Practice Impromptus-Day2

Ok hey everybody. I don't know if any f you are practicing, but for those of you who are, comment on how things went! Ok, so yesterday we started you off easy. Today your questions will be a little bit more difficult. :D Ok, so wihout further introduction I give you your next group of Impromptu Questions.

Group 2, Day 2

1. What are the effects of the increasing dispersal of knowledge brought about by the internet?
2. If you could be any animal other than human, what would you be? Defend your choice.
3. Is human overpopulation a problem modern society needs to be concerned with?


Ok, well good luck and keep practicing! The same rules apply and comment people! Haha. yup yup :D Also starters, comment on how your speeches are going. Ok, well practice! :D yup yup.

-Rita :D

Practice Impromptus-Day 1

Hey people. Ok so January 30 is right around the corner, and guess what! We are gonna have to give Impromptus! Isn't that totally better than going to sleep till 1 on a Saturday or going to Disneyland!!!!!!! Yeah, ok seriously, it's NOT!!!!!! At any rate, we still must do them. Ok so most of you are freaking out right. Well, why not try practicing. For the next week I will be posting up practice impromtu questions each day. They are only practice and remember an impromptu probably wont take more than 5 minutes of your time each day. All you have to do is choose 1 of 3 topics. Then you have to take one minute to prepare your thoughts. Next you speak for 1 and a half minutes to 2 minutes, DON'T GO OVER 2 MIN., and then you are done! It is that simple. yup yup. Ok here is the very first set of Impromtu questions. I know that some of the questions you may not know but try your best. Questions at competition are unpredictable.

Group 1, Day 1

1. What has been your worst experience with Academic Decathlon?
2. What is the biggest effect of the internet?
3. Can technology answer the problems of modern society?

Ok, so now that you have your first set of questions, PRACTICE! Time yourself and look confident. SMILE! hehe :D ok, hope this will help prepare you for the kinds of questions you might receive. Have fun practicing and good luck! I will post a new set of questions tomorrow. yup yup :D

-Rita :D

Art Works-Artists

1) The Wine Cooler-Vincennes Porcelain Factory 1753
2) Mezztin-Jean Antoine Watteau 1718-1720
3) Soap Bubbles-Jean Simeon Chardin 1734
4) Broken Eggs-Jean-Baptiste Greuze 1756
5) Modern Rome-Giovanni Paolo Batoni 1757
6) The Triumph of Aemilius Paulus-Carle Vernet 1789
7) Evening Lanscape with an Aqueduct-Theodore Gericault 1818
8) Stormy Coast Scene After a Shipwreck-Emile-Jean-Horace Vernet
9) Young Jewish Woman of Algeria, Seated-Theodore Chassireau 1846
10) Self-Portrait with Two Pupils, Mademoiselle Marie Gabrielle Capet and Mademoiselle Carreaux de Rosemond-Adelaide Labille-Guiard 1785
11) Princess de Broglie-Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres 1751-1753
12) Bust of Volatire-Jean-Antoine Houdon 1778
13) Portrait of a Young Man-Pompeo Girolamo Batoni 1760-1765
14) Royal Tiger-Eugene Delacroix 1929
15) The Start of the Race of the Riderless Horses-Emile-Jean-Horace Vernet 1820
16) Sheperd's Idyll-Fracois Boucher 1768
17) Minerva Protecting the Young King of Rome-Joseph-Antoine Romagnesi 1811
18) The Death of Socrates-Jacques Louis David 1787

Hope this helps at least knowing the names of the pieces and understanding when they were created, and by who. yup yup. :D
-Rita :D

Speech Topics for Starters!

Ok. hey everybody, hope you are having a good week back from break. As you all know, Acadec competition is coming up real soon. Starters will have to present a prepared speech to Mr. Hall on Friday. Ok so a lot of the starters including myself are having trouble with understanding exactly what our speech is supposed to be. At this point I honestly don't really have a clue,and a lot of you starters I already know are like me too. So I have come up with a list of some good speech topics you should consider talking about. Ok so here is the list. Hope you find something that you are interested in. Remember you only have one week to think of something and memorize it! Good Luck!

Speech Topic List
 Discrimination against (fill in the blank).
 Energy independence
 Political polling
 The demise of the newspaper
 The Scrabulous-Mattel dispute on Facebook
 The power of conventional wisdom
 LASIK versus genetic engineering—is there a difference?
 Foreign bathrooms
 Converse with someone historical
 A brief history of chocolate
 Sustainable development in the Andes
 The impact of ubiquitous Internet
 The economic theory of arbitrage
 The reality show “Man Versus Beast”—a new low?
 People who insist on having children with
“disabilities” like their own
 Drug ads
 Caffeine: should it be regulated?
 Hands-free driving laws
 Three things more dangerous than talking on the phone
while driving
 What someone from the past would think about today’s
world
 Alpaca farming
 An imaginary safari through the cities of America
 Praising the suburbs
 The aerial hunting of wolves
 The financial meltdown of 2008-2009
 The value of intuition (read Blink)
 The shortcomings of majority rule
 Tooth whitening
 Explore a cultural cuisine
 Everything I need to know, I learned from The Onion
 The “random walk” principle and the stock market
 The truth about college
 The Olympics used to have artistic and intellectual
events—research and advocate for their return
 Behavior and biology: how much do our bodies
control us?
 Is suffering ever good?
 The future of the water supply
 Afghanistan: what should we do?
 Different views of beauty.
 Religion: an agent of intolerance?
 Discrimination against the elderly
 Art and the Internet
 What if Helen Keller had been born today?
 Celebrity chefs (and Iron Chef)
 Tibet: crisis or cause célèbre?
 Educational systems in other countries: pros and cons
 A critique of the Academic Decathlon
 High school bullying: what are the consequences?
 Google’s plan to put data servers on ships to avoid
national laws
 The joys of teenage motherhood (this is a “shock”
speech and must be delicately handled)
 Comparing cartoons today to cartoons of yesteryear.
 America’s next great enemy—who, and why?
 The importance of pain in medical research.
 The value of prearranged marriages.
 The work of Doctors Without Borders
 The experience of an amputee
 What might Shakespeare have written today?
 How to negotiate: a crash course
 How your parents met
 The story of a deceased sibling
 Your first encounter with poverty
 Modern art—advancing or ridiculous?
 “Sticks and stones may hurt my bones, but words will
never hurt me.” Assess.
 Pick an everyday place and analyze it—a shopping
mall, an airport
 Libertarianism
 Dr. Horrible and the future of entertainment
 Take one event and report on how it was reported by
different media (for example, MSNBC and Fox News.)
 Propose a different way of electing the U.S. president.
 Discuss your first meeting with someone important to
you—say, an author, an actress, or an athlete.
 Weave song and prose together in an optimistic
speech about a “few of your favorite things.”
 Discuss what is meant by the phrase “life is a
revolving door.”
 Same sex marriage
 Stem cell research
 Broadway musicals
 Take a person—real or imagined—and offer a series
of snapshots of his or her life at different ages.
 The importation of drugs from India
 Make a case for illegal immigration.
 New laws requiring the public display of calorie
contents at fast food restaurants—good or bad?
 Defend Larry Summers for his comments about
women in the sciences
 American policies toward Cuba.
 Discrimination against people who weigh more.
 A day in the life of your generation.
 The meaning of the shopping mall.
 Pick a sport and explain its significance to you or its
applicability to life in general (baseball, tae kwon do,
etc.)
 Talk about blogging. Many judges will be fascinated.
 Allergies as a spiritual metaphor—why our souls
reject certain toxins.
 The understated epidemic of sleep deprivation.
 Media credibility (especially in light of coverage of
the recent presidential election)
 The effect of cameras on the way we remember our
lives.
 The phenomenon of child acting—does it impact the
children negatively?
 Surrogate motherhood. Explain a few interesting legal
cases involving mothers who were paid to give birth.
 Eating disorders—this is a common one but can be
done effectively and imaginatively. Consider eating
disorders in other nations.
 Where did popular foods come from, anyhow?
 How do we learn to speak? Isn’t it a miracle?
 What does it mean to be an existentialist? An
atheist?
 Why does the space program matter?
 Female stereotypes in Disney films—for instance,
ever notice the title characters rarely have mothers?
 How danger is important in life.
 Breakfast
 Censorship—is it ever necessary?

I know this is a lot to choose from. Still, if you find something interesting take it into consideration. Hope this helps. Thanx and yup yup. hehe :D

-Rita :D

Self-Portrait with Two Pupils, Mademoiselle Marie Gabrielle Capet and Mademoiselle Carreaux de Rosemond

Self-Portrait with Two Pupils, Mademoiselle Marie Gabrielle Capet (1761–1818) and Mademoiselle Carreaux de Rosemond (died 1788), 1785, Adélaïde Labille-Guiard, Oil on canvas, 83 x 59 1/2 in. (210.8 x 151.1 cm), The Metropolitan Museum of Art

ok so we all know this piece by "that one painting with the really long name"! soo here are some details on the painting and the artist.

Adélaïde Labille-Guiard was able to break into the profession during pre-revolutionary France. Her work focused on portraiture and she was quite successful. Portraiture and still-life paintings were said to be appropriate for female artists. Ok so super sexist in a way: they said it was unacceptable for women to study the male nude. Ok so, she married in 1769 but was divorced by 1776.. ok so no doubt that THAT was also frowned on by society! But HA, Labille-Guiard was able to support herself as a teacher and portrait painter even though society was being weird. :D

She set up her studio in the early 1780s and by 1783 she had 8 female students… yeah, they were ALL female. She painted members of the aristocracy and the royal court as well as MALE members of the Royal Academy. She was honored by being admitted to the Royal Academy as a member, but she was not allowed to study or teach at the institution.<-- WOW, once again just because she was a woman. Just because she was accepted doesn't mean all of the male members were happy about it.. and on top of that she was constantly gossiped about & then they even accused her of not painting her work herself!

You can see her self-confidence in this self-portrait; she is in the center of the painting, seated in her studio at work on a large canvas. Her students look on with appreciation and excitement. By dressing in an elaborate and expensive gown, Labille-Guiard represents herself as a painter and a woman of society. Her posture emphasizes her shapely figure and her gown is arranged to be shown at its best advantage. Her studio is also portrayed to be large and luxurious.. it is appointed with fine furniture as well as sculptures letting the viewer know that she was rich

We see the back of the canvas, but not what she is painting, great, just great. Art historians have three ideas about what that painting could be of: 1. it could be like another self-portrait, basically like a replica of the one that we are looking at, 2. it could be a portrait of one or maybe both of her students, or 3. there could be someone else who is having their portrait made. By including other people in her self-portrait, she demonstrates her ability to portray groups of people in one painting. This opened her commissions to patrons who might want to have family groupings immortalized. She was a clever entrepreneur: she used the painting as an advertising tool so the viewer of this painting could imagine themselves as her subject. Her direct gaze at the viewer is enticing and inviting. It’s like she’s saying: “why not let me paint YOUR portrait! Come and get your portrait painted by ME!” her way of advertising herself I guess, in the portraits she paints!
Uhmmm, I think that’s it! comment, tell me if I should add anything! Thank youuu!
-Vanisha!
p.s. you would think I’m getting tired of doing blogs on so many art pieces, but trust me, this is kind of FUN! :D ALSO, big thanks to the art group, I wouldn’t be able to understand these art pieces as much if you guys weren’t there!

Portrait of a Young Man

Portrait of a Young Man, ca. 1760–65, Pompeo Girolamo Batoni, Oil on canvas, 97 1/8 x 69 1/4 in. (246.7 x 175.9 cm)

Pompeo Girolamo Batoni was an accomplished artist who painted altarpieces, historical & allegorical paintings & portraits. He painted portraits of many important notable people in Europe - patrons from Austrian & Russian courts, royal courts of Europe and portraits of Pope Clement XIII and Pope Pius VI..so basically a lot of famous rich people. Since he was located in Rome, patrons just popped into his studio when they visited Rome. you could probably say he was a favorite stop on the Grand Tour! He painted portraits of them posed in standing positions or like in their royal clothes. Even though he painted a whole bunch of portaits, each one was unique. oh and btw, this portrait is oil on canvas!

ok so now we're gonna talk about this dude in the picture and all that cool stuff you see in the background :D

This young man is not identified, but it is thought that he is French. He might even be just a tourist. He is shown in a luxurious space. The objects shown in the painting were deliberately selected to show that the subject was not only educated about the discoveries of the time, but also had the tools in his possession. The furniture, clothing, and curtains show signs of wealth. Books, paper and pens are spread casually demonstrating his devotion to studies and writing. The people of this time period were fascinated with the work of the Romans. There’s guidebooks to Rome in the painting too. Rome was an essential stop on the Grand Tour. The city and its history were essential to a well-rounded education…word got around & his reputation became linked with the Tour, and the wealthy patrons were led to his studio where hundreds of people sat for their portraits and contributed to his illustrious career.
*Oh and for those of you who have that dandy fine arts day booklets, it’s on page 10! :D
Thanks for reading! Good luck with studying, & comment comment comment!
-Vanisha!

Young Jewish Woman of Algeria, Seated

Young Jewish Woman of Algeria, Seated, 1846, Théodore Chassériau (French, 1819–1856), Watercolor over graphite, sheet: 11 3/4 x 9 1/8 in. (29.8 x 23.3 cm), The Metropolitan Museum of Art

First, let’s start with Théodore Chassériau. He entered the studio of Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres when he was eleven. (Ingres was a former student of David and was a classicist!). So Chassériau had a strong classical approach to his work. That’s not the only influence he had though…he was also interested in the rich colors and romantic themes of the works of Delacroix. He ended up traveling to exotic places like northern Africa and the Middle East (just like Delacroix!) He died at 37, but made a lot of paintings, murals & drawings. Lots of which were portraits or studies of historical, religious, or literary subjects.

This work is a small work of graphite on watercolor paper. I think, on the right side of the drawing there are some notes? (that’s what it looks like to me, PLEASE tell me if you think otherwise!) Probably making you think that they might have been for a later work or something? (just a wild guess) The woman is looking directly at you, & is kind of in an informal posture. Her face is drawn with the most detail, compared to the rest of her body. Her clothing & the environment are really sketchy. She’s sitting on the floor, which I think is unconventional for French thinking..it would have been weird for a woman to be sitting on the floor; in French society she would have been sitting on a chair or something. This scene would have been appealing to those interested in romantic subjects. And I think that’s about it?
Comment, comment, comment! Thanks!
-Vanisha!

The Triumph of Aemilius Paulus

The Triumph of Aemilius Paulus, 1789, Carle Vernet (Antoine Charles Horace) (French, 1758–1836), Oil on canvas, 51 1/8 x 172 1/2 in. (129.9 x 438.2 cm)

This painting is by none other than… Carle Vernet! It’s a history painting a little over 14' long. The size of the painting alone probably would have gotten a lot of attention from the Salon. Carle painted this piece as the Revolution was getting strength. This was actually his reception piece. He thought that it would gain him full membership in the Academy. It was started in 1787 and finished in 1789. And I think it was actually shown again sometime in 1791. When I look at this the first think that comes to MY mind is: NEOCLASSICAL! (All the heroic stuff going on) It is disegno!

--For those of you who have the Fine Arts book it’s on page 14 so go ahead and look at these things I’m talking about, even though most of it is already written there. So some things I saw in here from my research were the general on the right, Aemilius Paulus!(he’s on a chariot). Somewhere behind him there are prisoners, including king Perseus and his family. [The story this is telling is of Aemilius Paulus celebrating his victory over King Perseus of Macedonia in 168 B.C.]


The light is dramatically focused on Aemilius Paulus with the background full of examples of classical architecture. Famous Roman buildings are in here, such as the temple of Jupiter and the Column of Trajan. (btw, they’re not accurate in placing them). Oh! And something interesting: he broke with tradition and drew the horse with the forms he had learnt from nature in stables and riding-schools in this painting. A Funeral of Patrocles was planned as a pendant but it never got finished. And that’s about all I got on this one! I wish I could have found out more than this though!
If you have anything to add just comment! good luck studying!
-Vanisha!

french revolution game

so i found this french revolution game and i thought i'd post it up here.
http://www.quia.com/cb/352762.html
*oh and i warn you, it wants EXACT answers, even tiny spelling mistakes make the answer incorrect.*

-Vanisha!