Intersection — S Dithridge St. & Fifth Ave.
Translating Complex Shapes into Understandable Figures
Objective: “Use simple shapes and colors to create 2d representations of your intersections that communicate important characteristics of the areas”
Duration: 2 weeks
Materials: White, Grayscale, Color Cardstock, Exacto Knife
Skills: Photography, Crafting skills, Relief Making, Design Decision Making, Simplifying Figures
09.01.2020
Venturing further into the city of Pittsburgh for the first time since I moved in, I visited the intersection of S Dithridge St. and Fifth Ave. on September 1st, 2020 at around 3:30 pm.
Different Perspectives of my Intersection
At first glance, I was captivated by this particular intersection due to the contrasting building facades. When directly facing the intersection, I saw St. Paul’s Cathedral embodying an antique and mystical atmosphere, reflecting 19th-century European architecture on my left. In stark contrast, on the right of the street was a modern-day, sleek building with glass windows reflecting the blue sky. This intersection definitively juxtaposes the past and the present which I found extremely interesting.
After slightly walking backward, I noticed countless interactions were occurring on this busy street. Continuing with the old vs new architectural styles, the entire left side of the road seemed much older than the right. Standing out, I noticed numerous different types of transportation apparent at that moment, revealing that it was a busy street intersection. On the left of the photo is a Port Authority bus and on the right is a bike rental rack. After looking more closely, I also noticed the street sign saying “Truck Route,” implying that during certain times, there would also be several trucks on this street. However, I didn’t see many pedestrians on this street compared to the vast number of vehicles passing by.
After completely turning around, looking back at my intersection, the same pattern of old-style buildings continued. In fact, in the background, I noticed several religious buildings also drawing from European influences with very distinct and breathtaking architecture, such as the tall tower with the arcs and castle-like border. Another feature of this street was its gentle downward slope as shown in the photo on the left.
Looking behind me towards the right, I noticed the introduction of greenery to this intersection. I thought it was especially suiting because it was beside the “healthy bike” rental stand. In particular, this stand was also powered by a solar panel on the top, further emphasizing their sustainability goals. I’m assuming this is a location that many people travel from, which is why there are also bikes available. There was also only 1 bike available at that time, shown in the picture (on left) below so perhaps this was a busy time to travel. The bright blue color of the kiosk also contrasts the gray and brown tones of the buildings behind it.
I didn’t see or hear many pedestrians walking along this street; nevertheless, it was busy with the buses, cars, and bikes passing by. However, standing on the sidewalk observing, I felt uncomfortable due to an overwhelming feeling of urgency as these vehicles rapidly passed by. A unique human interaction was a police motorcycle parked at the traffic light, appearing to write out a citation for the car on his right. I believe if I revisit this intersection at a later time during the evening — when it’s colder outside — I will see a lot more people walking and hear very different noises clashing.
09.04.2020
I revisited my intersection at a later time today, around 6:30 pm. The first difference I noticed was the abundance of people. Since it was around dinner time instead of the middle of the workday, and many of the cross streets nearby had myriad restaurants, there were several groups of pedestrians walking towards those locations.
Looking towards my intersection, the lighting and sky was extremely different than earlier this week: fewer clouds, more direct sunlight as the sun was setting. The sunlight illuminated the top parts of the buildings, making them stand out, especially the distinct architecture on the top of the cathedral. The glass windows on the building on the right were also very reflective. While on Tuesday the atmosphere felt trapping, today it felt open and welcoming. The tall buildings looming over you didn’t seem to be as powerful anymore. The warm yellow tones contrasting with the bright blue sky provided a sense of safety and comfort. The weather was also much cooler, with a slight breeze, being much more inviting for people out to stroll in the city. The angle I took this photo in also reveals a very expansive and vast road where many vehicles could travel.
Turning around, facing away from the street sign, this is what I saw (referring to photographs shown above). On the right side of the street was the Mellon Institute, part of CMU, continuing the trend of old-style buildings with its neoclassical architectural influences exhibited by the tall columns arranged along the front of the building. The gray/ brown color matches the antique buildings across from it. However, the square shapes of the pots and the stairs appeared somewhat out of place with a more modern appearance.
On the left side of the street was another view of Webster Hall beside a modern style building, and then further away was a tall tower and church. They all portrayed an elegant, old-fashioned look. However, something new I noticed was the greenery on the other side of the road. There were several tall trees, bushes, and shrubs, interrupting the busy and crowded atmosphere of this intersection. This was the first sign of greenery on this road.
Today, the “Healthy Ride” bike rental stand was empty, with no bikes available, unlike Tuesday. This corroborates my assumption that at this time of day there are typically more people out in the streets whether to eat dinner, take a stroll in the nice weather, or make their way home after work. Another new thing I noticed was the large width of the sidewalk I was standing on. The right side of the sidewalk was almost double the width of the one across it. I think one of the reasons for this was the bike stand, allocating more space allowing people to safely maneuver one out of the slot without hitting any people.
Walking half a block past my intersection, just before hitting the next cross street, I took this photograph. Facing the sun, unlike the other photos, you can see it set in the background behind the cathedral. I just thought this was a pretty picture with the different shades of the sky. This picture also emphasizes the contrast in old vs new buildings on the two sides of the street. On the left, you can also see a couple walking along the very large sidewalk. I didn’t photograph many people on the other side of the street because I didn’t want them to get upset if they noticed, but these people weren’t facing me.
While I saw a lot more traffic today in terms of cars and people, I saw fewer buses than I did yesterday. Perhaps I should look up the timings of the buses that travel to the bus stops nearby.
In contrast to photos I posted earlier, you can see the blinding sunlight in this one. As soon as I arrived at my intersection, this was what I saw, just before the sunset. As I mentioned, the bright sun really opened up this location giving it a friendly feeling, especially watching the light shine on the leaves of the trees. This is a view with my back to the intersection (facing away from it). After taking this photo, to avoid the sun glare in my photos, I just took pictures facing the intersection itself. To get a clearer image of the forms of the objects, I also tried to strategically position myself so the sun is hidden by the tree and isn’t in the camera’s line of sight.
I believe the basic key features of this location are the architecture (the modern building on the right and the cathedral on the left are the primary figures), the transportation interactions (bikes, cars, buses, trucks), the very large road, and scarcity of people, and the minimal greenery with a couple of trees and shrubs, emphasizing the urban nature of this street. The distinct differing colors and styles of the buildings also play a role in creating an open but slightly intimidating atmosphere.
09.09.2020
My first attempt at creating a physical rendering of this intersection — capturing its entirety through only a single photo and then through only the color white.
Creating this relief required a lot more precision and time than I originally thought it would take. I created my relief with 4/5 layers. The trees and the cathedral, especially with the windows, were the most difficult areas to carve out the details. I minimized the shapes into simple shapes to be able to more readily cut them. I attempted to also contrast the modern right side with the left side through the architecture of the windows. The ones on the right are more straight and have right angles versus the right with the curved arcs.
I first started my relief by tracing the basic shapes of my drawing onto tracing paper; turns out I traced a lot on extraneous details though. I had some difficulty trying to figure out how to transfer my graphite drawing onto the white card stock. In the end when I turned it around and pressed, it was slightly smudgy, so I decided to lay the tracing paper mirrored on top of the white card stock and cut through the tracing paper into the card stock underneath it.
I tried not to destroy the tracing paper too much when I was cutting through it and kept the smaller more detailed shapes intact so I could more accurately draw the next layers. After I cut one layer, I traced it to create the layer underneath it. I was surprised how much precision it took to cut the trees, especially with all of those curves; I had 3 trees in my piece that overlapped with the buildings. I also had a lot of details with the three cars (one in foreground) and two in the background, that were fun to cut. After creating all of my layers, I glued them together with the glue stick and then glued the segments onto the card stock backing. Even though it required a lot of time and brute effort, I thought it was a very interesting and fun project.
In my next relief, I hope to add some subtle clouds with one layer of card stock because my buildings on my intersection tilted downwards, leaving a large empty space in the sky. I wouldn’t add too much though because the rest of the buildings are very detailed, and I slightly like the contrast — it sort of leaves a buffer for your mind.
09.11.2020
I chose this particular gradient of grayscale colors to show depth with the layers in the background being lighter shades than the layers in the foreground. I thought this would make it easier for the audience to notice the perspective in the picture, especially because the streets are slightly tilted inwards. It would also emphasize the streetlights in the middle, which are a darker shade of gray.
I noticed that the gray scale relief emphasized the distinctions between the layers more significantly whereas the white on white relief heavily depended on shadows to establish distinctions between areas. I thought the gray paper was slightly thicker than the white and a bit harder to cut more precisely, especially for the trees and the windows in the cathedral. I liked the contrast the gray paper established, especially with the windows of the buildings on the right, the arches of the cathedral, and the cars, highlighting shadows and details of these prominent objects. I’m wondering if I maybe put in too many extraneous details into the cathedral?
I chose the darkest shade of gray for the traffic lights because I felt like those holistically represented the intersection and brought all of the detailed elements together. I also learned the importance of a sharp blade. I started cutting with a blade with a flat tip, and I had to score the card stock numerous times before it cut through.
My Process
Similar my the white on white relief, the first thing I did was trace my drawing onto the tracing paper. To transfer it over, I cut through the paper instead of trying to get the graphite to transfer. After cutting my bottom layers, I used the cutouts to cut the layer on top by tracing around the pieces, since the tracing paper was not intact anymore. After cutting the biggest pieces, I began to cut out the smaller easier ones like the cars, and then I did the trees which were the hardest in my opinion. After getting all my basic outlines cut out, I carved out the windows of the buildings and the cars. I think cutting into the paper adds more depth than adding the windows on top of the layer.
To try something new to portray the lines on the sidewalk on the bottom, I used my bone folder to make indent lines going off the page.
Challenges
Some difficulties I ran into included the paper scrunching up when I did the trees — the curves were significantly more difficult to do with the gray paper. Another problem was when I was cutting thin strips, the paper occasionally tore — which is when I realized the importance of having a sharp blade and some sort of larger piece attached to it for grip. One frustrating thing that kept happening was the glue being visible after being glued down. When I would lay my piece backward on my scrap paper to cover it with glue, I would make sure to cover all the edges well so the pieces stick together well. However when I put glue onto the trees, since the spaces between the little branch/leaf cuts were so small, the glue would get stuck in between and be visible when I glue it down even though it dries sort of clear. I had to resort to using my xacto knife blade to clean up the excess glue between the edges, but by that time, sometimes the other regions of the glued piece would dry out.
I enjoyed creating this grayscale relief more than the white on white because of the increased variety and options I had to be more descriptive of my intersection.
09.16.2020
Exploring the use of a single color in my relief: Light Brown
I chose this color to subtly bring focus to the cathedral, an extremely important piece of distinct architecture on my intersection. I didn’t want to compete with the traffic lights which are emphasized as the darkest on the page with the dark gray color.
When I first arrived at this intersection, I immediately noticed the distinction between the modern right side of the street and the old-fashioned left side of the street. In making the left side brown, I also strived to emphasize this antique style of the intersection in contrast to the modern side.
Changes/Reflections from last relief
- The tilt of the ‘truck route’ sign to be more accurate of the perspective and view of the intersection
- Added in the traffic lights attached to the sign- more accurately represent the intersection
- Cars in distance moved right to get position more accurate
- 6 lines on the street rather than 5
- The car in front is a darker value to match the other dark components (emphasize the vehicles and the traffic lights)- darkest tones
- One tree rather than two is more representative of the giant bushy tree
- Buildings are slightly straighter
- Brown muted color fades into the background
- Windows more precise- craft is better (except for the tip of the cathedral)
- Used bone folder to indent harder on the bottom sidewalk area
- Corrected the tilt of the concrete under the closest street sign (also made a slightly lighter tone- so smoother transition)
09.16.2020
A cohesive and interpretive relief of my intersection developed over time
Above all, I learned the importance of how a few basic shapes can capture the essence of a location, and how interactions of forms within a space establish the atmosphere it creates for the viewer. Different interactions create varying moods and experiences for the people in the location. The colors, noise, and smell can also alter one’s perception of the space. A lot of what I’ve learned about the specific cutting process is detailed in my comments above. This project helped me develop fine crafting skills, paying attention to straight lines, precise angles, and smooth curves. It also allowed us to work on translating complex images into understandable figures and figuring how to best portray the nature of a location with limited tools and materials. Holistically, when crafting my reliefs, I caught on that simplicity can be valued more than unnecessary details.
09.23.2020
Completed final presentations on our three reliefs
Analyzed these particular questions in our breakout rooms:
- What role does point of view play in shaping your understanding of particular places?
- How does the cropping of the photos and the translation of photo to shapes affect your reading of particular places?
- What roles do tonal values play in the compositions? Do they describe depth of field? Do they tell particular stories? Something else?
- How do design decisions made across the three compositions affect your reading of each group as a set?
- How does craftsmanship impact your understanding of particular places?
- What roles do colors play in the compositions? Do they describe depth of field? Do they tell particular stories? Something else?
From the review presentations today, I was able to learn more about the thought process many of my peers had as they finalized their relief designs. In my group, we discussed point of view. Two points that we noticed were everyone selected a particular point of view in order to emphasize an element of their intersection they wanted others to also see. Although Ricky and I had similar intersections in the vicinity, he chose to portray a more calm version of the street with emphasis on the people rather than t he buildings as I did. My particular point of view was chosen to represent a holistic view of the intersection contrasting the old and the new. We also noticed that the actual POV of a person in the scenario was different for each piece; Ana chose to portray hers as someone riding their bike through the space, while I chose to make it appear as if someone was walking along the sidewalk, looking up at the expansive buildings.
Another group talked about craftsmanship and color. I thought it was intriguing to hear how every person interpreted color in a different manner. Some people used it to establish a mood/emotion, some for composition, some for emphasis, balance, contrast, etc. Similarly some people used tonal values to demonstrate depth while others used it to highlight certain unique aspects of their intersection. It was interesting to see and hear about people’s decisions along the whole process and how it all came together to create cohesive pieces.
