Summary

Writing critical reviews of the arts is an eye-opening challenge. I sort of knew it would be of course, it follows that once you can describe something, put it into words, make the intangible tangible, you are arming yourself with insight to understand it more thoroughly. Once you have command over words that describe either a feeling or some quality that is not easily described you begin to notice it's elements more.
I attempted to review a variety of different media to get a feel for different styles of review and descriptions. Even the most tangible forms such as films were a challenge however. Beyond an outline of the plot and saying whether you liked the film or not, what do you write about? I guess for film it's analysis of the qualities that made the film good or bad. Was the story a good story? The direction? The colours? Framing? Was there something about the editing? Did the apparent choice of film stock have some impact? The soundtrack? The general flow with in scenes? How did all of this come together?
A music review was difficult, one had to describe the qualities and feeling produced by the sound of the music. One could also describe the lyrical content (I didn't).
There was the musical performance and perhaps most difficult was interpreting art installations, something I'm not at all familiar with.
Last of all was the review of BCT itself. This became more of a vent about juggling study with everything else. I really only resorted to reviewing it because being a student has meant I haven't really had a chance to go to any events. It's almost a Catch-22.
Regardless of the type of event, practice at writing critically about them is key to getting learning to pick out details and being able to describe them. Turning what seemed to be abstract concepts into concert words. Using  real words to communicate what at first seems like elusive ideas.
Explaining Aesthetics beyond measurements and perhaps proportions takes skill. It's sort of like describing what someone looks like. Anyone can say "Oh they are 5ft9, brown hair, blue eyes", it takes some skill to describe a persons appearance with metaphors that draw a picture in the minds eye. A skill I look forward to developing more as it in turn hones one's ability to actually see what at first appears to be almost invisible.