At the Moulin Rouge 1895

Purpose: To capture the style and interaction of Parisian nightlife

Audience: Urban city dwellers

Stance: N/A

Genre: Impressionism Painting

Media/design: Oil on canvas

Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec was an impressionists artist whom focused on the night life of city folk. The darkness of the background hints at the latest of the night. The focus of the painting is around the interaction of the people at the table in the center of the room as well as a lady in the right corner of the painting.  Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec was very interested in interaction within Paris’s cafés. The viewpoint of the painting is from the outside, giving the impression that the viewer is on the outside looking in, observing the scene within. Many of his paintings were advertisements and basic paintings for café walls.

world without television

Since television was created, it has slowly become more intertwined with our society and our culture. Many households have multiple televisions and the average American watches at least over 4 hours of television.  We unwind in front of the T.V., we eat in front of the T.V., and we even sleep with the T.V. running. If the power grid was ever to fail us, (and therefore eliminating our precious television time) I feel Americans would freak out and there would be mass hysteria. People wouldn’t know what to do with themselves. A perfect example would be the film, Grown Ups. In the film several families take a weekend after a tragic loss, to visit a cabin that played an intimate role in the childhoods of the fathers. The comparison between the parent’s generation, (which tended to spend the majority of its time outside) and their offspring highlights younger generation’s dependence on electronics.  In an almost perfect utopia, the children grew bitter and resentful when they lost all forms of electronics. The children were so narrow minded they couldn’t see all the entertainment that was around them. It takes the children several days to adapt and see that they can live without electronics and become more active physically. Grown Ups has tackled the “what if” situation of a world without electronics or television. I believe that if television was to disappear, young people would adapt and venture more outside to interact and explore their environment leading to more independent and perhaps more intelligent younger generations.

ads

Advertising is all around us. Some of the material advertised is not for all ages however, and this trend is a growing concern in a world that is more connected and exposed to media than ever before. Young people are very vulnerable to what the media says they either look like or act. It is said that every American is exposed to over 2000 ads per day. To say that people don’t pay attention to ads would be incorrect in every statement.  When people call for the control of advertisement I would agree, but not in the manner in which they say it should be controlled. Most call for more government control, I would respectfully disagree. I would argue that it is up to society to control itself. Giving more control to the government gives away too much power that should belong to the people. If people want something done, then they should do it themselves and not rely on the government to do everything. Society should control the morality of a nation, not the government. Therefore pressure should be put on the ad companies to alter their ad tactics or only release certain ads where young vulnerable youth are more likely to see them. Enough pressure will cause the companies to change. It’s all up to the people.