Blog #16: Kitsch Schmitsch!!

Kitsch Schmitsch! While I'm proud to be able to identify varying art as kitsch, I'm beginning to really dislike this term. It's very condescending in a way. At least it can be. Perhaps this is because it looks like a jumble of the words "sick" & "shit" but it seems that anything that isn't kitsch has to be disturbing or grotesque, anything that brings a recognizable pleasure is apparently passe and cheap. Well I LIKE kitsch but I don't want to be labeled a "kitsch" artist because then I feel like those who would label me think "aw you pander to what's safe and in order to be successful you pander to what you know will sell."  But then I suppose it's a no win situation here because anyone who claims to hate kitsch I automatically think "aw you're one of those people who have to shove your dogma into other people's faces and hope you become popular with some cult following! AND as soon as you do become popular...*cough Tim Burton cough* ...you suddenly become kitsch yourself!!"  So I LIKE pleasing people! I mean isn't that the foundation from which the profession of artist is built? ....granted so is prostitution but thats beside the point! Anyhoo, I also like pretty things. I like looking at them and I find great indignation when anyone insinuates that's a bad thing.

Blog #15: MIDTERM!!!

First off, what an awesome midterm! No studying, no writing just make something. Well! well well well. We are given two mediums to work with: soap or spam.
Naturally I chose the SPAM. Mostly out of my idle curiosity as to what spam looks like. I've never eaten it intentionally. Heck! I'm not even sure I've seen it up close before. Much to my suprise, it smells like tuna mixed with bacon.

Anyhoo we have to make something, anything! So question is. What does one make from SPAM? So from our past two class projects, I looked at the qualities of SPAM. It really is just mean, pork to be specific, and yet its seen as disgusting and cheap. Hmm. Well a penis came to mind with the connection of "edible meat" but I figured that was too obvious. Perhaps the subject matter should contradict the subject matter and make something either cute or beautiful. A classical bust maybe? I had decided on this. But then, out of the blue, I don't know where, it struck me. A FETUS!  Granted, I asked a few people and that was what got the biggest reaction. First I mention SPAM which on it's own made people go "Ewww!". Then to mention an aborted fetus and they replied with "Ewwwww!" (notice the extra Ws)

Let me be perfectly clear that I am politically Pro-Choice while personally I am pro-life. So this is NOT intended to push a strong political agenda.

However, I pose the question. What makes SPAM disgusting anyway? Again, its just meat. And when it comes to meat, what meats are more disgusting than others? Why is eating one animal any less disgusting than eating say a dog? SO! With abortion, we are asked a similar question; which humans are less entitled to life? When does the ...thing...go from being a cute baby to a disgusting fetus? Am I saying the fetus is just a piece of meat? Or am I comparing abortion to the use of SPAM that "hopefully" it should be a last resort?  Discuss!

Artist 8/20: Antonio Corradini

You know a man is talented when he can make stone look transparent and as light as air. People marvel at the fact that artists like Donatello were the first to make the garments of their sculptors contour to the human form but few artists ever took such contouring to greater heights than Antonio Corradini. Easily rivaling the likes of Bernini, this was the man capable of making stone sculpture of a veiled woman. Unfortunately he wasn't as highly commissioned and has still yet to gain the posthumous credit I think he deserves as very little of his work is mentioned in books.

A Baroque artist, Corradini worked in Venice in the early 1700s. And completed such remarkable works like Chastity (also called Modesty) a tomb dedicated to the patron of the chapel's mother. Corradini unfortunately didn't master his technique until late in his career and among his last commissions by the same patron was Christ beneath the Shroud. Sadly Corradini died on 29 June 1752 before the work was completed. Another artist by the name of Giuseppe Sanmartino finished the work, successfully completing the essence the original artist intended to captivate. One of the reasons Corradino's work didn't garner much attention from the Vatican was because his work was supposedly too erotic and somber.

There's a sense of subtle elegance in his work and I do agree that is does display a certain eerieness.

Blog #14: Childhood in a Purse/ Statement

Well, the crayon coin purse and the little wax coins have turned out extremely well. Fortunately...or unfortunately...I managed to finish it two weeks before the due date. One would think I'd have all that time off but nooo..... It was suggested that I go on to make a whole purse.

Well so that got my mind going. Rather than making a purse out of crayon boxes as well I figured I'd make it out af a girly backpack and it's contents out of various things pretaining to childhood and school. But what to women typically carry in their purses and what are the innocent parallels?

So among the first things to come to mind were the two objects I originally thought of working with: bubble gum and a condom. The parallel struck me. Condom symbolizes sex which is among the most exciting things adults get to experience. Then make it out of gum/candy which is a kid's prime source of pleasure. Also, for a woman carrying a condom can indicate that she is promiscuous (albeit responsible) and a child who brings gum to school is also...naughty.

Speaking of "naughty". How about some nasty habits? Smoking is the most obvious habit/addiction and in today's society its slowly becoming less accepted and more taboo. From personal experience, the worst habit I had in school was chewing my wooden pencils (one of the reasons I only like using mechanical pencils today). So with that I intend to construct a cigarette carton and ciggies from a box of pencils.

Cell phones.... how does an elementary student communicate? Notes...little obnoxious but cute love notes. While I doubt I'll be able to get my hands on a genuine love note I'll have to compose one myself and with it I hope to make a paper machete cell phone. However, I've recently decided to make this project a little sad. Already we've established that this purse's owner has a bad addiction, may be promiscuous, so to make that come full circle the message written on the love note and consequently the phone will be a negative one. Erin Cunningham reminded me of the old school notes with the "do you like me? check yes or no." So I plan to have the no box checked. This may even indicate as to why the purse was dropped.

This just adds to the reflection of simpler times. henceforth all the childhood supplies.

Other objects I hope to constuct are a stick of lipstick made from tootsie rolls (again candy being linked to sex)

a billfold with trading cards of some kind rather than credit cards and cash (forms of currency)

Keys made from a hall pass or a nail file made from a ruler. Hopefully the first thrift shop I visit will have all these things.

Blog #13: Crayon Purse Report

Right well.....  So I think I've worked this little bastard out. After a good half hour walk to the nearest known thrift store I managed to find exactly what I was looking for: Two little coin purses with them little snappy metal clamps. With some nervous wielding of a very sharp knife I was able to liberate the cloth/plastic sack from the metal on one of them. From that I had a basic pattern for cutting out my crayon box. To get the size and look. I want I'm gonna have to most likely sew two pieces together. But how the hell does one sew cardboard?

So I had to find a way to treat the cardboard so it would be more flexable and durable. This was a pleasant case were my first experiment proved to work. I disassembled the cardboard box and got it wet. I then crumpled the cardboard into a soppy heap and then carefully flattened it out as not to rip it. Then I repeated this process a few more times until the material had been thoroughly creased. Then I dried it out in the oven. The result is a leathery paper that has still retained it's printed surface. However, to make it just a bit more durable I'm going to later attempt soaking the brown side with a clear wax. I'll take some wax shavings, sprinkle it on the brown side, stick it in the oven and let heat and osmosis do their thing.

The coins were more little pains in the tucus. First, I tried making molds from sticky tack....no good. I'd make a print of the coin, pour the wax in which would dry but then not come apart from the tack. Then, I tried heating the coins and dropping them on plastic....no good. Too hot and the coin just melted right through. Too cold and the coin did nothing. So then I realized the wax didn't stick to the coins themselves and I figured it were the images that people recognized on our coins more than the writing so I've gone with that. also to keep the wax from spilling all over the place I'm using parts of an orange prescription bottle as a well. So I'm pouring wax on one side of a coin and popping it out. Then I do the other side. With the remaining wax I stick the two pieces together. Wear the sides down appropriately and then I apply the original crayon wrapper back on with the cunning use of hairspray. That stuff is AMAZING!

Artist 7/20: Louis Comfort Tiffany

As I may have mentioned before, my favorite period in art history is from about 1840 - 1920. This is when we saw the Pre-Raphaelite movement, the Impressionistic movement as well as the short lived Art Nouveau. While Alphonse Mucha is among the people who exemplified the painting of this period, the most well-known sclupt/3d artist of this time was Louis Comfot Tiffany.


Tiffany is a good example of the kind of artists we all HATE! Born in 1848, he was talented, and truly cutting-edge for his time....but he was RICH! Oh yes, he never had to worry about funds or making connections. His father was Charles Lewis Tiffany, founder of Tiffany & Co. ....as in Tiffany Jewelry. So Louis was raised with a silver spoon in his mouth and constantly in the company of America's elite society. Because of his family name, Louis quickly gained recognition and two of his earliest projects include the designing of Mark Twain's home in Hartford, Connecticut as well as parts of the White House in 1882.

Although he was a talented painter, Louis soon became interested in the use of glass like cheep jelly jars and wine bottles. He is a prime example of taking found material and making art out of it. He particularly was fascinated about the qualities of impure glass. Glass with bubbles, streaks or unmixed colours were his favorite but he was unable to convince various glass companies to produce planes of glass with these features in mass quantity. And so in 1885, Louis launched his own glass company to do just that.

Since then his family name has become synonymous with the style of using stained glass in lamps, windows, mosaics, interior design and pottery. His use of textures and colors were unheard of at the time, replacing the tradition of painting on glass, a method that had been used in stained glass for over 700 years. His characters and landscapes capture and exemplify the style of the Art Nouveau period and has remained prevalent and classy by even modern standards. A prime example of a timeless style.

Blog #12: About MEEeee!

So rather than do an entry about an artist I'm gonna do a bit about me. Me, me me me me. A bit of an artistic bio if you will.

Like oh so many artists, I apparently was making stuff as soon as I could pick up my own poop. My mother tells me I was a nightmare in the bathroom. Those white rooms were my artistic playground. After the fecal matter came her makeup and soon she realized i was destined for great things. So she bought me a box of crayons.

While I cannot honestly speak for myself. I'm told that I never went through a stick figure stage but instead I drew blobs of colors and shapes which resembled people. I never overlapped my figures but always made room for them. Like if I colored the grass, I'd always leaves uncolored gaps for the bunnies. My art also informed my mother that I was a bit of a...fancy child..shall we call it? My favorite subject matters were rainbows, fairies, unicorns, mermaids, princesses...etc. Despite the fact that I drew fictional things, I was always very adiment about proportion, perspective, distance, reality....as much as a 6 year old could be.

circa 1994?

Anyhoo, I outgrew my crayons because my obsession with details became frustrating when I couldn't erase my mistakes. So...i took up pencil. My older sister was an artist and the attention she garnered from her work was what I wanted too.

9 years passed. I used to draw for the love of it. I doodled all the time. I was revered as "the artist" of all my classes. But a traumatic event in 3rd grade changed all that. I was working on an assigned art project during a math lesson. I'm guessing the teacher was having a bad day because he said if I wasn't going to pay attention than maybe I should come up and teach the class. Which me made me do. Made me come up to the blackboard, stand there in horror, and admit that I had no idea what to do. I don't know why he was so testy that day. He had never yelled at me before and I was always being told how great a student I was.

my version circa 2000

So I've been scarred for life. From that point on, no more doodling for me. And even in highschool I looked down upon other kids that doodled because they weren't paying attention. But for some reason this didn't deter my knack. I was 13...almost 14 when I did a replica of the nude portrait from TITANIC. It garnered a lot of attention and was mostly deemed as "inappropriate" by the community. I don't know what clicked but I suddenly understood the use of shading and rendering. From then on, my drawing style has remained relatively the same. Sadly, I've lost the creative juices I once had but I like to think that my latest art class is helping there. I'm still snobbish toward the work that goes into it but I'm loving the endless possibilities of ways to send ideas. I'm continuously trying to replicate nature and immortalize beauty, visually. Now I am beginning to understand how to capture it intellectually. I turned down going to art school because a part of me was too arrogant to believe that anyone could teach me anything. Clearly, I have yet a long way to go.

2004

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2007