Shaikha Rashid Al Mazrou

It can be said that drawing is to the visual arts what mathematics is to the sciences. Like mathematics drawing is a universal language. Basic visual cues function the same for all people. Notwithstanding our increased dependence on technology, marking on paper continues to be the most expedient means to express ideas for painting, sculpture, or simple things like quickly making a map for someone. The paradox is that learning to see 2-dimensionally increases one's ability to see and project ideas that also take place in 3-dimensional space and time. Inventing 2-dimensional shapes to express multi-dimensional ideas or feelings requires a high degree of abstract thinking. With this course we use drawing as a tool for understanding 2-dimensional visual perception. The drawings we make in class document the degree of our ability to see 2-dimensionally.

This course explores the medium of sculpture and other 3D forms through the principles of three-dimensional design and the concepts that drive developments in contemporary art. Projects may include mold making, ceramics, and the use of wood working tools, as well as the use of sculpture as costume, performance, environment, or kinetic form. Students use a variety of materials from wood and cardboard to metal, plaster, paper, cloth and found objects to expand their understanding of form and space.

Whether planning images, sculptures, movements, maps, or more, drawing allows for the quick transposition of ideas. It is the foundational language of the artistic mind. Foundations in 2D explores the diverse practice of drawing across media and form, from charcoal to pencil to pastel to wet media; from figure to object to abstraction. This investigation is for novices and advanced drafters alike. The first part of the course focuses on practicing traditional drawing approaches in class, while homework assignments allow for greater subjectivity in applying the technique. Midway through the course, concept development takes center stage, with students learning about artists who have expanded upon traditional notions of drawing and/or subverted them. We study postmodern principles and use them to analyze works of art and to guide original pieces. For beginners, the class will help confront expectations about what drawing entails, allowing them to develop an emboldened drawing practice free from previous conceptions. Advanced artists' practices will be challenged and interrupted in order to invite creative risks and new conceptual approaches, expanding their practice.

This intermediate level drawing class takes mark-making to be the foundation of drawing, and entertains the idea that there are many ways to make a mark: through process, experiment, cutting, folding, staining, thinking, writing, and using a variety of materials to do so. The motivation for mark-making may not be to render a likeness - and this is an ancient as well as a contemporary approach to art; so-called "non-representational" art has many historical roots - from conceptual and process-based art grounded in fairly recent art historical developments, and also from traditions of patterning, calligraphy, textile work, and durational experiments not necessarily coming out of "main stream" art.

This graduate studio course is intended to familiarize students with several casting techniques involving plaster, alginate, slip, wax, and metal. In parallel to this studio work, we will examine artists who use casting, the concept of the multiple, and/or mass production in their work - artists such as Rachel Whiteread, Ai Wei Wei, Antony Gormley, Donald Judd, Eva Hesse, Seth Price, Karin Sander, Jane Alexander, Judith Shea, The Fluxus Group, and others, all toward developing strategies for producing bodies of work and work in multiple. The class will also work with a local foundry (Al Jaber, Mussaffah) to see industrial production techniques and cast their own projects.

Prerequisite: Declared NYU-AD Art & Media MFA student.

This studio-based course explores questions of time and memory in several mediums including photography and video, public art, time- based media, fiber arts, 2D and 3D. The representation of time and memory has been a theme that artists across centuries and cultures have engaged with and continues to be addressed in contemporary art practice, Students explore various questions in relation to time and memory, including collective and personal memory; memory, place, and architecture; documentation of time; deterioration and decay; archives; and time and process in art making using theoretical texts and examples of artists’ practices to the inform their different projects. Students’ engage with the approaches, processes and methods in the different mediums to explore aspects of time and memory that are in dialogue with their art practice. Students further develop advanced skills various techniques enabling them to give form to their research- based art practice. Students advance their ability to place their own work in the context of different advanced processes and conceptual approaches in relation to the subject of the course. The course is taught by several faculty members as well guest artists.

Prerequisite: Declared NYU-AD Art & Media MFA student.

The capstone experience provides seniors with the opportunity to work closely with a faculty mentor and to produce a senior thesis project. Projects may range in form from a creative art project to a theoretical, curatorial or historical research project. Students will be issued studio space for the senior year and will be expected to produce a body of artworks and a critical reflection paper based on their capstone research topic. The capstone experience will culminate in the spring with a public exhibition and a defense before a faculty panel. Students in this course are expected to use the fall semester to research and experiment in the studio by producing a series of artworks in progress (based on their capstone topic) which will be further developed during the spring term. Students will also produce an artist statement and begin drafting their critical reflection paper which will be further developed and submitted during the spring semester. Weekly class meetings will consist of short seminars, studio sessions, group critiques and one-on-one studio visits.

Prerequisite: Declared Visual Arts major and senior standing

Visual arts capstone students will work primarily with their faculty mentor during the spring semester with the goal of completing their capstone project. Students will continue working actively in the studio and will be expected to produce a body of artworks and a 10-page critical reflection paper based on their capstone research topic. The capstone project will culminate in a public exhibition and a formal critique with a faculty panel.

Prerequisite: VISAR-UH 4000