Extra Credit AssignmentFashion Design IFashion Design II

Visit a local art museum (San Diego Museum of Art or Timken in Balboa Park, or the Museum of Contemporary Art downtown or in La Jolla) Make sure you have at least two hours to browse and to draw and write down your ideas.

Attach a ticket stub or a photo of you at the museum to your drawings. No credit will be issued without it.

This assignment is worth a maximum of 20 extra credit points (10 points for each well-developed page, 8”x 10” size min.) However, extra credit will not be issued if you are missing a major presentation assignment, since it cannot replace your actual class work. So, make sure all major assignments are submitted prior to final exam date.

At the museum:Browse until you find an area that inspires you. Select your favorite art/objects and write the artist’s name, materials, and date of creation on the top of your page. Art can be 2-dimensional (drawings, paintings, calligraphy, prints, etc.) or 3-dimensional (sculptures, jewelry, architecture, etc.) Make notes, doodles and quick observational sketches on the first page. You should have at least 5 quick sketches and 5 sets of notes. Concentrate on the overall shape for some drawings and on minute details for the others. If the museum allows it, take some photos for later reference.

It is only by looking more closely at a piece that its details and subtleties become clear, and only when you draw it can you be sure that you are truly observing it. Your sketches and notes will then provide you with starting points for planning fashion pieces or even a collection. Think both big and small; look at the overall shape of the object and also at the tiny details. Play with scale, enlarging a detail and reducing a size of the piece as a whole. Don’t restrict yourself to looking at historical clothes just because you are designing garments, consider every piece that interests you.

Back at home:Begin working on your 2nd page. Start thinking about your color palette and explore the possibilities of shape, exaggerating some of the lines, blocks, and planes in your drawings and reducing others. Consider how the principles and elements of design that you have noted –lines,

colors, outlines, form, decorations, texture, etc. – might translate into fashion designs. Create and draw a minimum of two garments with at least two accessories each (shoes, hats, jewelry, etc.) Use colored markers, crayons, or watercolor paint to add color to your pencil or pen drawing. These garments and accessories need to reflect the original museum piece in obvious aspects and also need to relate to each other as a unit.