Anthony Baker's tumblr

[nicawawa]

About the book Sabrina & Corina by Sandra Cisneros:

I actually loved this book! It had very descriptive stories that would take me wandering away with it. I could vividly see the images in my mind as I read through this book. Some of the stories actually made me cough up a little. I really learned a lot of things about Colorado from this book, and I found my self googling places that once took place in Colorado. I just finished reading this book yesterday, and I share some of the stories my my family. It is very touching that this book is dedicated to American Indians, and women. I could relate a lot of some of my own experiences with this book, from the stories of the two sisters, or Corina, the girl that moved back to Colorado from LA after being in an abusive relationship, to how the single mother used to be a stripper, or even the feeling of having your mom gone in my early childhood.

I choose to do a painting based on the story of “ Ghost Sickness”, the part where Ana is in the tub and she visualizes Clifton’s death. Honestly today marks the day that my husband passed away for 3 years now, and all i can say is time doesn’t heal, time just sucks because it makes it more clear that they truly dead.

[anthony-baker]

Awesome painting!

[trod1987]

Reading and Response 5: Sabrina and Corrina

             While reading the short stories of Sabrina and Corrina, I could relate in some way to each short story.  Each story revolved around some sort of trauma or traumatic experience the person was involved with.  Aside from the storylines, the descriptions were well done so that you could visualize every detail and character.  Many of these stories revolved around Hispanic heritage and are something that I can relate to personally.  From normal struggles of life, to poverty, to sexism, to racism, to abandonment, every story had a different experience that we all could relate to in some way.  As I read through them, I could connect people in my life with the people I was reading about.

            The one that had the most meaning to me was the short story Galapago.  While my grandma never had to deal with killing anyone, the struggle of growing old and choosing a home was a real struggle in my family.  My family fought with my grandma, along with each other in choosing what to do as my grandmother grew older and needed more care. While my grandpa died back in 1993, my grandmother lived alone for most of the remainder of her life.  It was when she started injuring herself and was put on oxygen is when my family started to pressure her into a home.  As stubborn as she was, she refused and as much as everyone loved her it caused a lot of family tension.  Her house and belongings meant a lot to her and she ultimately wanted one of us grandchildren to buy the house when she passed.  Unfortunately, that never became possible.  Most of the stories in Sabrina and Corrina did not have a conclusion, and left the reader hoping the characters had found their happy endings. In my case, I drive by that house daily and I made so many memories in it and now I tell myself that someone else is making their family memories there.  

[anthony-baker]

Artist Statement 5

I chose to do our final Art Project as a Performance Art piece. For my performance, I chose to read Lady Lazarus by Sylvia Plath. The poem relates to the book that we read in that the book was about many people from diverse backgrounds facing adversity in one way or another. Sylvia Plath was an inspirational and powerful woman who faced adversity throughout her life as she struggled with mental illnesses. Unfortunately, she eventually succumbed to her mental illnesses and took her life. I interpret this poem to be about Plath facing challenges throughout her life and feel as if many aspects of her life reflect the themes that we explored in Sabrina and Corina. This poem also explores themes of anti-racism and anti-nazism, which is great. Thank you.

[anthony-baker]

Reading and Response 5

Sabrina and Corina was a very interesting read. The book was full of many unique short stories that highlighted the lives of many different people of color and gender. I really enjoyed how the stories take place in Colorado and how the author is an MSU Denver alum. It makes the stories hit home and have a greater impact. Many of the stories were sad and evoked ominous feelings. My favorite story was “Galapago.” This story was about an old widow who had lived in a house for a long time. Over the years, the neighborhood became more and more dangerous. Eventually the old lady was forced to buy a gun to protect herself. She ends up killing a man that broke into her home to do drugs there. In the end, she opens her window, letting in light. I believe this symbolized the end of her life in her home. Overall, this book was  very enjoyable.

[aitani]

Performance Art: I am not oppressed.

Following what’s going on in the world, as a Muslim, I felt obligated to talk about this and especially in the way I love most: through my work.

I am a proud Muslim. As this proud Muslim, I can tell you that my religion in no way calls for violence and murder; in fact, it calls for peace, equality and love between everyone, Muslim or not. Everything you see about Muslims is what the government and political system wants you to see...

Please, I only ask this of you. DO NOT BELIEVE EVERYTHING YOU SEE ON MEDIA! I cannot stress how important this is to me. The world is protraying Muslims as terrorists, ignorant and uneducated people, when in fact we are civilized humans just like you! This portrayal actually makes it so hard for us to fight this Islamophobia we face daily and live among everyone else. I cannot tell you how many times Muslims were beaten up, killed and harrased for being Muslims. Since when was abusing people for their religion okay?

It’s 2020 and there is a concentration camp in China, trapping millions of Muslims, brainwashing them out of Islam. FAMILIES ARE BEING TORN APART JUST BECAUSE THEY ARE MUSLIMS! They are forced to drink alcohol and eat pork (considered as sins in Islam), sleep with each other without marriage (also considered a sin) and are banned from prayer. You may not agree with our beliefs, but for sure you can agree that terrorizing people in this way just because they have different beliefs IS NOT OKAY!

My main focus was the Hijab; for those of you who don’t know, a Hijab is a veil wrapped around the woman’s head, along with dressing modestly. It is a way to show loyalty to our religion and obedience to God, similar to nuns. I have one question for you: why is it when you see a nun you have this immense respect for her, but when you see a Hijabi, you think she’s oppressed or “forced to wear it”. My mom is a Hijabi and the ammount of stares she gets when we go out is raging!

Please I do not ask of you to believe in what we believe in, but we are all entitled to believe in whatever we want and respect others who don’t as well. All I humbly ask is PLEASE do your own research; do not believe everything you see on social media!

If you’ve made it this far THANK YOU SO MUCH! I appreciate you giving time for this so so so much!

[1tzaaalllboutrt-deactivated2020]

I like that you connect yourself so personally with all of your work. This simple performance was quite striking in its simplicity. The choice to create a black and white image cements the comparison to nuns that you made in your artist statement. Overall I found this interesting and beautiful.

[jrv27]

4D Additional One Minute Performance

[anthony-baker]

Performance and Statement:

For my performance, I decided to read Caged Bird, a poem by Maya Angelou. Maya Angelou is a very inspirational and intelligent person whom I have a lot of respect for. This is one of my favorite poems by her. The poem depicts the story of two different birds. One is free and flies wherever it wants to go with its own free will. The other bird that this poem discusses is a caged bird with clipped wings that sings. This poem is a symbol for freedom and slavery. It serves as a reminder on why we should never let anyone be a “caged bird” ever again.

[thequiltedsail]

Technical Exercise 4: Richard Serra’s Verb List

[1tzaaalllboutrt-deactivated2020]

I dig the shots in this work

[cameroncoyhis]

Technical Exercise 4: Transforming Richard Serra's Verb List

Choose your three favorite verbs (from his list or your own) and show an example depicting each performance action. 

1. To Run

2. To Throw

3. To Dance

4. To Eat

5. To Compliment 

6. To Fold

7. To Hug

8. To Save

9. To Erase 

10. To Blow

11. To Freeze

12. To Drive

13. To Vote 

14. To Shake

15. To Twist

16.. To Spin

17. To Steal

18. To Ride

19. To Sink

20. To Write

[1tzaaalllboutrt-deactivated2020]

20 of Richard Serra’s Verbs

1. To roll

              2. To crease

                                  3. To fold

              4. To heap

5. To bend

               6. To shorten

                                  7. To twist

               8. Of simultaneity

9. To crumple

                10. To tear

                                   11. To encircle

                12. To cut

13. To drop

                14. To splash

                                    15. To knot

                 16. To curve

17. To pair

                  18. To rotate

                                       19. To swirl

                  20. Of grouping

[anthony-baker]

1. To Eat 

2. To Play 

3. To Drive 

4. To Run 

5. To Read 

6. To Record 

7. To Jump 

8. To Score 

9. To Smile 

10. To Listen 

11. To Go 

12. To Dream 

13. To See

14. To Whisper

15. To Learn

16. To Understand

17. To Fish

18. To Catch

19. To Hike

20. To Fly

[baddiecroxx]

Verb List

To fly

To execute

To destroy

To create

To break

To garden

To decay

To fail

To attack

To bark

To crawl

To echo

To drown

To hijack

To inflate

To listen

To scrape

To tremble

To wish

To puncture

To fly

To create

To destroy

[aitani]

Technical Exercise 4-part 2

2) To commit

[anthony-baker]

The Other History of Intercultural Performance

This article was refreshing and interesting. The first part of the article reminded me of Shakespeare’s The Tempest. The Tempest may be viewed as a normal screenplay, but in reality it is much more than that. The main character of The Tempest is a man of European descent that has been cast out by his people and sent to an island to live there in exile. On the island, he met a native, who is portrayed very poorly. The European man manipulates the man who is native to the island and is portrayed as being “better than” and “more civilized.” It definitely showcased how people thought of others who came from different backgrounds. 

Something else that was interesting about the article is how they mention that young children were the nicest people to the caged performers. I think that this shows how racism is taught and how people are born as “clean slates.”

[anthony-baker]

The Art of Performance

I have a lot of respect for performance artists, as it is very difficult to perform in front of a live audience. I found this reading very interesting and eye-opening. When people hear the words “Performance Art,” many people immediately think of actors and such. However, as the reading says, performance art is much more broad than that. Depending on what the artists are trying to accomplish, it can even be dangerous like the Marinetti situation. I found that interesting because we see things like that happen in today’s world as well. Sometimes performance artists will make their performances to make a political statement and there may be people that do not agree with them, and they can even get violent. Something else I found interesting from the reading is that Leonardo da Vinci would hold performances. Overall, I really liked reading about this broad style of art.

[dunlapel]

Art Project 3: Super Cut

Title: michael reeves tazing people for a minute straight

This was probably the most fun I’ve ever had editing a video in the few months that I’ve been doing it. I didn’t have issues while I was editing but I had a lot of issues with coming up with a theme. In the video I put together I decided to make the theme tazing. It sounds weird at first but seeing how creative Michael Reeves is with engineering objects to taze people (mostly himself) with. Michael Reeves is a YouTuber that I enjoy watching mostly because he knows how to make engineering and programing look interesting. I’ve been having issues getting in the creative spirit and his videos have been helping a lot lately.

I hope y’all have as much fun watching this as it was to make :)

This video used:

Michael Reeves -  If You Can’t Drink Fast Enough This Cup Tazes You

Michael Reeves -  Tazer Camera Makes Me The Tallest Person in The Picture

Michael Reeves - Tazer Tag

[anthony-baker]

This video is hilarious!

[mohamedhamid]

Art Project 3

The Art of Drifting

If you haven’t been following my recent posts, you can tell I’m a fan of cars but in this video it’s about the “Art of Drifting” and drifting is a driving technique where the driver intentionally oversteers and the car loses traction but the driver is maintaining control and is driving the car throughout the corner. I love drifting because my favorite car movie (Fast & the Furious: Tokyo Drift) which I’ve made GIFs on basically started my love for this sport. This video represents the “Art of Drifting” perfectly in my opinion which why I chose it and hopefully it demonstrates to you how a driving technique can become an art of motorsport.

Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_bkX5VkZg8U&t=41s