Inca Article Response--Rebecca

The Inca article, although long, gave me new perspectives on how people relate and work with their surroundings. The Inca civilization was very advanced for its time, and easily could have built large monuments or dwellings, however they chose to work with nature instead of against it. When they needed to build something, the Inca, went with the flow of the land--if there was a cliff, or even a large rock in the way, they tended to either move around it or just end what they were doing in order not to disturb nature. They were built from the outcrop, which was a bond between mother earth, and the culture living there. They used organic materials (ex rocks) to construct their buildings in an effort to blend in with nature rather than stand out from it. Most likely because of the Incas carefully constructed dwellings, they are now protected and revered world wide. The best example of the Incas buildings flowing with nature is Machu Picchu. It is way up in the Andes (as were the other Inca dwellings), and when you look down on the site, you can still see the sloping hills and protruding rocks, and the buildings built into the cliffs. Their devotion to nature while constructing places was also a work of art. Their dwellings are a model of what we should be doing today--in our effort to go green. How they lived and worked is truely inspirational.

I have put in a lot of thought and research into project 2, and have narrowed down my options. Originally I was thinking of very basic, obvious things (ex an unusual tea set, stained glass window plaque, or 3D puzzle). The more I thought about it though, I knew I could come up with something not only more complex, but more interesting and unusual. I have done ceramics for years, and all of my first ideas were similar to things I did in high school. While not bad ideas, I wanted to do something more advanced, where I might/should push myself past my normal boundaries. One of the options I have is a large vase with holes through out the entire thing. It would work with the idea of a system, because the holes work together throughout the whole thing, and these holes cause negative space therefore the architecture. My other option, which I am leaning a little more towards, is based on a picture I saw on the cover of The Penland Book of Ceramics: Masterclasses in Ceramic Techniques (check out pic at: http://www.amazon.com/Penland-Book-Ceramics-Masterclasses-Techniques/dp/157990338X). That cover had interlocking shapes (that looked a lot like bananas) form yet another shape. I would like to do something like that, but with a more organic shape that overall forms the shape of a wave, or some other cool, yet definable shape. This is both system--because the shapes interlock and have to work together, and architecture because it creates something else, which alters space.