The 36th Chamber

When I was watching the 36th chamber and thinking about my life in relation to San Te all I could think is that although art school has been brutal it is definitely not beating your head into sand bags. And it doesn't seem that useless either.
All joking aside, most of his life's journey I really can't relate with. Perhaps I most relate to his desire to exceed. He wasn't happy with just being average so he'd wake up in the middle of the night to work at something and I've slept less and less as the semester's progressed because I have that same desire.
Shaolin in a lot of ways is similar to art school because a lot of what we do seems a little over the top at first, but then as the year progressed you realize how significant things you thought weren't important are the more your eye is trained to view things. Especially simple things like pinning your drawings up straight.
Eating on top of a log in water is basically like being able to look at a model and let your hand draw without you staring at the page. Running on barrels would be like compositional balance. Also how the chambers work at training individual areas of his body, our classes train individual areas of artistic design, and each assignment focuses even more specifically within that.
I think as far as perseverance and art is concerned is that you can't just stop once you make something that works. Not stopping because of time or lack of funds, but working with what you have until you're satisfied, not just until you're "done".
I think monks are far too religious and dedicated to be compared to artists who from artist to artist can differ so much in practice, appearance, personality. Monks are kind of taught to not be extreme while artists are constantly pushing past extremes. But both monks and artists have a higher level of connection with themselves intrinsically.
Boot camp is not as physically trying as the 35 chambers, but more so mentally I would say. The 35 chambers were taught in a peaceful, spiritual, and solemn environment while boot camps involve drilling, loud noise, and lots of activity. Not to mention boot camp is essentially preparing people for war at its extreme while the chambers were only a means of bettering oneself.
The abbot's quote is actually surprisingly really applicable to the art community, not sure why it's surprising though. But art school is definitely an almost closed off existence from the world. Students [for the most part] don't have to worry quite as much about bills and responsibilities outside of making art for class. It's turbulent while you're inside the flow of the school but that turbulence will really be put in perspective when we leave school and understand that we have to make everything we learned work in a world that's primarily a business.
To challenge a master in art...well. I'd imagine first that a teacher, or someone who inspires you would be a master but maybe actually someone who doesn't inspire you. A popular artist that you feel doesn't deserve the recognition they get, if you were to take the goal or meaning that they intended for and then tackle it with your mind and approach it differently, I'd say that's challenging the master.
I don't think I've reinvented art in any way as drastic as creating a three part nunchuck. I've done things were I've done them without being taught or given the idea but I'm not sure I'd say it's the first time it's been done. I don't really know enough to say.
The 36th chamber in relation to art school feels kind of like, the students that go on to be teachers or artists that become popular in some manner, not necessarily really popular, but enough to inspire someone else to go into art school.
I guess my art teacher from HS Mr. Windsor was my San Te as far as the 36th chamber is concerned. I have yet to see the Godfather but everything he said to me really helped push me towards art and he saw something in me other than math and here I am tackling the chambers myself.
Who knows where it will go after this point. I've taken it upon myself to write down ideas that I don't have time for now, or concepts that I'm interested in, and perhaps they'll change after school but I want to remember the things that I don't have time to do now while I'm still learned so that when I approach the world even if I'm not sure how I can do what I want to do, I'll always be focusing on what I want to do, not making by.

Armleder

It feels to me as if John Armleder’s work is deeply rooted in how it is perceived by his audience as I would imagine most artists should at least consider. Especially if you consider himself to he a part of this own audience because he wants to change his own perception of his art when he exhibits so he wants to take on the role of a viewer separate from his art. It’s interesting that a good number of his exhibitions rely on historical knowledge of art so it’s more specific to an audience but he says he prefers the unknowing audience who would get an entirely different perspective from his art. Otherwise he would only get his own perception retold by those with a similar knowledge of art to him. He notes how people classifies his work within multiple different movements, and is glad that they can do that. Their perception of his work doesn’t change the meaning for him but he wants them to be looked at from changing perceptions. I don’t think artist movements are as static as a definition of what a fruit is, and the same with people’s perceptions so it’s entirely possible for Armleder to be a part of multiple different movements. During the Renaissance artistic styles lasted longer and varied less, but in today’s world there are tons of different cultures all with different movements coexisting and influencing one another and movements are created and die off quickly. So it’d be impossible in my opinion for artists now to only fit one movement, and even if movements directly contradict one another it’s possible to be associated with both depending on the perception of the viewer.
I think it’s highly plausible what he’s saying about it being impossible to have completely generic or neutral work because I don’t think it’s possible for anything to be completely something. Even if you take away the word completely I’d still lean towards agreeing with him because neutrality is subjective. I think even neutrality is important though and the idea of a completely neutral piece of artwork intrigues me a lot. I think it’s hard to classify anything as neutral though because it has the history of all art influencing it and the history of the artist.
The way Armleder recycles form is so important to me today because recycling of waste and energy is so important. Recycling ways of creating art seems to me to emphasize the importance of not giving up on forms simply because they’ve already been used, like how people treat clothing and electronics today. People should consider the importance of throwing away things more clearly.
When Armleder uses the term pseudo intelligent, he is approaching his art with the intention of failing at being smart so he is trying to create dumb art. Basically he is trying to fail which always devolves into a paradox about success, but I think it’s interesting. I’d fall back on the paradox though and say that if he is trying to create something that appears smart but isn’t, then his method is smart and so what the product, the art work. To reiterate my early points about his relation to his audience, because the lack of intelligence of the piece requires a specific audience, those without it may actually consider it to be very intelligent and it feels more like his usage of the term is simply a term to satisfy that specific art audience so that he can appeal more to the unknowing audience.
I think that it’s a matter of sequence, confusing the viewer should come first because if a viewer walks us to a painting and sees a beautifully painted bowl of fruit they’ll appreciate it’s beauty and continue walking. There needs to be something done to art whether in how it was created with texture, method, size, anything that adds some level of confusion to the piece so the viewer will stop and study it. People will study graffiti because it’s harder to read and they’ll listen more closely to people who talk quieter because they’re harder to hear. I feel like if artists want to influence people more they need to get their full attention for longer than a couple seconds, but I don’t think having no underlying explanation is good either. I don’t think that the artist’s explanation is important so much as the fact that multiple people can find different ones within it, if it’s so confusing that only art critics and the artist themselves can bull shit a response about it’s impact on them, then I don’t think it’s succeeding. Catching your eye and making you stop should warrant some sort of substance. It’s certainly more exciting to confuse someone then having them understand something that they create, like riddles. They’re beautiful whether they’re solved or unsolved.
As far as Armleder’s way of creating artwork I’m moderate on it. Which might be easy to be because he seems rather moderate about things, or neutral as was mentioned earlier, not to say entirely neutral but he’s not doing anything over the top, it’s subtle artwork. His method isn’t so much a method to me because it appears that he approaches different areas very different with an open enough mind to just left the art flow. It’s not like he set out to do things in my opinion, it all feels very natural, which isn’t something I’m necessarily great at but I appreciate seeing it.

Emily Rooney's Space

When I first walked into the exhibit, I saw the black mat with all the black objects on it, and tiny bits of light teal and pink. I instantly thought of Japan...more specifically the serenity, and zen quality that sitting mats and black objects create. The placement of the objects to one another was particularly interesting in the arrangement of different surfaces. Although they were all treated with the color black, the natural texture and nature of the object affected the black like with the placement of the dull radishes with the satiny shorts, and the smooth belt with the wrinkled grapes. The records weren't even visible as records at first, and just appear as these incredibly interesting textures. The colors that emerged from the black, were light pink, teal, and a deep blue bottle near the center. The bottle stood out to me a lot as if it were a cracked robin's egg, although it's color was much deeper than a robin's egg, it's shape was what brought me to that image. The shape of a broken circle, or misshaped circle was repeated a lot over the black mat with the wrinkled grapes, the burnt records, and the multiple pots.
Oh and the word 'sephora' was on the broom...which after some googling is apparently a beauty company with the name derived from the greek word sephos for beauty/

The piece with the concrete bricks was what caught my eye next because of how the bricks raised everything above the floor. It's height above the rope with the peace sign made it more prominent in the room. I think the placement of the black mat being right there first made it the initial viewing point.
The colors on the brick piece went from blue, cooler paint to warmers tones. Also the line incorported a section that was a red stripes and then a section with a blue star that immediately made me think of the American flag.
The layers of paints and the line that directs through the bricks are all concealing pictures of some kind as well. To me they feel like magazine clippings.
What lead me to the other section of concrete bricks was a continuation of the red acrylic paint, how it ends on one and begins on the other, or vice verse. The line of paint slowly becomes incense which is arranged tonely in warm and cool varieties similarly to the strips of paper on the other section of concrete bricks. They lead to drumsticks leaning upright like incense would. There were lots of bronze almost gold colored objects, and the urn-shape in particular stood out to me. The combination of them with the incense feels really reminiscent of a culture that I can't really think of.

Then I moved over to the peace rope because it was situated near by, and although it's color was the most vibrant in the room it's size and location played it down. What was interesting about it was that from most heights above it, the rope looks like it's merely rope, but because of the speckles of blue and green colors that are so intense, most people I saw in the gallery moved closer to see the texture up close and realized because of some cracks in the rope that it was actually ceramic. The use of color and texture was what drew people closer to take a deeper look.

That's about as far as I got before we left. I looked throughout the whole exhibit first but then I'd just be describing to you what I saw briefly and not what I thought about as I was there.
There was one photo in the first room that I paused at because the corner was lifted and I couldn't tell if it was meant to be that way or not. The more I looked at it, the less purposeful it felt. Especially considering that the other two photos in the room were neatly mounted on the wall next to one another like most photographs were.

Back Again

The second time I saw the piece of the plate and cup, I came to the realization that the piece was primarily a pattern. This came to me I think because of the last project, and that I was supposed to sketch the plate and all I could think was 'Oh. It's a pattern." which makes sense because I love patterns, and we're doing them in 2D too, cool how the classes mix like that.
So I talked about colors a lot last time, but to branch off the questions, the colors definitely attracted me to the piece. Well, the round shape contributed, if it were a square I'd probably have been mush less interested, but the colors came first. They're bright and demanding but how they're organized calms that enough that it doesn't overwhelm me or push me away. Second time looking at it, don't remember what it was the first time, but the red definitely stands out to me most. Probably has something to do with the red dot in the center radiating out.
I can't really think of a time it draws me to, the colors make me think of playgrounds, and the one that's in a park in my neighborhood. The colors are too dark though, then it starts to remind me of color charts. I can't remember if I've ever seen a primary colors color chart, but this would be one. I could carry it around to remind me of them and it would work brilliantly.
Also, smell? I smell my cherry eucalyptus cough drops.
I wanted to say that the piece felt smaller the second time I saw it too, and it wasn't as exciting of a discovery. I knew exactly where it was, so I wasn't a little lost in the museum, and lost in the room. Also I knew what I was looking for, so the colors still helped me find it and made it stand out but they weren't a surprise.

Maddie

I just want to say that I checked with the Blick in Allentown, a craft store, and a teacher's presentation store, and asked around if any of them knew where to get paper that's 5 feet by 5 feet without any results.
I think my favorite part of this assignment was the patterns. 

I apologize for taking so long to upload it here.
I've been asleep...a lot.  I'm not...totally better yet, but there's vast improvement, and I'm don't look like I'm going to fall over every time I stand up.

I took a couple pictures because I don't have anywhere to tack up the drawing and I can't really get one good angle when it's on the floor.
I'll take a better picture eventually.
OH YEAH.
I drew Maddie Hussar.   Also her hair totally looks like that sometimes, it just fades really fast.
I'm not just color-happy.

Red, Blue, and Yellow.

I went to the Penn Musuem with Maddie and Corinne on Saturday, right before they closed up their 'tempory exhibit of the Silk Road'.  For the record this temporary exhibit consisted of print outs of the objects on display until the 18th when they'll have the actual relics up. It was kind of hilarious going into the room and realizing that none of the artifacts were there, I guess that was a learning experienc, always research your trips.  Although I enjoyed seeing the "fake" exhibit, and how people visiting the museum spent less time experiencing the "objects" and more time reading about them.  Considering how difficult it can be to educate people in musuems, I was interested that people paid more attention to the information, even though the artifacts weren't there, which are normally what gives people reason to read about them.  So the exhibit was able to function without them, maybe even more efficiently as far as learning is concerned. Quite a surreal experience.
Back on the topic of color though, since the majority of pieces at the Penn Musuem are older works of art, and are a majority of objects made out of natural materials, most color schemes were neutral browns and greys, but that made it just easier to spot the colorful pieces.  The rarity of unnatural colors too helped the more colorful pieces stand out amongst other scultptures and objects.  I knew that the African exhibit would have more colorful objects or patterns, but most of the room was still very earthy and nothing really drew me into it.  The walls and floor were neutral, although a dark, vibrant blue wall was the first thing you saw before going into the exhibit, up against a bright orange stamped cloth, and the relationship between those two appeared much more thought out than the actual exhibit.  A ceramic plate in blue and white was the first thing to catch my eye in the room, because it stood out against the browns.  Taking my time slowly through the room, I found colorful bead work and sculpture, but it was the object sitting behind the white and blue ceramic plate that really caught my eye.  At first I didn't see it because it doesn't face the entrance, but after circling the room, and almost missing it, there it was.

 

After exploring a room that was almost entirely composed in earth tones, this plate captured my attention instantly.  It wasn't necessarily larger or smaller than anything else in the room, most of the objects were roughly similar in size, so it was really only the extreme difference in palate that caught my eye.  It made everything else in the room appear so much duller.  It's easy to find different hues even with a brown wood carving, but when set up against the bright, primary colors in small close proximity to one another, it's no question which stands out.  The colors are bordered with thin lines in geometric and almost architectural forms and it reminds me of stained glass, which I absolutely love.  It almost didn't seem to fit into the geographical setting because of images of European cathedrals that came to mind.  

The plate included a cup along with it, but I have to admit that I didn't find the cup nearly as fascinating as the plate.  I know that's partially because I love circular pieces with definition centers that focus all of your attention at first.  The shape of the plate really lends itself to the rings of designs, while the cup's curves don't necessarily enforce them quite like the plate does.  Also the designs on the sides of the cute start to lose the architectural arches and polygon shapes that the plate has.

There appears to only be about 4 colors used in the plate, red, blue, yellow, and teal/pearly green. The green is downplayed compared to the primary colors and yellow and blue in particular.  Red is only used as a circular form to accept the alternating blues and yellows com positionally. The red dots are very beautiful in their clearly hand-crafted, slight uneven placement and size. The complexity of the design with the bright colors feels festive, or celebratory in some manner.  I'm glad that the lighter green color is used as a soft alternative to the vibrant pure hues of red, blue, and yellow.  Also how it's most prominent in the center of the plate, and the inside of the cup, and in both the cup and plate, the areas with the most light green are the areas I spot first. 

The more I looked at it, I noticed tiny little dots inside the blue and yellow shapes within the arched shapes.  They started to look like really abstract one eyed monsters that were staring out at me from a fantasy environment.  Of course this would have been slightly creepy if not for the fact that I had already established in my mind that the piece wasn't worrisome, but happy.  Yet, the colors don't really make me think of a fantastical setting, just something bright and festive, something worth being happy about.  The brightness is overpowering, but the size doesn't make it took much.  It's not something that you can't handle, but if the plate were larger, it'd stop making me feel happy.  I can imagine being very unnerved or weak in its presence if it were larger.  Even when looking close up, I get lose in the shapes and start to feel like it's pushing me away from it.

I think it's safe to say that the primary colors objectively work together on the plate, because they are the most basic of hues.  But the placement of the plate in a room of relatively colorless objects, I think makes it more of a novelty, and hiding it from the initial viewing of the exhibit it an interesting decision of placement in a room.  I think a lot of people would have a hard time placing it in the African room though, and might be disconcerted with its presence. I'm afraid I didn't find the time period, and the picture of the labels I took is blurred, but I do have two link for the exhibit.

http://www.penn.museum/long-term-exhibits/259-african-gallery.html
http://www.penn.museum/about-our-collections/220-african-section.html

Oh and I didn't find anyone else down in the exhibit, although I would have liked to seen people missing it at first because of it's position.

Blue and Red

 

So I just realized I never ubdated my blog with my black drawing, but I guess that's because I didn't take it with me after class and I didn't photograph it before class.

I still don't have it, but I did find this work in progress picture I took.  I was taking pictures in grey scale to see how close to a black I was getting with the colors. 

Although this shows how...fixated...I am in drawing.  It works for me, I know it shouldn't though. 

I think doing it in oil pastels was a poor decision as well, and I only discovered that spraying it made it easier to layer colors once I had finished it.

 Dark blue, red, and brown were my favored colors until I started running out of them and then I loved green.