cupcakes

Starting this project, I honestly had no idea what to do. I thought that I could perhaps make some dumb scene out of candy and call it a day. Then I toyed with making a famous painting out of food, but I wanted people to really be able to eat something, and food would go stale if I did that. The painting I had chosen was a Salvador Dali, which got me thinking. I love surrealism and the absurd. I wanted to play off of that, and having just completed a project on Magritte, I got to thinking.

That’s when I knew what I wanted to do. I wanted to make cupcakes. Yes, real cupcakes, but I also wanted there to be fake cupcakes, which looked real.

So I bought all the ingredients to make cupcakes, and as I picked them out, I picked sprinkles that looked almost fake and colors that were bright and could be fake. I wanted the real ones and the fake ones to blend in perfectly. I used yellow and green, not only for a spring theme, but they are colors people would enjoy eating, and would also be far enough from plain white and would seem believable.

When making the cupcakes, I chose to use expansion foam, which rises, just like cupcakes would if cooked. I cut the foam down, and the texture looks just like cake, so if someone cut them open, they would look real too! I also wanted to go about making them like I would the real cupcakes. I put them in the liners and then I let them dry and then I painted the tops so if any “cake” part showed, it would be the same color as the real ones. I then used Spackle to cover the tops just like normal frosting; however, I added some acrylic paint for tinting to add some realism.

For the decorative tops, I bought decorating tips for frosting, and used Spackle as well. I did, however, match the colors of the frosting exactly. I added acrylic paint to Spackle and whipped it so it would have the appearance of frosting, and I added them to a bag and put a decorating tip on and decorated them like real cupcakes. I made them have ridiculous designs as well. The real cupcakes were frosted with the same exact tips and in the same styles so the fake ones would blend in.

While working in them, some people walked in and thought they were real! I was pleased that they created this effect. I’m really pleased with how they turned out, however I would have used less foam because some of them got really huge! I also wish I could make more so that I can get better at decorating, which is more of a fault of mine for not being an awesome cupcake decorator. It’s much harder than it seems!

I also wish I had a cupcake tower, but I didn’t want to buy one just for this project, it was getting rather expensive. I do love these cupcakes, and they look really good, and just like the real ones. I also got a sense of baking while making them, which I thought as pretty cool.

public art?

I went to the lecture on public art, because more and more I’ve been interested in public art myself. There’s something I am drawn towards, having my art in a public space. The art itself seems to take in the space and form a symbiosis with it. People also have a chance to interact with public art, whether they actively seek it out or not. This could be walking around it, or not being able to ignore it.

I particularly loved Lisa’s lecture. I had her for three semesters in a row, so I’ve gotten to know her pretty well. She talks to passionately about her art, which is predominately public. The interesting part about her art is that I live in the Dc area so I’ve actually seen her art in person. She talked about art objects being in the environment, which is the space. She said, “not every art object is public art” which got me thinking. The intention has to be there, and something are simply not meant for the public. I think this is definitely true; some art objects need to have the gallery environment.

She talked a lot about the site of the public art, something with she, herself has to strongly consider. The art needs to reflect the site. I found it interesting how she went about he piece in front of the New York courthouse. She knew the place was a courthouse, where justice is brought, and she thought of themes to go along with that. She had to consider the existing architecture, the history of the building as well as what happens inside it. She did the same with her airport pieces, how she created a wing type motif. She spoke a lot about the identity of a place. Her goal was to “evoke the identity of the area.”

Public art is definitely something which I enjoy, and I found this talk extremely helpful, not only in coming up with ideas for creating art, but also analyzing some of the artwork around us. I can definitely see why some public art “works” and other pieces don’t.

The people is also what Lisa talked about. The people play an important role. It’s like what we talked about the Vito Aconchi reading. Public space belongs to the people. People have to react to it, and they live and interact in the environment everyday. Lisa touched on this when she talked about her leaf sculpture by the metro. This was an extremely public place where passersby are always trying to catch the next train, heading off to work, or just another part of their everyday routine.

My favorite piece of public art was the St. Mary’s sea monster. I thought it definitely brought something to the pond, and added a mystical sense. It was so simple in design, yet effective. People added pictures and comments to the facebook page, and really got involved with it. I feel like public art on campus would be difficult though, because of all the history and meaning already existing. People hated the monster as well, they said “What is this fucking thing in our pond?!” which I thought was interesting. Public art is often tricky, in this aspect, because people may feel strongly about the environment, and after all, the public people are important as well in completing the art. Besides, is it really complete without the people?

PRofessor Browning

Earlier on in the semester I went to Ryan Browning’s talk. I have him as a teacher for “The Image as Readymade” and I was really curious about his art.

It turns out he’s really nerdy! I love it. He talked about his experience playing dungeons and dragons and how it inspired some of his work and allowed him to make contacts. He also mentioned the digital age, and the subject of avatars. He talked about an online persona and how people create an identity. He also discussed how videogames were an early inspiration for some of the textures and objects in his paintings. I liked what he had to say about the choppy graphics of the old video games and the geometric nature has some sense of beauty, which can’t be recreated with newer graphics.

He also talked about maps as an extension of space in every direction and also about creating space. He talked about creating spaces in art, much like in a video game sense, in how you get to “play with your world”. He likened creating a new space in his art as a “sand box” and he said that “Every painting begins with a space” which I found to be almost useful. I always seem to struggle with a place for my pieces, or a context.

I looked at his art this past winter break before I took his class. I love his surreal quality. The objects in his paintings are reminiscent of earthly objects, but I can never place my finger on them. They have such a dream like quality, and excellent painting technique, which I love. I love surrealism and especially when painted in a realistic style.

His paintings are almost sculptural sometimes, and very geometric. I loved hearing him talk about them, as he explained the origins of his inspirations, which added new meaning to them for me.

I thought it was interesting to hear such a young professor talk, and now I understand what he says in class more and more. I like his references to the Internet and video games, being a strong proponent of both. I always played video games as a kid, and recently have been incorporating some of it into my art. I love what he said about making art about what you love. I have usually strayed away from things I’m obsessed with such as Lord of the Rings and video games, because I felt people would judge me, but now I have an inspiration to do just that!

Jenny Holzer

Jenny Holzer: creativetime.org

"I show what I can with words in light and motion in a chosen place, and when I envelop the time needed, the space around, the noise, smells, the people looking at one another and everything before them, I have given what I know." - Jenny Holzer

I've heard about Jenny Holzer in various art classes and wanted to find out more about her. She related to digital, because she works mainly in projections. She projects words on public spaces, which relates to our Vito Aconchi reading from last week.

She was born in Ohio in 1950 and attended Ohio University in Athens and went to RISD for her MFA. Her artworks consist of projections, which are of words. The words or phrases she chooses for her pieces are never her own. She uses old disclassified government papers, poetry and prose, as well as bold statements. Her works is projected onto a large space, and has appeared in cities all over the world.

Jenny Holzer

Her works are presented in urban environments, meant for the public- the everyday person. She has written before, but uses the works of others because she feels that others can express and word what she wants to say.

Jenny Holzer

Trueisms is one of her most famous works. She has compiled “trueisms” or statements and puts them out for the public to see, on street signs, on posters and even projected on buildings. She says” my pleasure is in reading and not in writing” art21 She wants her work to stand for itself, to make the audience become enagaged and think about her work on a higher level. She also remains anonymous in her work :

“There’s a reason I’m anonymous in my work. I like to be absolutely out of view and out of earshot. I don’t sign my work because I think that would diminish its effectiveness.”- art21

I find her work to be quite interesting. To be honest, I was never particularly fond of this type of artwork. I've seen projected images and even seen some in art museums, but they never drew my attention. I feel like Jenny's work might be interesting to see in a public space. I like the fact that she projects her work in public, urban spaces where everyone can access them. I would enjoy to see something new to the business of a city life. Her works give something for people to think about, something to stretch their minds.

I feel like these works are most successful outside, because they have a nice narrative with the environment. They are meant for the public, and warp with the place they are projected on. They force us, the audience to interact by looking and thinking, which is refreshing in these busy, chaotic times.

VEctor Portrait

Synesthesia...

We listened to music and expressed ourselves through illuustrator...

siggy [:

Shinichi Maruyama

"Once your brush touches paper, you must finish the character, you have one chance. It can never be repeated or duplicated. You must commit your full attention and being to each stroke. Liquids, like ink, are elusive by nature. As sumi ink finds its own path through the paper g

rain, liquid finds its unique path as it moves through air." -Shinichi Maruyama

Shinichi Maruyama is a Japanese artist who works with liquids, and not in the typical sense. He throws liquids in the air and his photography catches the moment when it spreads and the liquid collides with other liquids or even the wall. One series of his, Kusho literally means “writing in the sky” which is what it looks like. He uses to liquids to “Write with” and almost create strokes. He merges space and time in his works and makes then seem as one. His work is almost like calligraphy, but in the air.

So how does he manage to capture such beautiful moments? Maruyama uses a combination of water and ink, and as he hurls them together, he photographs this. These beautiful photos would not be able to happen if it weren’t for technology. His camera is capable of capturing these photographs with strobe light technology, which can record these events which happen faster than our naked eyes can perceive them. We see the liquids and flowing, and all as one, and the camera is able to break this down.

I love these photographs, mainly because they’re so unusual. This comes from the fact that we normally don’t see liquid frozen in motion. You wouldn't usually see this view of the world, from such a brief moment, which I think is beautiful. I love the idea of the imprmanent. But does a photo make it lose some of this beauty?

I particularly like his series entitled “Gardens” because of the interesting dialogue between the different colored paints. This series contains colored paints as well as water, and the thickness of the paints allow it to intersect more heavily. The thickness of the paints give it a different quality which really draws my eye.

Website, Article

pictures, pictures, everywhere

Here are some of my Photo Retouches:

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This first image is of a bird we did in class.

Here is the new, retouched, much brighter bird:

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Here is a picture I took during my Post& Beam Class while raising the roof on one of the ghost houses seen from Route 5. There's still a pine bough on it if you ever drive by...
The picture is dark and crooked, but I didn't fix the crookedness because I didn't want to crop it yet. [:

Tah Dah! New picture.

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This picture is of Tyler and his grandma. It's suepr dark and he begged me not to put this online...

Aaaand the lighting is fixed.

ze end.

I found the artist Evelien Lohbeck on Rhizome.org. Her work, Noteboek (2008) is a multimedia work which portrays the media’s affect on society. It begins as a video of hands opening a notebook to reveal drawings of a keyboard and a screen drawn in the notebook. Stop motion is now used, and the “computer” boots up. The video goes on, as if the viewer were going on a computer and searching for more of Lohbeck’s works, except it is all drawn.

There is no sound except for whatever sounds typing and clicking make, and the occasional sounds that the internet on the screen makes. Her work takes you into a frame within a frame. When I watched this, I felt it was an extremely interesting and intriguing way to experience the internet. We are so used to all the crisp looks and intense graphics, but this internet is all hand drawn and with no color.

Sources: Rhizome., EvelienLohbeck.com

One of the videos shown on this interface involves her scanning her face into another notebook, and that notebook acting as a scanner, all while happening in a video on the notebook that is a video itself! It's crazy, which is perhaps why I love it so much!

Collages x2

I decided to make two collages, and unintentionally, they both have a red theme. My first one is of a gask mask and some ninja stars with a background which was originally a painting.

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Here is my second one: It is comprised of lace, a tassel on top of some red fabric, two shells., some CDs as well as some bubbles added to the background.

Photoshop

Here is my assignment that I had to complete for class. Overall, I am quite pleased, however the cats bother me a bit.
Find what I edited-I wanted the changed to be subtle and what I added, I wanted to make match the original picture.

Original.

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My edited version.

wOOt.

Scans!

Here are my scans, and I have every intention of fixing them, cropping, adjusting light, etc.

Cotton.
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Lights.
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String.
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Soda tabs.
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Soda tabs on a chain.
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Gas Mask
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Sauce packets!
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More scans.

Here are more scans and variations.

Ninja Stars
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Ninja Stars with Butterfly Knife
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Moving hands.
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Moving hands again.
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My hair.
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Lillian Shwartz

Studiolo Images

While reading the packet for class, I came across Lillian Shwartz. She used the computer to merge and manipulate images to play around with her interpretation and analysis of famous works (Christiane Paul). She is famous for her works using the computer, graphics, video, film, animation, special effects, and other computer generated art (lillian.com).

Her works were some of the first of their type to be displayed in the Museum of Modern Art. This new movement began a new field of art. She began this work of art as a continuation of her earlier works, and the merge between technology and art continued to grow. She later became more involved in the computer workfield and worked for AT&T as well as IBM (lillian.com).

One of her works discussed in the readings was a merging of Leonardo DaVinci's face with that of the Mona Lisa. The Mona Lisa is such a famous piece of art, and most everyone has seen it somewhere: on a coffee mug, a magnet, or parodied on television. Many people might not, however be as familiar with DaVinci himself. I found it to be a very interesting dialogue between the artist and the work of art itself to be a whole other art object.

I thought this particular work to be extremely successful, and made me think about the relationship between the artist and his work more than usual. Especially with a piece so iconic in nature, where most people do not go beyond the fact that it is famous.

Some of her other works include her anatomy series. These are 3-D images which can be viewed with 3-D glasses to achieve the full effect. Here, she payed attention to the pixel itself and how altering individual pixels could change a piece (lillian.com)

Her pieces in general strongly resemble something generated from a computer based media, and are not intended to be "hyperreal" or super realistic. They are taken for what they are.

Here is a documentary of her thoughts on the Mona Lisa and the development of :

'Ello People [:

This is my first entry of my blog for my Intro to Digital Media class. Phew. What a mouthful, heh.

So, to complete the assignment I will share a little taste of awesomeness from FailBlog.org:

Wear your seatbelts kids [:

and now a little insight from an awesome comic from XKCD, about why Google Maps are always a bad idea. [: