Taylor Van de Wint COFA1002 Blog

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Metaphorically this portrays one experiencing dangerous and difficult realities, in order to reach a sense of spiritual hope, as they must experience the bad in order to reach the good.

The teachings of Don Juan is another example which highly influenced us in the production of this event, as it explores the study of humankind in relation to spirituality, as it is based on the experience of an anthropology student, who consumes a variety of drugs whilst being watched by an Indian Shaman. Metaphorically this portrays one experiencing dangerous and difficult realities, in order to reach a sense of spiritual hope, as they must experience the bad in order to reach the good.

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Marina Abramovic allowed the audience to treat her like a doll, standing passively for six hours with an array of objects people could use on her, including honey, oil, a whip, a gun and a bullet. Someone pointed the loaded gun at her head, and she ended that performance topless, crying, with thorns in her skin.

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Aims of the poster

- Loss of Identity

- Find yourself, by loosing yourself first.

- 'Spiritual awakening'

- Individual goes through 8 hours of suffering by partaking in this event (uncreativity examples of already existent artists) 

- Desert Awakening

- Finding pre-existant happenings that either happened in the desert, or related to the desert

- Section the poster, with steps of the awakening 

- Ana Mendieta (artist related) 

- The teachings of Don Juan 

- 8 hrs - Marina abramovic

- Allan Kaprow 

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Assessment 3

Concept

 When does gold ore become gold? When it is put through a process of fire. So the human being during the training becomes as pure as gold through suffering. It is the burning away of the dross. Suffering has a great redeeming quality. As a drop of water failing on the desert sand is sucked up immediately, so we must become nothing and nowhere ... we must disappear.

Artists/precedents

- Allan Kaprow

- Spencer Tunick

Event

- Happenings

- Performance Art — gallery work or public work

Poster

- What is seen as gold? Is it precious because it is rare and found in the middle of nowhere?

- Finding 'everything' through the process of searching through 'nothing' 

- Archaeological excavations

- Ideas for objects that can be found/or maybe not found

- Objects which are valuable through everyday life, become 'more' valuable once highly needed through the absence of everythingness

- If there is nothing to excavate or nothing could be found - this can relate to the course concept of unfinished business

- once a month happenings, either something precious hidden, something hidden, something useful, something completely useless, or maybe nothing at all is hidden

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Nothingness

 When does gold ore become gold? When it is put through a process of fire. So the human being during the training becomes as pure as gold through suffering. It is the burning away of the dross. Suffering has a great redeeming quality. As a drop of water failing on the desert sand is sucked up immediately, so we must become nothing and nowhere ... we must disappear.

Bhai Sahib Singh (Sikh)

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Happenings

Allan Kaprow - "Yard" audience was encouraged to jump around all the tires and play and move them

Allan Kaprow - "Fluids" 1967 - huge ice blocks that look like a brick wall - nothingness 

Spencer Tunick "Opera House" 2010, everythingness - exposure 

Robert Smithson "Spiral Jetty"

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Philosophy on the internet

Not a bad entry point for philosophy here:

http://www.iep.utm.edu/nihilism/

http://www.iep.utm.edu/solipsis/

http://www.iep.utm.edu/timetrav/

http://www.iep.utm.edu/infinite/

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Nothingness

"We are surrounded by Nothing. Everywhere we go, we have no idea what we’re not seeing. We don’t know what gravitational fields look like, what dark matter looks like, what quantum foam looks like, what de Kooning’s drawing looked like, but what the scientists and the artists are telling us, in their very different ways, is that if we lean in, and pay very close attention, sometimes what looks like Nothing is the best place to find the most interesting…somethings."

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Unfinished Business

This week we explore the question of what it means to ‘finish’ a work. When working with process-based practices, when can we say that a work is finished? We will look at examples of works that have intentionally, and unintentionally, been left unfinished. How might work that has been abandoned by others suggest departure points for our own practice? How can we re-work our own abandoned works through a process of iteration?

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Reverse Engineering

This week we will be thinking about reverse-engineering. Reverse-engineering is a design process that involves deconstructing objects in order to learn more about the processes that produced them. What can be made by taking something apart? What can we learn from examining the relationship between an object and its constituent parts? How can a conceptual process deliver a new object from existing parts?

Deconstruction

Backwards Replication

Redesigning

Detective

Hazards:

Couldn't understand one of the steps

Chemical changes that you can't manipulate

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Concept Statement

The Effects of Brain Cancer

Taylor Van de Wint

Throughout the semester, I have engaged in the learning of ‘conceptual mapping,’ convergent and divergent thinking, ‘thinking through media,’ ‘uncreativity’ and ‘alien methods’. These methods have supported the conceptual processing and research that have contributed to my final concept and piece. Through Assessment 1 with conceptual mapping I chose the subject of Brain Cancer as I was interested in a topic close to home. Through divergent thinking is dispersed into more conceptual thinking and narrowed the topic down specifically to the effects of brain cancer. I first begun to think literally of the chemical reactions and experimentation side of brain cancer, but when mapping out some convergent ideas, the characteristics that joined together was the physical make-up of the brain and how it is segmented and each has its own function and purpose. My final concept reached how to showcase the brains separate parts in a figurative way and how to best represent the effects of cancer to the body.

When researching the brain cancer the physiology of the brain is split into four sections with different functions; the Temporal Lobe controls the perception and recognition of auditory stimuli, memory and speech, the Frontal Lobe is the strategic part of the brain powered by emotions, reason, planning and problem solving, the Parietal Lobe masters movement, orientation, recognition and perception, and the Occipital Lobe processing visual stimuli.

Through experimentation, liquid-fabric reactions with food-dye, oil, water, calico was not forming a strong enough bond to the idea of cancer and its effects. When developing my conceptual process into its final form and 10 parts of documentation, my attention was brought to the fact that brain cancer can dement and manipulate these parts of the brain, the visuals that came to my mind was plague and melting particular parts of the brain, which freezes or mutilates a function or roles in each segment of the brain. This gave me the idea of heating up candles and pouring hot wax over objects that can represent in an alien method the idea of restriction and disfigured nature of cancer. When thinking about the function and partitioned nature of the brain I thought of objects such as bottles, jars, boxes that I could use to physically separate each part of the brain and inside these containments were objects that relate to that particular lobes function.

Through convergent thinking I made a list of relatable objects to each different lobe and discovered several trinkets to put in jars. I didn’t specifically want to make the little objects myself as I thought this would be a great opportunity to use my ‘uncreativity,’ so I went around the house, the streets and quirky shops to find some found objects to put into four jars. I chose the knickknacks for the jars carefully and thoughtfully as I thought about ‘thinking through media’ and what certain materials I can use to represent ideas and concepts relating to the brain. Through using the hot wax I definitely thinking this puts the idea across of a plague taking over, and melting the wax over the jars is my way of interpreting cancer. The small objects inside the jar are random little objects but they exist, they exist for everyone so it creates a reliability between the viewer and the final piece.

My final piece I feel has utilized the class criteria well in an innovative, uncreative and alien product and has demonstrated my research and development in concepts to move from one idea to develop into another idea.

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Final Piece

This is the final work from left to right:

Temporal Lobe, Frontal Lobe, Parietal Lobe, Occipital Lobe

The lobes are in the form of jars to show the different segments of the cerebral cortex. Each jar is filled with knickknacks that represent each of the functions in the lobe. The wax is representative of cancer and how it can mutilate and take over different parts of the brain.

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Documentation One

This is my assessment 1, this was my personal way of mapping my original idea of making an artwork about loved ones affected by brain cancer. Throughout the assignment I have referred back to this mapping and used divergent thinking to push my idea further. I made the decision to make the concept less personal and drive towards the idea of how the brain works and the effects of brain cancer on the brains function. Just like this map, the brain is segmented and different and each different segment has its own purpose and role. But even if one segment is taken or mutilated, it could change that persons life forever.

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Documentation Two

Visual mapping for final work ideas:

• The brain is segmented

• Explored the segments and their functions

• Explored literal segmentation through jars, bottles, boxes etc

• Materials that could serve a purpose to block actions and dement materials - like cancer to the body (candle wax, fire, water, ink etc)

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Documentation Three

The brain is a highly specialized organ. It serves as the control center for functions of the body and allows us to cope with our environment. Words, actions, thoughts, and feelings are centered in the brain. It is so complex that some theorists believe we will never be able to fully understand it. We do, however, know that each part of the brain has a specific, important function, often a profoundly important function, and each part contributes to the healthy functioning of our body.

The location of tumors in the brain is one of the factors that determines how a brain tumor affects an individual's functioning and what symptoms the tumor causes. Click the link to learn more about brain anatomy in ourInteractive Tour of the Brain or refer to the short glossary below.

Cerebrum is the largest part of the brain and is associated with conscious thought, movement and sensation. It consists of two halves, each controlling the opposite side of the body. The halves are connected by the corpus callosum, which delivers messages between them. Four lobes make up the cerebrum: the frontal, temporal, parietal, and occipital lobes.

Frontal Lobe is one of the four lobes of the cerebral hemisphere. It controls attention, behavior, abstract thinking, problem solving, creative thought, emotion, intellect, initiative, judgment, coordinated movements, muscle movements, smell, physical reactions, and personality.

Parietal Lobe is one of the four lobes of the cerebral hemisphere. It controls tactile sensation, response to internal stimuli, sensory comprehension, some language, reading, and some visual functions.

Sensory cortex is located in the front part of the parietal lobe, or in other words, the middle area of the brain. The sensory cortex receives information from the spinal cord about the sense of touch, pressure, pain, and the perception of the position of body parts and their movements.

Motor cortex is an area located in the middle, top part of the brain that helps control movement in various parts of the body.

Temporal lobe is one of the four lobes of the cerebral hemisphere of the cerebral hemisphere. It controls auditory and visual memories, language, some hearing and speech, language, plus some behavior.

Wernicke's Area is part of the temporal lobe that surrounds the auditory cortex and is thought to be essential for understanding and formulating speech. Damage in Wernicke's area causes deficits in understanding spoken language.

Occipital Lobe is one of the four lobes of the cerebral hemisphere. It is located in the back of the head and controls vision.

Broca's Area is located in the opercular and triangular sections of the inferior frontal gyrus. The function of this area is the understanding of language, speech, and the control of facial neurons.

http://www.braintumor.org/patients-family-friends/about-brain-tumors/brain-anatomy.html

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Documentation Four

This is a diagram of the four segments of the cerebral cortex which each serve its own purpose and function in the way our body works overall. This image inspired me to rethink my concept and step away from abstract painting and perhaps look at sculpture instead. Using the segments to my advantage I started thinking of using jugs, jars, bottles, cups, boxes, envelopes etc in a way to represent the division of the brain.

http://serendip.brynmawr.edu/bb/kinser/Structure1.html

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Documentation Five

Experimentation with food dye and water Was experimenting with different ways to create liquid reactions to mimic the unpredictability of the reactions in the brain when altered by cancers. I also tried oil and water with food dye, balsamic vinegar and baking soda. But no reactions gave me much of an effect other than this experiment that has been recorded.