Michael Craig Martin Bringing the Everyday to Life

Martin’s artwork is the best work I have seen yet. It brings emotion and beauty to everyday objects as well as changing the meaning of such objects. With his artwork you are able to just look at the object or just look at the colors and get a different reaction based on your focus. Michael Craig Martin began his artwork in the 1960’s and is still creating masterpieces today.

During the 1960’s Martin used the new technology of the time to create video stills. These stills focus on shape. He focuses on the basic form of objects later adding color to give them more of a design. He moved to conceptual pieces during the 1970’s being interested in nontraditional things. He moved away from traditional paintings to art with ordinary objects and drawing in large scale. He used different mediums for his art such as one work which was designed with tape on a wall. In the 1980’s he depicted objects on a linear scale focusing more on the outline of objects. He used different materials to design his pieces. His artwork could be closely described to minimalist during the 1990’s. He painted whole spaces using significant colors. He would paint a wall or canvas a bright color and then use other significant colors to design the object. The bold colors that he used during this time are my favorite part of his artwork. It gives everyday artwork beauty and a new meaning.

During the beginning of the 21st Century he made several large scale pieces and his use of color is absolutely stunning. His brightly colored images have sometimes been referred to as nursery colors, which is suitable for his simplistic yet well designed art. These creations are epic in their design and make what one sees everyday a work of art. Martin is now giving back, in a sense, to the community. For example he has painted tiles in an underground subway system as well as at several banks so that everyday people can enjoy his art of everyday objects. His artwork is present to enhance the atmosphere of the place, not to be displayed at a museum to study. One of his professors at Yale, Al Held has impacted his art having many similar styles as Martin. However, I think Martin enhanced his art in a way with his bold colors and capability to change the meaning of objects. One example is his ‘Oak Tree” piece in which a glass is painted on top of a shelf hanging on a gallery wall. There is text nest to the piece explaining why it is in fact an oak tree and on one occasion he got stopped on a plane to Australia because he was carrying plant life and Martin had to explain that it really wasn’t an oak tree. I feel that Martin’s art really connects to everyday people and makes the ordinary extraordinary.

Al Held

After listening and looking at all the artwork from Michal Craig-Martin, I noticed that I have seen some of his pieces and recognized his name. His work in later years became hard lined or tape, with vibrant colors using mostly everyday ordinary objects such as a glass of water. He found his calling and what made him unique and popular all in one.

However like most famous artists he was taught by other famous or talented artist(s). It would make sense that would be able to see some sort of familiarity or branching off of from a students work from their teachers. In Michael's case it was above all Al Held who he seemed to absorb his experiences and teachings.

Al Held's Particular Paradox 2 (shown above.) has less hard lining in it but has a lot of shading, depth and contrast. It is mesmerizing with the center yellow structure expanding outwards and the purple, blue and red slide looking structures winding all around it. But the best part of this painting in my opinion is the background. The staggered and different color and size squares give this piece a great sense of depth. It also seems to give it movement, seeming as that center structure is actually spinning perhaps. Or even those slide looking structures are maybe wagging or slithering around.

I look at the very back of the painting and the use of the color makes it seem like I'm looking so far back I get slightly dizzy. All at the same time looking as though I am looking up and turning, very powerful piece to give off that feeling.

Bruce Nauman's Neon Messages

Bruce Nauman is an original artist who cannot be clearly labeled as a specific type of artist. He can be viewed with some qualities of a contemporary artist or a minimalist; however, he does not commit to one specific genre. He has a traveling expedition of neon and instillation works known as the Bruce Nauman Works with Lights, organized by the Milwaukee Art Museum. The exhibit is also at the Andy Warhol Museum which was fabricated based on the templates and sketches of Nauman. Nauman himself did not create the originals showing how he does not believe that art should not be a one-of-a-kind made by the artist with a sense of mysticism. Nauman rather thought that he "could make art that would kind of disappear, an art that was supposed to not quite look like art", stated at an art exhibit.

In Nauman's neon art he connects poetry and visual art. Nauman claims the text on an exhibition label, "language is a powerful tool which breaks down where poetry and art occur." In "Violins Violence Silence", those three words light up alternately; if the viewer considers the connections between the words, a narrative might arise from seemingly random words. Nauman has noted often that his works focus on the human predicament: sex and violence, humor and horror, life and death. One of his first pieces, "The True Artist Helps the World by Revealing Mystic Truths" is a spiral-shaped, red and blue neon from 1967 whose language is a most pointed vehicle for Nauman's conviction. This was originally displayed in his grocery storefront studio proclaiming a private thought to a general public.

Nauman wanted to make art that didn't look like art. His neon sign was just another advertisement on the street, making a subtle impact on the consciousness of those who simply passed by. The statements that he makes with these neon lights are left to interpretation but they are written down. They might not be true but when one reads them in a sense it makes them true. His worth has a truth to the fallacies that he writes and causes people to approach these signs with an open mind. It is up to the viewer to believe the art giving his art a kind of uncertainty.

After the discussion today in class about new technology affecting the art world today the first thing I thought of was the movie Avatar. It recently won an Oscar for Best Animated Film. To start an animated feature film can be defined as a motion picture with a running time of at least 70 minutes, in which movement and characters' performances are created using a frame-by-frame technique. In addition, a significant number of the major characters must be animated, and animation must figure in no less than 75 percent of the picture's running time. This was shown in Avatar and after watching a clip on how the director James Cameron created a scene in Avatar I developed a new respect for this animated art of today.

James Cameron originally created the movie in 1995 but the technology of the time could not accurately portray what he wanted the viewers to see. In 2005 he felt the technology made his creation into an animated movie. Cameron argues that although he uses computer generated images and characters, it is not only about the motion, but the emotion which was portrayed in the actual actors and actresses. The animators of the film made the emotions capable of being seen in the animated characters. Actors physically took part in every scene with a facial recognition camera that was able to transfer every facial emotion and motion to the computer generated character. The camera did this by picking up on muscle movement.

Cameron pushed technology to tell the story he wanted to tell. He kept trying to push the envelope creating a movie that does not look like anything else seen before. He was able to take actors and preserve their emotions in the computer generated characters which is an example of the art of today. I have personally seen this movie and was infatuated by the animations, they looked life like and every scene was filled with emotion and pure beauty. The animations came from an original sketch and portrayed the art and story Cameron wanted to show. This was a film that left the viewer wanted to see it a second time and is one of the best works of art of today.

Fred Tomaselli

Tomaselli has a different use of medium that I'm used to. It reminds me of gluing macaroni on paper in different shapes, sizes and colors and then painting around it. Of course this is the type of thing you do when you in kindergarten. However it has the same feel, except that is the idea, Tomaselli makes it look like it is actually paint. It doesn't give off the notion that it is pills etc on canvas until someone tells you. Of course this might be because I'm looking at a computer image but still.

He likes to use the shapes of humans, dissected in parts most of the time and animals especially butterflies. One that caught my eye is the one shown below.

He had it on show at The White cube and I believe its called The Eye . It is unique and along with animals it looks like a close up of a snake eye with the black scales around it. The colors are very vibrant and it reminds me of the snake in the Disney Movie: The Jungle Book. The one snake that mesmerizes the other animals and the boy. Maybe that was the inspiration? Perhaps. I also wonder why he uses pills. Is it because they come in many different sizes, shapes, colors etc, but also could look exactly the same if needed. Maybe. Or it could say something about our society needing to take all these. Possibly.

Are Jeff Koon's Inflatables Art?

I am torn on whether I consider Jeff Koon to be a real artist or a man takes art of another and calls it his own. On one side Koon banal to high art and is completely hands off where he lets everyone else do the work for him. In class today we discussed how Koon does not even know how to paint and he hires people who are probably eager students who just graduated from Art school looking for a job. On the other hand Jeff Koon has this added pressure to keep designing his art based on his theme of working with everyday objects. He tries to answer pop culture’s questions of taste and pleasure by designing different sculptures and works of art.

After looking at several of his works, although I am probably disagreeing with the majority; I actually enjoy his art. Even though he does not put the art together himself, he is the one who designs the art. Although it is similar to Andy Warhol’s pieces who similarly uses everyday objects such as Brillo boxes or Campbell’s soup cans, Koon’s in unique and causes a reaction and emotion which I feel is most important about art. I could not help but to look up more of his work after class because it is entertaining and creative. In a lot of his work you cannot help but laugh and I see nothing wrong with that. Koon is smiling in every picture that he takes with his art which is his goal for the viewers as well.

I enjoyed Koon’s Popeye exhibit that including several of his pieces such as: Popeye with his bulging muscles; the silicone-pumped breasts of a topless model; inflatable toys filled to bursting: all are complete, full, and as perfect as it is possible for them to be. All of his art looks happy and leads the viewer to leave with a smile as well. Koon chose to reproduce these cheap toys in hard metal because he found distilled in them all the freedom, fantasy and unselfconscious joy of childhood. Whether you call them found objects or assisted ready-mades, it took the eye of a great artist to appreciate their unrestrained imaginative vision, their joyous sense of design freed from the restraint of logic or good taste. His art is entirely, transparently impersonal. It keeps you at arm’s length because it proposes that the secret of happiness is to live life on the surface, not to take it too seriously, to always look on the bright side, never to give up.

Young Girl and Man in Spring by Marcel Duchamp

One of the most interesting movements in art history in my opinion is DaDa. It is mysterious, creative, controversial, political and wild all in the same sentence. Some of the Dadaists were into politics and put some societal imagery or discrepancies in their works, even in plain or "hostage" alphabet cut outs.

I think my liking to Dada comes from its differences from certain more beautiful paintings and sculptures as just pleasing to the eye or renaissance critics. Now, don't get me wrong those pieces are historical and I believe they are beautiful also, however beauty isn't defined in just that sense. There is a certain almost impossibility for everyone to think one piece of art is beautiful so in the opposition you wouldn't be able to get one individual to think every piece is beautiful. The underlying problem, as was the question of is a piece art is that the right question to ask is towards the individual themselves.

"Is [insert artwork here] beautiful to you? This would be the question that I would ask, stressing the word you even though it might already imply that. So.. in the eye of the beholder is how I believe artwork is perceived to be true beauty or not. Duchamp is a very famous and well-known modern artist but some of his work might not seem as the typical "beautiful" piece of artwork blending in with
Renaissance artwork. Now again nothing against Renaissance artwork enthusiasts and I only compare societal beauty to that group because it makes sense to me.

I think this piece is beautiful with its extraordinary shadowing, hard outlined figures and its almost childlike crayon effect. Both figures are reaching up and it just makes you want to look right up at what they are reaching up at with such vigor. Not to mention what is that background figure doing in the back?

Robert Mapplethorpe

Robert Mapplethorpe was a controversial American photographer who was known for his small-scale, highly stylized black and white portraits, photos of flowers and naked men. Some of his common artworks include flowers especially orchids and calla lilies; celebrities such as Andy Warhol, Deborah Harry and Patti Smith, homoerotic acts and classical nudes. Why he is most famous today is because of the frank homosexual eroticism of some of the work and the controversy about the public funding of the artwork.
Often the photographs explicitly depicted sexual organs and bondage equipment. Yet Mapplethorpe's art always revealed the humanity and emotions of his subjects behind their leather, spikes, and chains. This unique style of art I feel is still art because it is not about the nakedness of the pictures rather the beauty of the body. Mapplethorpe’s style is influenced by Edward Weston who produced hundreds of studies of the naked human form, examining its curves and crevices. There was so much to Mapplethorpe’s art such as the creative light and shadow that he uses. Mapplethorpe was raised in a strictly Catholic family and was influences by the rigidity of his religion seen in some of him later works. In his famous “Andy Warhol” where he is photographed inside a square shaped cross, his style of cross imagery and accompanying symmetry is apparent. The Washington Post claimed that “Mapplethorpe was very conscious of these religious undertones and was quoted in one interview as saying: I was a Catholic boy, I went to church every Sunday. A church has a certain magic and mystery for a child. It still shows in how I arrange things. It's always little altars." The symmetry is also seen in his nudes and flowers as well. In “Thomas” it shows a muscular man enclosed in a circle with his arms stretched 180 degrees pushing on the cage. In most of the flower portraits there are only one or two flowers and often in shadow.
Not all the works in his portfolios are explicit; however, they do contain his infamous self-portrait with a bullwhip inserted in his anus as well as many photographs of penises and men engaging in homosexual acts. Mapplethorpe's primary goals were to shock the public in order to sensitize them to gay issues. The Washington Post argued that, ” The Perfect Moment is exactly that: a study of the point where sex merges with sensuality, eroticism merges with the edges of pornography, fear of the camera merges with revelation of the inner self. Simply put, it is an extraordinary collection of work by an extraordinary man.” After looking at his work one can see the real art and emergence of all of these emotions and feelings which are what Mapplethorpe wanted to portray.

Gaz by Lucian Freud

Broadening our discussion on the top of "What is art?" Lucian Freud is a good choice. He mostly painted still lifes of real people, not models, with oils and brush. He paid much attention to detail of everything about the person, especially the flaws. But other than the the wrinkles, muscles, veins, hair, fat, sagging, protruding ears or nose etc.

In Gaz Freud picked a little bit of a different person to paint in that it seems like the guy is a farmer or cowboy of sorts, yet he has a peace symbol and an # symbol on his shirt. This is a little strange since its conflicting with southwest American style with Asian and math symbols. Maybe just a put together shirt or what the guy is about.. who knows?

Other than that we see he emphasizes his long face, his nose, lips and teeth in detail and draws out the details of his character even though his brush strokes are wishy washy-like.

To many art needs to be something of visual, emotional or spiritual tantalization and pleasure. Now, Freud's works aren't so much easy on the eye to say, however they seem skillful and intricate. Can art be something as simple as attention to some detail that the artist favors? Something about the past or about society? Perhaps something about almost nothing at all. These questions are up in the air mostly but one thing is for sure is that anything an even "somewhat known" artist does it catches the eye of a certain crowd or a certain taste or liking of someone. This is the main ideal.. asking this one simple question of "What is art?" isn't very handy considering the right way to me is never asking that way but directing it at one person and asking, "What is are to you?"

Adam Foster's Fine Art Jewelry

One topic that I found interesting in class today was how art used to be viewed as a skill and an occupation rather than expressing or painting about what interests the artist. Art was more of a job such as making jewelry. After class I researched ‘Fine’ artists and discovered a very talented artist, Adam Foster. He owns Adam Foster Fine Art Jewelry where his attention to detail is what makes his jewelry so stunning. He has a degree from the Art Institute of Chicago gave his a great appreciation for jewelry making. His store is said to be an experience that engages the senses reflecting the progressive ideas that keep the jewelry designs fresh and unique. At Adam Foster Fine Art jewelry you can choose from his current collections or a custom design that you have an active role in. Adams passion for design is shown in all of his works and he takes pride in making your jewelry and believes that jewelry should be a reflection of the wearer.

Adam has stated that, "I'm not here to sell people the biggest diamond, there are plenty of great materials, but when they are paired with bad design, it doesn't work." I truly consider Foster’s jewelry designs art. He himself meets with each client to discuss the details that go into the jewelry. He is the one that makes every aspect of the ring perfect. When discussing the ring, it is important to him that "they have to love it from every angle." Foster makes sketches of the piece, and uses the computer to carefully deign the jewelry allowing his clients to see exactly what the jewelry will look like as well as make any modifications. He cuts each stone and polishes it with pumice making it shimmer which is a very delicate process. Depending on how detailed the piece is, it could take Fosters months to complete. Foster claims that there is more to the process of designing jewelry then the four C’s; cut, color, clarity, and weight rather a true connection with his clients. When Foster finishes his unique pieces women are always astonished with how well the piece came out. Foster designs several wedding rings claiming to still know each of them.

What Adam Foster does is truly art. His view and designs that he makes in the rings and other jewelry that he makes are like no other. He himself designs each of the pieces and they are all unique and personal. Jewelry making is technically Adam Foster’s profession, however, it is a form of art that many women in this world are grateful for. His pieces cause a reaction, an astonishing one to say the least which is the main focus of every artwork.