Welcome to the Art-O-Matic Annotation and Analysis Tool for helping students to write critically
about art.
It uses the program Click Charts, which is free and which you can download from here.
You'll need to have that installed on your computer.
The Art-O-Matic is a template for art analysis based on the FTC palette developed by Dr.
Rene Sandel.
It has been adapted for use in the art courses at the International School of Beijing and
has a tool to help students prepare for the comparative study aspect of the new IB visual
arts curriculum.
It's important to keep in mind that this is a tool to help your thinking and what you
generate here will need to be refined and organized further in another document.
You will certainly be able to use aspects of your annotations, but additional research
and material will be required to make a truly effective analysis.
When you open the template, this is what you will see.
Click Charts is a fairly intuitive program and very user friendly.
Like any program, there is a menu bar at the top.
There are toolbars here and a symbol library is on the left.
Template is already set up to do most of what you will need, so the use of these tools
should be minimal.
Let's take a tour of the template.
On the left are nodes for all the elements from the FTC research guide.
Here there is a place to store your bibliographic information.
I can double click on the box and type in information.
I can cut and paste it from another source.
Here is a reminder that the form is a template.
It's important to remember this as it is not a real template and if you change it you will
alter the original file forever.
Over here is a yellow notepad.
We'll see more of that in a bit.
So let's get started.
The first thing I need to do is copy all this and cut it pasted to a new blank chart.
I can drag over everything or choose select all from the menu bar.
Once I have my working space, I need to insert an image.
I can place it wherever I want and resize it if necessary.
Then I can select from the FTC nodes and drag them to the image.
I can put the image to the back and make the nodes appear on top.
Remember, you should not choose every node, just the ones that are significant for your
artwork.
You will know what is significant from your research.
In this case color is an important aspect of Matisse's work.
I can also change the angle of the arrows.
If you need more than one symbol for a category, just copy and paste the one you want to reproduce.
I want to add some nodes for each FTC node I selected.
Go to the yellow notepad and get a note.
Double click on the icon and you can add your thoughts.
You can resize the node and move it around.
I can connect it to a node using the connector button if I like.
You can see that I've completed my annotations.
Now I'm ready to move on to part 2, the synthesis.
That's where the real analysis takes place.
Open the synthesis template.
Remember, you need to copy all the elements and open a new chart.
Go back to your original annotations and capture the notes you've made.
Paste them to the synthesis area.
Here are some questions to help guide your analysis.
Use the blue notepad to make notes on your thoughts.
These thoughts will not be in a finished form.
You will need to expand on these ideas in another document, your journal, or in your
comparative study.
I can also annotate and compare more than one artwork.
The screen expands to whatever you need.
Again, keeping in mind the elements essential to your artwork, choose from the questions
that will help you build a strong critical analysis.
Deciding what is essential will of course be informed by the research you've done on
an artwork and artist.
Now I can see all my notes in one place.
Using the connector tool, I can connect ideas.
These connections will help me zero in on the significant and relevant points that will
allow me to make a focused and concise argument.
My annotation is done and I made some notes on the critical aspects of my analysis.
As stated earlier, you may need to translate this information to your workbook or another
program for your comparative study.
Since you also have some good looking graphics, now let's migrate them to some other platforms.
Capture and copy the notes you want from the chart.
Open a new blank and paste these notes.
You may have to make some adjustments.
Then select export from the file menu.
Save as an image file which can be imported to PowerPoint or a word processing program.
If you import an image to PowerPoint, you will no longer be able to move individual elements
around but you can resize the image.
If you want to use the text from your template, you can simply cut and paste it into a text
box and then you can format your slides any way that you want.
This works in a word processing program as well.
Pretty cool!
Remember though that the information on the template needs to be refined and organized
in a way that presents a coherent and effective argument.
Hopefully the organization of your thinking using the template will make this an easier
task.
