Post up some pics for us, slant.

I know right rf? How bad could those sharpie sketches be. Question though slant6 (italics 6?) you said you drew them on site. Were these from your first visit to the site, and were they design sketches or were they capturing the environment? I am curious that's all

let's see em!

He obviously never saw a Frank Gehry sketch.

sgs23, that was my first thought, actually. Ha.

The sketches were done on a notepad with a sharpie during a visit to an anatomy lab. I didn't draw the corpses, but rather made some dirty sketches of some of the antique model displays, because I have a personal interest in them (I collect antique medical items).

(Disclaimer - I have a degree and some professional experience in industrial design. And prior to that, a few years of full-time fine arts school education. I can draw. Heh.)

Here goes. I know they're terrible, but the worst he's ever seen? I've seen graduating master's students here who draw worse than 6-year olds I know:




Oh, correction. Not a sharpie, but a double-ended prismacolor marker. My bad.

Wow - I didn't see that coming.

I had an entirely different mental visual of 'I drew them "on site" with a sharpie.'

Similar to techno, I thought, "hrmm...did slantsix lay a piece of trace down on the site and do a sharpie rubbing of it?" (that would have been cool)

I'm not sure what I think of the filets of corpses drawings. The middle image has some architectonic potential. Personally, I wish you didn't mention corpses.

i really enjoy the last two sketches, it doesn't sound like the sketches for your project, you said that you did them of models in your anatomy class, or am i wrong? otherwise i wouldn't hang them up. But if you used the last two sketches as a starting point for a building, i could see an interesting outcome

I'm not even at the form-generating stage yet.

What you're looking at are sketches of a couple of display items that I found interesting while visiting the anatomy lab. The "parts" on display are clay models, not real body parts. I didn't make them, so they're not sketches of my own models.

Anyway, I should have cleaned them up but really they were brought out at the last minute in an attempt to show the audience that I was using a personal interest to help inform the work I am doing.

It's complicated. It's arch school. You've all been there.

yeah, kind of cool.

You should have told him they "weren't drawings they were sketches" and then given him that look like, "what a dumb ass".

All studio critic comments need to be taken with a grain of salt. In my Ivy grad school years, crits often lasped into "Johnny Carson wannabees" quips (I'm showing my age). Critics sometimes tried to be cleverly amusing for audience's benefit, regardless of relevance of comment and at expense of learning experience. There was little academic quality control regarding studio critics and their comments. Many were trying to build their professional reputations as "witty" or "deeply intellectual" architectural theorists. Some comments were meaningful and some were stupid; many were lost in architectural jargon (early '80s). Many comments will have no relevance to your education or professional development. You just need to grin and bear it; in the work world, you'll deal with principals doing the same.

which ivy did u attend.

It was much more amusing than offensive. I think I probably even smiled.

I've learned over the years that there's nothing sacred about any work done in school (or the real world, probably) and none of it is precious to me. Yes, it sucks when you've spent two weeks working on something every day, only to have it shot down in two seconds, but since that's not going to stop happening any time soon, I'm just deciding that I'm over it.

Plus, I found out the next day (yesterday) that I have to have a bunch of surgeries done fairly soon. School somehow doesn't seem so all-important anymore ;)

hope nothing serious slantsix.

Yeah, hope your health is OK slantsix.

I love the second sketch, very slicey! But as you say: these drawings were self-communication, the comments of someone else looking at them are irrelevant.

Glad the first crit got excited by your project!

Ahhh, it'll all be okay. Not excited by surgery, but mind you it's going to be an annoying long-term issue rather than an acute and severe one.

Bla bla bla, thanks for your wishes.

I should pull that out at the next crit: "But but but I have an incurable condition!!!!!!!! Whine whine whine!" Hahahaha.

I got to give crits today. It was so exciting! I love it.....not sure why, there's just something about that interaction with the students and their ideas, and the exploration that comes with the dialogue between you and them. This is another one of the reasons I came back to grad school, to teach....I guess today could be considered my first formal step in that direction. Yay!

Sorry to tread on your thread slantsix....but you started a good one, so no need for me to start a new one.

(PS. If I had seen your sketches above, I probably would have said something like, "these are really great sketches, very descriptive....I think you should blow that up and make it a big part of your presentation". Eh, it's not the same when I type it. :o)

Tell us more about your crits, WonderK! I'd like to hear what it's like from the other side (I mean, besides fellow students and critics). Did anything strike you as particularly good or bad? Why?

"shoot them all, and let God sort them out."

ps. your sketches looks great.

Ok, well I guess the part that's really interesting, for me anyway, is to see where each of the students go with their ideas. Some students are very focused and goal-oriented with their designs whereas some are all over the board with their ideas, and tend to get lost in their process. I think that I've kept a lot of my experiences from my own crits in the back of my mind, and I'm a positive person to begin with, so I tried to be very conscious of how to direct the students in a constructive way without making it seem like I'm attacking them. I'm not sure if others would agree with me, but throughout the critiques I found myself sort of trying to determine what they wanted to get out of their own projects, and just suggesting ways to help them do so. I could tell that some of them might not end up with a fully developed building....but then again, I don't know that this was the point of their studio. So I encouraged them all to find ways of presenting their main concept so that it was clear, even if it meant that we didn't see totally finished plans.

I hope this makes sense. One thing I took from participating and watching crits over the years was the sense that you don't need to be an ass to tell a student to do something differently. It's about getting them to see things that they may have not realized before, that's all. And just remember, if your juror talks a lot, that's a good sign.....it means you've actually given them something to talk about!

What I don't understand , is why critics misunderstood crits to that degree --- if you critic something like this, then you find what is good and make it into a positive critics. As you are not there to critic, to down anything, you are there to inspire the good things ,back that up and find whatever small issue ,and newer in a negative way.
Well that's my attitude --- what's said here prove my point, You has to find the good thing and focus that , as if this is about getting better then the role of the critic is not to tear down but point to where the tallent is.
And there Allway's be some point of that.

cri·tique (krĭ-tēk') Pronunciation Key
n.

1. A critical review or commentary, especially one dealing with works of art or literature.
2. A critical discussion of a specified topic.
3. The art of criticism.


tr.v. cri·tiqued, cri·tiqu·ing, cri·tiques Usage Problem
To review or discuss critically.

the job of a critic is not ONLY to nurture the good, per. if a student is operating under incorrect assumptions or is wasting time doing things that aren't useful, a critic may only be able to help by criticizing.

True --- but being a stucent, having made the choice ,,,, and knowing your own first year crap , still indicate that a critic shuld find a way to guide rather than make a bad experience.

I agree with Per.*






*No need to make a scene, people. Per makes a good point. There is a way to tell a student not to do something without sending them off crying. And I think we've all got our fair share of "first year crap".

Having TA'd and sat in on others crits, I have to say I did find it frustrating when Students didn't take the advice given them, and push the building/design further. It almost always seemed that they stalled at the Mid-crit, and just produced for the final. Their designs would have such potential, and it was most often unrealized. Granted, these were all first-year students, but still. It makes me wonder if my projects suffered from unrealized potential. It always made me sad, and I would just want to strangle the students. Instead, I would just ask what their reasoning was, and share my disapointment with others after.

I miss that, though. Teaching was by far the best semester I ever had.