Author Question: How do the materials and design of Maya Lin's Disappearing Bodies of Water: Arctic Ice relate to its ... (Read 58 times)

nummyann · **on:** Jun 23, 2018

How do the materials and design of Maya Lin's Disappearing Bodies of Water: Arctic Ice relate to its theme?

What will be an ideal response?

Question 2

How do Don Gray's perceptions of the basalt boulders represented by Stone 2 suggest a framework for re-viewing Thomas Moran's Noon-Day Rest in Marble Canyon?

What will be an ideal response?

orangecrush · **Reply #1 on:** Jun 23, 2018

Answer to Question 1

Answer: The ideal answer should include:
1. Its elevation on the granite pole suspends the marble ice layers over space, so it visually floats on air as though on water.
2. Its height above the floor and jagged, unsupported projections appear fragile and easily broken with any contact, although it is actually made of marble.
3. Although the multiple layers of the object represent different states of the ice in different time frames, the recessions also replicate the appearance of ice shelves as the edge of the Arctic landmass would actually appear if seen from the water.

Answer to Question 2

Answer: The ideal answer should include:
1. Gray regards the stones as signs of a living organism transforming over long periods of time. Moran's scene emphasizes the massive rock walls with the gradations of geological time clearly visible.
2. Boulders are viewed at mid-distance in Moran's scene and along the edges of the water, leading directly into the viewer's space. A single boulder fills the central space and foreground of Gray's image, where the viewer is within arm's reach of the stone.
3. Gray's perception of a landscape's history being readable in a single stone is amplified in Moran's scene, a view understood to be just a sample of the vast history recorded by the expedition.