
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: MONDAY, October 9, 1995                   TAG: 9510100121
SECTION: NEWSFUN                    PAGE: NF-1   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: LISA P. SMITH STAFF WRITER
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

CATCHING YOUR EYE

Perspective, converge, horizon line, vanishing point, relative scale, picture plane, foreshortening and manipulate. These words may sound foreign to you, but for pupils in Jane Hale's Crystal Spring Elementary fifth-grade class, who toured the exhibit "Fool the Eye, Fool the Mind" at the Art Museum of Western Virginia, the words have become part of their vocabulary.

"Fool the Eye, Fool the Mind" is a history of artistic illusion, part of the hands-on ArtVenture series for children, which will continue until June 1996.

Illusion is an unreal or false belief, appearance or image. In other words, something can appear to be one way, but actually it is not.

Jenny Shamy, the ArtVenture coordinator, says that the idea behind the ArtVenture series is to "have the children learn while they are having fun."

During the tour of the exhibit, pupils first are taken to the ArtVenturers, a movable sculpture that brings color, shape, texture and lines into view.

Next the tour moves to the ArtVenture Gallery where the pupils can see "Fool the Eye, Fool the Mind." There the pupils can learn about different aspects of the artist's world. They can view several different artists' work, which helps them understand the idea of perspective. Perspective is how artists give pictures a sense of depth. It makes objects in the paintings that are close appear larger and objects farther away smaller.

Paintings used to explain the different aspects of the art world include Nancy Witt's "Flying Blocks," which also shows perspective and scale. Scale works along with perspective to relate objects to distance. A picture, known as "Magic Eye," is used to demonstrate how seeing with two eyes enables us to perceive the world in three dimensions, or 3-D.

Holograms, which are photographs that use laser light to produce three-dimensional images, also were used to show how light can be bent to change the hologram's appearance, depending on where a person is standing.

Shamy says the holograms suggests "that we see things differently" in the world and "respond differently to colors."

The tour includes a look at how hidden pictures and hidden ideas can be found in pictures. A computer-generated print by Douglas Brown, in which several different images are laid on top of each other, creates a hidden pictures.

Advertising posters also are used to show how photographers sometimes change their subjects to make it look as if something really strange does exist. For instance, in one poster a Shar-Pei's fur is being blown to the side by a very small fan. And in another, two pictures have been brought together to make a face, one side is the face of a puppy and the other is the face of a child.

After the exhibit, the tour goes to the Art in Action room where the children experience a hands-on approach to learning. They can paint, make Velcro masks and use computer programs to tell stories.

The pupils then may participate in workshops led by area artists that re-enforce the theme of the exhibits.

When asked about the exhibit, Page Garrett, a fifth-grader, thought it was "really neat." So did Tim Marshall, who was really taken with the hidden picture and hidden ideas picture.

And Ariel Taylor said, "It was really neat, because it fools your mind."

by CNB