WP3: Pre-Writing Assignment 3

I think the setting of my assigned art object, Monet's Table (from the Lilypad Series), is extremely important to its argument. When a piece of art is located inside of a building, its surroundings are, for the most part, static; a few adjacent pieces of art might be swapped for something else every once in a while, but that's it. Outdoors, however, an art object's surroundings are subject to drastic changes. The weather is always a factor; it could be rainy, snowy, foggy, sunny, and so on. The time of day is also important. Anyone can view these outdoor objects at any time of the day, but the same can't be said about the art located within the museum. All of these factors directly support important characteristics of Monet, after which this piece was titled. Monet often created numerous paintings of a location seen from different viewpoints, paying close attention to the lighting. He would sometimes return to the same location at different times of the year to paint the same landscape during a different season.

Lighting is one of the most important aspects in Monet's paintings. Monet used a combination of lighting and differing viewpoints within his paintings in order to generate certain pathoses. Monet's art style is reflected through the placement of Michael Todd's "Monet's Table." The table is strategically placed under a bridge so that, as the sun moves through the sky, the shadow of the bridge moves across across the surface of the table. This alone emphasizes Monet's attention to lighting. Also, the table is placed in an area from which there are many unique viewpoints; it can be viewed from below, from nearly every direction at ground level, and even from above on the bridge. Michael Todd clearly wanted to reflect the highlights of Monet's art style through his own piece.

The title of this piece, "Monet's Table," practially asks the audience to view this not as a piece of art, but as a simple table. That being said, it makes for a rather unique table. For one, it's composed entirely of steel, which, especially when located outside, is subject to rusting. Additionally, steel isn't exactly the most inviting material for a table; it can get extremely hot when placed in the sun, or it can be freezing when covered by shade. Also, the top surface of this "table" is bumpy and has rather large gaps created by the spacing between the "lily pads." All of these characteristics of this "table" sort of contradict the general purposes of a table. No one wants to write papers on or eat food over a rusty, holey table that doesn't even have any chairs to sit on. By creating this piece of art that contradicts the mainstream ideas of tables, Michael Todd almost seems to be poking fun at Monet's obsession with lily pads in his series of paintings centered on a lily pad pond. In my opinion, Todd seems to argue that this "table" should have belonged to Monet because of his numerous paintings of lily pads.