Max Jimenez - Art & Technology (FMX 211)

Despite always hearing about famous Broadway musicals, I have never been able to really become interested in a Broadway show. Seeing that my next blog post would have to be about Broadway made me worry that I would be bored when going through the Stage Door Blog. I was surprised to see that some of the Broadway show had been adapted from or adapted into movies. I thought that it would be interesting to watch and read about the similarities, differences, and origins of some musicals. The Color Purple was originally a Pulitzer Prize-winning novel from the 80s. Having known this prior to reading through the blog, this had caught my attention. Have seen various parts of the film version on TV I had never knew that it had been adapted into a Broadway musical. I surely thought that a film that was famous for its wonderful score would have a hard time transitioning to a new medium, but The Color Purple has recently had newfound success in its revival of its Broadway run. It has won 2 Ton...

Max Jim é nez Professor Roundtree FMX 211 24 September 2018 Bluebeard’s Castle The opera I chose to watch was Bluebeard’s Castle , composed in 1918 by Béla Bartók, written by Béla Balázs and based on the French folktale “ La Barbe bleue.” As a result of a live stage performance being incredibly difficult to find, I viewed a German film version of the opera from 1963: Herzog Blaubarts Burg (Duke Bluebeard’s Castle) with English subtitles. The opera was altered from the original folktale in several ways. The opera version only contains two performing characters, Bluebeard and Judith. In addition to this, the way in which the story progresses and ultimately ends is quite different from the centuries-old folktale this opera adapted. In place of Judith being left to her own devices and ultimately discovering Bluebeard’s room with the corpses of his former wives, Bluebeard stays in his castle and gradually reveals his dark secrets to his new wife, opening the s...

Madama Butterfly was originally a short story by John Luther Long that was adapted to be a three-act play. Sapegin had named the short  Aria. This play is widely known in the opera world, and is the the top 10 in terms of the number of performance runs it has had around the world. In class we had watched a retelling of the classic Italian opera. Pjotr Sapegin's retelling of Puccini's opera employed the use of toy puppets (reminiscent of Toy Story, at least to me) and stop-motion photography to create his condensed, film version of Madama Butterfly.  I would say that it felt bizarre and surreal when we watched Aria.  Upon watching this short the first time, the main character gave off a sort of child-like naiveness. This lovely, euphoric feeling that we shared with her lasted until the last couple of minutes of the short. After she bears the child of a visiting sailor, he leaves for an extended period of time. He returns with his wife, on a ship with a dozen othe...

For my Creative Thinking Exercise I was asked to merge and illustrate two objects. The picture above is titled "12-inch Pizza", and in it I merged a traditional turntable (which is able to play 12" vinyl LP records) with a pizza. I believe the reason that I created the drawing is because of recent hobby of collecting the music I enjoy in a physical medium, rather than solely streaming it on Apple Music, Spotify, etc. During the process of creating the drawing, the title and play on words had come to me first, so I decided to present my ideas in this way. I didn't have a certain step-by-step process when approaching it, because as you can tell, I'm not really that great of an artist when it comes to drawing. My source of inspiration for this drawing would be the turntable that I have in my room, and my constant thoughts of food. I hope you found the amalgamation of these two unrelated objects to be at least presentable, and somewhat interesting. Thank You...

After watching an interview of Raul Cuero, a Colombian microbiologist give his view on how to approach creativity, I had a few things that I could take away from it. I believe that combining Cuero's approach with aspects of my own in regards to creativity could help me in regards to how I approach my everyday life. In addition, it may help me to succeed in completing a project whenever I find myself out of ideas or options. I especially believe this to be true because of the fact that I have many more resources than Cuero who didn't even have access to books as a child, and he was able to overcome his difficulties to pursue a successful career. Creativity is based on innovation, it it based on something that is not obvious. According to Cuero, creativity has nothing to do with art, or being intellectually advanced, it has to do with how you perceive nature. Ideas emerge from interaction with others, and the age of technology has hindered creativity in this way, with p...

My name is Max Jimenez, and I am a first-year commuter student attending the University of Tampa intending to major in New Media Production. I am originally from New York, although I have lived in the Tampa Bay Area for most of my life. My feeling about the first Art & Technology class and the semester were pretty positive going into this new course. This class sounds interesting, and it also sounds like it will be a challenge for me this semester. When this  class  is all said and done I  expect  to expand and improve my skills in creating  projects in multiple formats so  I  can succeed in my major and various areas of interest. I have been a fan of the New York Yankees for as long as I could remember. Although I love the Yankees, I do watch other sports as well, including basketball and soccer. I love to watch professional soccer, whether it be the MLS or the English Premier League.  I love to attend live shows and sporting events. ...