POINT: REFLECTIONS

"He who knows best knows how little he knows."

-Thomas Jefferson

Reflections is the unit we began right after wrapping up the alternatives and we began with the infamous Baroque period. We talked about points that characterized the Baroque movement and those included: rich in fabrics and textures, excessive, ornamentation, applied surfaces, detailed oriented, made for the wealthy, a commonality in material selection, tapestry, and lastly stately. After defining what exactly Baroque was we moved into the structures that were built around that idea, and we looked at three different countries that were doing their own thing with it. The first being the Palace of Versailles in France which construction was done in four different campaigns with the first beginning in 1664. This is probably one of the more known sites because it features the spectacular hall that includes in total 357 mirrors. Next we moved to the country of England and there they had built a structure that is believed to be the best location of the prime meridian, and that is the Greenwich Observatory. The site overlooks the River Thames and it has played a significant role in the history of astronomy and navigation. Lastly we looked at the colonial North America and what was happening here, and we see the Palladian style still being used in the shape of Drayton Hall in South Carolina. From there we focused primarily on our country and what was just beginning to happen then starting with the Virginia Capitol Building built in 1785 by Thomas Jefferson. Another building, that which is a school also built by Mr. Jefferson is the University of Virginia and this site is a landmark because of it’s rotunda which originally was the schools library. We also talked about other buildings that were happening around the same time such as Monticello, the US Capitol, and the White House. Next we move to a new technology being produced within buildings, actually two technologies. Those technologies being the introduction of glass and iron which allows for a greater span, various shapes but along with its benefits comes disadvantages too. The first large-scale structure using wrought iron obersevred in class was the Kew Gardens; also features panes of glass throughout that are all hand-blown. From there, glass was being used in many different ways, and in many different forms. One of the most renowned places we talked about was the Crystal Palace built in 1851 for the Great Exhibition. It was constructed entirely out of cast-iron and glass and housed more than 14,000 exhibitions within which led the structure to span 1,851 feet in length. Somewhere along in the unit as well we talked about revolutions and I would say that the introduction of glass and iron created a revolution, it allowed for new creations, new ideas, different ways of doing things and from there it only progressed up (literally). Reflections is defined as a fixing of the thoughts on something, or simply just an image. You look at a mirror, you get a reflection cast back directly at yourself and that’s what I think this unit was about. It was about the present looking to the past for guidance and ideas but somewhere along the way, your view gets distorted and sometimes that can be good and other times not. Reflections are tricky because you want to dwell back on something that’s good and proves useful in its present era, you don’t want to revive something that has no use or sense being revived.