For my 4D class, I took a trip to see Disappearing Acts by Bruce Nauman at MoMA. I found the exhibition to be startling and discomfiting, and walked away deep in thought. Nauman’s work in simple, but not minimalistic. He says exactly what he needs to and nothing more, and often lets his materials do much of the talking. He is more effective in conveying his meaning because of this sparseness. While one may miss his point at first, Nauman is able to guide his viewer to a conclusion with ease, and often this conclusion is unsettling in nature. I found myself feeling completely differently about many pieces after closer examination than I had on just a cursory glance. Upon fully understanding a Nauman work, I often would feel unsettled at his ability to force his viewers mind to go to places it would normally work to avoid. His piece “Audio-Video Underground Chamber” was especially haunting to me. It consisted of a small television on a shelf on the wall, playing a live video feed of an offsite underground chamber. I watched the feed for minutes before reading the description, which gave me the realization that I had been inadvertently projecting my consciousness into “the grave”. To quote Nauman, “To project oneself mentally into the scene is to contemplate the grave”. While Nauman refers to the grave as a “Blank abstraction that never ends”, I was struck by the struggle between this theoretical interpretation of a grave and the very literal finite grave, a place we will all end up and one that is unchanging and eternal. When each and every one of us is laid to rest, we will remain there forever. That spot on earth is unchanging, and to imagine oneself there premature raises all sorts of questions about the nature of death and the infinity that it is. I was also inspired by his work “One Hundred Live and Die”. I am in a projects in glass class where we are learning to make neon signs, so this large scale piece was very inspiring and interesting. His use of not only different colors but variations on live and die, along with the coordinated phrases that strategically lit up in tandem, were fascinating to see, especially knowing how difficult neon is to work with.
Tag: classwork
There’s This Place in Philly
These are ceramic lighters, bowls, and cigarettes, strung on yarn. Hand painted, hand everything, this took forever . but in an un-obtrusive way. Meaning, I worked for like a month on this, but only for about thirty minutes every few days. #slavetothefiringschedule
Walk 20 Minutes There and 20 Minutes Back
This is a faux painting kit I made for my 2d class.
I constructed the box out of cardboard and painted acrylic and paint marker on foam core to create the demo piece. It can be totally reconstructed following the (somewhat convoluted) instructions in the bottom right corner.
First Photoshop Project
I made a postcard 🙂 It was hard to think of an idea cause there’s just endless possibilities on photoshop, but once i got it it was really fun and I love the result.
Pop Art Is For Everyone (2)
This is the final cut of my video project, I edited it further and am really happy with how I refined it.
Borges
Another assignment for my 2D class, this was only my third attempt at charcoal but I’m thrilled with how it turned out.
First Piece of College Art 🤑
The assignment was for my 2D class, to create a piece using one color and only line. It is called “Congress Shall Make No Law Respecting an Establishment of Religion, or Prohibiting the Free Exercise Thereof; or Abridging the Freedom of Speech, or of The Press; or the Right of the People Peaceably to Assemble, and to Petition the Government for a Redress of Grievances.” (So the whole first amendment) I like this piece but I can and will do better. 🙂