Two by Land: Katherine Sandoz and Nicole Donnally

Two by land is a gallery exhibiting Nicole Donnelly and Katherine Sandoz they both have works relating to landscape interpreted differently. Even though there work is different they compliment each other’s quite nicely.

Nicole Donnally had an art style that I can personally relate with. It was just abstract but with a nice touch of splash creativity. Some of her pieces looked as if she had started with the canvas facing one way but then decided to flip it around and works on it that way. Like she had a thought to begin with then decided last minute that she was going to do something different and flip it around. It was quite nice. I also like the dripping paint in some of them. I usually incorporate that into my own artwork so I was happy to see someone else did that as well. What else I also enjoyed was her way with colors. So bright and vibrant!

Katherine Sandoz on the other hand had a very abstract view on landscaped. There were very geometric and simplistic in shape. You got the feel of what she was going for without all the details a lot of people would try to put in. the colors complimented each other very well. It was a simplistic art that looked like it took a lot of time. One of my favorites (I cant remember the name) looked like a boat. It had the while outlines of it but that was all to indicate what it was. The colors used are some of my favorite to pair with, it being blues and pinks. The pinks were located in two heavy spots and two other smaller spots. This breaking the rule of three!

In conclusion both artists are lovely!

Persuasion by Pricilla Varner (Gallery)

What do you think of when you hear the words Happy, Sunny, childhood, yellow, ladybug? None of these words are associated with each other except under the context of me asking you. All these words should ignite happy feelings and thoughts. What do you feel when you see a picture of a grassy field? What Pricilla Varner does is put the two ideas together to make her concentration ‘Persuasion.’ She uses words to persuade the viewer into having certain feelings or thought regarding her photographs. I thought this idea/concept was just dandy. Instead of the viewer coming up with his or her own feelings of the artwork she tells you what to feel. I loved that idea. This had nothing to do with what she was trying to get across, but I interpreted it as kind of the Big Brother idea. Where those in control tell you have to think and feel leaving no room for imagination and self-development. That right there would have been the icing on the cake!

Priscilla Varner plays with the ideas of well…persuasion. In front of each piece is a set of words, so you read the words then look at the photograph. In turn the words you read set the mood and how you end up looking at the photograph. None of the words were related to each other but their association was there. Each word was in a different font setting a different mood for it. Most of the photographs were in black and white. I felt like she did this so that color couldn't change your view or feel of the piece. There was a time in my life where I wanted to study photography mostly that of black and white, so the photos were of more interest to me than anything else. My favorite photo was that of a carousel. Most of it was in focus but there was a blur aspect where the carousel seemed to be moving.

In conclusion this gallery was the bomb. I loved the idea behind it, even though I translated it differently and came up with my own view of it. 

Manovich reading questions!

1. Manovich talks about the differences between the copying process between the digital and the physical. with photos you can have multiple copies with the same quality, and with digital copies the computer slowly compresses the file losing information along the way every time it is copied. Is the copying of the same image worth the integrity and quality of the image?

2. Do you think digital media is interactive?

Project Paper!

Everyone is attracted to different types of art. Some like traditional and other not along those lines, for this project we had to find two artists under the umbrella that constituted as digital media. AS presentations where presented I saw that everyone had a different taste or an attraction for something different. For my project I wanted to stay a long the lines of art pieces having to do with video games or something with that feel. Through my extensive searches I found two artists Jose Ulloa Acosta and Alan Kwan. These two artists captured my attention and for good reasons.

Jose Ulloa Acosta is an artist based in Chile.  He earned his Bachelors in art at Pontificia Universidad Catholica de Chile. It’s one of the six catholic universities that Chile has.  He also studied at the Universidad Metropolitana de Ciencas de la Educacion, meaning metropolitan university of sciences for education. And he is now studying at the University of Barcelona for his Masters in production and artistic investigations. The piece that caught my attention from him is called Fabrica la Ruina, meaning created ruin. It was a video installation in his gallery ‘Construir la Ruina.’ which was exhibited July 5 - August 3 in 2010. Essentially the piece is a video of brick blocks shaped as Tetris shapes falling and then breaking upon impact with the floor. The sound that accompanies the piece is the classic Tetris game music. The background is black so your sole focus is on the bricks. The bricks come down in a slow motion kinda like stop action. And a little before impact its normal speed footage of the blocks breaking.

http://www.ulloa-acosta.org/page/video.html [First video on the page]

            Alan Kwan is a media artist and filmmaker that is based in Hong Kong. He had over 10 years of film experience and has won many awards at film festivals including Hong Kong International Film Festival. He is currently working on something called Lifelogging. His current system for his Life logging glasses, which is just a rigged system of a camera in his glasses, is what I focused on. The video he made describing the program Memory palace was just so captivating. It’s a program designed to be a companion piece to the lifelogging glasses. The lifelogging glasses record your daily experiences and at the end of the day you import your ‘memories’ into program Memory Palace. Memory Palace is a virtual world where your video clips take forms of blocks. You can move these blocks around and also cut them into shorter clips. You are able to add different buildings to store your memories in, and you are also able to add decorations. In this virtual world there is a town. Within the town are people who walk around with segments of your memories as their heads. You are not able to edit these clips. This program was quite interesting when I first saw it, yet it raises many questions.

Memory Palace from KwanAlan on Vimeo.

When reading about Jose Acosta’s piece, I found a very inspirational description for it. What he wanted for the viewer to see was not his art but the meaning behind it. What he wanted to convey was the idea that the Tetris blocks are the social influences and essentially memories and things that make you yourself. Just like in Tetris you build up and make the pieces fit. When the blocks are rectangular and destroyed he is trying to say that we are not made up and we don't have to be defined under those things. We don't have to be created by that mold society put on us. I fell in love with his meaning and now knowing what he was trying to convey I wouldn't be able to make my own interpretation of the piece. In Alan Kwan’s program you have the basic idea of just storing memories. What I got out of it was so much more though. The idea that you can remember everything precisely is a bit scary. You not only have the good but you also have the bad. You can log in and relive all those good times, but also remember that with good also comes bad. I find the meaning behind this piece to be grounding, that those memories make you who you are, including the good the bad and the boring. Without those you would be no one but a blank slate.

            In interpreting the two I found many similar and different ideas and concepts behind them. Memories seem to be a big part in both the pieces. Acosta uses his in more of a destructive way, while Kwan views his to be cherished and stored. Memories are the central focus of both od the pieces. There are a lot of differences between the pieces as well. Acosta’s is a video while Kwan’s is essentially and game program. The biggest difference I found in between them are the way the interpreted the concept of  ‘memories.’ While both projects are amazing in there own ways they also have faults with them. I would have wanted Acosta’s piece to be bigger and more in your faces and I would have loves Kwan’s piece to be more out there.

            Walter Benjamin talks about the recreation of art pieces and the aura of the piece. Digital media is kind of a tough one when it comes to reproducing and feeling the aura. Many would say that digital media doesn't have an aura, but it does. The two pieces both have amazing auras. Acosta’s piece has a slightly darker aura while Kwan’s has kind of a happy one. They both make their presence known. On to the next point would any of these be reproducible and still have that same aura? Not at all. They both have something going for them. In Kwan’s case it would be difficult to reproduce suck a unique idea such as the lifelogging idea. On the other hand it would be just as easy to take that same concept and make your own with it.

        In conclusion this two pieces ‘Fabrica la Ruina’ and ‘Memory Palace’ are both unique pieces that caught my attention. There were a lot of wonderful things and a lot of things I did not like about each, but whether I like it or not is none of their concern. You should make art for yourself not for the attention of others.

--I contacted both but no reply so far

http://bilbaoarte.org/?p=1398317&lang=en
http://www.kwanalan.com
http://www.galeriamacchina.cl/construir-la-ruina-jose-ulloa-acosta/
http://www.ulloa-acosta.org/index.html
http://www.marxists.org/reference/subject/philosophy/works/ge/benjamin.htm