My installation piece was a very personal piece of art that showcased the intimacy of an artist as an individual. Inspired by Marina Abramovic, I wanted to create an intimate atmosphere where I was able to figuratively open myself up to my audience. Something that was difficult for this project was the installation aspect. It took around 4 hours to install, but once I was able to get the strings in place, the rest of the installation went smoothly. A lot of things in this project went favorably, ranging from the sturdy foundations of the installation to accomplishing audience engagement. I was really proud about this piece’s ability to draw the viewers in. I think that the use of the photographs appealed to the audience members’ natural curiosity, thus drawing them in. As this was a very emotional and personal piece for me, it was really comforting to see the respectful and curious way that the audience interacted with the environment. Something that took me by surprise was the movement of the piece. During the installation process, I noticed the way that the strings moved in tandem with each other, creating something akin to a wave throughout the piece. Overall I am very proud of the overall outcome of this piece as installation wasn’t something that I was comfortable with at the start of this class. I think that utilizing 3D and 4D spaces has helped to broaden my range as an artist, and this project made me really see the artistic potential I wouldn’t have discovered had I stayed within my comfort zone.

This idea initially came to me during my research of Marina Abramovic; I was very interested in her exploration of individual vulnerability and intimacy. I wanted to lament the highly personal role that the artist plays during any piece of art. My proposal specifically was about the intimate things about me as an individual and an artist.

In order to get a better idea of the layout I wanted, I looked up images of actual human heartstrings which led me to thinking about laser traps and the way they’re shown to be reaching and crisscrossing throughout a room. This difficulty of movement led me to the symbolism of the restraint to the levels of intimacy and how you can get so tied up in someone or yourself.

I looked at additional references of the human heart both in its actual and simplified forms. I used this to plan out the way I would fabricate a stuffed heart.

In this project, I wanted to explore the sense of touch through the decontextualization of different textures made from every-day items. I used cardboard, yarn, q-tips, bubble wrap, thread, hot glue, and newspaper to create different mats of varying textures. I then placed these textures to the underside of the desks in the classroom. My goal was to get different reactions from each person feeling the textures without being able to see what they were touching. I decided on using the classroom for this installation because classrooms are usually seen as tools to create art rather than spaces to find art, and I wanted to show that the room itself could become an artistic space.

Something that I think went well was having everyone participate in feeling around for the different textures. It was interesting to see everyone react differently to feeling different unexplained things. I think I was successful in getting my purpose across because some people were able to relate the experience to feeling gum underneath a table, which was one of the things that lead me to this project. Another thing that I think was successful was having no one using their eyes to look for the textures; this really conveyed my concept of finding the art. Something that I would do differently if I did this project again would be making the texture mats bigger so that they cover a bigger surface area. I think it would also be interesting to put the textures on different surfaces within the room like on the ceiling or doors so that there’s more chance for individual interaction. Overall, I think that this project went well because I was able to see what kind of art I could create without a visual sense.

For this project, I wanted to explore the senses in a setting where sight isn’t accessible. I wanted to incorporate touch, scent, and sound. I decided on experimenting with different every day items to create different textures that would be ambiguous without seeing what it is that you’re touching.

Notes from site:

Site Map:

The site I chose was the Catholic church right behind Central Building.

• Individual people have different natural smells, so where would the chemical composition difference be found? Why can’t an individual recognize what they smell like? Are they too used to their own scent?
• There are some perfumes that chemically mix with your own natural smells and pH levels, could that be considered a form of art? What do you think “Scent Art” would look like? I’m imagining something like scratch & sniff stickers.

https://www.citylab.com/life/2015/11/wake-up-and-smell-your-city/413908/

Interpretations:

1. One piece that I enjoyed interpreting was Cadence’s video Cards. To me, the piece encompassed the passage of time and the entirety of a lifespan all just through images of fragments of cards. It made me think about the value and the importance we put into a card to signify these big life events.
2. A second piece that I enjoyed thinking about was Karissa’s video Flatiron Reservoir. To me, this piece signified the genuine human intimacy and interactions that people are able to have. It was very lighthearted and it made me feel connected to the people in the video because I enjoyed watching them have a good time.
3. Another piece that was a bit more self-explanatory was Dave’s piece A Squirrel Life which followed the personalities of squirrels on his porch. He voiced over the actions of the squirrels and his intentions for wanting to show how they’re personable animals. This piece made me think about the personality that all animals have that just haven’t been seen yet.
4. Yven’s video The Birth of a Modern Day Warfighter also made me reflect a lot. I think the purpose of this was to show how much is at stake when people go into the military– the video itself was a deluge of photos ranging from funerary precessions to silly pictures of “warfighters” together. It made me reflect on how much goes into the people in the military, and the pictures themselves went by so quickly that I felt that I’d miss something even if I blinked; maybe that was on purpose to symbolize the fast pace of the military.
5. Another video that made me think was Victoria’s piece Decay. It was very fitting for October because it showed the decay of a pumpkin, and I think the meaning was very literal– time is measurable in this case by the rate of decay. It made me a little nervous just because it made me think about the element of time and how there’s no way of slowing that down or even slowing down our own decay.

Suggestions:

1. One video that I wish we saw more of was Shane’s piece The Life of Shane. It was very entertaining to watch and was composed of very relatable humor. It was only a few minutes long and I felt like that was too short to get the full experience of the life of Shane. It would have been interesting to see the documentation of his life over the course of multiple days each in the same level of depth, including even the most mundane scenes.
2. A second piece that I wanted to see more of was Geoff’s video No Puedo. The quality of the video was overall very good, and it felt as if it were an established silent film. The ending was intense; however, I don’t think that the video built up enough to give that intensity justice. I would have liked to see faster repetition of frames that lead up to the final scene of laying in your own grave. I think that doing that would emphasizes the abruptness and intensity of the last frame.
3. Another video that I have a suggestion for is Roman’s piece My Friend & I Play Magic. I think that in order to improve this piece, there could have been more focus on the audio and making sure that it was filmed at an audible level. I also think that some of the video transitions could have been a little smoother because without the element of sound, the transitions felt more abrupt than I think they were intended to be.
4. Deborah’s video Refuge was also very fun to watch because of the utilization of sound and how it was visualized. I think that the transitions between urban and rural scenes were a little bit intense in the way that the transition presets were used. The overall video would have benefited if the visual transitions took a more subtle approach.
5. Lastly, I had a suggestion for Kodi’s video Changing Seasons. The painting that she created was beautiful and very well done; however, it wasn’t initially obvious that she was painting the different seasons. I think that there could have been more specific indications of each season that would have emphasized the idea of painting through the seasons. When I watched the video, the only seasons I was able to pinpoint were winter and spring. Maybe those were the only two she painted, but I expected to see the changing of all of the seasons just based off of the title.

For this project, the prompt I got was “natural.” At first I didn’t know what or how I wanted to represent this idea, but the thought of a “natural makeup look” came to me as I was doing just that one day before school.

Initially I didn’t know if I wanted to have audio or say specific things or have background music, but I happened to be watching old 1940s commercials and random videos with my mom. This sparked the idea of having old makeup tutorial voice overs be the main audio to my video project.

I sampled video clips from three different videos that were first filmed in the 1940s and 60s.

Video Links for sound clips:

How Do I Look?

The video piece that I created is titled How Do I Look? based off of the prompt “natural.” The piece focuses on me following makeup application instructions from the 1940s-60s in the hopes to achieve a “natural” makeup look. I wanted to focus on the decades worth of beauty standards that are rooted in the presence of femininity and natural beauty. There has always been a societal pressure for women to look as if they are naturally beautiful by other people’s standards. Something that I thought was effective in this piece was the repetition of the audio clips saying “how do I look?” I found this effective because it conveyed the feeling of being pressured and having an internal voice taking a compulsory approach in questioning the individual purely based on appearance. Something that also went well was the trimming and splicing of audio clips from multiple different videos. I haven’t worked much with sound before, but I think this was a successful first time experience. Something that I wish had gone better was the smooth transition between scenes in the film. In order to cut out unwanted scenes, I had to time my movements to avoid looking choppy, but I think that if I had slowed down my movements during the actual filming, I could’ve gotten those transitions a lot smoother. I also had a lot of technical difficulties in uploading all of my audio clips and event just exporting the video and raw footage. Despite my difficulties, I think I made a pretty distinguished piece of work.

30 seconds exercise