It's due...

...sigh...

...this was like pulling teeth, I am so sososososo not accustomed to drawing something so large-scale. My concept changed slightly - I was originally anticipated putting more detail into the objects on the ground, but then I realized that it wouldn't make any sense to do so considering my weird ground-source lighting, and the rug was going to have more detail but that went the same way. So I'm left with one really dark half and one really light half, which I hope doesn't divide the composition too significantly, but otherwise...I don't know, I did value studies but something changed. That or my value studies weren't detailed enough. I'm not floored by this composition (although I could pass out on the floor, hahaha!...not funny). I also had some troubles focusing on this because of familial issues, so next time...next time maybe it won't be such a traumatic experience altogether.

My knees hurt. SO. BADLY.

Drawing week 2

This week I focused on the overall composition for this piece: after several small-scale sketches, I have decided that I want the perspective to be what I see looking down at the ground. Apart from that, I'm still working out the details and additional figures that I want to include...I have some ideas, but have yet to finalize the research.

Crazy models, man...

I do believe that in the animal kingdom, this is referred to as "presenting"...

In the former edition of this image, I was a little unsure about the noisy pattern on the corner of the table behind the figure. So I smoothed it away right after taking its picture. I still don't know which is better...somebody help me with composition and the conditional ( but not really, it seems) rules of art O-o

Drawing Assignment week 1

This week I went to the library for some serious art researching, and it was pretty freaking intense. I borrowed 4 books on painting design and composition theory, and 1 book pertaining to the art of Michelangelo. Here are my notes on these books so far:

Although I'm far from knowing exactly what I want to draw for this massive self portrait, I feel very strongly about my view looking down at my feet...I'm also considering including a piano (although the symbolism/meaning won't be so black-and-white as "omg I <3 the piano") ...I don't know, maybe some aerial views of my family around my feet (positioned in an interesting way, because I'm aware of all these compositional elements now >_<) and...I really like drawing hands and feet, but I've yet to locate a meaning behind them.


So as I gather the elements I would naturally like to include within this piece, I will simultaneously be researching elements from classical compositions that...I don't know, may or may not have had some sort of cultural definition during the period they were utilized. This coming week (er...well...thanksgiving "break", I suppose....sigh...) will be spent sketching like crazy...

Response to a quote

"The point is, that every piece of art changes your whole perception of the rest of the world for the rest of your life. 

And it's not a joke! And if it doesn't, then it's not art, it's a commodity."

            I largely disagree with this quote and the language utilized therein, for in spite of the conditional fact that a piece of art may “change the whole perception of the rest of the world for the rest of the life” of a person, this doesn’t necessarily happen to every single person who views that particular piece.  Not only does this presumptuous statement assume that there is a constant definition for “art” within a society and that the perceptions of every being are exactly the same; it asserts that “commodity” and “art” reside in two separate spheres of existence. Speaking from my own perceptions and experiences, I have never witnessed a piece of art that has “changed my whole perception of the world” (although that is another highly subjective statement) – would this entail that “art” has yet to be created? I would like to see what the author considers to be a piece of art and, by extension, their definition of art itself.

            Just the other day, I looked at the Mona Lisa – a piece that is commonly accepted throughout our society as a work of art. I cannot say that my perception of the rest of the world was altered in the slightest; in fact, I’m not entirely sure what that would entail. Would that even be possible? Could the human psyche survive constant perceptive alteration when viewing a series of artworks? Is true art really that selective? …anyhow, because my “perception of the world” (although this largely lacks a specific definition) wasn’t altered (according to my own judgment), have I proven, based on this absurd logic, that the Mona Lisa is not art?

            In order to support this quote or bring it into any realm of understanding, there must be a working definition of what art is, which I also find to be a difficult – if not impossible – item to define. Personally, I define art by both the perception of the individual and the perception of the surrounding society; what they perceive to be art (based on my own perceptions; as much as a philosophical cop-out as that may be). From this viewpoint I also disagree with this quote, which suggests such qualifiers as “your perception of the world must be altered after viewing” if something is to be considered to be art. Because the perception of art is so thoroughly based on the individual – the emotional and aesthetic appealing to their own tastes based on their own interests and, by extrapolation, life experiences – I find it all the more obtuse for a person to assert such a boisterous position on the matter.  Is the classification of a work as a piece of art dependent on the individual’s personal preferences and sense of aesthetic, or on those of the society by which they are influenced, or both?

            Another opinionative presumption made by the quote is that if something is not classified as art, it must immediately be categorized as “commodity”: a statement whose language creates the illusion of saying a lot without actually having said anything meaningful. What is the definition of “commodity”, why is it assuming the role of being opposite to art (as expressed in the context of the statement), and why is it being portrayed negatively?! Is this person assuming that “art” and “uncommon” are synonymous? In terms of commodity and art, what of Jackson Pollock: his “Brillo Box” sculpture was indistinguishable from the form of an actual cardboard Brillo box. Essentially, a common item became art which society has accepted on the whole (although undoubtedly a certain level of their conviction that Pollock’s work was art stemmed from the relatively well-grounded acceptance that he was an artist); this butts heads with the author’s conviction that commodity cannot be art. Furthermore, within the art-producing community of any time period, the work of these artists will be stylistically and thematically similar to one another due to the standards and acceptances dictated by the surrounding society (“supply-and-demand” to offer a highly generalized explanation). Is this to say that if an artist’s work should be that which the society accepts, and therefore that which has become “the norm”, it becomes a commodity, and therefore cannot be art? Even if that explanation were to work in earlier generations where standards were more discriminatory, in this modern society it is generally accepted that most anything could be accepted as art (again, Pollock’s box sculpture). If anything could be art and if everything is common, does art even exist anymore (based on the author’s statement)? 

Perspective :)

I don't get why people don't like perspective - it lets me sit in my grandmother's house and listen to Schumann while she pesters me about anything and everything and cooks me wonderful food.

(This is the second piece, for which I decided to place myself under the piano. THAT WAS NOT A GOOD IDEA, my brain can't handle all those mechanisms and angles..).

Art classes drove me to steal and deface a book...

For this project we took 25 (or more) pages from a book, created an image from observation on each, taped them together, drew a figure from observation overtop, and then taped off the negative space with masking tape. The process was then repeated, only with fewer pages.

Persona drawing

Persona

Persona...a most peculiar film whose message the audience flounders to grasp, directed in an artful, meticulous manner, far surpassing the borderline between a mindless studio production and a well-composed piece of visual art. Screenshots can be taken at any interval, regardless of the pertinence of the scene, to observe the ceaselessly wide array of  tonal values and strong compositional components that are tediously controlled throughout the film. In accordance with its visually artistic aspects, the director utilizes the time that is expressed through the filming process itself in a highly visual manner, emphasizing certain moments while blending over others. At one point, the camera trains itself on Elisabeth for a painful few, long minutes, during which time she blankly returns the stare, unblinking, as the room goes dark around her. In another instance, Alma delivers a lengthy dialogue to Elisabeth, exposing her extensive knowledge of the girl without her having spoken a word. The camera focuses and periodically zooms in on Elisabeth's face; the dialogue is then repeated, this time with the camera focused and zooming on Alma. These parallel scenes paired with the artistic mechanisms of the film's direction signify the blurring of the lines between the characterization of Alma and Elisabeth.

Another curious motif pertinent throughout the film (particularly in periods of mounting tension) is the insertion of an alien image to break the flow of the film for the slightest brevity. Within the opening and closing sequences, images of Vietnamese priests who burned in protest of  the war, an erect penis, a crucifixion, the bleeding of a lamb, and, shown at the longest interval, a young emaciated boy in a hospital room filled with unmoving elderly patients (from which I drew an allusion to WWII, regardless of whether or not that was intended). All of these subliminal images who exist in space for only a fraction of a second - hardly long enough for the audience to understand them; so brief that we wonder if they were ever there - ellicit a strong emotional response for the viewer (largely horror: the images are largely of bodily mutilation or societally inn]appropriate subjects). This response and, therefore, the inclusion of these images, allude to the emotional state or thought processes of the subject (Elisabet) who is searching for meaning behind life,or simply "to be", in light of all these catastrophic events surrounding her. It speaks to the fragility of the human psyche; to an interpretation of the bare core of the artist, who creates illusions to hide the destructive nature of humanity and life itself in order to live.

In spite of its outward simplicity - a seemingly undeveloped plotline with minimal dialogue, surprisingly few characters and simplistic sets - Persona explores the human condition in incredible detail through the characterizations of Elisabet and Alma. The audience observes a conversation between the two women, which is peculiar because only Alma speaks. They visualize the blurring between the two characters; the fright inflicted by the one soul inhabiting the body of the other and vice versa. I found it to be not only an expression of a person searching "to be", but also an investigation of the alarming amount of power a person can hold over another in a mutually loving relationship, or if one person so thoroughly understands another as Alma and Elisabeth understand each other. If the lines are blurred between the characters - if Alma can become Elisabeth - then both would experience a sufficiently crippling loss of personal identity. All of these layers together - the complexity of the characters and the difficulty in grasping its underlying psychological/philosophical theme coupled with a highly artistic quality of film and direction - make this a highly successful, thoughtfully-executed film that has withstood the test of time (and that I anticipate will continue to do so).

Drawing assignments

[I will edit this into a slideshow, but my laptop cannot run the program necessary to upload so it will be done at a later time]

Drawing Assignments - Picasa.com

Heaping piles of...art??!

After perusing through countless articles on numerous blogs, a series of pictures featuring unimpressive piles of segregated rubble in a gallery space caught my attention. This is the work of Lara Almarcegui, a Spanish-born artist whose artistic fancy lies in "wastelands" - those nostalgic patches of land marking the desecration of a past structure that is slowly being reclaimed by nature, on which societies are deliberating what should be done with them so that, for the time being, they remain wastelands. The press release for her show "Bauschutt Hauptraum Secession" in Vienna (2010) is found on the Contemporary Art blog.

Lara's message (according to the press release which appears to quote her) is, in summary, to emphasize the importance and value of these wastelands that are in a transitional period:  not only do they reflect nature's capability of reclaming past territory, they are something that reflects both the past and the possibility of the future and that only exists temporarily; constantly changing. Lara attempts to document the locations and images of these wastelands all over the world - this is her art.

First of all, I would like to make a statement against the exhibit featuring these piles of rubble she has amassed and labelled "art": when first I saw this picture, what drew my attention was "What on earth has happened? What lunatic has managed to fool the curators into believing that several hundred rocks piled together, without facing any other skillful alteration by the person, are deserving of this gallery space?" It wasn't until AFTER I had painstakingly read the review that I even began to understand Lara's statement through this gargantuan display (although its significance still escapes me): she piled recycled materials that were used in previously destroyed buildings and that would be used for construction in the future - again, a transitional period that at the moment presents itself as a wasteland. Because I've yet to hear of anybody - artist or otherwise - investigating this transitional period, I find it to be a rather interesting subject. However, do not agree with the approach: Lara has chosen to display strictly symbolic items that, without accompanying explanation, offer little to no insight pertaining to their specific meaning to the viewer. I, for instance, would not have arrived at the conclusion of "transitional wasteland" had I not read the accompanying review, and because these works are so strictly centered on this underlying theme, I find it to be crippling for the piece's stature as "artwork". If I were to walk past these piles of rubble in a gallery space, I would immediately assume that somebody made a critical error; that this gallery space was actually in the midst of construction, and I would thus pass them by without a second thought. Outside of the gallery space, nothing would differentiate these piles of rubble from any other, so why is it that we call them art? Is it because Lara arranged them in order to convey a message?

And furthermore, I do not appreciate the manner in which these art reviews are presented: in Lara's case anyways, the review is highly biased towards her case which manipulates the reader into finding an appreciation for her work without looking and feeling for themselves. In order to instill their own opinions into the reader, the author of this article utilizes such manipulators as, "a poetic work awaits the visitors", "Lara Almarcequi renders visible what we otherwise fail to regard, see or notice", etc. The author even treads on my personal pet-peeve by writing "...an organism of social structures that pervades them——and fills them with meaning". This is the most VAGUE statement any analytical writer could possibly make when conducting a review; it is absolute bogus and leads the reader to think "ah, meaning, that's so deep!" without really thinking about what "meaning" the writer could possibly be talking about!

I am not one to judge an artist based solely on the analytical capabilities of one review author: I appreciate Lara's statement and find it to be both unique and interesting (although I maintain my stance of disagreement with the piles of rubble in the gallery space...). For the most part, I wanted to play devil's advocate towards this review since it was so pointed towards Lara's work. This is yet another reminder of how manipulative ANY media text can be, and how we as a society must view everything through eyes unclouded by bias, in search of truth and not opinion.

*note* This is actually the doll from my first memory

My first memory...

It started out a fine and dandy day - just as they all do - when all of a sudden the walls of my dark cozy room started pressing in on me, and after hours of discomfort I was launched into a cold and unforgiving world...!

...no not really, I can't remember being born. My first memory is, in all actuality, of a much less profound point in my life:

I was sitting in a shiny new red wagon in the front yard of our house. It was my birthday - somewhere around age 4 I'd assume - and my tiny hands were clenched around a long-awaited Thumbelina baby doll. Much to my disdain, my older cousin Nicole approached me, audaciously asked to see my brand new doll, and proceeded to snatch it away from me. Thinking I might never get it back, I burst into tears.

And there it is: my first memory is not of any significant point in my life. It's just a reminder of how painfully timid and possessive a child I was.

And here I am somewhere around that age. (Oh hey, this photo reminds me of another story. Can I write it...? To hell with it, it's in parentheses: that's my dad with the bagpipes; he's kind of my hero. Anyways, we're at the Scottish games, and they have lots of Scottish games at the Scottish games. Nonsensical, dangerous games, one of which is a telephone-pole toss. I don't remember this, but I'm told that on this particular year I - being adorable and little and...well, not smart - decided it'd be awesome to try to run across the field on which these telephone poles were being tossed. Thanks to my dad's quick reflexes, I'm alive to tell the story! Hahaha, ooohh Scottish games...)