Senior Review

Looking through the BFA show I noticed these paintings by Klint Flentge. The one that held my attention the most of the two that were displayed was Validity/Conversion, consisting of oil paint on a wood panel. What brought me to this piece was the mysterious figures that arise from the background within the piece. As a whole you get an eerie feeling as there are scattered body parts throughout the piece as if Klint is using the gestures of the figures to insinuate some sort of untold narrative. Its composition allows the viewer’s eye to flow through the piece well, connecting the viewer to the artist’s train of thought in creating this piece. The color is very well executed, giving it a dreamy feel, as well as coherently working with its composition to strengthen the flow of movement through the piece. Personally my favorite part of this painting would have to be the fact that the contours of the figures themselves aren’t outlined strongly allowing the figures to merge with the painting as a whole rather than in individual sections. The merging of the figures also allows for the conceptual aspect to broaden for the individual as well allow the viewer to connect one section of the painting to another much easier. I loved this painting and I can’t wait to see more! 

Matt Sellars Review

Matt Sellars show at the Platform Gallery is entirely influenced by the barren landscape of the desert. Included pieces on display vary from drawings, to sculpture, and one video shown in a shack made up of what looks like scavenged wood and cardboard for insulation. Through these pieces he challenges the assumption that the desert is an empty landscape by portraying various objects that are influence by things he observed in the desert. The drawings themselves show the landscape as a line drawing, capturing the dimension of landscape as a mapped out outline of the forms he observed. The sculptures were abstractions of things he saw in the landscape, which at first glance the viewer can definitely tell he looked at some bones the others are not so much as quick to take note of though that's why he has the video to explain why certain things are what they are, or at letting the viewer know his thought process behind making the pieces.  

Overall, considering the subject matter, I believe that he was successful in portraying his concept through his pieces. Though personally I would have enjoyed it more without the video and possibly have had that information elsewhere rather than with the pieces because it sort of took away the mystery of the pieces and more so classified them as artifacts rather than art. I did not get a chance to see the whole video, but the parts that I did watch were resembling that of a documentary which personally pushed me away from it. I would have enjoyed it more if it were short and to the point and more of Matt explaining why he chose the desert rather  than showing the desert itself through the video. Though it is important to make a connection to what the artist was observing I would have rather made the connection to the desert conceptually rather than visually through the video.

Core Final: The Dependent Self

Core Final: The Dependent Self

Alan Watts- The Self  
Bibliography:
Kołakowski, Leszek, and Agnieszka Kołakowska. Why Is There Something Rather than Nothing?: 23 Questions from Great Philosophers. New York: Basic, 2007. Print.Morrell, Peter.

"A BUDDHIST VIEW OF ADDICTION." A BUDDHIST VIEW OF ADDICTION. N.p., n.d. Web. 19 Mar. 2013.

My research consisted of continuing reading/listening about what people had to say about "The Self." One of the chapters of the book I read was titled "Being and non-being: what is real?" this chapter was not only insightful as something to think about but it helped me get a sense of how I want my figure's face to look like. The fact that our existence, our being, has been questioned for ages before our time is rather interesting because it's not one of the subjects that's talked of widely. Some people simply exist and are content with it, though what I want to get across with my sculpture's facial expression is a sense of "I'm existing? What am I?" As well as getting across how us, as an intangible self, have become somewhat dependent on external objects to portray who we are.  "People who are addicted to something have become too solidly locked into a love of pleasure and are reaping the consequences of that lifestyle. It also means that their sense of identity is rewarded only when they indulge whatever they crave, and this has thus become dependent upon their addiction. A firm sense of self-identity is based solely upon their habit, and without it, they feel invisible and non-existent." This passage is from the site concerning Buddhist's view of addiction, it portrays an explicit understanding of the sense of relying on something in order to view one's self which is what I would like to portray through my piece.

The Dependent Self

Since the dawn of man, the question of our own existence has driven our curiosity. The only thing inciting our interest is the fact that we are aware of our tangible existence among the global consciousness. Reality is in the eyes of the beholder, therefore we our dependent on ourselves to differentiate between what is true and what is false according to our surrounding environment. The Dependent Self is an exploration of this idea, we have become dependent on our physical entities to portray ourselves to ourselves and to others and it's always been a wonder to me that we aren't content with solely existing. The all-seeing eye incorporated in this piece comes into play as what the being is dependent on in order to view his self. The all-seeing eye, representing an omnipotent view on life, is therefore allowing the entity to be aware of his physical self, hence The Dependent Self.

Oscar Tuazon - Terry Barrett's Describing Art

Oscar Tuazon's piece of his old living room is rather moving, although static in its composition. This was taken out of his old apartment that he had to move out of because of a fire that happened underneath his apartment that caused damage to his apartment. Visually it reads like a tangible cubist painting that's leaking onto the physical planes of its setting allowing the viewer to interact with it, literally putting the viewer in the piece. Taking into consideration that this piece once had a use grabs my attention as a viewer, viewing it not only as structure but also as an artifact of Oscar's life. Because this piece once had a purposeful use in mind at one time it makes the viewer contemplate on what other uses it could have, rather than just being decorative in a gallery. In the context of a gallery setting it seems very out of place almost as if it belongs outside somewhere for people to skate on. The fact that it has many different uses is the greatest aspect of Oscar's pieces, allowing a broad horizon of interpretations for the viewer.

Sam Whalen - Friends Forever: The Transfer, Terry Barrett's Describing Art

 

In Sam's piece, Friends Forever: The Transfer, she enacts what seems to be some sort of ritualistic ceremony in which her and two friends transfer make up from one person to another and Sam then imprints it onto a paper on the wall.

Her and two friends began her performance piece by standing in the room before the critique, ready for the performance before the audience became present for the critique. Once the performance began they chose who would have the make-up put on them first through a series of rock-paper-scissors games, the loser of the games would then be the person who gets caked up in make-up. Afterwards her friends rubbed their faces together to transfer the make-up onto the other person, with closed lips to not include sexual activity. As they are enacting the transfer, for 21 seconds, Sam whispers memories "that come to mind of moments where she recalls adapting something from a girlfriend(Sam Whalen)." The same process was repeated for the transfer onto Sam's face though no one whispered in her ear. Once the transfer was complete Sam then proceeded to the paper on the wall and transferred the make-up onto it, rubbing her face on the paper for 21 seconds saying each second out loud. Her friends then put their clothes on and left before the critique began.

Personally I think that the purpose of this piece was to portray how close these friends were and how they inspire Sam's work, which was made evident to me when Sam included the fact that their lips would be closed as they're rubbing their faces together to not include sexual activity. The process of the transfer made it seem almost as if one person was giving off their knowledge to the other person; kind of like a telephone game within a group of people and how the message gets distorted as it goes along, though in this case it was a visual representation. In the end the piece on the wall seemed to portray how the those around you affect how you yourself make your mark in the world. The final piece itself is presented well by showing the artifacts of the performance in front of the final piece itself as if showing a visual timeline. Overall the piece really grabs the attention of the observer and makes them wonder what the hell is going on, which is what I love about the piece.

Cinematic Space - "The Awakening"

Inspiration for cinematic space

30 Minutes of observation for cinematic space

For my 30 minute observation I sat across whole foods and tried capturing the motion I saw in front of me, such as people walking,running, biking, conversing, etc. This exercise made it evident to me that it is very difficult to capture motion in a mere second, photos would have been easier but this was more of a challenge. Through this process I was able to take notice to the bends of the body as they move as well as how weight is distributed as people move which will help my stop motion be more "life like."

1st Thursday

My favorite gallery that I visited was 4 culture. The video's towards the back of the gallery were what really got me. The artist had 3 videos, one on a wall in which he walked backwards through a forest with the help of mirror that was attached to his torso and two other videos that were projected onto the same structure but on opposite sides so the viewer was able to see what was going on in the obstruction that he was wearing as well as an external view as he walked down a trail. The videos themselves weren't quite exciting (though the presentation of the two pieces was) but it was the concept that sparked my interest. In his artist statement he stated that his pieces were an exploration in self and how we view ourselves as well as others. The concept of self is a very reoccurring theme throughout the art world, and has been ever since the modern era has past, though it's always great to see a variety of approaches to the same concept; just like it was when we had the same prompts for our books.

My least favorite gallery was the punch gallery which had the pieces of the cracked landscapes. Although it was visually cool it just became too repetitive to me, I understand that cracked landscapes may be this artist's thing but I would have liked to see more coherence within each piece if they all had the same theme. If I were the person I would have made all the pieces part of a panaramic view of a landscape that would have been awesome! It was a good concept, visually appealing, but personally didn't grasp my attention to want to further my interest in each piece, it was more of a glance over each piece and then on to the next one to see what they had done different from the previous one.

Artist Lecture: Jonas Wood

Jonas Wood is prominently a painter on canvas. He starts off most of his pieces with either a collage, a photo, or a drawing of a photo or collage he has made. His subject matter varies from abstract paintings of plants to realistic portraits of people and their environment. One thing that is constant throughout his pieces is the fact that he focuses more on how color takes up space rather than an object taking up space, therefore he does not really portray shadows in his pieces making his pieces rather flat. The process in which he creates his work tends to be quite tedious though rewarding. From his presentation it seemed like he would usually start out with some sort of rough draft, or initial idea, and then work from that and move it onto a bigger format, which usually seemed to be canvas. Through his presentation I got a sense that his paintings were simply just paintings of observations in life he thought were amusing rather than portraying some crazy concept,. Jonas Wood portrays strong composition throughout his pieces and a variety of interesting shapes through his abstracted still life pieces though they lack that conceptual background that I personally crave for.

Annotated bibliography

Aguilar-Moreno, Manuel. Handbook to Life in the Aztec World. N.p.: Facts on File, 2006. Print.

            This is the book that interested me the most therefore spent the most time on. The ideologies of the Aztec people are quite astonishing, the fact that for their superior amount of knowledge about the stars and mathematics they lived every day for the Gods is crazy to me because these days I see people using this kind of knowledge for selfish reasons rather than for a higher power. Which in my mind is a crazy concept because the Aztec’s were a very advanced civilization and it’s hard to imagine that they would just make up their beliefs, which is what most modern people would say. The Aztecs touched on a very important concept of creation theories, destruction between one stage of human existence and the creation of another one afterwards which is why at least 4-5 of my prompts involve their creation theory which involved human existence under 5 different suns, the fifth being the present. This also touched on their thoughts on after life which lead to another prompt which is somewhat a contour drawing with wire of a soul leaving a body in the fetal position.

Brooks, Max. The Zombie Survival Guide: Complete Protection from the Living Dead. New

York: Three Rivers, 2003. Print.

As humans our most important instinct is survival there’s no arguing that. I was lead to this concept of zombies after having read about how in many creation theories there have been creations followed by destruction of the creation then again followed by another, better, creation. It lead me to make a sewn prompt in which there are 3 white napkins being ‘attacked’ by brown napkins to symbolize the spread of the disease that supposedly spreads from zombies.

Daniken, Erich Von. Chariot of the Gods? N.p.: Berkley, 1980. Print.

            I started with this book and lead off to find “Creation Myths.” This book talks about a variety of theories which surround themselves with the notion that early civilizations were visited by extraterrestrial beings that helped them start their civilizations. Having said that it seems like a farfetched idea at first but the book backs up this theory with facts from around the world that lead to this theory being a logical conclusion.

Franz, Marie-Louise Von. Creation Myths Revised Edition. N.p.: Shambhala, 1972. Print.

            After reading about the possibility that human kind was visited by aliens in the beginning to give us somewhat of a head start I wondered how early civilizations believed we came into existence so I checked this book out and read all sorts of different creation theories from around the world. Afterwards I went on to read more in depth about other culture’s creation theories.

McKenna, Terrence K. Food of the Gods: The Search for the Original Tree of Knowledge. New

York, NY: Bantam, 1992. Print.

This book introduces the notion that human kind’s state of mind was initially sprouted from the introduction of a mind altering substance in our ancestor’s diet. It goes on to talk about shamans and how they are tied to the spiritual world because of the use of mind altering substances. This lead me to think about how in this day and age we see people who use mind altering substances as absurd and crazy and how the general public is mostly strayed away from this kind of thing. But looking back on it I think that as a society people of that day were more as a whole than any other time rather than being selfish as the general public has come to be today. Leading me to a prompt about how the human mind thinks more about money than the spiritual aspect of life.

Nicholson, Irene. Mexican and Central American Mythology. N.p.: Paul Hamlyn, 1967. Print.

            This book talks about Mexican and Central American Mythology, including their creation theories and stories about their Gods and how they went about their days. The crazy think about that region of the world is that they had similar creation theories and Gods as well. Which lead me to think, what if they actually saw what they believed in? Seeing is believing in some people’s eyes after all.

Noss, David S. A History of the World's Religions. N.p.: Pearson Education, 2003. Print.

            I was lead to this in search of a variety of different creation theories, but it was more of a dictionary of religions so I chose to skim through but didn’t really get much out of it.

Owen, Ted, Denise Dickson, Walter Patrick. Medeiros, and John A. Platt. High Art: A History of

the Psychedelic Poster. London: Sanctuary Pub., 1999. Print.

I was lead to this book after “Food of the Gods,” I wanted to see the most recent visual aspects of evolving minds, because of the fact that during the time when these posters where made the general youth was infatuated with mind altering substances.

Sayers, Dorothy L. Dante The Divine Comedy 1: Hell. N.p.: Penguin Group, 1949. Print.

            Skimming through the book I noticed an illustration of the levels of Hell and that lead me to recreate it as one of my prompts but not as an illustration more like an abstraction.

Taylor, Charles H., and Patricia Finley. Images of the Journey in Dante's Divine Comedy. N.p.:

Yale University, 1997. Print.

I got this and the book above at the same time to get a visual with what I was reading but the books themselves didn’t really go together because it wasn’t as chronological as I thought it would be. So it was more of a visual reference for ideas more than conceptual.

Thompson, J. Eric S. Maya History & Religion. N.p.: University of Oklahoma, 1990. Print.

            The Mayan people were tied with the concept of time which lead me to create a prompt made of times cut out of receipts surrounded by bus transfers in the form of a clock to symbolize how the concept of time is still important.

World Bible Publishing St, comp. The New American Bible. N.p.: Catholic World/World Bible,

2011. Print.

The creation theory that usually comes to mind comes from the bible which is why I picked this book out. This was one of the books I came to later on, definitely after “Creation Myths”, and the comparison between how the bible says we came into existence and how other cultures say we did isn’t far off. I read of many stories in which humans were molded in one way or another out of the dirt or clay. The fact of the matter is that there are a lot of theories that are very similar to one another and that lead me to believe that this is no coincidence.

Rob Rhee

He moved across a variety of mediums by letting the materials speak for themselves therefore allowing him to follow a unique process in order to create a piece with each individual material. He would also take the viewers' statements about his art into consideration as he did another piece because that would spark new concepts and ideas for him which also had a factor on his material choice. I did the opposite throughout my ventures through different mediums, my vision as an artist is somewhat focused visually so everything I make whether it's 2 dimensional or 3 dimensional looks similar to my other pieces so you can tell it's made by me.

Performance/Presentation Ideas

1. One thing that my piece could relate to somewhat at the Henry was the black and white film playing in one of the rooms next to the tv's on the ground. It gave me a chance to see how a person of that time would walk around in a suit, their posture was up right, confident walk, and hand shakes are a given! One of the ideas that I have for my performance is to go around, shake people's hands, and hand out fliers pertaining to the audio that would be playing at the time. 
2. I also checked out the "lelavision" link on the blog and thought about becoming one with the piece i'm making as the person did on the link under performances. This brought up the idea of being a stationary piece because of the fact that I'd be wearing a television as a head, so it'd make sense no?
3. My third option would be to stay in a certain area for the whole time and pace around after being connected to the wall through an outlet for a while and I would hand out fliers like that. I thought of this after watching Joseph Beuys' video of him with a coyote.
4. If not these separately I was thinking of combining the third idea with the first and begin by sitting down connected to an outlet with static playing as the audio and once it comes to be my turn i'll stand up and continue to go around and shake people's hands/hand out fliers and once my turn ends i'll go back to the outlet (or a different outlet) and connect myself again, or have someone else connect me I haven't figured that out quite yet.

Prosthesis project

Research: Propaganda is a means of spreading concepts or ideals to a mass of people to either change their opinion on a matter or strengthen it. It’s been in used in many various ways throughout history, some for the good of the masses and others for personal gain. During wars, for example, many countries begin to speak to their people by using propaganda to gain their trust and support for what the government is doing. Such as when America began advertising war bonds in order to finance the military needs or how they began advertising “Uncle Sam” in order to gather more recruits. Then there are those unfortunate countries where people do not have a choice in what to believe in, their leaders force information on them basically brainwashing them into supporting their ideologies. In most cases during wars it’s a common for either side to spread propaganda bad mouthing the opposing country/enemy, which in terms of propaganda would be referred to as the “name calling” technique used solely to create an unfavorable opinion towards another subject/person/mass of people. The cold war for example, though not technically a war, presented a situation in which both the Soviet Union and the United States of America were trying to gain the support of other countries to make themselves look better while making the other country look bad in the process. In 1952, “Communism”, produced by Coronet Instructional Films, an education film made was released to schools in America to make others think of communism as a bad form of government, throughout the film there are many points in which the narrator points out Russia specifically to gain more viewers support against the Russians because it was during the times of the Cold War. Nowadays we see propaganda mostly in the form of advertisement for shows or products, the media, and political campaigns using various amounts of propaganda techniques to deliver their message to the masses. It’s interesting observing how the intent for propaganda has progressed over the years, shape-shifting as the years pass becoming elusive as it becomes something that concerns the everyday.

Bibliography

Communism. Prod. Coronet Instructional Films. 1952. Educational Film.

"PropagandaAbout Our Definitions: All Forms of a Word (noun, Verb, Etc.) Are Now Displayed

on One Page." Merriam-Webster. Merriam-Webster, 2012. Web. 18 Nov. 2012. <http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/propaganda>.
"Propaganda Techniques." Http://mason.gmu.edu. N.p., n.d. Web. 18 Nov. 2012. <http://mason.gmu.edu/~amcdonal/Propaganda%20Techniques.html>.

"U.S. War Bonds." U.S. War Bonds. N.p., n.d. Web. 18 Nov. 2012. <http://www.u-s-

history.com/pages/h1682.html>.

Concept: My idea for my prosthesis project is to research famous propaganda, mostly within the guide lines of American propaganda, in which it’s been used to persuade people into either changing their opinion on a subject or telling a false truth to gain the support of the masses. I plan on portraying my findings through audio recordings found on the internet and projecting the sound through a “Television Helmet” as well as passing around fliers that pertain to what the audio is saying. Personally I think that a television came to be the perfect way to present the audio because of the fact that whoever watches TV endures commercials whether or not it affects the viewer is totally up to them and it’s basically the same thing with history; one can choose to learn it or just avoid it. So by using the television I hope to create this sort of portal into the past, kind of like a short documentary, of how propaganda has been used in history by comparing the past and the present. I also want to show how easily somebody can be a victim of propaganda by using the television as a simple means of showing how TVs easily spread information to the masses, making a connection with the past to the present as we are bombarded with politics, the media, and thousands of rerunning commercials convincing consumers to purchase items. I want to show how the subject of propaganda has changed shape over time through this presentation of audio, from war time propaganda aimed at gaining people’s support for their country to commercials that are aimed to for profit focusing less on important matters at hand.

Inspiration: 

Space/ Object project

The idea behind this piece was to create tension for the viewer both from inside the room and outside the building because of where the piece was positioned. Though it ended up not being very noticeable from outside the building. Though I felt that it did indeed have the potential to freak out at least some people if they happened to be day dreaming and glancing up while walking on the street below. Unfortunately, it ended up being more as if he was just chilling on the window glancing outside rather than trying to get out (at least it seemed that way to me from the perspective from inside the room) due to technical difficulties such as figuring out how to make him stay in that position. As I was working on this piece, the head in particular, I noticed I wasn't going to be able to make it resemble an actual person with the time frame given so I improvised and created the head you see here above. Originally my intent was to create Jesus about to jump out of the window to bring back the concept of how Jesus died to save us all. Though it would have been a completely different take on it because of how he would have been positioned, because he would have been sitting like how the piece is it would have created a inferred narrative that he was debating whether or not to jump, but, again, because of the time frame I decided not to dwell too far into a project that deserved more time than given. So, instead the idea of Jesus lead me to think of creation and how we question who we are and why we are. The intent of creating the piece with clearly noticeable raw materials and having its head slightly turned to the right aimed at his hands was to have the piece question itself as to why it was created. The fact that it was basically chained to the inside forbid him from jumping so he was then stuck in an eternity of interrogating perplexity as to why he exists. If the face of the piece was more noticeable and the viewer could trace where the eyes where pointing at easier I think I could have achieved my intent easier, but now I know for the future; nothing better than learning from mistakes.

space object: tension/camouflage

Tension

Camouflage

Camouflage

Camouflage

Tension

Tension

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