Inventors often work to find faster, more efficient ways of completing a task. How did Samuel F.B. Morse use his artistic ingenuity to create a more efficient telegraph machine?
(1 point)
Responses
by using higher-quality wires
by using higher-quality wires
by using more wires and background objects
by using more wires and background objects
by using fewer wires
by using fewer wires
by using stronger wires
Which shared trait of artists and inventors allows an artist to render accurate images on canvas, and an inventor to create a detailed model of a product?
(1 point)
Responses
knowledge of mathematics
knowledge of mathematics
hand-eye coordination
hand-eye coordination
photographic memory
photographic memory
knowledge of engineering
French artist Daguerre invented the camera using which creative sensibilities that were developed during his painting and set design career?
(1 point)
Responses
an eye for line and form
an eye for line and form
an eye for patterns and design
an eye for patterns and design
an eye for color placement and color mixing
an eye for color placement and color mixing
an eye for composition and design
Potter’s Wheels, Telegraphs, and Portraits
The wheel could be characterized as one of the greatest inventions of all time. Without this simple tool, cars and bicycles would never have been created. Just think of how long it would take you to get from your house to the grocery store without a set of wheels! And how could you possibly visit your relatives or friends over 20 miles away without spending the night?
Yet it’s entirely possible that the first wheel was created not by an inventor or mechanic, but an artist looking for a way to shape a perfectly round, ceramic pot, as shown in the picture. Just think: the desires of an artist to make a perfectly round pot may have been the birth of the design for modern transportation!
Hand shapes clay on a potter's wheel.
How does an artist turn his creative skills to the task of inventing? Consider the story of Samuel F.B. Morse.
Morse was born in Charleston, Massachusetts in 1791. While in college at Yale University, Morse was already developing dual interests in electricity and painting. Morse was initially interested in art and became an accomplished portrait painter. His skill with the human form is apparent in this sketch of an armored knight. But tinkering with concepts and ideas was never far from his thoughts.
Like most inventors, Morse was interested in finding faster and more effective ways to complete tasks. Aboard a ship from England to the United States, he happened to hear a conversation about electromagnetism. Suddenly, the wheels in his mind began turning. While he had never completed a thorough study of electricity, Morse knew that pulses of electric current could carry information through wires. Inventors had been working with a telegraph machine designed to transmit such information, but up to that point, it was highly impractical because it required too many wires. Would it be possible to simplify the machine to just one wire?
Working with mostly makeshift tools (like a homemade battery), by the year 1837, Morse had created a one-wire telegraph. In 1838, at an exhibition in New York, Morse transmitted 10 words per minute through his telegraph system using what would later be known as Morse code. Morse code is now a standard system of transmitting information through on-off tones, lights, or clicks that can be understood by a knowledgeable listener.
By 1842, Morse had received $30,000 in funding from Congress to further his plan to connect the United States by telegraph, effectively wiring America. Morse the painter was now firmly established as Morse the inventor.
This ink sketch shows the backside of an armored knight bearing a sword. The figure is drawn above a page of written text.
To the Possessor of this Book in the year 1865…
by Samuel Finley Breese Morse
The Walters Art Museum, Baltimore
Two nineteenth-century gentlemen sit at a machine receiving a telegraph.
The Artist Becomes Inventor
This early black-and-white daguerreotype of Daquerre shows a white-haired man in a suit coat. He is seated facing the camera.
Portrait of Louis-Jacques-Mandé Daquerre
by Charles Richard Meade
Digital image courtesy of the Getty’s Open Content Program
Artists as inventors, or inventors as artists, are not as rare as you might think. Renaissance creator Leonardo da Vinci is famous for his journals which detailed possible inventions as fantastical and futuristic as a helicopters, tanks, and crossbows. What is it about the fields of art and invention that are so compatible? Do artists and inventors share similar qualities?
Louis-Jacques-Mandé Daguerre was a French painter and printmaker. He was most famous for his artistic abilities in creating spectacular theatrical sets using painting and lighting.
Daguerre’s career as an inventor did not take off until he was over 50 years old. With his eye for composition and design, Daguerre had been wondering for at least a decade if he could find a way to capture permanent, realistic images by using light and chemistry. In 1838, he secured the financial help of an investor and was finally able to showcase the magical process he was developing: he had discovered a technique to preserve extremely detailed photographic images with chemicals and light on sheets of silver-plated copper. Can you image your reaction to seeing this daguerreotype for the first time? With the flash of the camera, a new technology was born that would be used to create art, study the natural world, and record history.
Daguerre saw the world around him in new and different ways than his peers. What qualities did he possess that helped him succeed as both an artist and an inventor?
ingenuity – Ingenuity is the quality of being clever, original, and inventive. Both artists and inventors have a knack for creating what is new and has never been seen before, whether this is a unique method of creating form on a canvas, or a new tool to accomplish a task. In essence, ingenuity means seeing the world from different perspectives, which often yields distinctive solutions to tough problems.
flexibility – Artists and inventors often like to try out new ideas. They will work tirelessly to find a solution, even if it means throwing out old ideas and looking at a problem from a completely new angle.
skilled hands – Visual artists generally have finely developed hand-eye coordination that they have earned through many hours forming pottery, sketching pictures, crafting sculptures, etc. This is the same coordination that serves an inventor when they piece together working models.
visualization – Artists practice visually modeling their world on a regular basis as they create drawings, paintings, and sculptures. Inventors must also be able to visualize their new creations both on paper and in 3-D.
There are probably many other traits that artists and inventors share in common. Above all, inventors and artists are both creators. They are not content to sit idly; instead, they feel compelled to search out solutions to practical and artistic problems, sharing their revelations for the benefit and pleasure of the world around them.
The invention of photography has a long and rich history. Improvements on the original daguerreotype have been varied and continually progressive. The two cameras represented here both produce photos in a much quicker format than original images made in the 1800s. These new cameras are also handheld and easily transportable unlike the original large, boxy setups.
Artist-inventors create brilliant, unexpected ideas. How might an artist help to shape the development of new prosthetic legs? Could an inventor design a new artistic technology to improve the way we print photographs? The possibilities of future inventions are endless.
When inventors come up with a solid idea, it is very important for them to own their unique invention. In the United States, this involves is a process called the patent, which is a set of exclusive rights granted to the inventor by the United States Patent and Trademark Office.
1 answer
Here are the answers to the questions based on the provided text:
How did Samuel F.B. Morse use his artistic ingenuity to create a more efficient telegraph machine?
by using fewer wires
Which shared trait of artists and inventors allows an artist to render accurate images on canvas, and an inventor to create a detailed model of a product?
hand-eye coordination
French artist Daguerre invented the camera using which creative sensibilities that were developed during his painting and set design career?
1 answer