Critique: Alternative Map Project

Link to Art 214 Website

Link to Alternative Map Project

I chose to map St. Mary's through music. I chose to create visual cubes of my room and my friends' rooms and incorporated music that we listen to in order to really get a sense of the space. I also chose to have Monty 25, practice rooms, and coffeehouse on the map in order to display all of the places that I perform at with my TNA (a cappella group) and Chamber singers. Finally, I have the point on the map because I associate a certain song with it and once more when that song is played with the visual cube it gives the space a certain feel and mood. I also incorporated the video in order to show the space in action. I wanted to do an overlay of sheet music which looks really interesting juxtaposed with the land and I used song lyrics to point out the places which I was calling attention to.

Artist Presentation 11: Vito Acconci

"Seedbed"

Vito Acconci began producing conceptually-driven performances in 1969 with "Following Piece." In that work, he randomly followed strangers around New York City until they went into a non-public space. He has challenged the very nature of the artistic experience and he is completely caught up in the relationship between the artist and the viewer.

In another group of works, Acconci tests the question: "How do I prove I'm concentrating on myself? I do something to myself (attack myself)." In "Rubbing Piece", he sat in a restaurant and rubbed his arm until it bled to see if viewers were more likely to approach him if he made himself vulnerable. In "Trademarks," Acconci again puts his body to the challenge. Sitting naked in a gallery space, he bit different parts of his body in an attempt to reach as much of it as possible. His motive was "to move into myself--move around myself--move in order to close a system." He literally displayed the idea of the artist as a maker by applying printer's ink to the bites and making imprints of them.

In his work, "Seedbed," Acconci created a bridge within a gallery space where he laid underneath it and masturbated. This work's purpose was to create an uncomfortable, intimate relationship between the artist and the viewers. They could not see him and this created a disturbing sense of mystery. His work interests me because it is completely non-traditional. He goes against the grain and pushes every envelope. The art that he creates is completely based on action instead of visually aesthetic work.

Artist Presentation 10: Donald Judd

"Untitled"

Donald Judd is one of the most well known Minimalist artists. He is famous for his sleek, metal, box-like structures which were made of industrial materials such as: plywood, sheet metal, and plexiglass. His work is very depersonalized and focuses more on exploration of space, scale, and materials. The art he creates does not serve as a metaphor for the human experience. Judd is emphatically concerned with pure forms. His works become lucid statements about proportion and rhythm as well as assertions about the displacement of space. His sculptures share rather than invade the observer's space, but they create a sense of monumentality which often lends them a dynamic presence.

Donald Judd says, "Abstract art has its own integrity, not someone else's 'integration' with something else. Any combining, mixing, adding, diluting, exploiting, vulgarizing, or popularizing abstract art deprives art of its essence and depraves the artist's artistic consciousness. Art is free, but it is not a free-for-all." When I see Judd's work I automatically think of Tony Smith's piece, "Die," which is considered by many to be the end of modern art. I never really knew a lot about Minimalist art, but now I have become very intrigued by it because I like the fact that it is not trying to portray the feelings of human beings. Instead, this type of art is more focused on the essence of an environment and how one can interact with an object in its space.

Artist Presentation 9: Jana Sterbak

"Vanitas: Flesh Dress for an Albino Anorectic"

I took an art history class in England that discussed 17th century art focusing on Rembrandt and the Dutch School and I learned that the term Vanitas originally described still-life compositions of rotting meat and game, guttering candles, and skulls. These paintings bring spirituality to life and were intended as meditations on the fleeting nature of life as well as the inevitability of death. By calling this work Vanitas, Sterbak is stating that her work stems from the alienation that humans feel from their own flesh, aging, and mortality. Here, the natural aging process takes place before our eyes as the meat passes from a raw to cured state.

Women, fashion, consumption, and the body are key components to her work "Vanitas: Flesh Dress for an Albino Anorectic." The equation of women with meat and the notion that “you are what you wear” are common ideas and there are a growing number of young women with eating disorders such as bulimia and anorexia because their body types do not match the prevailing fashion or the “look” displayed by models populating the media.

Over the span of the exhibition, the aging process drastically changes the appearance of the work. The dress was stitched together from 60 pounds of raw flank steak and must be constructed anew each time it is shown. Following a centuries-old method of food preservation, the meat is heavily salted and allowed to air-dry. I like Sterbak's work because it reminds me of surrealist photographs which took the epitome of fashion and displayed it in different ways on the bodies of women. I think of the photographs of Lee Miller taken by Man Ray. Often times he would have her positioned in ways so that it looked like one of her limbs had been amputated or so that the viewer just focused on a part of her body which did not lend to her being viewed as a person, but rather as an object.

Artist Event: SMP Opening

SMP Show II

I really enjoyed the SMP show because many different elements were incorporated. Ya Haddy's work focused on her search to find herself. I thought it was interesting that she said she often defined herself based on the people around her. She had talked about how she chose to do pen and ink, but this was not her usual medium.

It was amazing how Emily Norris used her experience with carrara in order to create three dimensional spaces of backyards and found objects and then chose to paint over them. I really enjoyed this topic because I like the idea of mixing digital media with the tradition of painting.

Bonnie Veblen's paintings were really beautiful. She had mentioned how she was afraid of paint, but her works were extremely successful. I especially liked the dark work because its size and tone really creates an intense mood.

Psychogeography Reading Response

Psychogeography is "the study of precise laws and specific effects of the geographical environment, consciously organized or not, on the emotions and behavior of individuals."-1955 Guy Debord

The sectors of a city are deciphorable, but the personal meaning is incommunicable like the secrecy of private life in general. Psychogeography combines subjective and objective knowledge and studies. There is a connection between psychogeography and sexuality and there can be more maps than you think based on sight, hearing, smell, touch, and taste.

Critique: 3D Terrain

Chesapeake Beach Water Park

I chose a location which already had an artistic look to it from the elevation photos as opposed to a larger body of land which was not as aesthetically pleasing. The Chesapeake Beach Water Park is one of my favorite places near my house and I have gone there with my friends during elementary school, middle school, high school, and college. I wanted to make the environment look authentic, but also I incorporated more vivid characteristics such as color and shapes that made this arena stand out more.