Saturday, December 3, 2011

Summary




 I picked Jennifer over other, far better known, artists. Her work was really interesting and got my brain thinking a lot at first and then I lost some interest in favor of other artists. In my Aesthetics course (AVT 307) we were reading about Robert Irwin and what he was working at over time. Jennifer's work plays with perception too.





I feel that she has come a great deal in terms of her animations and graphics she uses. It made me think about being the first one to do something, the originality, as one of the key elements of art. I didn't find her original video work to be particularly engaging by itself, but when placed in a certain way in a certain place it suddenly transforms space and engages the viewer in a whole new way. Sometimes it can just be a small projector in a corner and the space is new and alive like never before, but you can take it further. She transformed a stairwell into a throat, so what else could be transformed and how?




 Keep looking. New questions formed from old answers. Keep looking.







  I still want to study abroad. Now more than ever! Peter is going to teach in Italy (Congrats!). Jennifer did some art for Istanbul and I saw there is a Mason program that visits Greece and Turkey for Art history credits. I just can't afford to go without more grant money. So money is just always going to be a thorn in the side it seems. I would greatly appreciate seeing the art I am learning about in class in person, especially some of the sculptures.



Studying a semester in the Rome area would tickle me pink. I would like to carve something out of stone! Until then, I would love to see Bernini's work, Michelangelo, Donatello, More please!











Researching Jennifer, I began to think more deeply about the art grant process and how you can make a “living” as an artist without having to sell ready-made-work in a gallery. There are a few options out there and it does give one hope, but a realistic sense that in a tough market, that is seen as drying up. If I am to succeed, I'll have to be doing something right, working hard, and being creative.

 Once in the “Professional-level” you can get grants through institutions such as museums or foundations, often set up by dead patrons who didn't want to see art disappear in future generations. Museums and non-profit organizations can accept grants from NEA and then re-grant it to you, as the artist. They are no longer allowed to give money directly to artists. You can get fellowships and artist-in-residences though various means such as submitting an application (most common), or sometimes specific individuals are asked directly.

There is a variance to the type of artists that get awards and even how they use them. The trick seems to being pro-active and hard work. I hope to create works of wildly different media and, if my vision is clear enough and picked up, get funding to produce them.

 Anish Kapoor received 6 million dollars to make “Cloud Gate.” And in the end cost the granter 23 million! I am sure he received a decent salary for his hard work. I can totally get behind that idea. I am not looking forward to Ramen noodles and a rusty bike for my only transport. And, yes to stainless steel.

With the knowledge of what has been done and connecting to things I already know and a different perspective, I can make more informed work. I have long time thought about transforming and changing spaces and surfaces through projection and with her feet deeply entrenched into this realm it is interesting to see how far it could be pushed and in what new ways it could be adapted.




 You don't become an artist because you want to. You do it because you have to. (Doug Sanford)

I want to do a little bit of everything and mix and meld them. I don't know what the future holds but I will work on continued growth. If I let myself stay open to new ideas and learning, I can keep making new connections and opening new paths. New theories, ideas, technologies, styles, references converging in my head. I had never thought of myself as an artist before; but I am trying to soak up everything I can. I feel the little things are bubbling up and taking shape. I will keep working and I just might flourish.

Anish Kapoor


Artist Anish Kapoor
Year Built 2004–2006
Type Stainless steel
Dimensions 10 m × 13 m × 20 m (33 ft × 42 ft × 66 ft)
Location Millennium Park, Chicago, Illinois, United States





One of his more famous works, Cloud Gate, was originally proposed at 6 million dollars for AT&T Millennium Plaza, but ended up costing over 23 million!
















When Cloud Gate's interior components were completed, construction crews prepared to work on the outer shell; this comprises 168 stainless steel panels, each 38 inches (10 mm) thick and weighing 1,000 to 2,000 pounds (450 to 910 kg).[30] They were fabricated using three-dimensional modeling software.[24] Computers and robots were essential in the bending and shaping of the plates,[25] which was performed by English wheel and a robotic scanning device.[31] Metal stiffeners were welded to each panel's interior face to provide a small degree of rigidity. About a third of the plates, along with the entire interior structure, were fabricated in Oakland.[24] The plates were polished to 98 percent of their final state and covered with protective white film before being sent to Chicago via trucks.[32] Once in Chicago, the plates were welded together on-site, creating 2,442 linear feet (744 m) of welded seams.[30] Welders used keyhole welding machines rather than traditional welding guns.[7] The plates were fabricated so precisely that no on-site cutting or filing was necessary when lifting and fitting them into position.[30]

Cloud Gate 


Katherine Bradford

 2011 Guggenheim Fellow - Fine Arts



 




Night Fountain, Gouache on paper, 13" x 11", 2008.









 




Parting Of The Seas, Gouache on paper, 10" x 14", 2006.











Titanic Iceberg Close, Paint on plaster and metal ship, 7.5" x 11" x 6", 2010



 






Superman Kiss, Oil on canvas with collage, 48" x 29", 2011.

Stephen Vitiello

2011 Guggenheim Fellowship Recipient








Something Like Fireworks, lighting design by Jeremy Choate, 2010







Something Like Fireworks, lighting design by Jeremy Choate, 2010







Smallest of Wings, London 












Smallest of Wings, London 
 






Sound of Red Earth, Sydney, 2010, photo by Paul Green












Flying over Marfa




Janine Antoni















 
2011 Guggenheim Fellow - Fine Art

After the fall: An installation view of Janine Antoni's To Draw a Line 2003

I'm not a member of the sizable Janine Antoni cult, one of those who view this MacArthur-winning artist as a kind of aesthetic archangel. I am a fan, however, even if I know her work can be unvisual and overly cerebral. Still, I love Mom and Dad, her gender-bending photographic transformation of her parents; Mortar and Pestle, her terrifying photo of a type of kiss I never imagined (Antoni's eye being licked full-on by a man's tongue); Loving Care, in which she dipped her hair into dye, then mopped a gallery floor with it; and of course Gnaw, her chocolate and lard sculptures. When Antoni's on, she laces material with a primitive mix of desire, pensiveness, petulance, and grit. When she's off, there's more to think about in her work than look at. Usually, when this happens with an artist, it means that the ideas exist outside the object. This troubling tick surfaced in Antoni's celebrated 1993 performance/sculpture, Slumber, for which she slept in the gallery, recorded her rapid eye movements, and, on waking, wove strips of her nightgown into a blanket patterned on her dreams. When she was in the space, you could experience her shrewd circular logic, and the piece was magical. On it's own, Slumber was a snooze. To Draw a Line, the huge sculptural centerpiece of her current show, has this problem, yet it also gives you so much to think about that it almost overcomes its dullness.

http://www.villagevoice.com/2003-09-30/art/the-artist-who-fell-to-earth/

Margaret Cogswell





















Hudson River Fugues

June 2009-March 2010

Site specific installation for Lives of the Hudson exhibition at the Tang Museum, Skidmore College, Saratoga Springs, New York

Co-curated by Ian Berry and Tom Lewis

Group exhibition with site-specific mixed-media installation by Margaret Cogswell
http://tang.skidmore.edu/index.php/posts/view/210/

In his Musices poeticae praeceptiones of 1613, Johannes Nucius defined a fugue as “the frequent and definite recurrence of the same theme in various parts which follow each other in spaced entrances.”
Hudson River Fugues is part of a series of ongoing River Fugues projects which use the musical structure of a fugue as a conceptual point of departure to weave together the disparate visual and audio components exploring the interdependency of people, industry and river waters.

Hudson River Fugues (2009) juxtaposes stories from people along the river with Henry Hudson’s disillusionment in not finding a short passage to China. It also contrasts Henry Hudson's journey with the tragedy of the Native Americans whose ancient prophecy promised that their nomadic journeys would end in peace and prosperity when they found a great stream whose waters flows two ways. The installation was sited in the entrance to the Tang Museum and layered the view from the window with video projections onto the glass panels on either side of the entry doors. Shutters, custom-made for each set of the windows, housed speakers from which the narratives accompanying the video emerged. Benches in front of each window invited the viewer to look out at the layered landscape and “eaves drop” on the river’s stories which emerged from each of the shutters.

Video footage was shot from the Saugerties Lighthouse and on a 10-hour journey down the Hudson from Albany Manhattan on the Adirondack schooner. Narratives collected include those from shad fishermen, ice boat sailors, lighthouse keepers, boat captains, regional historians, climate historians and observations recorded in the Hudson River Almanac published weekly by the New York State Department of Conservation.

(I have family in Saugerties.)

















She was awarded Guggenheim Fellowship after this work in 2009.
River Fugues:
 
included in:
MELTING ICE/ A HOT TOPIC: ENVISIONING CHANGE exhibition
Curated by Randy Rosenberg and exhibited at:
Ministry of Culture, Monaco, 2008
The Field Museum, Chicago, Illinois, 2008
BOZAR, Brussels, Belgium, 2007
Ministry of Culture, Monaco, 2008-
Presented in honor of the official programming for the Tenth Special Session of UNEP's Governing Council/Global Ministerial Environment Forum on Globalization and Environment: Financing the Climate Challenge

The Field Museum, Chicago, Illinois, 2008 -
Bridging Earth Day, on April 22nd, and World Environment Day (WED), on June 5th, the Natural World Museum exhibited Melting Ice / A Hot Topic: Envisioning Change through summer 2008 highlighting the importance of raising awareness throughout the year. Hosted exclusively in the U.S. by The Field Museum this exhibition was integrated into one of the country’s leading natural history museums and scientific institutions and featured the works of 26 artists representing 10 countries.

BOZAR, Brussels, Belgium, 2007-
Produced in association with the Natural World Museum in partnership with the U.N. Environment Programme for World Environment Day 2007, Melting Ice / A Hot Topic: Envisioning Change addresses the theme of climate change from a global perspective — the melting and thawing of ice, snow and permafrost, which are environment-altering changes taking place around the world — from the Andes to the Himalayas to the melting ice caps of the Poles.

Artists participating in Melting Ice / A Hot Topic include: Subhankar Banerjee, Robert Bateman, Alfio Bonanno, David Buckland, Christo and Jeanne- Claude, Margaret Cogswell, Sebastian Copeland, Xavier Cortada, Siobhan Davies, Era & Don Farnsworth, Helen Mayer Harrison & Newton Harrison, Mona Hatoum, David & Hi-Jin Hodge, Laura Horelli, Gary Hume, Icelandic Love Corporation, Ichi Ikeda, Svein Flygari Johansen, Chris Jordan, Yoshiaki Kaihatsu, Fred Ivar Utsi Klemetsen, Angela Lergo, Jonas Liverod, Ives Maes, Dalibor Martinis, Strijdom Van Der Merwe, Jacob McKean, Gilles Mingasson, David Nash, Lucy & Jorge Orta, Sven Pahlsson, Cecilia Paredes, Philippe Pastor, Shana & Robert Parkeharrison, Andrea Polli, Ana Prvacki, Kahn Selesnick, Anne Senstad, David Trubridge, Theo Wujcik, and Justin Young.

http://www.enn.com/top_stories/article/30718
http://www.artworksforchange.org/exhibitions_ec.htm
http://www.rona.unep.org/documents/news/NWM_Chicago_PR_final.pdf

RIVER FUGUES-
River Fugues is a fragment of a larger mixed-media installation and part of a series of projects which address issues of water and climate change through the exploration of the complex and changing relationship of a society to its industries and rivers. The musical structure of a fugue is the vehicle for weaving together the video and audio components seen embedded within the installation pipes.

MEDIA:
24 inch diameter spiral steel pipe and fittings
24 inch diameter poly-plastic pipe, video projectors, DVD players, audio speakers, plexi glass video screen.
Two rear-projected video loops - 5 minutes each
Steel mills loop rear projected in 24 inch diameter steel pipe.
River video projected along 8-foot length of translucent pipe.

DIMENSIONS:
Installation dimensions: 9 ft. H x 56 ft. L x 25 ft. W


Margaret Cogswell

Cal Arts Grad goes onto Pixar

















In 1984, John Lasseter, who had met Catmull at a computer graphics conference and was employed by Walt Disney Studios, visited Lucasfilm for a month-long stint. Lasseter, who had graduated from the California Institute of the Arts where he had won two Student Academy Awards for animated film, decided to stay. Meanwhile, after spinning off a joint venture called Droid Works, George Lucas started shopping around Pixar with hopes of a second spinoff. Pixar caught the interest of several companies, including EDS, then a division of General Motors, Philips N.V., and computer whiz-kid Steve Jobs, cofounder and chairman of Apple Computer Inc. Unable to convince Apple's board of directors to invest in or purchase the fledgling graphics company, Jobs reluctantly abandoned his hopes for Pixar.

...

Luckily, Pixar's crew came up with several software innovations, which they used to create a myriad of products. In 1986 came the first of many Oscar nominations from the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences for a short animated film called Luxo Jr. Next came Red's Dream in 1987, then the development of RenderMan, for which the company applied for and received a patent. A revolutionary graphics program that allowed computer artists to add color and create texture to onscreen 3D objects, RenderMan produced stunningly realistic photo images almost indistinguishable from actual photographs. RenderMan's brand of images paid off when Tin Toy, written and directed by Lasseter as the first computer-generated animation, won an Academy Award as Best Animated Short Film in 1988.

...

Pixar's creative department is led by Chief Creative Officer John Lasseter, an Academy Award®-winning director and animator. Under the guidance of Lasseter, Pixar has built a creative team that includes a department of highly skilled animators, a story department and an art department. This team is responsible for creating, writing and animating all of Pixar's films. Pixar strives to hire animators who have superior acting ability - those able to bring characters and inanimate objects to life, as though they have their own thought processes. In order to attract and retain quality animators, the company founded Pixar University, which conducts three-month long courses for new and existing animators. Pixar also has a complete production team that gives the company the capability to control all elements of production of its films. Pixar has successfully expanded the production team so projects may be worked on simultaneously.

Pixar