Project Week Fall 2020 - The Putney School

Project Weeks – In the order they were received.

Click on photos in the photo galleries to see a higher-res image.

Ceramic Project Weeks

Magda Sharff

Discovering Sing: Dissecting the Sing Book for Thoughtful Use

While I am very sad that we aren’t able to have Sing this year, I see it as sort of an opportunity to press the reset button and closely examine our practices related to cultural appreciation, stylistic accuracy, etc.. This project was a first step towards doing that; I collected in this document some research on any songs that seemed like they were missing information in the Sing book or that I wanted to learn more about, as well as adding notes on style, examples, and notes on the Sing version where they seemed applicable. You can use the doc outline to jump to any song you are curious about. Another part of my project was getting in contact with former music directors James Wallace, Inés Gómez-Ochoa, Judy Zuckerman, and George Emlen, to hear from them about their additions to and thoughts about the Sing book, which is still an ongoing process.

Click here to Read the Full Project Week

Daniel Cha

THE STATUS QUO – A Documentary on East Asian Confucianism and South Korean Students

Jo Fillipowski

Cornerstone Bakery Internship

Ian Glejzer

Manditory Minimum Sentences

Emma Ding

How e-commerce live broadcasts used consumers’ psychology in terms of marketing strategy.

Jason Gross

Guilt of the Damned: a Horror Fiction Podcast

Sky Friedman

Photographic Study: COVID-19 at The Putney School

View the photo album by clicking here.

Bailey Casey

The Anatomy of Ballet – An Exploration of the Medical Side of Dance

In many cases, passion is far more a choice than an innate feeling. Similar to talent, many of the best artists, magicians, comedians or athletes got there though grit and a decision to dedicate themselves.

Three things that I have chosen to “try for” here at Putney have been ballet, the human anatomy, and drawing. None were an interest of mine before, and perhaps not after but right now I love learning about all of them.

Despite the challenges of such an open ended project and all the chaos that ensues, I am super happy to have gotten to explore these topics in such a way.

I hope that these posters can let you have a peek at what I love about them.

View the posters by clicking here.

Henry Stephenson-Ryan

Deer in Massachusetts

View Henry’s Writings and Reflections

Isobel Hamilton

IBH’s Toasty Socks

Here are Isobel Hamilton’s socks, made from “IBH’s Toasty Socks” pattern, unintentionally bi-colored because I ran out of yarn halfway through. They are woolen and very comfortable!

Kevin Zuo

Soviet economy and the fall of the Soviet Union Project week

Dissolution of an Empire: The Soviet economy and the fall of the Soviet Union

From 1922 to 1991, the Soviet Union had a lifespan of 69 years. In its journey from an unstable and divided nation to its transformation to a global superpower, the Soviet economy was shaped around five-year periods of central economic planning and rapid industrialization. Meanwhile, its people paid a great price for industrial advancements. From the tyrannical administration of Stalin to the futile efforts of agricultural investment, the Soviet people had not stopped suffering for a day. Eventually, although Perestroika and Glasnost triggered the Soviet people’s resistance and dissatisfaction, it was the will of the people that took the Soviet Union down.

Read the Full Essay Here

Kai Crowley

Crystal Jewelry Smithing

Each of these pieces is original and abstract. Stones and crystals, epoxy clay, metallic paint, resin sealer, and vintage chains were used to form the jewelry. Each of the trinkets are diverse, both in the materials used, and the way they look. I made rings and necklaces; most of which are wearable for anyone. None of them have names, for they have equal value and form a neutral statement: “Creativity is hidden in everyone”

Rei Kimura

Enhancing Musical Mixing Skills Through Home Recordings

Link to work

https://soundcloud.com/rei-sk/bluecolors-demo/s-ayErj9jNg9m

Description

During the past couple of weeks I worked with David Ross to record and mix a project I had been working on. From the start to finish, I was able to significantly grow my idea from a few tracks to a fuller, more fleshed-out version. During the first week I focused on the recording and composition aspects of the project, adding new tracks and revising old ones. Once I was happy with the recordings, I moved on to the mixing part where I learned more about EQ, reverb, compression, and filters. With notes and help from David, I developed my project and was able to get a clearer sense of how to both mix and record my work from home. There’s still a lot to polish and learn but listen to my demo, “Blue Colors” here!

Charlotte Russell

The Progression of Adolescence

Visual depictions of growing up in the twenty first century. Through the eyes of me, Charlotte Russell.

To view this project, click here.

Hannah Sardinas

My First Book

I wrote about a siren who doesn’t want to kill sailors like the rest of the sirens. I also wrote about her twin sister to get a sense of what being a siren who wants to kill sailors is like. My goal was to write about a siren who falls in love with a sailor she’s supposed to drown. At the end I managed to get to the part where she first sees him. I want to go back to this project at some point because there is a lot more that I want to add.

Read the full story by clicking here.

Kyran Dell

Music in Three Parts

In this project I found two songs, one by an artist I have listened to and one by an artist I have never listened to. I then learned the songs and recorded them. After recording these songs I took what I learned and wrote and recorded an original song.

Song 1- Drift Away by Dobie Gray

Song 2- Still Waiting by Sum 41

Song 3- Original

Giulia Puppin

Equine Nutrition Through Whole Ingredients

Gio Calabrese

Woodland Profiling

To create these posters, I developed a 3 page procedure to record the data that I was looking for: tree species, ages, altitude, etc. I performed three of these surveys in each forest at staggered altitudes to form its profile. Identifying a tree in the wintertime without its leaves—the clearest indicator of species—is challenging, and I had to learn other methods, but the effort was worth the final product: an easily digestible forest profile.

Solomon Ponzio

Building A Raspberry Pi Weather Station

Isabel McCarthy

The Phonetics and Grammar of My Constructed Language

Lane Dreslin

Learning Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator

Mazie Chamberlin

A Study of Strangers

Hilary Menegaz Weitzner

Arranging and Recording a Song

This project has three pieces. Click the links below to view each part of the project:

Andrew Kiger

Abandoned Vermont Photographed

View the all the photographs by clicking here.

Willa Sheehan

The Study of Frankenstein and Unconventional Portraiture

In this project, I delved into my interests in painting and literature by learning about the use of portraiture in both art forms. I was curious about the more cryptic, and less traditional, ways artists choose to portray identity in their work. I also wanted to study the parallels between the way the human psyche is communicated through writing and visual arts. To begin, I read the novel Frankenstein by Mary Shelley as well as a variety of poetry and prose that spoke to these ideas. I studied the concept of illustrating a visual portrait and its evolution throughout art history. In the end, I created a small collection of oil portraits paired with poems that reflected abstract characterization.

Click here to view the document containing images and text

Kara Rhoades

A selection of pages from a graphic novel adaptation of Once Upon A Time (In Space) By The Mechanisms.

View Kara’s website by clicking here.

Lim Dierks

Brain hat

For Project Week I put together a hat that resembled the human brain. The hat consisted of a knit base, crocheted tubes, and embroidered details.

Ibrahim Sidow

Where I am From

This is a short film of my neighborhood. In this film I took, I used a Canon Rebel T7 to interview and film two people from my neighborhood and a couple of locations in my neighborhood. I put the film together using Adobe’s Premiere Pro 2020. In this project, I learned a few interviewing techniques, Shooting techniques, and how to use Premiere Pro at a beginner level.

Sponsor/Teacher/Mentor : Andy Reichsman

Grace Campanella

ADHD in Day to Day Life

Robert LeFevre

Painting At Home

MacNeille

Edible Calendar of Vermont: A Guide to Edible Foods and When to Harvest Them

View the Calendar by Clicking Here

Jiaqi Cai

An exploration of three documentary photographers ：Margaret Bourke White, Robert Frank and Henri Cartier Bresson

Introduction : For my project I researched three documentary photographers. On the basis of my understanding of their career and life experience, I wrote three pieces, one is a presentation, one is creative and one is a comparison.

Click here to view the document

James Townsend

Learning C# through game-building tutorials and Unity

This project week, I chose to learn how to code in C# by building a game in Unity. I followed game tutorials on youtube and other websites in order to learn how to build a game, navigate Unity, and script in C#. From the start, I was interested in making a space shooter game, so I looked for tutorials on 2D space shooters like Galaga or Asteroids. At first, I followed the tutorials very closely, but as I became more familiar with the process, I started to write my own code and change the game to what I wanted it to be: I added effects, different graphics, and more complexity. My final product is a game that you may or may not be able to download and play (for some reason the hardest part is sharing the game) and a bunch of knowledge on how to make a game. I definitely plan to keep doing this and updating what I have built during this project week.

Griffin Gooch-Breault

Learning SketchUp

For my project, I went through the beginning processes of designing a building and learning the 3d modeling program SketchUp. The slide show here is a showcase of the models I’ve made of the layout and structure of the house. I did my best to incorporate structural support into the plan as well as aesthetic choices. This project is relatively simple as while this is not my first time working in 3D space this is my first time working in SketchUp.

Milo Townsend

Wooden Chess-men and Chess-women

Broden Walsh

Jewelry: Chain making and cold joint experimentation

Julissa Garcia

American Dream Game & America To Me

Romy Lafage

Film of Elated Moments

Throughout the past two weeks I dove into learning Adobe Premiere Pro software and learning about filmmaking. I interviewed three of my peers here at Putney and overlaid their words with appealing videos that had only a mild connection to what they were saying. I spoke with my friends about the positive aspects of their mental health to learn and inform.

Francis Noyes

Childhood Sexual Abuse and it’s Impact

For my project I created a mixed media art exhibition to raise awareness for childhood sexual abuse. I glued together a canvas and gathered childhood artwork and photos, I also took some photos specifically for this project. As well as photos and artwork, I interviewed someone gathered quotes and statistics and put them into my art piece as well. The last thing I did was write a short paper explainng my art piece, how sexual abuse impacts children, and how to help. I would prefer if the essay part of this project stays private due to the personal aspect of it.