Students will compare a mainstream advertisement and a counterculture optical-art image, sort visual evidence into analytical categories, and take an initial evidence-based position on how visual art challenges mainstream values and shapes public opinion. They will leave Phase 1 with a launch artifact that identifies optical techniques, weighs competing interpretations, and sets up the claim-and-evidence work of the next phase.

Students will evaluate competing claims about whether counterculture optical art shifts public opinion or manipulates viewers, weigh supporting and challenging evidence from curated images and short texts, and produce a claim map that guides their poster and artist statement.

Students will present and defend an optical-art poster in a rapid gallery walk, use evidence-based critique to analyze how visual choices challenge mainstream values, and complete a brief artist statement and 60-second critique for an authentic audience.