Review of "Stay Rad Stay Focused"

I thought the show looked great. I really thought it showed off most of the students skill in their concentrations. It was very nice to finally see individuals work based on something they wanted rather than a project that comes from a class requirement. I thought we did a good job of dividing the gallery space up amongst everyone. I really enjoyed Louis Merced's, Mary Imgrud's, and Andrew Schweighardt. I like Louis's juxtaposition of old art with new modern subject material, and found his quotes to be powerful. Mary's clothing line was pretty sick. The colors and use of nautical elements with what i would think is non-traditional nautical colors made for a very interesting clothing line. The table she used to display her tee shirt designs was amazing and worked extremely well with the nautical themed clothes. Andrew's design came out spectacular. I really enjoyed reading the side blurbs he used to help convey his meaning of the work. I thought the piece was designed very well, with the use of light colors and nice typeface. The typeface allowed for variance within the text and type he used within the design. Lastly i also really enjoyed Ashley Malm's photo realistic paintings. The scale made the colors really pop out without having any color over saturate the others. I also really like the camera view depicted in the painting.
~With all that said i did have a few negatives from the show. I really did not like the performance piece done towards the end of the show. The music was wayyyy to loud and really for me killed the night. There were so many people there for various reasons, from having parents there that might not be familiar with the art scene or having friends there that it was way to intrusive to the rest of the show and gallery. I had visitors that drove over an hour to come see my work and support me only for them to have to put their fingers in their ear and walk out early from the gallery because the music and sound of the performace was too loud. i did not really find it fair to disrupt the gallery presence that heavily for everyone else. The Thesis show is for some of us(me) the biggest thing we have done in our college career and to have it disrupted like that i found unfair. Besides that i was very unhappy with my planning group. Everyone bailed (besides Naqeeb) before the show was even over leaving ppl that were not even in the opening group to help clean up. Rebekah was awesome enough to take over the duty of setting up the catering, yet her boyfriend and her got stuck cleaning up after everyone else from the opening group left. This i also found very UNFAIR. Lasty i found it annoying that there were some people that showed up for the opening group the day of the show opening but yet never attended the group meetings or helped to contribute through out the semester. Where were they all semester long? this i found really annoying and again not right.

update for project

so this weekend i spent a lot of time constructing the form for the sandbox. for the most part it went smoothly. i was able to make it so i can construct it as well as easy deconstruct it in the gallery space. i have also stained the wood for the box to give it a more finished look. i have figured out the dimensions i will need for the plexiglass and hope to pick it up thrusday or friday. i will also be getting the sand i need when i pick up the plexiglass. lastly all i need to finish is the design layout for the floor and send that out to the printer. getting the print is the only thing that has me worried. but construction in the gallery should not be to hard.

Second Project Crit

so finally i came up with what i feel is a fairly solid idea. and from that i had a very good critique. It by far helps having a project i guess you could say have confidence in. from the crit came a few changes to the project that im ok with. if i have more time i would like to of constructed my project with a few of the ideas i originally had such as the size and type on the floor, so the shifting of the sand would wear away the text. But with construction and completion time dwindling away i have decided to go with the new ideas presented in class. Which were making the sandbox smaller, so now im going with a 5x5 square and printing the type on say paper and laying in it in the box to than be covered with plexiglass. this way as the thesis show progress's all the information written on the floor that pertains to my idea is still intact and readable to the viewer. i have started to buy materials and will start construction this weekend. still have yet to come up with a design for the floor space. but im hoping to have it all figured out by the weekend. in conclusion it was a sigh of relief to have a beneficial critique for once..... now whens may 18th again. cause it certainly cant come fast enough.

finalized thesis idea

Project Description: My project engages the viewer with the idea/topic of global warming. For my thesis project I want to build a sandbox that viewers can walk in, with type under the sand. The goal is to have the viewer step into the box and have to shuffle around the sand to read the text. The sandbox will depict the analogous relationship of the ocean tides to the idea of global warming. If you imagine the weather as waves and the tide as the climate you can begin to see the metaphor between the two. Waves at the beach repeat the never-ending cycle of the tide; they come in, they go out. Some waves travel far up the beach and some fall short. But you can't tell without observing whether the tide's coming in or out. It's only the trend that matters, not the waves. This idea is the basis for my project.

reaction to crit group 2/12/10

theres not much to say on this front, except more frustration. i will say its been the best critique i've had dealing this this project. it wasnt as negative or aggravating as the ones i have in my design class . im trying to work through some new ideas proposed such as creating controversy and possibly adding some form of audio or sound clips. my frustration level is reaching a record high since it seems my path to my project keeps changing. which is getting me worried since the installation date is coming quickly. the further we move through this thesis process the more i dont understand it. i mean if i wanted to create work for the gallery i would of been a sculptor or painter. but i dont want to create for a gallery and would much rather be learning techniques within the design programs to boost my skills. i feel this would get me further once i done school than being able to say i put work up in a gallery!

pending thesis project.

this is in the working stages and i just developed a more formal idea for my thesis. Here it is:

*I came up with a general survey question relating to the world outside someones door, "the natural world". With the data collected I want to create a video that is made up of pictures, so more like a slide show. The slideshow shuffles through generalized pictures that relate to the data collected from the survey. Some of the survey answers were audio based so i might use that as the sound for the slide show. After the show shuffles through the generalized photos it will shuffle the same photos but with a human figure standing in image. The figure will be holding a sign so to speak, saying the answer to the survey question. Once all the data is done being collected I will pick out the best answers that fit the question. Then once those images are done, the screen would go from maybe a gray color to complete white. This in hope would transition to the idea of “nothing”, representing if we dont fix our planet now and soon we will be left with nothing. The slide show would more or less be broken into 3 parts . Once it plays through once the speed of the show goes faster, and again on the next rotation it goes faster still. Until the images start to blur together into the white of the emptiness. While this is playing on the gallery wall I will have vinyl txt, that is either the survey question or helps get across the main focus of the piece which is that we need to save our planet so to speak. The way in which the text is laid on the wall be help evoke the person to want to watch the video, i want to use the text pull the viewer into the video/slideshow.


-- as a side note to the install group i do not need much space and would only need enough to put up a tv for my video/slide show. yet enough space to make the txt large in size. so i have no experience in dealing with gallery wall but i would assume like a 8x8 maybe 10x10 square piece of wall. i don have much of an idea. but there's a starting point i suppose.

MFA gallery review

*this was definitely the weirdest show ive viewed so far. not in the idea of content but with the layout and process or make up of the show. there were a lot of things that werent completely finished with the display of the show. artists placed napkins with tape in the postion of where the name tag should go. this looks very unprofessional. the video piece wasnt even on for veiwers to see. and it looks as if some of the names on the title wall are out of position, they dont all appear to be evenly space. and there are many pieces on display that dont even display an artists name, whether it be on napkin or not. while this doesnt come off very professional, in a way i still found it interesting. in the idea that it seemed like we got a behind the scenes look at the gallery exhibit. we got a behind the doors all access pass in the making or procedure of the show. yet really it wasnt a full out behind the scenes experience, i still got that sense of feeling.*
-couldnt find the name of the artist, but the piece in the first room on the left as you walk in i thought was interesting. the size of the pieces were captivating and i found the juxtaposition of texture on texture to be interesting. this texture on texture being the paint painted over the computerized digital image on the canvas.
-i also like the mixed media room, for the use of one of the pieces actually existing on the wall itself. most of the work ive veiwed so far has been hung on is in a frame. but this work breaks the mold of the frame and actually have the work produced on the gallery wall itself. i think it brings an interesting idea or thought into the piece since the artist had to think of the wall as part of their canvas. and the gallery wall adds to the idea of the "mixed media".
-the sculpture pieces hanging from the ceiling are also very interesting. by hanging the pieces from the wall i think it brings a new element to the art work. for me by hanging on the wall i lose the idea of what is actually hung, and start to feel the shadows displayed by the hanging objects becomes the art. or the idea or action of walking around the hanging pieces becomes the art. and for me im always scared to walk into, bump, or knock over the art pieces that take up the viewers space, so for me this also becomes more of the art that the pieces, this idea of doing a dance or some sort of abnormal walk to get around and through these objects is what becomes the art for me.-lastly i like the pictures of the naked women in the right corner of the gallery as you walk in. i didnt see/couldnt find the info for the pieces but in the long run that really didnt matter. the photo of the splattered paint and the nude i found to be very interesting. i havent really come up with an idea behind the image yet think it captures the idea of time perfectly. in the image you have the splattered paint being captured mid splatter, mid air which to me evokes a sense of time. also with an in depth look of the image you can see the female has goosebumps. it captures the moment of time when the female was "cold" enough to give her goosebumps. goosebumps dont last a long period of time so it captures this moment of when she got these goosebumps freezing them in time. The other image i found interesting was the image with the balloons. There is an oddity at play here and i dont mean the face paint, haircut, or outfit, but the way the balloon in the foreground is positioned is definitely odd to me. the balloon is not floating straigh up and seems as if it is stuck to the wall or possibly someone is holding it in that position. for me thought this is what captivated me. like why is that balloon positioned that way what purpose does that balloon serve. and my thought is that its positioned that way to not capture the reflection of the photographer. when you look closely at the balloon you can see the reflection of the female but not of what or how the image is being photographed. i feel the thought process of being that detail oriented to make sure to not capture the photographer is very interesting.