This is one way to get people to stop tripping over these things.
Showing posts with label street art. Show all posts
Showing posts with label street art. Show all posts
Sunday, December 4, 2011
Sunday, November 7, 2010
oooooh! I'm starting to get it
Michelle also said something in our meeting on Thursday that made me think. How do I see this work entering the community itself? What do I see as the site-specific application of my abstractions, symbols and drawings? I just discovered a Brooklyn artist who places tape in geometric (mostly cubes and rectangles) shapes in the street environment. This is the description from the Art in Odd Places festival in 2008: "In a city made up of rectangular buildings, windows, and blocks the artist plays with a shape that is symbolic of New York City. In the attempt to draw attention to forgotten dimensions and overlooked layers, he creates reminders and portals with cubes that allow pedestrians to see the lines they are surrounded by in a new light."
Image from Art in Odd Places.
Aakash Nihalani currently has his first solo show at the Bose Pacia gallery and I'm actually so happy for him it's as if I knew him as a friend. I feel such a kinship and understanding of the work he's doing in the street environment, and he also has beautiful abstract paintings.
I'm putting together a presentation for Seminar class that started out trying to define psychogeography and it's really interesting to track the trajectory of my research. I started with psychogeography on Wikipedia. Apparently the term was coined by a man named Ivan Chtcheglov in the 1953 essay "Formulary for a New Urbanism". He was then banned from Situationist International (SI) and was eventually committed to a mental institution where he went through shock therapy and eventually died in 1998. It's horrible how fickle the SI and Lettrist movements were and there was constant turnover in the membership of both movements. Guy Debord seems to be the only constant name throughout, and also the only member with a full theoretical work, Society of the Spectacle. I read this book over the summer after finishing Naomi Klein's No Logo and was inspired by the lofty language and theory of the former while learning about case studies through the more practical language of the latter. Both books are essentially about the "spectacle" of contemporary society, and not having to accept the way it is just because that's how it is.
You can see the similarity in beliefs from the biography of Guy Debord on the European Graduate School site: "At the beginning of the SI movement their goal was to transgress the boundary separating art and culture from the everyday and make them part of common life. They theorized that Capitalism has the effect of diverting and stifling creativity, dividing the social body into producers and consumers, or actors and spectators. The SI saw art and poetry as a production by all people, that this was a way to make art the dominant power rather than having power rest in a small group of designated men. They argued for complete divertissement, and were against work. By 1962 they were applying their critique to all aspects of capitalist society, and no longer limiting it to arts and culture."
It also turns out that Debord was quite the heavy drinker and the SI movement did most of their theorizing in bars around Paris. Not the upscale bars that philosophers like Camus frequented, but smaller, seedier places. Debord tragically committed suicide in France in 1994, at which time the French press memorialized him after never acknowledging or recognizing any of his work before.
Psychogeography began in this way as a critique of urban geography. In the late 50's and 60's the French intellectuals and artists that made up SI were contemporaries to the Beat generation in the US. They rejected the traditional experience of the street, which they considered part of the spectacle itself with expressionless, cold modern glass towers. Le Corbusier was their nemesis because of his insistence on homogenous architectural structures and spaces that left little adventure in their chance and exploration. They proposed a more organic and spontaneous encounter with the city landscape. Debord describes the theory of the derive: "In a dérive one or more persons during a certain period drop their relations, their work and leisure activities, and all their other usual motives for movement and action, and let themselves be drawn by the attractions of the terrain and the encounters they find there. Chance is a less important factor in this activity than one might think: from a dérive point of view cities have psychogeographical contours, with constant currents, fixed points and vortexes that strongly discourage entry into or exit from certain zones"
Chance. That was the theme of the latest Art in Odd Places festival in New York City. It's surprising that this event (or series of events) is so related to the theory of Dada and Situationist movements but they make not one mention of it on their site. In the opening sentence of the curatorial statement they mention the word spectacle, which is an obvious nod to the work of Debord without literally saying it. As the statement goes on, they suggest that chance gives us the opportunity to move past our cultural conditioning to see the world in a new way. They aim to reveal undetected aspects of the city through performance and sound-based work.
Coming soon: a critique on this event series and also the Conflux festival.
Image from Art in Odd Places.
Aakash Nihalani currently has his first solo show at the Bose Pacia gallery and I'm actually so happy for him it's as if I knew him as a friend. I feel such a kinship and understanding of the work he's doing in the street environment, and he also has beautiful abstract paintings.
I'm putting together a presentation for Seminar class that started out trying to define psychogeography and it's really interesting to track the trajectory of my research. I started with psychogeography on Wikipedia. Apparently the term was coined by a man named Ivan Chtcheglov in the 1953 essay "Formulary for a New Urbanism". He was then banned from Situationist International (SI) and was eventually committed to a mental institution where he went through shock therapy and eventually died in 1998. It's horrible how fickle the SI and Lettrist movements were and there was constant turnover in the membership of both movements. Guy Debord seems to be the only constant name throughout, and also the only member with a full theoretical work, Society of the Spectacle. I read this book over the summer after finishing Naomi Klein's No Logo and was inspired by the lofty language and theory of the former while learning about case studies through the more practical language of the latter. Both books are essentially about the "spectacle" of contemporary society, and not having to accept the way it is just because that's how it is.
You can see the similarity in beliefs from the biography of Guy Debord on the European Graduate School site: "At the beginning of the SI movement their goal was to transgress the boundary separating art and culture from the everyday and make them part of common life. They theorized that Capitalism has the effect of diverting and stifling creativity, dividing the social body into producers and consumers, or actors and spectators. The SI saw art and poetry as a production by all people, that this was a way to make art the dominant power rather than having power rest in a small group of designated men. They argued for complete divertissement, and were against work. By 1962 they were applying their critique to all aspects of capitalist society, and no longer limiting it to arts and culture."
It also turns out that Debord was quite the heavy drinker and the SI movement did most of their theorizing in bars around Paris. Not the upscale bars that philosophers like Camus frequented, but smaller, seedier places. Debord tragically committed suicide in France in 1994, at which time the French press memorialized him after never acknowledging or recognizing any of his work before.
Psychogeography began in this way as a critique of urban geography. In the late 50's and 60's the French intellectuals and artists that made up SI were contemporaries to the Beat generation in the US. They rejected the traditional experience of the street, which they considered part of the spectacle itself with expressionless, cold modern glass towers. Le Corbusier was their nemesis because of his insistence on homogenous architectural structures and spaces that left little adventure in their chance and exploration. They proposed a more organic and spontaneous encounter with the city landscape. Debord describes the theory of the derive: "In a dérive one or more persons during a certain period drop their relations, their work and leisure activities, and all their other usual motives for movement and action, and let themselves be drawn by the attractions of the terrain and the encounters they find there. Chance is a less important factor in this activity than one might think: from a dérive point of view cities have psychogeographical contours, with constant currents, fixed points and vortexes that strongly discourage entry into or exit from certain zones"
Chance. That was the theme of the latest Art in Odd Places festival in New York City. It's surprising that this event (or series of events) is so related to the theory of Dada and Situationist movements but they make not one mention of it on their site. In the opening sentence of the curatorial statement they mention the word spectacle, which is an obvious nod to the work of Debord without literally saying it. As the statement goes on, they suggest that chance gives us the opportunity to move past our cultural conditioning to see the world in a new way. They aim to reveal undetected aspects of the city through performance and sound-based work.
Coming soon: a critique on this event series and also the Conflux festival.
Sunday, June 13, 2010
Some Ramblings on Community
I'm at a point in my thesis research development in which there are so many ideas bouncing around in my head that I'm having trouble narrowing down to a specific direction for primary research. In terms of secondary research, the sources I have range from visual intelligence, resource sharing systems, sustainable cities, community building and place marketing.
My idea is that through love for banal everyday occurrences, objects and situations, we slow down enough to appreciate our city and experience our place in a new way. Through this new perspective we will build stronger communities by creating valuable programs and services. Why build community? As an antidote to the isolation of globalization, to reduce consumption and share information.
'Walk', project by Constantin Demner of Studio Elastik
An intervention in public space in East London, UK, using the language of street art to bring local history to life in the imagination of passers-by.
This project captured my imagination because of my interest in street art as a portal to the essence of a city, and representation of the more subversive side of it's population. Street artists, however, are not community-builders - they are vandals at worst, and political activists at best. Projects like Walk balance between those two sides and unite them to deliver a strong message about how we view our surroundings, and offer a suggestion on how to explore different ways of seeing. Demner's focus on local history is a great example of creating a connection to the community, something that residents would find valuable. I think there could be a lot more information in the signage for this project in order to get the most value out of it, but it definitely makes a statement on seeing the city in a new way. I especially like the part when the music stops and we take a look at the historic building across the street for a few seconds - that is a beautiful observational moment.
This concept does not address the 'how' of building community however. There must be programs and services put into place to add value to our neighborhoods. Things have changed so much since my parents generation. They grew up in 1950's-60's Bronx neighborhoods, which I picture as the idyllic example of community. You knew your everything about your neighbors, and when you had to run out to the store you asked them to keep an eye on your kids playing stick-ball in the street. My great-grandmother was a real estate maven - she owned 6 or 7 buildings and rented out the apartments, while my great-grandfather had a beautiful garden in the backyard of their house, with overflowing tomato plants and even chickens!
I grew up in Connecticut on an isolated street that was nothing close to being a neighborhood. If we needed something, we got in the car and drove to the store - we rarely spoke to the neighbors much less ask them for a cup of sugar. I used to envy the kids that could run across their yard and get their friend from next-door for a playdate, since my mom had to call and make arrangements well in advance.
Society is moving closer and closer to internet dependence, and there are many opinions on the effect of this on our social interactions. Does it make us more or less isolated to be plugged in to 'social software' like Facebook, Ning, and Foursquare 24 hours a day? I don't know the answer to this, I can only give my opinion which is that there is NO WAY a computer screen will ever replace being with a person in real time. Then again it's possible that an online community can strengthen connections between people because they know each other well enough to say hello. John Thackara writes at length about this - most recently on Change Observer.
The transition toward sustainability is not about messages; it’s about activity. It’s not about proclamations; it’s about practices. Many professional designers are in the representation business, so their default response in recent times has been to design a poster about sustainability. Or maybe a website filled with green things to buy.
But projecting more signals into an already cluttered environment is like throwing confetti into a snowstorm. Advertising folk respond to what they call “the clutter problem” by adding to it. Social media? They’re part of the clutter conundrum too. Online communications are a mode of publication, not of conversation. The number of bloggers is growing at 35 percent annually; the number of people using the internet is growing at 10 percent. Do the math!
Emitting messages, however clever and evocative they may be, is not the same as being with real people, in real places, who are changing their lived material reality. That’s why I have a radical proposal: Consider speaking your words in a place rather than pressing “send.” Ivan Illich believed that our culture started to go off the rails in 1120, when monks stopped reading texts aloud to each other and became solitary scholars.
Are social media playing a similar role today? For Illich, there was a huge difference between a colloquial tongue — what people say to each other in a context, with meaning — and a language uttered by people into microphones. Or typed onto a Facebook page.
When someone we trust tells us to our face that a thing is important, we pay attention. Conversation is usually a more powerful medium for provoking change in behavior than pre-packaged messages projected at us by media. Conversation matters more than content. Out there in the bioregions, and especially among folk like the Transition Towns groups, face-to-face is key.
There’s continuity here between today’s social radicals and the avant-garde of art in earlier times. For years, artists fought to bridge the schism in Western culture that separates the creator from the spectator. The Constructivists, Dadaists, Surrealists, Lettrists and Fluxus artists all fought in different ways against the idea that art was about the creation of beautiful, static forms.
As Guy Debord put it: “Representation separates life from experience.” The philosopher Maurice Merleau-Ponty argued that perception is a process in which an active body enters into a “communion” with its surroundings. I empathize especially with the Lettrists, who invented a technique called hypergraphics, or super-writing. Their technique merged poetry as text with more graphic ways of communicating such as painting, illustration or signs. Rather as traveling storytellers have been doing in Rajasthan for 2,000 years.
I apologize for practically transcribing the entire article by John Thackara, but it is just so pertinent to the point I'm trying to make. I'm reading 'Society of the Spectacle' by Guy Debord, a provocative 1960's book on cultural theory. He describes the spectacle, 'In all its specific manifestations - news or propaganda, advertising or the actual consumption of entertainment - the spectacle epitomizes the prevailing model of social life.' He argues that we want what we are told to want by the governing bodies of this 'spectacle', which in modern times means the advertising industry and any other governing body in control of our cultural experiences (film, art, music, etc.). He also laments society having downgraded from 'being into having' - this successfully describes the cause of alienation in a globalized world. The one way communication of mass-media adds to our consumerist society and potential feelings of isolation and apathy.
So let's talk about some solutions! My teacher showed me this great link to an Italian craft fair, Unconventionall Holiday Market, where they are bringing artists and designers together from around the world to create better souvenirs for the town. The creative agency Unconventionall accepted submissions from artists for a minimum of one week stay in the town and they expect over 150 artists over the course of the summer. This is a really unique way to create value in the community, and stop the manufacture of cheap knock-off not-made-here souvenirs.
I've also done some research into 'Use Communities' and I can't believe how many there are out there! It's a great way to limit environmental preaching (which no one really listens to) and actually do something to reduce consumption. It is related to the idea of reuse of materials, which I've posted about numerous times. It is the idea of providing services without requiring ownership, from car-sharing to dress rentals. There are many online resources that provide the link between individuals in a community, rather than consumers renting services from businesses. Here are a few: Neighborgoods, Rentoid, I Let You, Building Bulletins, Gogo Verde, Bright Neighbor and Barterquest. Even more sites offering product sharing include Swaptree, Techtain, Loanables, Sharer!, FreeCycle, RentAThing and Return My Pants. Shared office space sites are WorkSpace, The Hub and Aula. Thank you WorldChanging for this great list!
Borrowing from friends and strangers can help build community, and using an online network to do so can eliminate the awkwardness of knocking on someone's door. Need I also mention that this saves money and the need for storage space? This requires a critical rethinking on what the American Dream really does to the Earth, and to really consider the side effects of our lifestyles. If we visualize the negative backstory (and future) of the products we are using, it will change our behavior, and could change our relationship with objects from one of ownership to one of use.
My idea is that through love for banal everyday occurrences, objects and situations, we slow down enough to appreciate our city and experience our place in a new way. Through this new perspective we will build stronger communities by creating valuable programs and services. Why build community? As an antidote to the isolation of globalization, to reduce consumption and share information.
'Walk', project by Constantin Demner of Studio Elastik
An intervention in public space in East London, UK, using the language of street art to bring local history to life in the imagination of passers-by.
This project captured my imagination because of my interest in street art as a portal to the essence of a city, and representation of the more subversive side of it's population. Street artists, however, are not community-builders - they are vandals at worst, and political activists at best. Projects like Walk balance between those two sides and unite them to deliver a strong message about how we view our surroundings, and offer a suggestion on how to explore different ways of seeing. Demner's focus on local history is a great example of creating a connection to the community, something that residents would find valuable. I think there could be a lot more information in the signage for this project in order to get the most value out of it, but it definitely makes a statement on seeing the city in a new way. I especially like the part when the music stops and we take a look at the historic building across the street for a few seconds - that is a beautiful observational moment.
This concept does not address the 'how' of building community however. There must be programs and services put into place to add value to our neighborhoods. Things have changed so much since my parents generation. They grew up in 1950's-60's Bronx neighborhoods, which I picture as the idyllic example of community. You knew your everything about your neighbors, and when you had to run out to the store you asked them to keep an eye on your kids playing stick-ball in the street. My great-grandmother was a real estate maven - she owned 6 or 7 buildings and rented out the apartments, while my great-grandfather had a beautiful garden in the backyard of their house, with overflowing tomato plants and even chickens!
I grew up in Connecticut on an isolated street that was nothing close to being a neighborhood. If we needed something, we got in the car and drove to the store - we rarely spoke to the neighbors much less ask them for a cup of sugar. I used to envy the kids that could run across their yard and get their friend from next-door for a playdate, since my mom had to call and make arrangements well in advance.
Society is moving closer and closer to internet dependence, and there are many opinions on the effect of this on our social interactions. Does it make us more or less isolated to be plugged in to 'social software' like Facebook, Ning, and Foursquare 24 hours a day? I don't know the answer to this, I can only give my opinion which is that there is NO WAY a computer screen will ever replace being with a person in real time. Then again it's possible that an online community can strengthen connections between people because they know each other well enough to say hello. John Thackara writes at length about this - most recently on Change Observer.
The transition toward sustainability is not about messages; it’s about activity. It’s not about proclamations; it’s about practices. Many professional designers are in the representation business, so their default response in recent times has been to design a poster about sustainability. Or maybe a website filled with green things to buy.
But projecting more signals into an already cluttered environment is like throwing confetti into a snowstorm. Advertising folk respond to what they call “the clutter problem” by adding to it. Social media? They’re part of the clutter conundrum too. Online communications are a mode of publication, not of conversation. The number of bloggers is growing at 35 percent annually; the number of people using the internet is growing at 10 percent. Do the math!
Emitting messages, however clever and evocative they may be, is not the same as being with real people, in real places, who are changing their lived material reality. That’s why I have a radical proposal: Consider speaking your words in a place rather than pressing “send.” Ivan Illich believed that our culture started to go off the rails in 1120, when monks stopped reading texts aloud to each other and became solitary scholars.
Are social media playing a similar role today? For Illich, there was a huge difference between a colloquial tongue — what people say to each other in a context, with meaning — and a language uttered by people into microphones. Or typed onto a Facebook page.
When someone we trust tells us to our face that a thing is important, we pay attention. Conversation is usually a more powerful medium for provoking change in behavior than pre-packaged messages projected at us by media. Conversation matters more than content. Out there in the bioregions, and especially among folk like the Transition Towns groups, face-to-face is key.
There’s continuity here between today’s social radicals and the avant-garde of art in earlier times. For years, artists fought to bridge the schism in Western culture that separates the creator from the spectator. The Constructivists, Dadaists, Surrealists, Lettrists and Fluxus artists all fought in different ways against the idea that art was about the creation of beautiful, static forms.
As Guy Debord put it: “Representation separates life from experience.” The philosopher Maurice Merleau-Ponty argued that perception is a process in which an active body enters into a “communion” with its surroundings. I empathize especially with the Lettrists, who invented a technique called hypergraphics, or super-writing. Their technique merged poetry as text with more graphic ways of communicating such as painting, illustration or signs. Rather as traveling storytellers have been doing in Rajasthan for 2,000 years.
I apologize for practically transcribing the entire article by John Thackara, but it is just so pertinent to the point I'm trying to make. I'm reading 'Society of the Spectacle' by Guy Debord, a provocative 1960's book on cultural theory. He describes the spectacle, 'In all its specific manifestations - news or propaganda, advertising or the actual consumption of entertainment - the spectacle epitomizes the prevailing model of social life.' He argues that we want what we are told to want by the governing bodies of this 'spectacle', which in modern times means the advertising industry and any other governing body in control of our cultural experiences (film, art, music, etc.). He also laments society having downgraded from 'being into having' - this successfully describes the cause of alienation in a globalized world. The one way communication of mass-media adds to our consumerist society and potential feelings of isolation and apathy.
So let's talk about some solutions! My teacher showed me this great link to an Italian craft fair, Unconventionall Holiday Market, where they are bringing artists and designers together from around the world to create better souvenirs for the town. The creative agency Unconventionall accepted submissions from artists for a minimum of one week stay in the town and they expect over 150 artists over the course of the summer. This is a really unique way to create value in the community, and stop the manufacture of cheap knock-off not-made-here souvenirs.
I've also done some research into 'Use Communities' and I can't believe how many there are out there! It's a great way to limit environmental preaching (which no one really listens to) and actually do something to reduce consumption. It is related to the idea of reuse of materials, which I've posted about numerous times. It is the idea of providing services without requiring ownership, from car-sharing to dress rentals. There are many online resources that provide the link between individuals in a community, rather than consumers renting services from businesses. Here are a few: Neighborgoods, Rentoid, I Let You, Building Bulletins, Gogo Verde, Bright Neighbor and Barterquest. Even more sites offering product sharing include Swaptree, Techtain, Loanables, Sharer!, FreeCycle, RentAThing and Return My Pants. Shared office space sites are WorkSpace, The Hub and Aula. Thank you WorldChanging for this great list!
Borrowing from friends and strangers can help build community, and using an online network to do so can eliminate the awkwardness of knocking on someone's door. Need I also mention that this saves money and the need for storage space? This requires a critical rethinking on what the American Dream really does to the Earth, and to really consider the side effects of our lifestyles. If we visualize the negative backstory (and future) of the products we are using, it will change our behavior, and could change our relationship with objects from one of ownership to one of use.
Sunday, May 23, 2010
Pursuit of Happiness
I feel that the last seven years of my life have been a search for the elusive 'happiness' that we all try to capture in a little bottle, to pull of the shelf and take a swig when we need it. Our assignment for Directed Research this week is to describe three pivotal moments of our lives that have led us on the path we are on today. I am on the path to become a graphic artist, and there are a few key moments in my search that have gotten me here:
Infographics I created to symbolize three pivotal moments.
One.
In 2002 I transferred to NYU to finish my undergraduate degree in Political Science but I was immediately impacted by the vibrant culture, street art and architecture of the city. Street artists like Swoon and Banksy expose truths about the political and corporate culture we live in and that spoke to me very much. I love how the integration of art with the crumbling old building and layer upon layer of posters and paint create a juxtaposition of old and new. Their beautiful illustrations, stencils and pastings collaborate with the building facade to engage the observer in an exploration of the experience of the street. Looking back, moving to New York City is probably one of the most pivotal moments in my life since it has provided inspiration and adventure for the past 8 years.
A Banksy stencil from last week in DUMBO. Side note: the quote on the bottom left was from a girl that wrote it with her lipstick while we were standing there.
Two.
Upon graduation in 2004 I decided to put aside my desire to save the world by becoming an environmental lawyer and discover the adventure of the screen and stage. I began an intensive study of film and theater, as well as body and voice technique classes. The study of acting is very much a study of yourself, since the actor's body and mind is the instrument - much like the guitar is to the musician. I also really enjoy character study, which requires observation of people and situations.
The films I am drawn to are controlled, meditative and searching for meaning in mundane reality. Some film-makers that made an impact on me at this time were Darren Aronofsky, French director Eugene Green, David Lynch's Mulholland Drive, Sofia Coppola, and Gus van Sant's Elephant. Many of these films confront the viewer to examine the limits of boredom, loneliness and beauty of everyday life. They test how much impact can be made with the smallest, most subtle actions
Also at this time I began the practice of yoga, mostly at Jivamukti, and most impacted by the teacher Ruth Lauer-Manenti. One day she told a simple story from Ananda Ma:
A wealthy merchant was traveling on business, and a thief decided to dress as a wealthy merchant and pretend he was traveling with him and steal his money. Every morning the merchant would get up and count his money carefully and tediously, while the thief watched on. Every night the thief would search through the merchants belongings, his clothes, his person even and could not find the money. This went on for many nights. Finally the thief could not continue in this way and he said to the merchant 'I have to tell you the truth. I have been deceiving you. I only wanted to come with you on this trip in order to steal your money. I have not been able to find it for all of these nights. Please tell me by what magic you have been hiding your money from me.' The merchant laughed heartily and said 'From the beginning I had a feeling you had these evil intentions. I hid the money in the best place I knew it would never be found: under your pillow.'
We search everywhere outside of ourselves for happiness, money, love, and peace. Everything we are looking for outside of us is already within. We don't have to look any further than our own person.
Ruth told our yoga class that there's no reason for people to be unhappy or dissatisfied with the mundane activities of life, because if you put your spirit into everything you do there is never boredom or dissatisfaction. Even doing the dishes can be a peaceful, happy experience where you simply focus on what you are doing and do not think of anything else. This is beginning to living a peaceful and fulfilled life when the smallest things are savored and considered just as important as the big accomplishments in life.
Three.
I learned perspective drawing in the summer of 2006. The insecurity of acting had finally worn on me and I began a job at momAgenda in the fall of that year. Needing to continue on the creative path, graphic design was the perfect blend of business thinking and application of artistic concepts. The Artists Way by Julia Cameron, as well as other classes over the next few years contributed to my development of artistic tools and the belief that I can have a career in graphic design.
These are two drawings I did in 2009 from the course Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain with Betty Edwards.
I'm on the right path now and feel good about it, and have since realized that always asking 'Am I happy?' 'Am I happy?' causes more unhappiness than just living my life and developing appreciation of what surrounds me.
"One of life's most fulfilling moments occurs in that split second when the familiar is suddenly transformed into the dazzling aura of the profoundly new.... These breakthroughs are too infrequent, more uncommon than common; and we are mired most of the time in the mundane and the trivial. The shocker: what seems mundane and trivial is the very stuff that discovery is made of. The only difference is our perspective, our readiness to put the pieces together in an entirely new way and to see patterns where only shadows appeared just a moment before."
-Edward B. Lindaman
Thinking in Future Tense, 1978
Infographics I created to symbolize three pivotal moments.
One.
In 2002 I transferred to NYU to finish my undergraduate degree in Political Science but I was immediately impacted by the vibrant culture, street art and architecture of the city. Street artists like Swoon and Banksy expose truths about the political and corporate culture we live in and that spoke to me very much. I love how the integration of art with the crumbling old building and layer upon layer of posters and paint create a juxtaposition of old and new. Their beautiful illustrations, stencils and pastings collaborate with the building facade to engage the observer in an exploration of the experience of the street. Looking back, moving to New York City is probably one of the most pivotal moments in my life since it has provided inspiration and adventure for the past 8 years.
A Banksy stencil from last week in DUMBO. Side note: the quote on the bottom left was from a girl that wrote it with her lipstick while we were standing there.
Two.
Upon graduation in 2004 I decided to put aside my desire to save the world by becoming an environmental lawyer and discover the adventure of the screen and stage. I began an intensive study of film and theater, as well as body and voice technique classes. The study of acting is very much a study of yourself, since the actor's body and mind is the instrument - much like the guitar is to the musician. I also really enjoy character study, which requires observation of people and situations.
The films I am drawn to are controlled, meditative and searching for meaning in mundane reality. Some film-makers that made an impact on me at this time were Darren Aronofsky, French director Eugene Green, David Lynch's Mulholland Drive, Sofia Coppola, and Gus van Sant's Elephant. Many of these films confront the viewer to examine the limits of boredom, loneliness and beauty of everyday life. They test how much impact can be made with the smallest, most subtle actions
Also at this time I began the practice of yoga, mostly at Jivamukti, and most impacted by the teacher Ruth Lauer-Manenti. One day she told a simple story from Ananda Ma:
A wealthy merchant was traveling on business, and a thief decided to dress as a wealthy merchant and pretend he was traveling with him and steal his money. Every morning the merchant would get up and count his money carefully and tediously, while the thief watched on. Every night the thief would search through the merchants belongings, his clothes, his person even and could not find the money. This went on for many nights. Finally the thief could not continue in this way and he said to the merchant 'I have to tell you the truth. I have been deceiving you. I only wanted to come with you on this trip in order to steal your money. I have not been able to find it for all of these nights. Please tell me by what magic you have been hiding your money from me.' The merchant laughed heartily and said 'From the beginning I had a feeling you had these evil intentions. I hid the money in the best place I knew it would never be found: under your pillow.'
We search everywhere outside of ourselves for happiness, money, love, and peace. Everything we are looking for outside of us is already within. We don't have to look any further than our own person.
Ruth told our yoga class that there's no reason for people to be unhappy or dissatisfied with the mundane activities of life, because if you put your spirit into everything you do there is never boredom or dissatisfaction. Even doing the dishes can be a peaceful, happy experience where you simply focus on what you are doing and do not think of anything else. This is beginning to living a peaceful and fulfilled life when the smallest things are savored and considered just as important as the big accomplishments in life.
Three.
I learned perspective drawing in the summer of 2006. The insecurity of acting had finally worn on me and I began a job at momAgenda in the fall of that year. Needing to continue on the creative path, graphic design was the perfect blend of business thinking and application of artistic concepts. The Artists Way by Julia Cameron, as well as other classes over the next few years contributed to my development of artistic tools and the belief that I can have a career in graphic design.
These are two drawings I did in 2009 from the course Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain with Betty Edwards.
I'm on the right path now and feel good about it, and have since realized that always asking 'Am I happy?' 'Am I happy?' causes more unhappiness than just living my life and developing appreciation of what surrounds me.
"One of life's most fulfilling moments occurs in that split second when the familiar is suddenly transformed into the dazzling aura of the profoundly new.... These breakthroughs are too infrequent, more uncommon than common; and we are mired most of the time in the mundane and the trivial. The shocker: what seems mundane and trivial is the very stuff that discovery is made of. The only difference is our perspective, our readiness to put the pieces together in an entirely new way and to see patterns where only shadows appeared just a moment before."
-Edward B. Lindaman
Thinking in Future Tense, 1978
Friday, March 5, 2010
Paul 'Moose' Curtis and Environmental Graffiti Art
via Flavorwire
This is such a refreshing idea. There is already too much pollution, so why not use the pollution to create art? Instead of spray paint, artist Paul 'Moose' Curtis uses stencils and a power washer to CLEAN his canvases. I love the idea of taking away what is unnecessary to create something completely new. His most recent canvas was the 140 foot wall inside the Broadway tunnel in San Francisco. The artwork was made up of varieties of indigenous plants that would be found in the area of the tunnel.
Thursday, September 10, 2009
I heart stencils
Is it just me or is stencil lettering everywhere? Stencil letters, or any stencil art for that matter, takes us back to a time when everything was done by hand. There is a nostalgic quality, but stencil art also creates a rebellious and even dangerous aesthetic, as Steven Heller asserts in this article. The history of stencil art has a few chapters on street graffiti, and could represent lawlessness and sketchy neighborhoods that you wouldn't want to walk around in the dark. Here is an example of a really cool stencil I found walking around in Soho the other day.
'There is always hope'
On a side note, I also picked up some cute stencil books on our recent trip to Scotland. One was all different types of horses and another was mythical creatures. They are fun to create basic artwork fast and especially cool when working with layers of color.
I appreciate the tactile quality of street art - the crumbling side of the building is the format, then there are layers of wheatpaste, stencil, or scrawling spraypaint. Especially in New York, the layers upon layers of art are fascinating. Sometimes things are partly peeled off to reveal an interesting layer underneath.
I will share a secret about myself - in junior high school a few of my friends and I created tags for ourselves. I will try to recreate it and post it up here - I think I thought graffiti art was cool even back then.
Another interesting aspect of street art is the lack of respect for the institution on which the art is sprayed, and the passersby that have no choice but to absorb the artists message. There is inherently an anti-corporate message in anything hand-altered at street level. There are the obvious examples of folks vandalizing actual advertisements and the indirect message above, but then there are the subtle messages like Banksy's amazing political art.
'There is always hope'
On a side note, I also picked up some cute stencil books on our recent trip to Scotland. One was all different types of horses and another was mythical creatures. They are fun to create basic artwork fast and especially cool when working with layers of color.
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