Response to Lecture Graffiti Good? or Graffiti Bad?

Last Tuesday’s lecture about graffiti and the documentary “Bomb It” I found to be very interesting but did not change my negative opinion about graffiti overall.  To me Graffiti is vandalism, not art.  If you look up the definition it says that graffiti is “unauthorized drawings or words that are scratched, painted, or sprayed on walls or other surfaces in public places”.

During the start of class Mr. Z asked the class to vote whether we thought graffiti was good or if we thought graffiti was bad, and I was very surprised to see that 21 students voted Graffiti good and only 4 (including myself) voted Graffiti to be bad. 

Graffiti consists of gang symbols, bad words, and sometimes pictures you see painted or scrawled on fences, bridges, in subways, on the sides of buildings, houses, and elsewhere, otherwise known as tagging. Most of it is junk that looks like 5-year-olds have done it. But some of it is colorful and might look artistic if it hadn't destroyed someone's property. That to me is the problem with graffiti — it is “unauthorized”, as the dictionary says, and it destroys someone's property. It is a crime, like stealing, because it steals the property owner's right to have their own property look clean and nice. It also makes repairs costly for the property owner. Graffiti scribblers never offer to pay the cost of repairing their destruction, which may cost thousands of dollars.

Mr. Z also brought up that some graffiti is legal versus some being illegal.  Some people pay to have colorful murals and other large-scale paintings on their walls and fences, which is perfectly legal. Although some people try to say that is graffiti while the unauthorized scribble is “tagging”, the dictionary does not make a distinction. That's because graffiti already has a bad meaning in people's minds, so people who think they are “good” graffitists will need to find another word if they hope to ever make a positive impression.

Ch 11 Leopard Society Emblem of the Ejagham Culture vs. Petah Coyne's Untiitled #1111

The Leopard Society is a secret, all-male organization that, according to Ejagham belief, draws its power from the leopard spirit. In their culture the leopard is admired for its speed, stealth, and lethal power. Emblems such as this one, created between 19^th to early 20^th century, were hung on the inmost walls of the sacred space of the Leopard Spirit society's house where business and ritual were conducted. The Leopard Spirit societies in villages of southeast Nigeria and southwest Cameroon serve to govern in place of centralized chieftaincy systems. Young Ejagham men initiated into these societies make their way up the ranks to gain power and prestige. The skulls of monkeys and baboons on the emblem were meant to scare away evil. The two brooms framing the center were to sweep away magic and evil and protect the society's members from harm.

Untitled #1111 (Little Ed's Daughter Margaret), is an eleven-foot assemblage of tree branches, feathers, ribbon, thread, tassels, and hundreds of silk flowers dipped in a specially formulated midnight-blue wax. The underlying figure is a cast-fiberglass statue with a hidden mechanism programmed to cause its eyes to well up with "tears" twice a day, at random times. The sculpture also includes remnants of a couture gown specially made for the figure by a dressmaker, two large stuffed fighting birds, and empty bird skins. The artist also incorporated a braid of human hair given to her by an art collector. The braid, according to Coyne, belonged to the collector's mother, a Victorian woman named Margaret who was a musician and early feminist and who died when the collector was a child. After a long and hard look at the piece, buried elements within the sculpture emerge. To me this piece is an elaborate and beautiful thing, but has a deeper, darker story.

Both the Leopard Society Emblem and Petah Coyne's Untitled #1111 (Little Ed's

Daughter Margaret) are interesting pieces that are assembled from materials that we don’t normally associate with a sculpture. The African emblems components have religious and societal meangins to their people while Petah Coyne’s work does not have such deep rooted meanings, but to me has a deeper meaning to the individual viewers of the work.

Ch 11 David Smith's XI Books and III Apples vs. Mark di Suvero's Origins

David Smith’s XI Books and III Apples stands 7 feet and 9 inches tall and was made of stainless steel in 1959. The shape and look of this piece to me looks very modern for the time that is was made, yet oddly enough it does look like a bunch of two dimensional metallic books and apples assembled together. I agree with the book exactly that this work appears to be an odd but friendly being with no arms. In the photo it stands almost warily in the shade, but in the sun I think it would gleam brightly and look a more vehement.  I find this piece most interesting because David Smith was working as a welder while trying to establish himself as an artist, and then when he started to focus on his art he adapted his welding skills to an artful purpose.

Mark di Suvera’s Origins was finished in 2004, it stands 36 feet and 4 inches tall and it is made of painted steel, the preferred material for this contemporary sculptor. The artist makes his sculptures from steel I-veams which are the same kind of girders used in construction. He bolts the elements together in the same fashion as a constructions workers bolt together the steel beams of a building. I think his piece featured in the book, Origins, is also a modern looking piece but instead of friendly it seems more intimidating. I think the black swirls atop the steel arrangement give it some beauty while the rusty orange/red base gives the piece a feel of ferocity and strength.

Some similarities among David Smith’s XI Books and III Apples and Mark di Suvera’s Origins are that they are both made of steel, they are both modern, and they are both set on a grassy hill.  David’s Smith’s piece much smaller than Origins, it is very modern for the time that it was made, and is a 2-dimensional structure. Mark di Suvera’s piece is more common in the modern time it was made, it is very, very tall, and it is a 3-dimensional structure that looks nearly the same from every angle.

Response to Lecture The Razor's Edge & Maria Abramovic

Last Tuesday’s lecture was very interesting to me because we got to
see a good chunk of the 1984 film The Razor’s Edge starring Bill
Murray as Larry Darrell and Catherine Hicks as Isabel. I enjoyed this
movie and think it is inspirational for dreamers that don’t care what
anyone else is doing. The movie starts with Larry returning from the
battlefields of World War I to America a changed person.  His fiancé,
Isabel His fiance (Isabel) leaves him due to a delay in the wedding
plans when Larry heads off to Paris. In Paris he prefers a similar
existence and begins to read, a lot. A certain book inspires him to
visit India and then on to Nepal where he finds spiritual help from a
lama. Returning to Paris Larry finds Isabel and some old friends.
Everyone has changed.
At the start of the movie Mr. Z recited the opening “He had everything
and wanted nothing. He learned that he had nothing and wanted
everything. He saved the world and then it was shattered. The path to
enlightenment is as sharp and narrow as a razor’s edge.”
I really like that quote and find that it qualifies in every walk of
life and I find it especially relates to the lecture about Maria
Abramović, an artist that takes risks.
Maria Abramović is renowned as the grandmother of performance art. She
pioneered the use of performance art as a visual art form. The body
has been both her subject and medium. Exploring the physical and
mental limits of her being, she has withstood pain, exhaustion, and
grave danger in the quest for emotional and spiritual transformation.
In her interviews shown in class she says that something isn’t worth
doing unless it scares her. In my opinion, her path to enlightenment
has been as sharp and narrow as a razor’s edge, and it has rewarded
her life greatly.

Ch 4 Raoul Dufy's Regatta vs. Samuel Fosso's The Chief He Who Sold Africa to the Colonists

Raoul Dufy’s Regatta is a very vibrant and color painting of what
looks to be boat races. Dufy was a French painter whose paintings of
open-air recreational events, such as boat races, horse races,
concerts, and parades, stunned art admirers’ and critics alike. This
piece is best known for its colorful representation of the boat race
along the French Riviera. Dufy painted this masterpiece when he stayed
at a famous resort on the Isle of Wight. At this time, he witnessed
many small yachts gearing up for the race. This spectacle inspired
Dufy to use his brilliant brushstrokes and create the masterpiece.
Raoul Dufy painted the randomly organized yachts, possibly fluttering
in the light breeze, in a bold blue backdrop, capturing the energy and
the 'Romanticism' of the sea environment. For his use of colors here,
Dufy is referred as the 'Painter of Light,' as his skies and seas are
bluer than normal. This colorful painting depicts Dufy's pursuit of
joy, enthusiasm, and emotional rendition without making a social
statement. This masterpiece truly portrays the artist's love for
depicting everyday scenes as still life.
Samuel Fosso’s The Chief He Who Sold Africa to the Colonists is a self
portrait of the artist sitting in a chair surrounded by a plethora of
patterns. The use of bright colors and patterns makes this painting
practically jump off the page. The use of different patterned squares
in the background reveal some of the various African settings that one
would come into contact with when living there. Fosso is wearing
leopard patterned cloth, futuristic glasses, and lots of jewelry. He
also has a purse and is holding a flower. He dressed as a ridiculous
parody of a traditional African ruler and is clearly mocking the Chief
who sold Africa to the colonists. This painting exhibits the visual
delight and spatial ambiguity that patterns can produce.
Some similarities between the paintings are the use of many objects,
many bright and vibrant colors, and the use of either texture or
patterns used to give the paintings to life. In both paintings the
artists create a visual texture, even though not all visual texture
may be seen as a pattern.

Ch 4 Judy Pfaff’s Cirque, Cirque vs. Jennifer Pastor’s Sequence 6 from Flow Chart for "The Perfect Ride" Animation

Judy Pfaff’s piece Cirque, Cirque took 3 years (1992 to 1995) for the
artist to construct. It is made up of automobile paint, steel and
aluminum tubes, hand-blown glass orbs, primer, cable, and other
materials. This is Judy’s Pfaff’s most famous piece, and it is
actually nine miles of metal tubing spread over a huge span of 70,000
square feet of space.  It is permanently installed in the Pennsylvania
Convention Center in Philadelphia. I think the piece as a whole gives
a feel of some sort of sci-fi adventure in space. The twinkling blue
and yellow shaded glass spheres and the great looping lines in the air
used in "Cirque, CIRQUE" give you a strong feel of being on an ocean
bed, with light and life on land forming the layer far above, near the
water's surface.
Jennifer Pastor’s Sequence 6 from Flow Chart for "The Perfect Ride"
Animation was created in the year 2000. There is a still shot in the
Living with Art book drawn in simple black lines. The bull undulates
and torques against a bright void white background, while the cowboy,
hat on, arm waving, is holding on. The lines in the piece are flowing
through the rolling motion of a generic cowboy on a furiously bucking
bull. A perfect ride in a rodeo, or for that matter in surfing and
skiing, combines recklessness, danger, power, elegance, and beauty. In
the perfect ride, one finds the point of dynamic equilibrium just at
the tipping point into chaos and loss of control.
The similarities I find between the two pieces are that they both rely
on lines to give life to their artworks. The reason I decided to
compare these two is because I thought it was an odd coincidence that
Judy Pfaff’s Cirque, Cirque has a large piece of a copper metal
flowing through the sky that is almost the exact shape as the lasso
shown in Jennifer Pastor’s The Perfect Ride Animation. Both of these
shapes center the pieces and when you look at the two together it
makes the very different works show a resemblance. The differences are
the artists use of color, materials, and space.

Who Am I? What is Art? Response to Video Blog Lecture.

My name is Nichole Eddleman. I am 23 years old, a proud army wife, I
work full-time in finance and accounting at a manufacturing company,
and this semester I am also a full-time student attending Fullerton
College and Cypress College. After working on it for too many years, I
will be receiving my AA in Business Administration from Fullerton
College at the end of this semester, and then  beginning in Spring of
2012, I will be a full-time student at Cal-State Fullerton pursuing my
bachelors degree in business administration with an emphasis on
accounting. This is the first art class I have ever taken in my life,
and so far it isn’t what I had expected from an art class.

When I thought of art class before I would think of walking through
the art halls and seeing amazing sketches, photos, sculptures, and
paintings created by students of the art department, but our class has
been focused much more on the history, concepts, and appreciation of
art. Last week we were doing video blogs in class. I was excited about
the video blogs but unfortunately I was unable to make mine during
class because Cypress’ internet connection had too many things
blocking me from accessing the internet, so my 1st video blog will
have to wait.

Mr. Z asked us to write –What is Art? There is no single answer, and
not everyone will agree on a definition. In fact, art lacks a
satisfactory definition. It is easier to describe it as the way
something is done – "the use of skill and imagination in the creation
of aesthetic objects, environments, or experiences that can be shared
with others” (Britannica Online) -- rather than what it is. An object
regarded as Art today may not have been perceived as such when it was
first made, nor was the person who made it necessarily regarded as an
artist.