So, Why Is this Art?

The Walker Art Center in Columbus, Ohio, has a great collection of works and info for those who might be asking: SO, WHY IS THIS ART?

Their resources include background on work by Gabriel Orozco and Adrian Piper, as well as this piece by Jana Sterbak, a dress made out of meat.

Head Room

from German group Bilderwerfer

7 hosts -- with very different backgrounds except for the city they live in -- stage 7 interventions in a public space in the city. Through the use of a Head Room home box, a box covering their heads yet leaving their bodies visible, they invite one person for a face to face conversation.

This home box, designed by architect Stephane Derveaux, is not just a box, but a reproduction of the hosts’ favourite room in their own houses. The Head Room, from this perspective, balances on the edge between so called private and public space.

The hosts themselves -- an artist, a shopkeeper, a scholar, a worker -- decide who to invite. The conversations they engage in are not interviews. There are no specific questions that need to be answered. It is in the first place about the actual experience of being in the Head Room, its performative aspect, the feelings and reflections it brings about. The Head Room home boxes, the hosts and their conversations are brought back to the project’s base camp -- the Head Room of the project -- located at the platform China studio in the 798 factory. Every box adds another “room” to the installation that is being created as the interventions proceed.

LEDs in the news

This is an LED bra.

Read up about how a marketing campaign using LEDs was misunderstood as a bomb threat.

Stay tuned later in the semester as Nick, Matt, and Iain lead us in a skillshare to make LEDs! Or in the meantime, you can investigate how to build your own. Check out these links:


http://www.makezine.com/blog/archive/2007/02/homemade_led_sh.html
http://graffitiresearchlab.com/?page_id=19
http://graffitiresearchlab.com/?page_id=6
http://imakeprojects.com/projects/usb-xmas/
http://www.sparkfun.com/commerce/present.php?p=GPSClock-1
http://sub-zero.mit.edu/fbyte/ledart/
http://www.instructables.com/tag/keyword:led/

schedule for 12-21 Februrary

MON 12 FEB: PROJECT 1 SCREENING
-We will screen documentation of your use of your sculpture in your chosen location. This should be with photos, video, or both. You will submit your 1-page paper. See initial project handout for all the details.
- project 2 screening

WED 14 FEB: CONCEPT STATEMENT + SKETCHES
READING: "Jasper Johns & Robert Rauschenberg" by Jonathan Katz and "Queers and Marriage" a report by the British Broadcasting Corporation
HW: at least 3 sketches and written concept statement for your project based on the readings. Post concept statement to your blog.
in-class: individual meetings with FHT

MON 19 FEB: REFINED SKETCH + MODEL
HW: Bring to-scale cardboard model of your piece and one refined sketch with measurements.
- Lacey demo 2 and Kelly & Hannah's skillshare: paper making

WED 21 FEB: BUILDING TECHNIQUES
- Lacey demo 3

links from Lance Winn

These are some of the artists and projects that Lance Winn mentioned during our group discussion. Some others are linked on the side bar under "Artists".

Valie Export

Tap and Touch Cinema, 1968, in which the artist, a box attached to her naked chest, invited pedestrians in several European cities to “visit the cinema”.

Gabriel Orozco

Yielding Stone is a large ball clay that was rolled down city streets in 1992, making impressions in the ball and collecting various debris. The ball ultimately weighed as much as Orozco himself.

Manet's Olympia and the Gaze



objectification and the male gaze

Bruce Nauman

Wall-Floor Positions, 1968. Making himself into a "minimalist" prop sculpture in the manner of Richard Serra, Nauman moves through various poses in realtion to the floor and wall. While other sculptors were using wood planks, pieces of lead, or sheets of steel, Nauman uses his body to explore the space of the room, turning it into a sort of yardstick to investigate and measure the dimensions of the space.

The Uncanny - essay by Sigmund Freud
Sigmund Freud described the uncanny as ‘a hidden, familiar thing that has undergone repression and then emerged from it’.

U.S. artist Mike Kelley curated a show about The Uncanny that explores memory, recollection, horror and anxiety through the juxtaposition of a highly personal collection of objects with realist figurative sculpture.

Adrian Piper

Adrian Piper, Performance, Catalysis III, 1970

Adrian Piper, Performance, Catalysis IV, Frozen Speech, 1970

From the New Museum website: Marking her first explorations in spontaneous and unannounced performance, in 1970, Piper embarked on her seminal Catalysis series in which she physically transformed herself into an odd or repulsive person and went out in public to experience the frequently disdainful responses of others. These explorations into xenophobia involved such activities as covering her clothing with sticky, wet paint while shopping at Macy's. Though photographs are all that remain of the Catalysis series, the work itself focused on the interaction between the artist and the public, and more specifically, on the reaction of the individual to Piper's presence.

Some things for consideration

I've added a few links and images to my blog that I thought were relevant to Monday's conversations... namely trees, restraint, and mirrored contacts. I'll continue posting some reference and things as the class goes on, so please review at your own convenience. And I'd personally love to hear your comments, so bring 'em on!