Click the link to see description....
Elevator Music
4.05.2010
Orlan
As much as I really don't like to see medical procedures being done in any way, I could not stop looking at Orlan's works. I mean talk about balls, how do you sit through ANY type of surgery and keep such a straight face?!? I got stitches removed from my leg and damn near passed out. And to do it all in the name of art, to mutilate and contort your body just to say you did and then call it art takes even bigger pelotas.
In some ways though, I kind of feel bad for her as it seemed like as she got older, she leaned on the plastic surgery thing more and more. I really enjoyed her first pieces we saw where she was the work of art coming through the frame. And that was not just because she was a good looking woman, but they were really very beautiful. Now it seems like the plastic surgery is just for the shock value, which it kind of losses after you see multiple surgeries in one sitting anyway.
In some ways though, I kind of feel bad for her as it seemed like as she got older, she leaned on the plastic surgery thing more and more. I really enjoyed her first pieces we saw where she was the work of art coming through the frame. And that was not just because she was a good looking woman, but they were really very beautiful. Now it seems like the plastic surgery is just for the shock value, which it kind of losses after you see multiple surgeries in one sitting anyway.
Gilbert and George
Talk about two funny little English guys. They remind me a lot of Montey Python skits, the good ones. It seems to me like they just really love hanging out together and doing whatever the hell they think is funny. From dancing around to funny music for 5 minutes or using their own poop in a piece of art, they're like two eternal 10 year old boys, again in a good way. I really like their quote, "To make art you don't need objects, you are the object." This appeals to me so much more than, let's say the Fluxus ideas of picking up two random things and nailing them together to make a new "art" object. Maybe I just like Gilbert and George because they're funny, I don't know, but I like them.
Fluxus and Joseph Beuys
In a similar, but still different, light of DaDa, Fluxus was a group of artists designers and musicians that had their own goals in mind. In their own words from their Manifesto,
"Promote a revolutionary flood and tide in art, promote living art, anti-art, promote non art reality, to be fully grasped by all peoples, not only critics dilettantes and professionals."
The artists involved in the movement (although they would not call it so, rather preferring to call it an "attitude"), who some say died with it's founder George Maciunas in 1978, liked to promote a "do-it-yourself" attitude towards art and used what they had at hand. Even though mostly regarded as an Art period, the group actually started gathering at a music class in New York.
Much like the Fluxus and DaDa time periods, I find the story of Joseph Beuys more than the actual works that they produce. Born in pre WW-II Germany, Beuys served under Hitler in the Great War and even received a medal for being wounded in combat. However, an even that happened in the field of combat would change him forever, even question his loyalty.
According to Beuys, after his plane was shot down over the German-Russian boarder and the German patrols stopped looking for him, he was rescued by local Russian townies. They found him buried in the snow three days later and would wrap him in felt blankets and apparently covered his body in fat to keep him warm. Even though this story may not be entirely true, as it was the account of a man who had just been through a plane crash in which he suffered major head wounds, it would be a very interesting window in which to see the influence this experience played in his future works of art, many of which consisted of covering things in felt.
Both have great background stories, but their art takes some getting used to. Call me old fashioned, but I just don't typically enjoy a lot of their works. Beuys was interesting and original, but I guess growing up in the world of Modern Art a lot of the "shock value" is lost, if that's what they were going for in the first place. I like the idea of "I like America and America likes me" is very intreguing, but the reasoning behind it a little confusing. The only thing he wanted to interact with in America was a coyote? Maybe I'm just missing something.
"Promote a revolutionary flood and tide in art, promote living art, anti-art, promote non art reality, to be fully grasped by all peoples, not only critics dilettantes and professionals."
The artists involved in the movement (although they would not call it so, rather preferring to call it an "attitude"), who some say died with it's founder George Maciunas in 1978, liked to promote a "do-it-yourself" attitude towards art and used what they had at hand. Even though mostly regarded as an Art period, the group actually started gathering at a music class in New York.
Much like the Fluxus and DaDa time periods, I find the story of Joseph Beuys more than the actual works that they produce. Born in pre WW-II Germany, Beuys served under Hitler in the Great War and even received a medal for being wounded in combat. However, an even that happened in the field of combat would change him forever, even question his loyalty.
According to Beuys, after his plane was shot down over the German-Russian boarder and the German patrols stopped looking for him, he was rescued by local Russian townies. They found him buried in the snow three days later and would wrap him in felt blankets and apparently covered his body in fat to keep him warm. Even though this story may not be entirely true, as it was the account of a man who had just been through a plane crash in which he suffered major head wounds, it would be a very interesting window in which to see the influence this experience played in his future works of art, many of which consisted of covering things in felt.
Both have great background stories, but their art takes some getting used to. Call me old fashioned, but I just don't typically enjoy a lot of their works. Beuys was interesting and original, but I guess growing up in the world of Modern Art a lot of the "shock value" is lost, if that's what they were going for in the first place. I like the idea of "I like America and America likes me" is very intreguing, but the reasoning behind it a little confusing. The only thing he wanted to interact with in America was a coyote? Maybe I'm just missing something.
4.01.2010
Xerox Project
The concept was a surreal landscape. The hills/ground is my forearm, the trees are my hand, the mountains in the back left are my knuckles and the clouds are the back of my calf. Originally I was hoping my leg and arm hair would come out more defined, but after scanning it did not, however I left some white around some of the cut outs to add some more texture, which I think was especially effective in the clouds and ground/hills.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
