Class Notes on Environmental Project

I really liked the idea of not having to do a power point, but after doing so many, I feel as though I didn't have a solid outline to discuss my project. Almost everyones project had a conservation, or nature awareness theme to it, which I really enjoyed. As an Eagle Scout, I too like conservation, and preservation of wildlife. Most artists have t see a problem to bring to life, in order to really capture the audience. The environment was a great topic.

Robert Adams Art21

Robert Adams

I completely agree with his work on the book on Deforestation. He highlighted the detail that goes into photographing landscapes, and the problems threatening nature. Even tough he expressed that everyone should hug and care about the trees; I feel that some level of appreciating nature is necessary. Black and whit photography is a cool style, but I feel a little bit of color would have made the images a little less nostalgic, and a little more current. It may have just been the quality of the video, but it looked like the images weren’t in that great of quality.

Nature walk @ the park

Seeing all the trees made me want to use wood or natural materials as my medium.
I also thought about habitat. What exactly the word means. My natural habitat is the club. So I'm left wondering how do I capture the beauty of the wild outdoors. I also noticed the human impact of the forest, and I really want tot emphasize that aspect in my project. I'm thinking a photo series might be the best way.

How do you respond to being outdoors?

Personally, I feel that nature is relaxing in the sense that It’s a returning to the basics. Essentially it’s a form of primitivism. It’s a wild, and uncivilized place, but the beauty and mystery are unfathomable.

Are you comfortable around nature?

I feel nature is an escape from the industrial and corporate world taking over how we think, and how we live. Personally I hunt, fish, camp, kayak, and scuba dive. I love nature.

What is your current relationship to the outdoors?

I am an eagle scout, so camping is my passion. Being outdoors and managing to survive in the wild always brought me quite a thrill.

How is our relationship to outdoors deeply cultural?

Now that I no longer have time to go camping, I feel that culture is slowly taking over. Culture today is mainly based on being inside. Depending on your heritage though, I feel can impact your love of nature.

What is the "American" relationship to nature? How has it changed?

The American relation to nature varies person to person, but I feel nature is losing the battle to the industrial side of America. The sad truth is pure nature in the basic sense is being depleted day by day.

Class critiques

Class Presentations 2/17

Proposal number 1
Hanging piece illuminated by multicolored led lights

Sketching rampage while trapped by the snow God help us.

So follow up on class Monday.
Time is a hard concept to display in a piece, considering you don't use a watch, a clock, an hour glass, or any hint of the notion of the idea. However, I believe that there might be a conceptual aspect of time that we left out. Memories are a reflection of a certain time that we remember the way we see fit. Unlike grasping the man manmade aspect of universal time, I feel that the best way to depict time is through using my own interpretation of what I remember. As a posed to making people change there view of what time is, I want the viewers to see time as a personal illusion rather than a set in stone tool of science.

Charles Ray

Charles Ray

How can the book say that he offers a drug-free turn on, when he describes drugs as achieving the feeling he was out to achieve in the beginning paragraph?

Objective Becomes Subjective

His emphasis of time is outstanding. Time is a binding mechanical idea that makes humans conform to the known universe.

How does Ray go about disrupting common stereotype, without offending anyone?

He tries to disrupt complacency, not lives. He relinquishes objective authority. However, pieces like Male Mannequin, could be seen as offensive and wildly controversial. Without explanation, the viewer’s mind must take a narrow road less traveled ion order to arrive at the proper idea behind the piece.

He obviously loves to confuse the audience in some pieces, but would it would appear that through the entire mind altering substances he used, he is lost in the same confusion. His Clock Man is one example of how he destructs the audience’s view of time, by creating his own version of time.

Even from the names of the different titles above each description shows that he makes things out to be what they aren’t: Mind Becomes Matter, Art Viewer Becomes Art Medium, Static Becomes Mobile, etc.

In his particular case, I am convinced that he believes that art is lead by culture. In other words art depicts society, instead of leads it. Pieces like A Curse Becomes a Festivity, where he placed 8 replicas of himself performing self-love. This to me is an indication of an interpretation of society, not a presentation of where society should be lead.

Though Charles Ray is not by any means your generic artist, he still creates pieces that probe deep into the mind of the viewer. He plays on interpretations of the current world, as well as his own experiences. He is an art rebel, a propaganda-creating maniac. Something revered by the wisest of men. In a way, I see him as the Hunter S. Thompson of art. I would classify him as crazy, but in a good way.

First Post

This is the first post for my Concept Design Class.