La Lu

"Amurallar el propio sufrimiento es arriesgarte a que te devore desde el interior." Kahlo

[lachulamula]

Project 5 Word on the Street “Gentrification is coming”

I wanted to make a statement on a current topic surrounding the Denver area. Denver area has been growing very rapidly the last couple of years. I wanted to use rhyming poetry to give make the idea of gentrification simple to understand. gentrification has been moving a people from their neighbourhoods, rents are unaffordable. I placed the poster on an existing banner in Aurora, a banner that promises a “New Aurora” while displacing old neighbourhoods and old homes to replace them with new unaffordable ones. 

[lachulamula]

Alejandro Jodorowsky quotes around town Exercise #5

[oldadvertising]

Click image for 1125 x 1662 size.

Elena Simonova, Vasily Shukshin. Far Away… VTO Literary-Dramatic Theatre, Moscow, 1977.

Scanned from the book “The Soviet Art Poster”, Penguin Books.

[badthoughtsandbadluck-blog]

I was not excited to be in front of the camera. I don’t like taking selfies much less performing. To that end I decided to make a video that was me searching for the perfect selfie angle. I love selfies. I think it’s a natural evolution from self portraits and portraiture that was once only available to the elite. I just don’t like myself in selfies. I’m too self conscious to feel comfortable. The video shows me being present and attempting to find a flattering angle. It’s more than just picking up the phone and turning on the camera. The same techniques you need in portraiture (lighting, composition, color etc) needs to be considered when snapping the photo. As often happens for me though, I ended up not deciding I didn’t like any of the possible photos and didn’t snap a photo. 

[morghanelizabeth-deactivated201]

What a great concept! Nearly everyone can relate to this feeling. This is simple but powerful.

[waarrows]

This is actually really amazing! I’m sure it’s a process that everyone who has taken a selfie goes through, but chooses to hide in favor of a flattering picture of themselves. 

[lachulamula]

ah, the life of a selfie! we always strive for the best photo sometimes it takes so much time! its really an art form I say, sometimes we learn so much about our self in the process and sometimes the process does not end in an amazing work of art and sometimes well it does! LOVE

[morghanelizabeth-deactivated201]

Artist Statement: The Artist Is Present

But is the art present? 

What is the definition of art? Well, here is an Oxford English Dictionary definition:

The expression or application of creative skill and imagination, typically in a visual form such as painting, drawing, or sculpture, producing works to be appreciated primarily for their beauty or emotional power.

In this short video, I raise the question of what makes art art. Is it skill? Is it intention? Is it beauty? Is it meaning? Is it impact? Is it setting? Does art have to have a message? Does art have to be provocative in some way?

Who is the arbiter of art? The artist? The audience? The museum curator? The gallery owner? Your mom?

Some answers to the question, What Is Art?

Art is the unceasing effort to compete with the beauty of flowers–and never succeeding. - Marc Chagall

Art is either a plagiarist or a revolutionary. - Paul Gaugin

Filling a space in a beautiful way. That’s what art means to me. -Georgia O’Keefe

To me the thing that art does for life is to clean it–to strip it to form. - Robert Frost

Art does not reproduce the visible; rather it makes visible. - Paul Klee

All art is autobiographical; the pearl is the oyster’s autobiography. - Federico Fellini

Art is a habit-forming drug. - Marcel Duchamp

Art is a revolt, a protection against extinction. - André Malraux

To evoke in oneself a feeling one has experienced, and…then, by means of movements, lines, colors, sounds or forms expressed in words, so to transmit that feeling–this is the activity of art. - Leo Tolstoy

What is your answer? In my opinion, that’s all that matters. Art, like beauty, is in the eye of the beholder.

Note: Thank you to VFW Post 1 Gallery for the use of their space. The amazing sculptures seen in this video are by artist Rod Ford. Please support veteran artists!

[lachulamula]

this was great! so on point! my favorite part was the “postmodern art sucks balls” while you are holding an Andy Warhol book! genius! good job! 

[sarahfolsomart-blog]

I was so nervous about going into this project and unit, I  did not know much about performance art and was very unsure about trying to create one. However, after I started thinking and got started on the project, this was probably one of my favorite ones we have done in the class. 

For my project I chose to write negative words, but in cursive and try and make them look good. My purpose in doing this was to show, that sometimes people tend to put on a positive face or mask, but really suffer from many of these traits. And while we can try to hide them, we ultimately can not cover them up. I used a word for each letter of the alphabet, with the exception of x, y, and z, because I was unable to think of any that fit for those ones. Since it is hard to see in the video, here is the list of words I wrote in chronological order: apprehensive, belligerent, condescending, despair, enmity, fatigue, gloom, havoc, irritate, jaded, killjoy, lonesome, misery, neglected, oppose, pessimistic, qualm, regress, shameful, timid, unwilling, vice, and weak. 

[lachulamula]

I really liked this! I feel like sometimes we tend to focus on the negatives in our day to day life, but seeing them written out seems to have so much more weight to them. I like how you wrote them in cursive it gave it so much more power. love it!

[lachulamula]

“Washing my hands clean”

When I started thinking about this project, I thought about myself as part of a community a more global feel to it. As a human on this earth, I need to be more mindful, more involved, more of a human being that will help create change locally and globally. These are big ideas and big goals and as my time in this earth starts to expire I need to remind myself that washing myself clean from things that I don’t see in a daily basis maybe because they don’t directly affect me doesn’t mean they don’t need attention, global warming, immigration, discrimination, war, etc. change is important, necessary and we need to help one another achieve new goals.

[lachulamula]

[lachulamula]

Response reading #4

Reading Rosenlee Goldberg on Performance art, while reading this it reminded me a lot of what this class has been all about. As a painter, I am usually focused on the two-dimensional plane trying to express myself and create something new, something that will move an audience to feel and understand my point of view. When it comes to four-dimensional art it incorporates all of the same elements of art yet you can use many of the traditional methods like painting, drawing, collage and use them in a more engaging and gain immediate gratification and acknowledgment from the viewer.

The Artist is present Marina Abramovic

I watched this documentary a couple of years ago, and I really loved it so much. She takes something so simple and made it so powerful. We as a society are full of technology, we forget to connect by just being present with one another. Just watching the reactions full of emotion and passion makes you move in a way that only performance art could do. The ripple effect of her performance is huge when the participation of the audience grew by the day. She could have not been able to create this by using any other traditional art media, she needed to be present and interact with her audience.

[morghanelizabeth-deactivated201]

 Project 3: Vanishing and Becoming

Lightning. A natural phenomenon of enormous power. A mystery explored by humans over the millennia through religion, art and science. It was believed by the ancients to be a tool wielded by gods and goddesses - Zeus, Thor, Indra, Shango, Xolotl, Dian Mu, Namarkkun and many others.

Lightning appears, disappears and reappears in endless variety, creating a spectacular visual display. It also briefly illuminates the sky and the earth, and quickly leaves its subjects to vanish in darkness again. 

In addition to its own nature of vanishing and becoming, lightning is part of a cycle of destruction and rejuvenation by igniting fires that clear the way for new growth.  

The music accompanying these images is the intro to Adele’s Someone Like You. Falling in love, being lovestruck, feeling the current of electricity with another person, is as natural and idiosyncratic as lightning and leads to its own cycle of vanishing and becoming.

[lachulamula]

I love lightning! And the way you put all the clips together almost makes it look like an orchestra of light 💜

[caleballesteros-blog]

For this project I thought the best way to display light and color was to do a time lapse video of the sun setting.  This was not the best of ways, but I think this still does a good job of displaying light no matter the condition, and how the colors and light change when the sun goes down.

[lachulamula]

I love watching how the sun sets and the light start to turn on. I really wish there was some sort of sound or music. 💜

[dicommdesign-blog]

Visions - Project 3

Artist Statement:

The reading “Projection: Vanishing and Becoming” inspired me in a couple different ways. I wanted to reflect two of the most interesting things in nature, the human eye and human emotions. The sounds provided both convey emotion, the colors can enhance the feeling of emotion, all the while watching the human eye adjusting to light sources. All combined I think this has become a wonderful work of art.

[lachulamula]

Love it, it’s so interesting to watch it has an amazing texture and movement quality to it. 💜

[lachulamula]

Vanishing and Becoming “Beauty Standards” We live in an age where we are visually and audio bombarded with beauty standards, what we should wear, how we should look, things we should change about ourselves to truly become “beautiful”. I was reminded of beauty from my childhood playing with fashion dolls and wanted to become more white and more blonde just like my dolls. I juxtaposed images of vintage beauty commercials with images of myself to mimic some of the time spent using products to “fix” or “beautify” ourselves. I also used videos of someone preparing meat as a metaphor for beauty tutorials. The imagery of the cockroach in the glass is in how we keep trying the new things over and over again as if we are in the constant search for the perfect recipe of beauty. 

[glitchedmemories]

ｍｙ ｍｉｎｄ

made using: VHS source 1980s video color processor 1993 text generator VHS tape for texture

[lachulamula]

(via https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T6z9Tt3No2E)

For Exercise 3, I went with a clip from Luis Buñuel’s film “An Andalusian Dog”, I feel the film clip perfectly went with the audio of  “you don’t own me” by Lesley Gore. 

[theleoisallinthemind]

Andy Goldsworthy

[morghanelizabeth-deactivated201]

The Loop (Dance Forever)

I had another idea in mind for this gif series, but I changed direction after completing the exercise last week. For that exercise I used a video of my daughter when she was a toddler grooving to Kanye West to make my first-ever gif. After that I could not get the idea of dancing out of my mind and I began to think of great dance scenes from my favorite movies. From musicals to movies that just have one seemingly spontaneous outburst of dancing, there are so many choices that it was hard to narrow it down to just ten. Dancing brings such joy and is a beautiful art form in itself. But beyond that, the desire to move our bodies to a beat is so universal, so essentially human, that it transcends boundaries like language and borders and even time. These gifs lighten my heart and if they do the same for anyone else this project will be a success. 

Part 1

[lachulamula]

I looove dancing GIF’s and I think you made an awesome job with yours, they loop just at the right point.