Visiting Artists (Day 2)

Alec Acevedo is an Illustration major in his senior year. Alec showed us his work, which mainly consisted of assignments he did in school. He focuses on fantasy illustration, and wants to work on graphic novels. I wasn't aware how heavily the major was reliant on painting. Looking at his collection of work, you can tell that Alec leans more towards a darker style of animation. The most interesting thing Alec showed was his sketchbook: it really showed his skill as an artist and how he worked through his ideas before creating a final project. The level of detail in even his sketches shows that Alec is passionate about what he does. Graduating this semester, Alec emphasized the fact that illustrators have to promote themselves in any way possible, whether it be a website, postcards, email, or getting connected with a local gallery. Alec plans on working freelance after he graduates, but he is also going to be working on a graphic novel with the company he did an internship with.

Shimpei Shirafuji is a graduate student in art photography. Instead of setting up scenes, Shimpei instead shoots from the hip: taking pictures of anything that might catch his eye. His work didn't really appeal to me because it looked like not much thought was put into the images, which Shempei even admitted himself. Shimpei said that sometimes when he is going through the pictures he has taken in a day, he doesn't even remember taking some of them. This makes it seem like anyone could have the same level of work as Shempei as long as they just walk around shooting pictures. Before graduate school, Shimpei said he mainly took pictures of objects, and didn't particularly like photos of people, but he now has a balanced work of both. Shempei recently had an exhibition up, and he showed us a smaller scale of how the photos were arranged on the walls of the room. His work is printed on normal paper, and tacked to the walls, not mounted or framed. This is because Shempei says that the individual photographs aren't really worth that much to him, and I agree very few of his photos are things that are overly interesting.

Video in Better quality

Visiting Artists

Kat King is a fourth year industrial design major. She showed her current portfolio of work, which concentrated on work for the community and enhanced environmental design. Kat's work shows the amount of time and research is put into each project, yet she loves what she does. Industrial designers have to think of every possible problem, and create a design that will enhance people's lives. As an Industrial Design major myself, I was very interested in what Kat had to say, and the fact that she was actually a student here gave me an idea of what I could be doing in 3 more years. Following her love for kids, after college Kat hopes to get a job creating toys for the community, such as for playgrounds. In her most recent project, she designed a set of gears that children could play with at local playgrounds; later that day she was headed over to a local school to have children play with her prototypes and critique her work. The criticism from children, Kat said, is more severe than that of adults.

Varvara Mikushkina is a art photography undergrad whose passion is to photograph her family and Russian girls. Just because she's a photography major doesn't mean that's all she does. Varvara also paints and draws, which keeps her creative. She has found a way to combine her love for photography, painting and drawing by combining the three in unique ways. In her photographs, Varvara takes slightly staged photos, trying to capture the small moments in life that many people may not focus on. Most of her photos are portraiture which focuses on her life and heritage: the clothing of her models gives us a sense of her Russian heritage. Looking at her photos from mikushkina.blogspot.com, you can see that Varvara repeats the same models in her work, but although the subjects are the same, the photos are all different, giving a view into the mind of the artist.

Personal Soundtrack

This assignment was to create a soundtrack to your life using pictures, and sound clips. The images had to be different things such as self-portraits, things that identify you, friends, etc. The images I chose were those of places I've been, important times in my life, and also just some random things that I've done, like coming across a live beaver at 2am on the side of the road. A few of my sculptures are also shown in the video. We had to chose three songs that we felt best represented ourselves at the time: I chose "Hysteria" by Muse, "The Fallen" by Franz Ferdinand, and "Run" by Snow Patrol. Muse and Snow Patrol are two of my favorite bands, and the songs that I chose are ones that I feel connected to the most. "The Fallen" was chosen because I feel like it has the tempo of my life right now: upbeat. Together the pictures and sounds create a soundtrack to my life.

SQUIRREL! (street art assignment)

What did I think of when I thought about what to create for the Street Art assignment? Squirrels made out of trash bags of course! By putting magnets in the front feet of the squirrels I was able to stick them just about anywhere.

Water Tower

Response to Style Wars

It's understandable that graffiti creates a lot of controversy. In one respect, it is a way for the youth and young adults to express themselves and feel like they have made their mark on society. On the other hand, graffiti defaces public property and the efforts against graffiti and in the removal of it cost the government and transportation system hundreds and thousands of dollars.
Graffiti becomes a problem when the subway system and sides of buildings are covered with tags. One person who was interviewed said that he only cared about bombing as many things as possible, he didn't care about making his work the biggest or best looking. This mindset is when graffiti becomes a nuisance: its not an art form, but just a way for people to mark where they have been. Graffiti just becomes a jumbled mess, and the areas that actually have graffiti that looks good are painted over by people who just want to be d-bags and go over other peoples work.
Graffiti has the potential to become something other than a nuisance. Taggers can put their work on a canvas instead of a subway car and sell it instead of having their work tagged over or removed. This allows the work of artists to last far longer than it would have on the streets. Graffiti artists could also be hired out to decorate sides of buildings, subway stations, and trains. This way, artists can leave their mark for all people to see in a way that will last, instead of trying to bomb every single train, leaving work unfinished and doing things that are potentially dangerous. The government should not totally shut down graffiti artist, but promote it in a way that will be beneficial instead of detrimental to the community. Some amazing art can be created if artists are given a chance by the public. If artists are commissioned to work in the interiors and exteriors of subway cars, other artists would be less tempted to vandalize the public property because there wouldn't be a blank canvas for them to work on. This would also give each train an individual presence, turning graffiti into a public art form rather than a destructive pastime.
There should be a way for the public and graffiti artists to come to an agreement to make graffiti less of an issue in the city. Now that it has surfaced, graffiti will never disappear, it will only evolve.

Father's Day '99

The stories told in “Father’s Day ’99” tell inspiring stories about the relationships between fathers and their kids as they care for and protect each other. There are three stories told in the radio story, one about a father who recovers his son’s lost teddy bear, another about a son who brings his father with Alzheimer’s back to the place where he had lived in hopes of bringing back some memories that had been lost due to the disease, and the third about a father who tries to protect his daughter only to crush her spirit further. The three stories are told in slightly different ways, the first switching between a narrative and an interview, the second between a narrative, interview and raw footage, and the third strictly an interview, but from two different perspectives.
The first story is about a father who does the seemingly impossible for his son, finding a beloved teddy bear against all odds, given a massive pile of trash and only 15 minutes to go through it all. The program combines a narrative telling of the story by the person whom the story is about, with an interview of that person with the host of the program. This way the listener not only gets an overview of the story, but also the opinion of the father that may have not been included in a mere retelling of the story. The small miracle that occurred is inspiring.
During the second act of the program, clips of conversation fade into music, which sets the mood of the story being told. The music doesn’t overpower the story, but adds to it. At moments the music in the background stops when the sons tells the story, then it slowly fades back in as the audio switches to the raw footage of the trip. At places where the audio is cut, the music swells, and then fades again as the next part of the audio comes back in. The audio of the second story gives the listeners a better idea about what actually happened: you get to listen to the man’s father trying to remember the names and professions of his sons. A retelling just wouldn't have the same effect on the listener.
The third episode tells a story about how a father ended up disappointing his daughter when he took a lie too far: the father ended up making his daughter believe in something that was never really there. This story is told by both the father and daughter, the interviewer asking the occasional question. Through this method of storytelling, the listener gets both sides of the story and understands how each side felt in response to what had happened.

Reaction to Dina

This artist uses an experimental method to present her work. Instead of using a single sheet of paper, she overlaps multiple sheets that are cut at odd angles, torn, and cut to create an interesting surface to work on. The artist leaves a majority of the work uncompleted, parts of the scene or figure left as a pencil drawing, while the rest is painted into a lifelike image. Standing at different distances from the work reveals different levels of the painting: only at a close distance can a person see the light sketches. Instead of trying to fill the blank space, the artist emphasizes the empty space in her work and the incomplete areas. This works because the painting is not done on a traditional rectangular canvas, and the blank space forces the viewer to fill in the image, leaving the scene depicted up to interpretation. In this way, the artist creates a successful collection of work.

Reaction to Guy Carlo

The photographs by Guy Carlo are nothing less than strange. A hand print stands out red against a left butt cheek, and a man's face is warped into a cartoon-like portrait. The collection of Carlo's work is based primarily on computer manipulation of photos. The photos that aren't edited, like the first photo shown, are of random images, not what one would call fine art. I personally feel that Carlo's work is nothing special, something that could be done by a student who was playing around with photos on his or her computer. There was one photo that was blurry, and it cannot be deduced whether or not the photo was blurred accidentally or purposefully. Overall, the images Carlo presents are somewhat interesting, but seem amateur.

Earcleaning Exercise

At night, sitting in the atrium of the Life Science complex every sound is amplified, reverberating off the lofty ceiling and long corridors. As opposed to the noise that usually results from echoed rooms, the lack of people sitting in the atrium creates a hushed atmosphere. The smallest of movements--the turning of a page, creak of a chair, the scuff of a foot--are heard from across the room. Everyone tries to make their movements make as little noise as possible to not disrupt the pressing silence. Conversations that are more than a whisper are heard clearly, passerby interrupting the hushed silence of the building. Drumming fingers on a chair sound far too loud. The hydraulics in the doors create an airy sound as they work so that the doors neatly shut in a "snap." The scuff of feet is the most dominant sound in the atrium, few people able to pass through without notice. In the hushed silence, the hum of the refrigerators in the cafe and the lights hanging from the ceiling create a white noise that can be heard only when a person focuses on the sound. A messenger bag rubs against a nylon coat as a person cuts through the building. Conversations in Indian fade in and out, some loud and laughing, others hushed and hurried. The strange silence that hangs in the air between the noisy interruptions seems almost loud in its own way.

Good Copy Bad Copy

The film "Good Copy Bad Copy" brings to light important controversy in the music and film business. Piracy and the use of samples in other music is a much debated topic in today's culture.

The new generation has grown used to obtaining whatever music and video they want for free. Piracy of music and video can never be stopped, but all efforts should be made to make it more and more difficult to download illegal media. Personally, I have never downloaded music off of Limewire or watched a movie offline. I'm part of the small group of people that still buys cds (which is actually a shopping addiction of mine). Yes, the price of cds are outrageous at times, but I believe that if you truly love an artist or film, you should purchase it. You would never steal something like clothing from a store, but with the use of the internet people steal billions of songs just because they know they have a very small chance of getting caught. However, what is to say that if the chance of getting caught is low enough, what would stop a teenager from stealing a watch they thought was overpriced?

When music is used in ways such as Girl Talk uses it, the original artists of the songs should be given credit for their music. Compensation for each individual sound clip would be far too expensive. A fan of rock music, I personally do not find the music of Girl Talk and other similar artists as original. Yes, it creates an interesting combination of music, but smashing sounds together does not constitute musical talent.

Hannah Starkey

Hannah Starkey
Untitled - 1998

Using female actors, Starkey recreates scenes from everyday life. The dramatic lighting and quality of the pictures make them seem like snapshots from a film. Her photographs depict the moments of tension in everyday life.
The choice to only use women as subjects in her photographs may come from Starkey's interest in female interaction and everyday life. The cinematic style of the photos make the viewer question the story that precedes and follows the frozen moment. The use of actors and staging of scenes allows for photographers to get the exact image they were envisioning.