our larger human family. Like the ripple effect of a stone falling in a pond, such an abrogation of delivering educational services fans out to impact the well being of the community as well as the nation.
Children are our greatest resource and our ability to educate them ranks among our greatest humanitarian obligations and achievements. The inability of leaders, educators, parents, and care givers to provide quality educational summer resources to children because of disintegrating budgets has fostered a sense of abandonment, disappointment and frustration among students who are most in need of academic remediation and psychological support. The enormity of the problem of missing summer school is incalculable; missing one summer term for a struggling student likely prevents that child from mastering a crucial subject, preventing him from entering the fall semester on improved academic ground. The most hard hit groups are minority and alien resident students. Yet, the need for supplemental academics touches all classes, races and ethnicities. The summer session is a particularly sensitive and critical session most likely to be attended by the weakest performers in mathematics and language arts. Summer offers remedial students a second chance to re-apply themselves to what was missed in the regular term. Thus, the summer session is critical to failed and barely passing students. Importantly, summer also assists gifted students in moving ahead on the learning track. The failure of the system to provide summer school leaves children without a place or focus of learning and with few resources. The adage, “It is a terrible thing to waste a mind,” would seem to have come to pass in our current educational debacle were it not for the arrival of the SOS Classroom Project to the rescue.
As the SOS Classroom steps forward in its development to salvage our schools, we realize we need this internet classroom because it provides an answer to our most pressing questions: Where can we turn to in order to intellectually aid our children in kindergarten through 8th grade? What resources will provide them with a quality academic experience that is cost effective/free, and convenient to the safety of the home? Moreover, what academic solution will our children be willing to respond to? What will appeal to them to the degree they will be willing to learn and thrive in doing so?
The SOS Classroom answers these questions in being built and organized with Web 2.0 technology. The website is in the process of being established through the combined efforts of University of Southern California professor, Dr. Mark Marino, joined by tech writing students that are assisting his efforts. It is the first web address that uses social bookmarking, such as diigo and del.icio.us, for academic studies. As everyone contributes to reviewing sites, what was once a problem for the greater Los Angeles community becomes solved by the communal effort of the community combing the internet to post quality academic learning sites. These sites offer a sense of fun to academically challenged students, relieving performance anxiety through colorful animated formats and interesting ways to learn. Learning games, music, animations and other exciting features provide a close connection to pleasurable entertainment media. The SOS Classroom is a learning engine built of care, vision, and human resource, that becomes more advanced and improved as we use and build it.
As soon as a hundred fliers were printed announcing the SOS Classroom, they were immediately grabbed up by parents and children in East Los Angeles. Another stack was immediately sent out and I’m printing more. From the enthusiastic reaction on the street to the pilot “Preview” announcement of the SOS Classroom, it seems that the need and desire to make the SOS a reality is very real indeed. Reflecting on the enthusiasm encountered so far for the project, it seems the need for the SOS project goes beyond the failure of the educational system: the need for the SOS Classroom is powered by the basic human need for mental engagement that fuels our desire to learn. Providing a forum that allows kids to process learning information at their own pace and on their own terms is immediately recognized as an ideal situation. The SOS helps kids master mathematics and language arts in an arena that empowers them to get hold of their own academic success through self-directed study. As one kid was reported to have said, “Wow! Very Cool! This is something I can do!”As much as educators vitally contribute and prescribe to the learning process, learning also significantly takes place within the initiative and willingness of students to enlist their own personal challenges and enthusiasms. Personal initiative is something the SOS Classroom capitalizes upon.
The need for the Save Our Summer Classroom extends well beyond summer and is a resource kids can turn to all year long. On the street handing out fliers, feedback from older kids and adults voiced the hope that eventually the site might address the challenges facing high school students in becoming competent in math and English in anticipation of passing the High School Exit Exam. Through the SOS Classroom recommending a menu of sites that best address studies most helpful to High School Exit Exam preparation, the role of SOS as a vital academic resource would be extended. It would prove especially helpful to those who have been unable to pass the exam and have matriculated without a diploma, discovering themselves out of school and severely limited in their job opportunities. Indeed, future students coming to work on building the SOS might want to explore extending the venue of the SOS project to assist this academic hurdle. For future students coming into the project, canvassing opinion and keeping an ear open to feedback is important to keeping the SOS fresh and vital.
The potential for the development of personal pride in working toward self-directed accomplishment in the SOS Classroom is tremendous. Indeed, the SOS Classroom is something kids can do themselves, enjoying the activity and process of learning as much as playing. The more the SOS Classroom empowers children as well as adults to feel a sense of accomplishment and academic improvement, the greater will be the site’s success as a respected resource. Indeed, mathematics and language arts are the cornerstones of the curriculum offered by the website at www.sosclassroom.org,which tags and reviews these must-have, much needed subjects by grade levels. The SOS organizes the web as a great educational portfolio and accessible treasure trove, concentrating on subjects that provide today’s children the needed tools with which to meet tomorrow’s challenges. Most of all, the SOS Classroom places the keys to accomplishment in student’s own hands. The SOS is arriving to the rescue!
Children are our greatest resource and our ability to educate them ranks among our greatest humanitarian obligations and achievements. The inability of leaders, educators, parents, and care givers to provide quality educational summer resources to children because of disintegrating budgets has fostered a sense of abandonment, disappointment and frustration among students who are most in need of academic remediation and psychological support. The enormity of the problem of missing summer school is incalculable; missing one summer term for a struggling student likely prevents that child from mastering a crucial subject, preventing him from entering the fall semester on improved academic ground. The most hard hit groups are minority and alien resident students. Yet, the need for supplemental academics touches all classes, races and ethnicities. The summer session is a particularly sensitive and critical session most likely to be attended by the weakest performers in mathematics and language arts. Summer offers remedial students a second chance to re-apply themselves to what was missed in the regular term. Thus, the summer session is critical to failed and barely passing students. Importantly, summer also assists gifted students in moving ahead on the learning track. The failure of the system to provide summer school leaves children without a place or focus of learning and with few resources. The adage, “It is a terrible thing to waste a mind,” would seem to have come to pass in our current educational debacle were it not for the arrival of the SOS Classroom Project to the rescue.
As the SOS Classroom steps forward in its development to salvage our schools, we realize we need this internet classroom because it provides an answer to our most pressing questions: Where can we turn to in order to intellectually aid our children in kindergarten through 8th grade? What resources will provide them with a quality academic experience that is cost effective/free, and convenient to the safety of the home? Moreover, what academic solution will our children be willing to respond to? What will appeal to them to the degree they will be willing to learn and thrive in doing so?
The SOS Classroom answers these questions in being built and organized with Web 2.0 technology. The website is in the process of being established through the combined efforts of University of Southern California professor, Dr. Mark Marino, joined by tech writing students that are assisting his efforts. It is the first web address that uses social bookmarking, such as diigo and del.icio.us, for academic studies. As everyone contributes to reviewing sites, what was once a problem for the greater Los Angeles community becomes solved by the communal effort of the community combing the internet to post quality academic learning sites. These sites offer a sense of fun to academically challenged students, relieving performance anxiety through colorful animated formats and interesting ways to learn. Learning games, music, animations and other exciting features provide a close connection to pleasurable entertainment media. The SOS Classroom is a learning engine built of care, vision, and human resource, that becomes more advanced and improved as we use and build it.
As soon as a hundred fliers were printed announcing the SOS Classroom, they were immediately grabbed up by parents and children in East Los Angeles. Another stack was immediately sent out and I’m printing more. From the enthusiastic reaction on the street to the pilot “Preview” announcement of the SOS Classroom, it seems that the need and desire to make the SOS a reality is very real indeed. Reflecting on the enthusiasm encountered so far for the project, it seems the need for the SOS project goes beyond the failure of the educational system: the need for the SOS Classroom is powered by the basic human need for mental engagement that fuels our desire to learn. Providing a forum that allows kids to process learning information at their own pace and on their own terms is immediately recognized as an ideal situation. The SOS helps kids master mathematics and language arts in an arena that empowers them to get hold of their own academic success through self-directed study. As one kid was reported to have said, “Wow! Very Cool! This is something I can do!”As much as educators vitally contribute and prescribe to the learning process, learning also significantly takes place within the initiative and willingness of students to enlist their own personal challenges and enthusiasms. Personal initiative is something the SOS Classroom capitalizes upon.
The need for the Save Our Summer Classroom extends well beyond summer and is a resource kids can turn to all year long. On the street handing out fliers, feedback from older kids and adults voiced the hope that eventually the site might address the challenges facing high school students in becoming competent in math and English in anticipation of passing the High School Exit Exam. Through the SOS Classroom recommending a menu of sites that best address studies most helpful to High School Exit Exam preparation, the role of SOS as a vital academic resource would be extended. It would prove especially helpful to those who have been unable to pass the exam and have matriculated without a diploma, discovering themselves out of school and severely limited in their job opportunities. Indeed, future students coming to work on building the SOS might want to explore extending the venue of the SOS project to assist this academic hurdle. For future students coming into the project, canvassing opinion and keeping an ear open to feedback is important to keeping the SOS fresh and vital.
The potential for the development of personal pride in working toward self-directed accomplishment in the SOS Classroom is tremendous. Indeed, the SOS Classroom is something kids can do themselves, enjoying the activity and process of learning as much as playing. The more the SOS Classroom empowers children as well as adults to feel a sense of accomplishment and academic improvement, the greater will be the site’s success as a respected resource. Indeed, mathematics and language arts are the cornerstones of the curriculum offered by the website at www.sosclassroom.org,which tags and reviews these must-have, much needed subjects by grade levels. The SOS organizes the web as a great educational portfolio and accessible treasure trove, concentrating on subjects that provide today’s children the needed tools with which to meet tomorrow’s challenges. Most of all, the SOS Classroom places the keys to accomplishment in student’s own hands. The SOS is arriving to the rescue!
Making a Difference - The How: My Involvement with the SOS Classroom Project (Paper #4, Portfolio)
When Dr. Mark Marino first unveiled the Save Our Summer/SOS Classroom Project around Mid June 2009, our Advanced Writing 340 class became immediately involved with his groundbreaking concept. Unbeknownst to many of us studying at the University of Southern California, we learned from Dr. Marino that the Los Angeles Unified School District had fallen victim to severe budget cuts and was being forced to cancel summer school. It was clear that educational services would cease to be delivered to struggling kids. As we listened to Dr. Marino’s presentation, the scope and impact of the school district’s cutbacks gripped each one of us like witnessing a train wreck. I myself experienced an almost emotional reaction in thinking about kids who would be prevented from accessing their classrooms at key stages of their academic development, especially in grades K through 8 that would affect their future.
Listening to Dr. Marino, I found the SOS Classroom project to be deeply appealing. I could see the whole class coming together to create an academic forum that would reach out to our local community and perhaps even the larger national community to further important educational goals. The project wouldn’t be about one person; from the outset the SOS Classroom was clear about bringing multiple talents and ideas together to shape a significant resource. Right from the beginning, the SOS Project possessed the potential to address more than just summer school. It seemed to be a larger project with the potential to be helpful to different kinds of students in different locales at different times of the year through the creation of a website where students can access a wealth of academic resources at www.sosclassroom.org. I was immediately excited that the project would use cutting-edge Web 2.0 technology in ways that hadn’t been utilized before. The project would create an educational locus with unique social bookmarking tools like Diigo and del.icio.us, giving students an opportunity to explore the capabilities of these new technological tools in academia.
Enthused, I immediately went to work in preparing to interface with LAUSD schools as school liaison. My goal was to obtain a list of principals’ emails in anticipation of getting the word out about the SOS site. In a very real sense, the school liaison position seemed to complement my ongoing appointment as a congressional intern, where I’ve assisted the Director of Homeland Security. From my congressional office experience, I’ve witnessed how first impressions and phone contacts can affect future dealings with institutions.
I went to work creating a phone log and daily activity journal in the same manner that I conduct work for the Congressman’s offices. Keeping track of phone calls, conversations and progress, I called the LAUSD Superintendent’s offices and found a warm reception to my description of the SOS project. In that conversation, I enquired about getting principals’ emails but was denied this information by the LAUSD staff who declared the list off-limits. I followed up with literature and promise of a future contact. Nevertheless, conversations describing the SOS Classroom project went well and I gained the telephone numbers of key LAUSD administrators.
The feedback I gained in searching out emails for the SOS project generated positive enthusiasm for the project. I spent significant hours canvassing and compiling a call list from my personal and professional contacts to find access to emails. At the point I made my calls, the final materials of the SOS project and the website were still under development per the Daily Diigo updates. As of the July 22nd update that was posted on Google Docs, we’re awaiting the announcement of the official press release upon which to act. Extremely enthused about people’s responses to Save Our Summer and at the request of some business owners and professionals, I went ahead and printed a hundred of the preliminary cartoon logo announcements that feature the SOS web address that are being distributed within the Chicano community.
From phone numbers and further enquiries, I discovered hubs of authority within the LAUSD that could get the word out to schools. I compiled this list after making a number of long distance phone calls that enabled me to put together this list as well as a roster of schools’ emails that could be accessed on a per school basis. Some schools offered individual message boards to principals but no direct email addresses. However, other schools did not offer the message board feature on their sites which I observed in more than a hundred locations. I put together a list of schools and remain ready to individually paste in emails to principals where message boards are available. Working with Taylor Randall, my school liaison colleague, we’ve kept each other updated on progress and have kept in contact with Liz Warden and Matt Schrader who continue to spearhead the PR effort.
In continuing a deeper search for principals’ emails, I contacted prominent educators and discovered that the Orange County School District is more open about providing access to principals and the dissemination of information. However, my assignment was within the LAUSD and in this forum, I constructed my list as thoroughly as was possible from my limited access to information. Undaunted, I continued my enquiries, but came to the conclusion on legal advice that any emails I found other than those obtained on authority from the LAUSD would be considered an invasion of privacy and a matter for legal action. Nevertheless, I’ve continued to work independently on the SOS project.
From my combined experiences interfacing with schools and making connections, I’ve written a report that contains some positive suggestions that would help conduct school liaison activities. Independent from my updates, the report is a draft of some my creative recommendations for the SOS project that take it beyond its present purview. I would be delighted to submit this paper for consideration if asked to do so.
Above all, I’ve wanted to continue the positive excitement of the SOS vision. I combed the web in order to post quality sites for students to log onto within the SOS classroom. I found Math Forum at mathforum.org offering tips on math that would be useful to students studying at various levels of mathematics. I also selected the teaching and English language learning portal Waylink English, that links to the United Kingdom. Through the SOS classroom, right at children’s fingertips at their computer, worldwide educational resources can become available in an expanded learning environment. In support of SOS content, I’m continuing to post academic sites and will continue to do so after the class concludes.
Building on excitement in getting the word out, as an artist I’ve responded to the “DreamList” posted on the Save Our Summer update that appeared on Google Docs. I’ve made progress in constructing some prototype models I’m donating to the project that are necessary to the eventual process of obtaining bids from production companies. I’m excited about how the SOS lunch box and Sosie doll are coming together in newconcept designs. I’ve also redesigned a children’s SOS t-shirt which has just been delivered from manufacturing and I’m delighted to announce the adult t-shirt as well as the large poster are complete. Hopefully, these promotional items will be helpful to the commercial end of the project in anticipation of a developing market.
I’m also excited about the promotional presentation I’ve worked on to get the word out on SOS! I’ve put the finishing touches on a PowerPoint video telling the story of SOS, and I’ve posted it on YouTube. I enjoyed writing the script, finding the music and putting the pictures together.
In conclusion, the SOS classroom project is an innovative milestone of tremendous excitement and consequence. We’re working together as a group on the SOS, and I believe the project is creatively moving forward!
Listening to Dr. Marino, I found the SOS Classroom project to be deeply appealing. I could see the whole class coming together to create an academic forum that would reach out to our local community and perhaps even the larger national community to further important educational goals. The project wouldn’t be about one person; from the outset the SOS Classroom was clear about bringing multiple talents and ideas together to shape a significant resource. Right from the beginning, the SOS Project possessed the potential to address more than just summer school. It seemed to be a larger project with the potential to be helpful to different kinds of students in different locales at different times of the year through the creation of a website where students can access a wealth of academic resources at www.sosclassroom.org. I was immediately excited that the project would use cutting-edge Web 2.0 technology in ways that hadn’t been utilized before. The project would create an educational locus with unique social bookmarking tools like Diigo and del.icio.us, giving students an opportunity to explore the capabilities of these new technological tools in academia.
Enthused, I immediately went to work in preparing to interface with LAUSD schools as school liaison. My goal was to obtain a list of principals’ emails in anticipation of getting the word out about the SOS site. In a very real sense, the school liaison position seemed to complement my ongoing appointment as a congressional intern, where I’ve assisted the Director of Homeland Security. From my congressional office experience, I’ve witnessed how first impressions and phone contacts can affect future dealings with institutions.
I went to work creating a phone log and daily activity journal in the same manner that I conduct work for the Congressman’s offices. Keeping track of phone calls, conversations and progress, I called the LAUSD Superintendent’s offices and found a warm reception to my description of the SOS project. In that conversation, I enquired about getting principals’ emails but was denied this information by the LAUSD staff who declared the list off-limits. I followed up with literature and promise of a future contact. Nevertheless, conversations describing the SOS Classroom project went well and I gained the telephone numbers of key LAUSD administrators.
The feedback I gained in searching out emails for the SOS project generated positive enthusiasm for the project. I spent significant hours canvassing and compiling a call list from my personal and professional contacts to find access to emails. At the point I made my calls, the final materials of the SOS project and the website were still under development per the Daily Diigo updates. As of the July 22nd update that was posted on Google Docs, we’re awaiting the announcement of the official press release upon which to act. Extremely enthused about people’s responses to Save Our Summer and at the request of some business owners and professionals, I went ahead and printed a hundred of the preliminary cartoon logo announcements that feature the SOS web address that are being distributed within the Chicano community.
From phone numbers and further enquiries, I discovered hubs of authority within the LAUSD that could get the word out to schools. I compiled this list after making a number of long distance phone calls that enabled me to put together this list as well as a roster of schools’ emails that could be accessed on a per school basis. Some schools offered individual message boards to principals but no direct email addresses. However, other schools did not offer the message board feature on their sites which I observed in more than a hundred locations. I put together a list of schools and remain ready to individually paste in emails to principals where message boards are available. Working with Taylor Randall, my school liaison colleague, we’ve kept each other updated on progress and have kept in contact with Liz Warden and Matt Schrader who continue to spearhead the PR effort.
In continuing a deeper search for principals’ emails, I contacted prominent educators and discovered that the Orange County School District is more open about providing access to principals and the dissemination of information. However, my assignment was within the LAUSD and in this forum, I constructed my list as thoroughly as was possible from my limited access to information. Undaunted, I continued my enquiries, but came to the conclusion on legal advice that any emails I found other than those obtained on authority from the LAUSD would be considered an invasion of privacy and a matter for legal action. Nevertheless, I’ve continued to work independently on the SOS project.
From my combined experiences interfacing with schools and making connections, I’ve written a report that contains some positive suggestions that would help conduct school liaison activities. Independent from my updates, the report is a draft of some my creative recommendations for the SOS project that take it beyond its present purview. I would be delighted to submit this paper for consideration if asked to do so.
Above all, I’ve wanted to continue the positive excitement of the SOS vision. I combed the web in order to post quality sites for students to log onto within the SOS classroom. I found Math Forum at mathforum.org offering tips on math that would be useful to students studying at various levels of mathematics. I also selected the teaching and English language learning portal Waylink English, that links to the United Kingdom. Through the SOS classroom, right at children’s fingertips at their computer, worldwide educational resources can become available in an expanded learning environment. In support of SOS content, I’m continuing to post academic sites and will continue to do so after the class concludes.
Building on excitement in getting the word out, as an artist I’ve responded to the “DreamList” posted on the Save Our Summer update that appeared on Google Docs. I’ve made progress in constructing some prototype models I’m donating to the project that are necessary to the eventual process of obtaining bids from production companies. I’m excited about how the SOS lunch box and Sosie doll are coming together in newconcept designs. I’ve also redesigned a children’s SOS t-shirt which has just been delivered from manufacturing and I’m delighted to announce the adult t-shirt as well as the large poster are complete. Hopefully, these promotional items will be helpful to the commercial end of the project in anticipation of a developing market.
I’m also excited about the promotional presentation I’ve worked on to get the word out on SOS! I’ve put the finishing touches on a PowerPoint video telling the story of SOS, and I’ve posted it on YouTube. I enjoyed writing the script, finding the music and putting the pictures together.
In conclusion, the SOS classroom project is an innovative milestone of tremendous excitement and consequence. We’re working together as a group on the SOS, and I believe the project is creatively moving forward!
Paper #3 Rewrite (Portfolio)
Affirming the Role of Connoisseurship
The Search for Authenticity in a Disputed Jackson Pollock Collection
“There are great artists or those who wish to be like them; this essential division, wrapped in the desire for money, is the fuel of forgery.”
Edwin Banks
Introduction: The Triad of Proofs for Authenticity
Establishing the authenticity of an art work depends upon a triad of proofs, one of which depends upon science to deliver technical testing results into questions of dating and authorship. Indeed, the realms of science and art intersect in cutting-edge art conservation where radioscopic, chemical, and computerized technologies are applied to the challenges of restoring a damaged art work as well as determining the material composition and technique of a masterpiece. As is often the case, the conservator’s analytical domain is impacted by a number of scientific, aesthetic, and economic concerns that come from various sources including museum curators’ quests to verify certain pieces in a collection. In this regard, conservators’ scientific analyses of artists’ techniques and materials often come to be applied in providing ultimate answers to pressing questions of connoisseurship in regards to dating and authenticity where copies and forgeries are suspect. Despite the indisputable authority of forensic conservation science to confer authenticity in certain testing situations, establishing authenticity rests upon a triad of proofs. The first tenet of proof establishes provenance or the previous ownership of art works; followed by connoisseurship which depends upon the superior knowledge of an expert to spot a fake; and last but not least, material analysis which utilizes scientific testing to establish authenticity (Barabe 1).
In tackling problems of dating and attribution, material analysis is increasingly regarded as the ultimate means of assessing authenticity, tending to place connoisseurship in an adjunct position (Carlyle 8). Yet, some technical conservator’s techniques are more reliable and conclusive than others. Indeed, some of the science has been seen to fall short of the mark in determining authenticity, particularly in light of difficulties that exponentially tend to escalate in the analysis of modern paint substances. A notable case study of the difficulties of technically proving authenticity in the case of modern and contemporary paintings has been witnessed in the assessment of a relatively recently discovered cache of Jackson Pollock canvases. The discovery of 23 paintings in 2002 purportedly by Pollock, gains attention when one considers that the auction hammer came down in 2007 in the amount of $11. 6 million for a Pollock canvas entitled, November 12, 1949, measuring approximately 79X57 cm (Schreyach, 38).
Provenance of the Matter Pollock Collection
Among the triad of proofs employed for authentication, the question of provenance appears to have been indisputably established for the newly introduced Pollock hoard. Indeed, the new collection purportedly created by Jackson Pollock is said to have been discovered by Alex Matter in his parents’ storage facility in 2002. The presumptive Pollock canvases were stored with paintings created by Matter’s mother and father who had worked closely at one time with Jackson Pollock and his artist wife, Lee Krasner. As Steven Litt, Plain Dealer art critic notes, “ The paintings were wrapped in brown paper on which Herbert Matter had written a note in pencil dated 1958, saying that the contents included ‘Pollock experimental works’ painted in 1946 -49” ( 2-4).The provenance of the paintings which rests on the relationship of the artists, has a wealth of proven documentation from the Pollock –Krasner Foundation, whose Board of Directors decline to dispute the association between Matter and Pollock (Kennedy 4)).
Central Questions
More than half a decade later in 2009, Matter continues his campaign to have his collection included in Pollock’s larger oeuvre. And, according to Steve Litt in the Plain Dealer, he has successfully engaged in marketing some of his “Pollock” canvases through agents (4). Matter’s ambition for attribution remains controversial and gives rise to essential questions, both scientific and aesthetic: What technical conservation analyses have been applied to Matter’s collection in light of other Pollock works? Has the science been conclusive in determining authenticity for every one of the Matter canvases? Can a consensus on forgery be reached on the Matter Collection of Pollocks across the triad of proofs for authenticity? Given the emphasis on scientific material analysis, what can connoisseurship contribute to the proof of authenticity? What can connoisseurship tell us about any of the works in the Matter Collection?
In answer to this latter question, taking into account provenance and the results of material analyses, the quest of this research report is to more adequately address the role of connoisseurship in determining authenticity for the Matter Pollocks. Through citing a review of literature on the science and scholarship that has weighed in on assessing the Matter Collection, this paper goes forward to conduct interviews and a survey that probes one or two Matter examples for authenticity against a genuine work, in the interest of building the input of connoisseurship from noted Pollock authorities. Such a survey steps into the breach where conclusions of material analyses have been inconclusive. In this sphere, a survey coupled to interviews conducted to garner informed observations from noted Pollock connoisseurs, helps give perspective as well as possible resolution to the continuing debate on the authenticity of this newly identified Jackson Pollock collection.
Literature Review
Material Analysis Applied to the Canvases of Pollock
Addressing the problems of maintaining, restoring and authenticating modern paintings began in earnest in 2002, when the Getty Institute in concert with the Tate in London and the National Gallery of Art in Washington, undertook a comprehensive analysis project, entitled Modern Paint that would have direct bearing on the authentication of works by Jackson Pollock. Indeed, the scope of the Getty’s commitment to the investigation of 20th century paint chemistry was outlined to the public in a New York Times article as late as 2007, in connection with the introduction of the Matter Collection of purported Pollocks (Kennedy 4). As a result of the Modern Paints project, since 2002, a full roster of more than 700 analytical technical experiments together with extensive analyses of the physical properties of modern paints have been documented and cached at the Getty Institute. These studies include an analysis of the chemistry of Pollock’s painting mediums and grounds and join a range of studies devoted to chemical pigment analysis of contemporary painting fluids available to the conservation and art historical community (Getty 1).
Principal to the question of finding markers that uniquely distinguish Pollock, is the study that was undertaken in 2004 to analyze the paints that the artist poured and dripped onto his canvases. Indeed, analysis conducted by Drs. Lake, Ordonez and Schilling that was published by the International Institute for Conservation of Historic and Artistic Works, profiled more than 10 types of enamel that were thought to be utilized in Pollock’s art. The study, housed at the Getty before the introduction of the Matter cache, was aimed at the repair of cracks that had already appeared in sub-surface priming agents in Pollock’s canvases. The network of distressed crevasses that appeared in the subtraits of Pollock’s million dollar painting, Number 2, 1949, housed at the Williams; College Museum of Art in Massachusetts, instigated a conservation crisis that was among a small but worrying set of deteriorations that prompted the commissioned Lake study to apply X-ray Flourescence (XRF) as well as X-ray diffraction (XRD) to analyze the surface paint and deeper layers of Pollock’s work (Getty 1). As Schreiner and his colleagues at the Vienna Art Institute noted, these radioscopic techniques utilized by the Lake team were preferred over Fluorescence Microscopy which would require a paint sample to be removed from the Pollock canvas with subsequent embedment in resin before being subjected to laser analysis. XRF and XRD appeared to offer a less invasive means of analyzing paint layers and composition (Schreiner, et al 4). The Lake team determined that more than eight kinds of enamel utilized by Pollock were of a class that began to emerge in the 1930’s for industrial application, and that by the 1950’s, had begun to be employed in artist’s studios. As Cernuschi outlines in his book, Meaning and Significance, Pollock admitted to enlisting industrial gloss enamels because of their pour-ability. The Lake team was able to confirm these materials in Pollock’s art that were uniquely manufactured through World War II and on into the early 1960’s, when production ceased in the wake of new paint formulations (Lake et al., 13-17).
Directly taking up the question of authenticity within the paints established by the Lake team, along with other Getty contemporary paint analyses, Dr. James Martin of Orion Analytical Laboratories, subjected the collection of purported Pollock canvases to chemical analysis and found the pigment on five of the canvases to be positively identified by its manufacturer as having been compounded in the 1970’s, “making it certain the material could not have been available to Pollock.”( IFAR Symposium, 15). Delivering his findings to the symposium sponsored by the International Foundation for Art Research, Martin determined through radio spectroscopy and other chemical analyses that 16 of the 23 canvases “contained one or more pigments or resins not available during Pollock’s lifetime;” an observation that was printed in the catalogue for the exhibition of the Matter Collection staged at the McMullen Museum of Art at Boston College. In his IFAR lecture, Dr. Martin cited his studies of more than 80 paint samples retrieved from Pollock’s studio on Long island, along with veted works in museums, coming to the conclusion that none of the extant works currently attributed to Pollock contain the kinds of pigments that constitute the Matter cache (IFAR Symp. 36). Additionally, the type of canvas board supporting 16 of the spurious paintings, was not manufactured until the 1970’s (36). Martin’s use of XRD and employment of a device “called a microfadeometer, which trained an intense beam of light – 8 million lumens per square meter, compared with about about 12,000 for a cloudless day at high noon” – on a tiny area of Matter’s Pollock drip painting to see how it would fade, was also inconclusive in determining the dating of aldehyde enamel for the seven remaining canvases (Kennedy 2). It is well to note that seven new canvases potentially attributable to Pollock would be a sizeable and invaluable cache. While not accusatory, Martin issued the statement that his analysis “must at least include consideration of the possibility that some intentionally misleading objects were created”(Litt, 2). It is should be noted that Alex Matter’s principal business agent, Dr. A. Borghi commissioned Dr. Martin to conduct his tests, and that the Getty Institute was not employed to examine the canvases (Litt 2).
Fractal Geometry and the Material Analysis of Pollock
Moving along the technical sphere of examination through various scientific mediums, further dispute of the authenticity of the paintings was lodged by physicist Dr. Richard Taylor, who was commissioned by the Pollock-Krasner Foundation to apply tenets of fractal geometry to the authentication of the Matter cache (Schreyach 38). Published in the science journal Nature, the length and twist of Pollock’s wrist actions in dripping his paint suggest that markings on the painting could not have been created by anyone else: Analysis of the drip swings and patterns in the Matter paintings were judged to be untypical of Pollock’s peculiar handling of his medium that resembles the traceries of tree branches and other natural forms ( 39). Taylor’s study contends Pollock’s signature is a measurable constituent of paint layering and forms an embedded signature as dynamic as the artist’s own handwritten name (Nature 35). However, Randy Kennedy’s article that appeared in the New York Times, covered Taylor’s research and determined that the proofs of Dr. Taylor’s fractal studies were inconclusive (3).
Perspectives of Extant Connoisseurship
Conducting research, I ascertained there was a dearth of conclusive connoisseurship applied to the Matter Collection. Opposing the contentions of scientific analysis, noted Pollock scholar, Claude Cernuschi of Boston College, and leading Pollock historian, Ellen Landeau, agreed to support the exhibition of the Matter Collection, claiming to not have vested interests in staging the show. While not providing any commentary on the authenticity of the cache, the scholars wrote the McMullen Museum exhibition catalogue unafraid to include Dr. Martin’s onerous findings. (McMullen/Pollock intro.1-4). The publication of the catalogue in connection with the show that Cernuschi helped to arrange at the Boston College museum, was viewed as a powerful endorsement for the new Pollocks. As outlined in the Plain Dealer by Steven Litt, Ronald Spencer, an attorney for the Pollock-Krasner Foundation has yet to dispute the authorship of the Matter Collection, saying that the McMullen exhibition was “intended to open the possibility that the paintings could be authentic, so they could be sold in the future” (1-4). The jury remains out on the Matter Collection for scholars Dr. Allen Silverstein and Lorne Hayes of the Whitman Art Trust who note that “Color streams that appear visually synchronized in such canvases as ‘Lavender Mist’ and ‘Cathedral’ appear less developed and disharmonious in some of these newly discovered paintings. However, some works are more satisfactory than others. The Matter Collection presents a range of problems that remain unresolved.” (Arts Table 25). Pollock historian, Dr. Trevor Taft, of LACCD, comments that if the Matter Collection “ comes to be proved genuine, it might answer some basic questions as to the density of webbed networks of paint, offering a means to examine examples that show less layering thus exposing more of the artist’s early progression of applying paint. ” (Art Archive, 23). As in Taylor’s fractal analytical studies, a sampling of pronouncements from connoisseurs appeared inconclusive.
Formulating a Survey on Connoisseurship in Search of Applicable Insights and Data
Given the shortfall of analytical testing, I determined that connoisseurship would need to be more fully employed in proving authenticity.It was apparent that chemical and radio-laser spectroscopy tech tests from Orion Labs were conclusive in pronouncing 16 of the 23 Matter paintings fake. However, neither a positive nor negative result could be ascertained by technical conservation science for all the canvases. Thus seven paintings remained possibly authentic if Dr. Taylor’s fractal analysis was to be discounted. Taking up an intensive research initiative on a tight deadline, I edited a list of 25 people ranging from art history professors with a discipline in Pollock, artists who understood his work, as well as published arts scholars and gallerists. I ended up contacting a short list of ten noted Pollock authorities via email to ascertain their responses to a brief question grid that might shed light on the Matter Collection’s authenticity.
I emailed my questionnaire that posed a set of three visual connoisseurship questions on the assessment of the paintings, attaching two jpg. images of canvases from the Matter cache. The first image was of a painting whose authenticity was indeterminate and thus possibly genuine (Sample A). The second image was one Dr. Martin had judged to be a 1970’s canvas (Sample B). I also emailed the image of an authentic but little known and not well publicized Pollock canvas from the offices of the Pollock-Krasner Foundation that I had obtained through channels from the Foundation in New York via email (Sample C). I emailed these three visuals to survey participants without identifying which image was a genuine work. My questions asked for full length written answers as well as multiple choice responses: 1. Comment on the technique in the Painting A in relationship to paintings B and C (similar, dissimilar or other, with room for a short answer as to observations (why)? 2. Why or why not was A, B and/or C a genuine Pollock? (Please consider defining visual clues – color, texture, line density, composition, canvas thickness, overall visual ‘feel,’ and indefinable perception – with room for short answers) 3. If you had the chance to own one these works, which one would you choose and why? Short answer. I also let certain select people know I would be contacting them by telephone to interview them about their thoughts on Pollock and connoisseurship.
My hypothesis was that experienced connoisseurs would be able to spot the genuine Pollock. It would be interesting to see if the participants would choose the Pollock painting that scientific radio-laser spectroscopy analysis had not discounted. I looked forward to seeing visual knowledge and connoisseurship applied in a more specific context, applied to just three paintings to determine authenticity. While it was a small sampling within a small percentage (5.7%) of total extant recognized Pollock canvases, I felt that connoisseurship should be more equitably investigated as a measure of authentication, equally important as material analysis and provenance. Restating the matter, it was a conception of mine that as a balance to the strength of scientific analysis and the weight of provenance, a research survey on connoisseurship amongst Pollock scholars might assist authenticating the balance of the Matter Collection. My survey addressing just three paintings would assist reopening connoisseurship applied to Matter and provide a sampling for other arts investigators to follow on the balance of the remaining five canvases.
As stated, I began to email the questionnaire to participants. I attempted to telephone Dr. Ellen Landau at Case Western Reserve University and obtain her email. Landau had declined attending the IFAR symposium and I was told over the phone that she is no longer involved in the debates over Pollock paintings, a statement corroborated when I looked over Steven Litt’s article, Fraud Can’t be Ruled Out. The response I met on the phone seemed to affirm the dearth of definitive statements from connoisseurs. From those I emailed, I received seven responses to my survey. I heard from Dr. Phil Rubin, Director of the Agalma Virtu Gallerywho has dealt in Pollock; noted arts contemporary scholar and Pollock aficiando, Jane Holburn;, as well as the artist and collector Casey Rivens. Corinne Howe, who owns a Pollock, also responded. I was hoping to receive a response from Dr. Marie Busco, former curator at the Los Angeles Museum of Art and Director of the Lincoln Center for the Arts in New York City, who possesses an extensive knowledge of Pollock but I did not hear from her. Additionally two professors of art responded. All respondents wished to remain anonymous in relationship to their answers on the survey.
Results, Interviews and Insights
My first question on technique comparison between paintings yielded surprising results. All seven of the respondents felt the paintings were similar but the reasons for similarity were uniquely expressed. Respondent #1 wrote: “A, B and C are similar. C is a quieter, more dense/ more layers in it. I prefer C. #2. A was dripped when Pollock was stoned. It’s not typical. A’s more hurried and splashed than painting B. C has a warmer, accessible tonal value than the other two. #3: similar. #4: Where can I go to examine? Twins but worlds apart in terms of the juiciness of the paint. B is more likeable than A. C is better but nothing to shout about. #5: I can’t see much of a difference in the drips between A, B and C. Show me. #6: The Pollocks look related but I need to see the paintings in the gallery. #7: A good match-up between canvases. C has energy in connections, particularly the whites. Where can I inspect? From this first round of questioning, I concluded that Canvas C was the favored work, with B running a close second, with A the least favored amongst canvases that were considered to appear relatively similar.
For question #2, as I had surmised, five out of seven, more than half the respondents, were able to pick out the genuine Pollock. In answer to question #2, only two respondents, constituting less than a third of the participants, weighed in favor of the scientifically disputed B canvas as genuine, even though in question #1, greater preference was shown for it. Canvas A received just two positive votes for authenticity.
Issues of composition, canvas thickness, overall visual ‘feel’ and indefinable perception were included as criteria to consider in question #2, in order to urge the panel to more closely examine the paintings and to help participants call up gut level instincts connected with perceiving genuine works from forgeries. I had derived a perspective on the importance of “hunches” from studying the careers and observations of two legendary art dealers, Duveen and Bernard Berenson, whose services on connoisseurship were integral to the formation of the worlds most noted collections including the Metropolitan Museum in New York and the holdings of Baron Rothschild (Carlyle 41).That old adage, “There’s just something about it that tells me its real,” might well have come from Berenson himself. Indeed, three of the participants stated that they needed to actually see the work in person to conclusively select the Pollock, even though the jpg.’s were excellent. I was surprised at the response to the third and last question: out of seven people, four had no interest in taking a Pollock home: one questionnaire was left blank, one bore a question mark, and two declined. Two participants wanted canvas B and C respectively. One person opted for A.
Following up the survey, I placed calls to four of the most distinguished participants, Drs. Rubin, Holburn, Howe and a professor who did not want to be named. My principal method of documentation was note-taking. Dr. Busco was unavailable, but I was able to speak with Dr. Rubin who expressed his conviction that connoisseurship is essential to the three proofs of authenticity and that more attention should be paid to it, “because knowledgeable observation is usually the primary impetus that causes anyone to view and consider an artwork worthy of attention in the first place.” Rubin went on to reflect that “Masterworks, such as a genuine Pollock, possess strong characteristics that do not escape the trained eye. I’ve had the chance to deal in two Pollocks here at the gallery. And, I’ve extensively studied them in New York. The paint itself, an industrial gloss enamel, fit Jackson’s taste for things sleek, flowing and black. You can tell a Pollock by the position of where black is in the painting; by that I mean, observing where black makes its entrance into the layered web of the picture. The black threads or drips in Canvas C look to be positioned toward the mid-level, maybe toward the third tier of application. That is typically where Pollock introduced his black but you have to know his work well to note it and analyze its position. Science hasn’t yet made this observation since it really is an insight of connoisseurship. If you really want my candid opinion, I think the only real canvas worthy of attention is C.”
I contacted Dr. Holburn for a subsequent interview. I opened our conversation asking about her views of the current science and the place of connoisseurship in authentication studies. “Science can confirm, but connoisseurship trumps most other means of telling the truth about painting,” she said. “Art is what you or I say about it. However, the most important factor is how keenly we are able to see into a work of art - what knowledge we bring that transforms our eyesight into insight.” In response to my mentioning the work of Dr. Martin testing a new collection of Pollocks, she asked, “Was the Getty commissioned to look into these works as well?” I told her they were not involved. “Whenever you get testing done, it should be carried out by the most disinterested group and not a private company,” she said. I asked her opinion about the purported seven Pollocks that science had been unable to confirm. “The science can only tell you so much, particularly with works made yesterday,” she responded. “ I know about the new Pollocks. I think they are all suspect since we know what Pollock did and we have his body of work. More of his work does not make his reputation better or his methods clearer.” I asked her what she thought of the three images I had sent along. “The photos are first-rate quality. I think C belongs in a museum; it has the right density for Pollock and the corners are typical of his build-up.The picture is probably already in a major collection – am I right?”
I called Dr. Howe who owns a small Pollock drawing, to discuss her opinion of my attempt to round out the triad of proofs stressing connoisseurship applied to the Matter Collection. “When you speak about connoisseurship,’ she said “definitely more attention should be paid to it. A lot of money and attention is thrown at the science and the equipment rather than the scholars; the people who care and study these things.” I discussed the Matter Collection and asked her if she thought Sample C was a forgery. “I think they are interesting paintings, but A and B are too thin for Pollock. He had a rich taste and a love of oily paint. A and B don’t use nearly enough of his glossy enamel. C looks less anemic and more adequate - more real.”
I concluded my interviews by calling the professor who wished to remain anonymous. When I discussed the Matter Collection and that 16 paintings had been labeled forgeries, the professor commented, “But even if 16 paintings have been shot down as forgeries,” she said, “seven still equate to something upwards of $70 million dollars. The real question should be, who wants at least some of the canvases to be real? I can’t be sure any of them are genuine; it takes a lot of time and training to properly appraise Pollock.” Concluding, I wanted to confirm her thoughts on connoisseurship. “Art is about looking at it.” she said. “Art is about viewing it. When the art of visual appraisal becomes dimmed, the science and analysis can become less vital because we tell science what to test according to our visual recognition of anomalies and such. We have to keep our eyes and knowledge sharp. To a very certain extent, connoisseurship is wasting a bit in the current milieu. We should encourage more connoisseurship with more looking and visual studies. Conservators should use their technology to restore art rather than serve the art market. Money, art and science can be incestuous and can tell us false tales.”
From my small survey that might be representative of a larger sampling, I was able to determine that connoisseurship, while not infallible, is a front-line tool that experts should continue to hone in anticipation of identifying genuine works. I was able to conclude that most of the participants I contacted were able to identify the genuine Pollock canvas that presently hangs in the Pollock-Krasner Foundation. From this, I was able to ascertain that connoisseurship is alive and well despite the professor’s remarks. Interestingly, five out of seven of the participants judged the most promising of the Matter canvases, Sample A, to be fake. Dr. Rubin, who seemed to be among those most knowledgeable, discounted both canvases A and B. Perhaps this assessment will persuade scholars and collectors to look more closely at the canvases before endorsing and purchasing works from the Matter Collection.
In the case of my study, questions and interview material combined to offer a greater sense of the importance of connoisseurship. The study earmarked connoisseurship as offering a counter-balance to modern technological methods that are increasingly accurate to the degree that they are tending to take the spotlight away from what Dr. Rubin describes as “knowledgeable observation.” Yet, connoisseurship remains vital to authentication since observation and taste criteria form much of the basic rationale for performing scientific material analysis. Indeed, connoisseurship will continue to be required in cases where science becomes less exact in pronouncing authentication. My conclusion is that the triad of proofs resting upon provenance, connoisseurship and material analysis should be established with equal emphasis on each category of investigation when pursuing questions of artistic authorship. Inherent to the authentic Pollock collection at the Whitney where Alex Matter aspires to hang his cache, is the concept that genuine works of art that are correctly attributed to their makers, hold special value, connection and meaning down through time. The drive to authenticate the Matter Collection stems from our will to adequately identify and preserve what is worthy to be remembered. Art is an expression of the society that gives rise to it. Within this calling, correctly attributed artworks form the memorial of our cultural heritage.✦
Works Cited
Barabe, Joe, (2003). The Microscope in Art Conservation and Authentication Studies. True Colors. 3 July 2009. http://www.modernmicroscopy.com/main.asp?article=27.
Carlyle, James. Bernard Berenson: The Dealing Giant. Ltd. Ed. New York: Empire Art 1988.
Cernuschi, Claude. Meaning and Significance. New York: Harper Collins, 1992.
Cernuschi, Claude, and Ellen Landau. Pollock Matters 1& II. Chestnut Hill, MA: McMullen Museum, Boston College, University of Chicago Press, 2007.
Getty Institute. Modern Paints/Related Publications. 28 July 2009. http://www.getty.edu/conservation/science/modpaints_publications.html.
Kennedy, Randy. “Computer Analysis Suggests Paintings are not Pollocks’” New York Times, February 2006. http://www.nytimes.com/2006/02/09/arts/design/09poll.html.
Kennedy, Randy. “Paints: Mysteries Challenge Protectors of Modern Art.” New York Times 29 July 2009. http://www.nytimes.com/2007/02/14/arts/desgin/14 pain.html.
Kennedy, Randy. “The Stakes of Adding More Pollocks.” New York Times 28 July 2009. http://www.nytimes.com/2005/05/30/arts/30iht-pollock.html?pagewanted=all.
Lake, Susan, Eugena Ordonez, and Michael Schilling. “A Technical Investigation of Paints Used by Jackson Pollock in his Drip or Poured Paintings.” Modern Art, New Museums: Contributions to the Bilbao Congress. London: International Institute for Conservation of Historic and Artistic Works, 2004.
Litt, Steven. “ Fraud Can’t be Ruled Out” Cleveland Plain Dealer 28 July 2009. http://blog.cleveland.com/top_entertainment/2007/11/fraud_can’t_be_ruled_out_in_ori.html.
Martin, James. “Testing and Analysis ReCap for Pollock: Art they Pollocks?” Vol. 10 No. 1 International Foundation for Art Research. 29 July 2009. http://www.ifar.org/publication_detail.php?docid=1228414310.
Schreiner, M., Furhman, B., Jembrih-Simburger, D., Linke, R. (2004). “X-Rays and Archaeology – An Overview.” Institute of Humanities, Sciences and Technologies in Art/Advances in X-Ray Analysis. Vol.47. 3 July 2009. http://www.icdd.com/resources/axa/vol47/v47_01.pdf.
Schreyach, Michael. “I am Nature: Science and Jackson Pollock” July 2007. Apollo 35.
Silvertstein, Allen, and Lorne Hayes. “Analysis and Conception: The Art of Pollock” Vol. 21 Arts Table Los Angeles (2008).
Taft, Trevor, int. “Process and Pollock” File10, Art Archive Arts Letters LACCD. 2006.
Taylor, Richard. “Fractal Analysis of Pollock’s Drip Paintings” Nature. 28 July 2009 http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v444/n7119/full/nature05399.html.