Art Crimes: Graffiti Art

After lecture today, I was intrigued with the graffiti art and decided to research and find out more information about graffiti all over the world. I stumbled upon Art Crimes, an online gallery of graffiti art from the US, Europe, and many other cities around the world. This project was founded by Susan Farrell in May 1994 with a handful of photos from Atlanta and Prague. In September, after her project went public, Brett Webb teamed up with Farrell supporting the site until 2005. Art Crimes has won various awards, such as; Cool Site of the Day (1994) and Top 10 nominee for Best of the Web (1995). It has also been featured in several publications such as, Flashbacks, Newsweek, Discovery Channel, Radio France, New York Times, and USA Today. 10 years later, Art Crimes had thousands of images from 445 cities around the world. It was the first graffiti site on the net and has since inspired others to be created.

The purpose of this website was to publish and preserve the graffiti that one walks past every day. In several locations graffiti is illegal and the website does not advocate breaking the law; however, they think that this art belongs in public spaces and more legal walls should be available for these expressive artworks. Art Crimes wants support in their effort to preserve your local graffiti history. Another main goal of Art Crimes is to provide cultural and scholarly information and resources along with helping to preserve and document the constantly disappearing painting. They also want to inform people that this kind of graffiti, known as, “writing” is being done by artists who call themselves “writers” not by gangs.

Art Crimes is a collaborative and ongoing volunteer project and holds great respect for the writers and their artwork. Terms such as, "graffiti," "artist," "spraycan art," "graff," are objected by many writers. However, this website but a lot of thought into its name using the term “writer” which does not adequately set graffiti writers apart from other book authors or journalists. Also the term “graffiti” is used because it is thought to still have the most recognition and using it makes Art Crimes more findable with search engines. I found this site to be extremely interesting and full of graffiti from all over the world. It is a shame that it illegal in so many places and that it is constantly getting erased. However, this also allows for more graffiti to be created so I feel that this website does a great job preserving this art. When people think of art, graffiti typically does not come to mind but it one of the most visible art throughout cities and I will not notice and appreciate it. I also looked at the art from the different cities and it was remarkable to see all of the different artworks created and how there were some similarities and differences based on the cities. For example, many of the art in New York and LA had similar styles verses the art in Kansas which I felt a different vibe from.

In lecture today we briefly discussed the Guerrilla Girls, so I decided to research more about the feminist group. The Guerrilla Girls began in 1985; after a few women attended an exhibition titled “An International Survey of Painting and Sculpture” held by the Museum of Modern Art in New York and discovered that only 13 of the 169 featured artists were women. The ratio of artists of color were even smaller, none of whom were women artists either. They are an anonymous group of radical feminist artists who were established in New York City in 1985. They are known for their posters, books, billboards, appearance and other creative forms of culture jamming that expose discrimination and corruption. They were trained visual artists and their first work was putting up posters all over the New York City streets decrying the gender and racial imbalance of artists represented in galleries and museums. They have since expanded greatly to examine Hollywood and the film industry, popular culture, gender stereotyping and corruption in the art world. They are known for wearing gorilla masks in public and the names of dead women artists as pseudonyms. The Guerrilla Girls invented a unique combination of content, text, and snappy graphics that present feminist viewpoints in a humorous manner. Their intention is that many viewers who initially disagree with their positions will get drawn in by the comic hook, think about the issues, and then change their minds.

In 2000, closed to 100 women worked in the group; however, three separate groups formed in which they do not share members and have their own work and website. The Guerrilla Girls was the original group established by the two founding members of the Guerrilla Girls continuing to use provocative text, visuals and humor in the service of feminism and social change. They travel all around the world discussing feminist issues and reinventing the “f” word into the 21st Century. The Guerrilla Girls on Tour is the second group and is a touring theater collectively founded by three former members of the Guerrilla Girls. They develop original plays, performances and workshops, street theater actions and residency programs that dramatize women's history and address the lack of opportunities for women and artists of color in the performing arts. The Guerrilla Girls Broadband is the third group that combats sexism, racism and social injustice, exploring such taboo subjects as feminism and fashion and discrimination in the world.

Every year the Guerrilla Girls visit colleges and universities, in full jungle drag, to give multi-media presentations of their history and work. Exhibitions of Guerrilla Girls’ work have been organized at museums in the US, and at the Tate Modern, London, The Centre Pompidou Paris, and others. One of their most famous posters was plastered across New York City buses in 1989. Its headline read, "Do women have to be naked to get into the Met. Museum?" The Guerrilla Girls conducted a "weenie count" at New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art, counting naked males and naked females in the artworks as well as numbers of female artists in the collection. Less than 5% of the artists in the MMOA's modern art sections were women, but 85% of the nudes were female. The Guerrilla Girls went back in 2005 to do a recount and found that there are now fewer women artists shown at the Met, but more naked males in the artworks. I think that the Guerilla Girls are very creative and enthusiastic about their cause and they have every reason to be. They raise very important issues and add entertainment and excitement to the art world.

Nicolas Bourriaud

After listening to Bourriaud's interview on "altermodern" there was a few key points I took away from it. First to explain what "atlermodern" is, Bourriaud says, "atler is multiplicity and otherness". He goes on to say that he believes postmodernism is over and the new altermodern is the new movement emerging.

He is trying to explain that it is difficult to decipher what exactly modernism is. He of course explains postmodernism is after modernism but altermodernism is what would, more or less, be the one having to become out on top.

The basis of this interview was he is about to unveil an exhibit at the Tate art show and he has three other unvelings to show to compliment altermodernism. One for traveling, one of exile and the last based in dimensional borders. He goes on to say that he believes that the new modernism needs to be global from scratch.

Down to the last minute or so he says, "The last continent artists need to explore is time." I am not exactly sure what he means by this. But then again I am not sure what he means about a few other things. However I believe he has good points and he really believes that this is the new modernism for art.

Back To The Basics With Louise Bourgeois

Louise Bourgeois is a famous traditional artist that we discussed in class. She is not like the other artists that we have recently been talking about because of her traditional style. She is a sculptor, painter and print maker. She uses materials such as; wood, clay-stone, mirrors and clothing. All of the materials that she uses have a sense of history to them and the story of history is revealed in her work. Her work is autobiographical and tells a story about her life and family. She believes that art is taking your own life and using it to create works, which in that sense makes her a traditional artist.

Bourgeois claims that she should not have to explain her art and that the work should move and speak to you. I agree with this statement; however I disagree with her argument that if her work does not move you then she failed as an artist. This is a belief of many traditional artists. Bourgeois claims that her work is inspired through her history but since everyone has a different history, every piece will not mean or inspire that same reaction. It is refreshing to know that there are still traditional artists creating work that is inspired through their history. I feel that this kind of art can be the most inspiring and cause a reason that truly connects the viewer with the artist.

Some of the work that she is best known for is Cells, Spiders, and several other drawings, books or sculptures. Louise bourgeois has a true connection with her work and speaks of them in symbolic terms focused around relationships. Her major inspiration is from her childhood; mainly her adulterous father, who had an affair with her governess, and her mother, who refused to acknowledge it. She conveys feelings of anger, betrayal and jealousy, but with playfulness in her work. Bourgeois’ pieces consist of erotic and sexual images and also forms found in nature, such as her sculpture, Cumuls (referring to clouds in the sky) and Nature Study. Although she has worked with spider imagery since the 1940s, perhaps her most famous works are the spider sculptures from 1994 to 2003, including Mamad.

Experiments of Vik Muniz

A Brazilian Vik Muniz born in 1961 is a New York based artist who experiments with media. His momentary works are of objects arranged to make an image which he then photographs the arrangement resulting in the final piece. This makes one question the truth and realness of a photograph. When one typically thinks of a photograph, they think it is of something that is real, not objects arranged to make an image.




Muniz began his career in the late 1980’s as a sculptor moving from Brazil to Chicago and ending in New York. During this time most of his works were often jokes or visual puns. A famous piece of art during this time was “Clown Skull”, a human skull augmented with a clown -nose shaped bump. In 1990 was when Muniz started creating work that portrayed his signature style of photographing his drawings or creations. “The Best of Life” was a photograph which he drew pictures of photographs included in the coffee table book “The Best of Life” from memory after losing the book. The drawings of the photographs were then photographed and shown as photographs. Muniz continues this method today.

Vik Muniz then moves to making a drawing out of a nontraditional material and then photographing it. Such examples are, “Equivalents” (1993), “Pictures of Wire” (1994), and “Pictures of Thread” (1995), where he makes drawings out of readily recognizable non-art materials such as, cotton, wire or thread. Muniz participated in the 1997-1998 New Photography exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art in New York because of his because “Sugar Children” in 1996. Muniz has expanded his range of materials working with chocolate syrup, caviar, diamonds, earthworms, and much more. He has exhibited his work in several different museums and galleries around the world.


I find Vik Muniz’s work to be the most interesting art work I have seen in a while. I feel that it is very creative and unique and I find it enjoyable to view. Some examples of his creative art are his two detailed replicas of Leonardo da Vinci’s Mona Lisa, in which he made one out of jelly and the other out of peanut butter. He also created a replication of da Vinci’s The Last Supper working with sugar, wire, thread, and Bosco Chocolate. His recent work of creating larger scale works, geoglyps, which are pictures carved into the earth. Another recent work “Pictures of Clouds” is humorous where he had a skywriter draw cartoon outlines of clouds in the sky. I really think Muniz is a great artist whose unique style is very eye appealing, creative and enlightening.

Joseph Beuys' Performance Art: How To Explain Pictures To A Dead Hare

After watching Marcus Coates’ performance art, I decided to investigate Joseph Beuys, one of the earlier performance artists. He was born on May 12, 1921 in Germany and he is a German performance artist, sculptor, installation artist, graphic artist, art theorist, and pedagogue of art. His artwork is grounded with the themes of humanism, social philosophy and anthroposophy. He can be seen as one of the most influential artists of the 20th Century. His extensive artwork can be broken up into four domains; works of art in a traditional sense (paintings, etc.), performance, contributions to the theory of art and academic teaching, and social-and political activities. Beuys brought aspects of creative practice outside of the institution and into the everyday.

Beuys’s first solo exhibition in a private gallery started on November 26, 1965 with one of his most compelling performances: How to Explain Pictures to a Dead Hare. The artist could be viewed through the glass of the gallery’s window. His face was covered in honey and gold leaf, an iron slab was attached to his boot. In his arms he cradled a dead hare, into whose ear he mumbled muffled noises as well as explanations of the drawings that lined the walls. Such materials and actions had specific symbolic value for Beuys. For example, honey is the product of bees, and for Beuys, bees represented an ideal society of warmth and brotherhood. Gold had its importance within alchemical enquiry, and iron, the metal of Mars, stood for a masculine principle of strength and connection to the earth.

Beuys explained his performance in several ways, one being: “In putting honey on my head I am clearly doing something that has to do with thinking. Human ability is not to produce honey, but to think, to produce ideas. In this way the deathlike character of thinking becomes lifelike again. For honey is undoubtedly a living substance. Human thinking can be lively too. But it can also be intellectualized to a deadly degree, and remain dead, and express its deadliness in, say, the political or pedagogic fields.” He feels that gold and honey indicate a transformation of the head, and therefore, naturally and logically, the brain and our understanding of thought, consciousness and all the other levels necessary to explain pictures to a hare. The idea of explaining to an animal conveys a sense of the secrecy of the world and of existence that appeals to the imagination. He claimed that “even a dead animal preserves more powers of intuition than some human beings with their stubborn rationality”. Joseph Beuys tries o bring to light the complexity of creative areas. I find his work peculiar and although many of his traditional art, such as his paintings and sculptures I consider art, his performance art I do not.

Marcus Coates

At what point is the line drawn between performance art and entertainment? Is it merely title justification? Are Coates' performances only a type of art because he says they are or is there some other type of requirement? The first thought that comes to mind is purpose; meaning it's art because he's doing these performances with a deeper meaning in mind. This definition could change, however, due to the reason people consume his art. If people only watch him because they find him funny does that make his performance not art anymore?
If these questions seem reasonable ways to categorize art than it could be possible for the same performance to be art in one instance but not in another. For example as long as he has a deeper meaning for his work and someone consumes his art because of that meaning, or to search for that meaning it may be considered art. If another person, however, only views it because they find it funny or entertaining in some way at that point it may no longer be art. This is an interesting though because it adds a fourth dimension (time) to an artwork.

The Whitney Biennial: 2010

On April 3, 2010 I visited the Whitney Museum of American Art. The building itself was a work of modern art standing out among all of the buildings on Madison Avenue. It is a five story building which at each new level; the building protrudes out, similar to an upside down staircase. There were also very few windows to help showcase the art inside the museum. When I arrived, there was a line out the door, luckily it was a nice day outside. I observed the people on line while my mother and I waited about forty minutes to get in. Most of the people at the Whitney, which is what the museum is typically shortened to, look very sophisticated and keen on art. Their dress was very modern and untraditional and many had accents showing their different backgrounds. This museum attracted a variety of people, most who found art very interesting and fascinating. Although I enjoy art and have taken an introductory class in visual art, I felt out of place. I feel that many of the people at the museum knew a great deal about art and different artists, where my mother and I had a narrower background. However, I enjoyed the visit at the Whitney a great deal, seeing works of art by artists that we’ve talked about in class as well as art that I could compare with other art we’ve discussed.

From February twenty-fifth to May thirtieth, the seventy-fifth edition of the Whitney’s signature exhibition, the Whitney Biennial, took place. The exhibition this year was titled ‘2010’ and embodies a cross section of fifty-five artist’s contemporary art productions. The Biennials are always affected by the cultural, political and social instances of the time. Many more artists are operating and active, each of them part of a rich and lively system from which the Biennial as an exhibition draws its inspiration. Balancing different media ranging from painting and sculpture to video, photography, performance, and installation, ‘2010’ is a great example of Whitney’s past and future. Many of these artists have created spaces for performances and encounters between themselves and individuals from different communities. Several of the artists collectively try to develop a new historical movement, while others look back on abstraction and the history of modernism. Many of the images of the body are shaped by physical, spiritual, or social violence and have evidence of scars of war, discrimination, and hatred. However, these draw attention to larger social and political issues and are not hopeless, rather a form of regeneration, providing a chance for a new beginning. There were many artists whose work interested me and that I found very intriguing.

Born in Dickson Tennessee, Hannah Greely now resides in Los Angeles where she creates great sculptures. The sculpture in display at the Whitney, ‘Dual’ replicates everyday objects like many of her sculptures. In ‘Dual’ she replicates two booths in a bar, where the lighting is dark. It looks like Greely carefully designed this art because the rips in the cushions are nicely scattered. I feel that he is trying to display how the familiar can become strange and unknown. It questions what a real world object is and what a sculptural design is. Some in congruencies are the length of the seat cushion, the height of the table, and the handmade pay phone. This reminds me of the artist we learned about in class, Andrea Zittel whose relational art took regular objects to a new level. Although Andrea Zittel lived in her art, I feel that Hannah Greely’s sculpture delivers the message of taking art to the next level.

Josephine Meckseper creates a variety of art such as, installations, photographs, and films. He uses his art to expose the political ramifications of America’s culture of consuption. In ‘Mall of America’, Meckseper uses a video camera to explore the Mall of America in Minneoapolos, one of the top tourist spots in the United States. In this video he stops to obsevre all the different faucets of the mall such as the amusement park, the window displays, sale signs and shoppers. He then creates an abstraction of these images disorienting it. He does this by placing red and blue filters over the lens, turing some of the fottage on its side and creating a erry soundtrack. The mall turns into a dnagerous place of war where Meckseper uses the flight simulator attraction in the mall and added fighter pilot footage to create a hostile environment in the mall. It was interesting how he turned simple images and footage into an experience of war and violence. The normal wa turned into a cry for change in consumption and this art was a very creative may of displaying the messege.

Another piece of art that I found interesting was ‘Landscape with Houses #1’ because I find replication models very interesting. James Casebere, born in 1953 lives in Brooklyn and has since the 1980’s has used pictures and models to create surreal environments. He constructs tabletop models using materials such as Styrofoam, plaster and cardboard and then dramatically lights the model creating a mood for the art. His model, ‘Landscape with Houses #1’ was a very detailed model to date of an American subdivision based on one in Dutchess County, New York. The lighting created a depressing mood on the community, which was hit hard by the foreclosure epidemic of the past few years. Without reading about the art one could feel the message he was trying to portray based on the lighting and design which to me is what art is.

Kate Gilmore is another talented artist whose work is displayed at the Whitney. She was born in Washington DC in 1975 and now lives in New York. Her still from ‘Still Standing Here 2010’ is a mix-media sculpture with video, color, sound and dimensions variable. She is the sole protagonist in her video which explores themes of displacement, struggle and female identity. In the work displayed at the Whitney, she tries to escape from a tall column made of sheetrock by climbing, kicking and punching holes into its walls. Her attire displays her femininity wherein high-heels and a polka dot dress; however she works through these limitations determined to break free. The picture taken was before she escaped symbolizing women’s struggle and obstacles still faced in the social world today.

Lastly, Robert Grosvenor’s diverse and abstract sculpture intrigued me. He was born in 1937 in New York. His work seems to be fabricated; however, he created every contour by hand. He often forges relationships between two or more seemingly unrelated forms in his art and the art displayed at the Whitney did just that. Robert Grosvenor contrasts the surfaces of an aluminum screen along with a red bridge structure. Grosvenor describes the sculpture as “two lines of poetry meeting, one in the foreground and one in the background.” The aluminum element as well as the bridge both can be looked through to see the other piece of his art. This work creates unusual tension and curiosity; however, after looking at the art the two pieces fit well together and in a sense relate. The holes in the aluminum wall and the bridge both provide a way to the other side.

Drink Away The Art by Hannes Broecker

What.. a.. clever.. idea. If your wandering around an exhibit not knowing whats going on, why not be able to booze. Not just take out a flask and down it but drink the actual piece of art. Hah.

The name is perfect and I think even though this is simple color wine tasting thing.. it is pretty in its own little sense. Drink Away The Art, I imagine there was probably no more art left for Broecker to wind down after a busy showing after the exhibit was closed.

Besides it being freaking cool, I noticed that he made the shapes a rectangle.. kind of like the shape of a television. I think maybe he wanted to be able to show more surface area of the colorful liquid.

Or.. what I like more is that, like a television you sit in front of it and watch, and only be able to hear and see. But now when you look at this box, you can smell and taste the entertainment.

Mona Lisa Curse - Robert Hughes

"The entanglement of big money with art has become a curse on how art is made, controlled, and above all - in the way that it’s experienced."

The above quote, by Robert Hughes himself nails one of the biggest issues with art, in my opinion, right on the head. This film or documentary, with Hughes going from place to place, person to person and year to year really brings pressing issues upon the foundation of art.

Why are we paying so much for this stuff?

Hughes argues that this art, most of it, really isn't that spectacular, tasteful or just wowing in the way DaVinci and others of that nature. Now this sounds like a stubborn old mans devotion to his own beliefs but he, in my opinion is totally right.

I have always had a problem with, just because your (f)art(s) don't stink that they are worth millions of dollars. I mean, we have discussed this again and again, yes the droplets of paint are nice and I'm sure it wasn't as easy as a child making a mess. But millions of dollars.. really? No disrespect to Warhol, he was a fan favorite talented artist, but a painting of a can of a name brand of soup selling for $6 million dollars at an auction.. what have we become?

Hughes backbone and outlying start of this problem was when, of course the Mona Lisa was moved to New York. He says, without being so offensive to America, because he has lived here for a long time, that it was just a disgrace.

He says people were lining up to see the Mona Lisa, just to simply say they saw it, not because they wanted to gander and speculate on this piece of art. Not only that.. he says it really isn't that spectacular in its own sense. It is nothing of beauty (to him) and for this piece of art to be a spotlight for a circus is just disgraceful.

Relational Art: Andrea Zittel

One artist who I found interesting was Andrea Zittel. In class today we discussed how artists do not have a distinctive style, rather their work seems to blend together. Nicolas Bourriaud feels that we are living in a Relational Art world today. Artists are not working with the mindset of producing one piece of art. Rather, they are interested in utilizing a different space and connecting with society. Artists are blending with the world and not working independently which is causing artists to not develop a distinctive style like years ago when one could notice a Van Gogh or other famous artist work just by looking at it. Relational Art is defined as a set of artistic practices which take as their theoretical and practical point of departure the whole human relations and their social context, rather than an independent private space. Nicolas Bourriaud feels that those of us who are ongoing and more creative are really creating things for the twenty-first century art.

One example of a Relational Artist is Andrea Zittel. Zittel was born in 1965 and can be best described as a sculptor and installation artist. Her art dealt with many issues such as her past as a child, special connectedness, making a comment on society and human values. She feels that her art is affected by her growing up in South California, a place that is so normal compared to her new apartment in Brooklyn, New York. In the early 1990’s she began making art in response to her own surroundings and daily routines. She created her first “Living Unit” which was an experimental structure that intended to reduce everything necessary for living into a simple, compact system; as a means of facilitating basic activities in her 200 square foot Brooklyn apartment. This Living Unit, included the basics and when she completed it she was depressed and desponded. She had a revelation that no one really wants perfection, which I can relate to. It is important to have something to aspire and try to obtain but once you obtain this goal, what else do you have to work for?

Influenced by modernist design and architecture from early twentieth century, Zittel’s one-woman mock organization, “A–Z Administrative Services,” develops furniture, homes, and vehicles for contemporary consumers with a similar simplicity and attention to order. She commented that all of her work traces back to what she dealt with as a child and most of her work is about being alone. She used this Living Unit in a sense to isolate herself from the outside world which what her work is mostly about. Zittel also created a 44-ton floating concrete island anchored off the coast of Denmark. She lived on the “fantasy island” for one month as an experiment that allowed her to escape and isolated her from the rest of the world. Zittel moved to a 25-acre dessert in the California desert to isolate herself once again. Her goal was to explore how perceptions of freedom have been readapted for contemporary living. It was her theory that personal liberation "is now achieved through individual attempts to slip between the cracks". Andrea Zittel now lives in both New York and California constantly altering and examining aspects of life that are taken for granted and responding to day to day events and her surroundings.

20x200

The piece I chose to "purchase" from 20x200 was Beth Dow's The Pinetum, Wakehurst Place. I started my method for finding an artwork by browsing the site and choosing about ten or so artists who's work appealed to me. I did this because firstly to narrow the field but also because I did not want to "buy" a piece I didn't like. Once I narrowed the field I wanted to find an artist who was popular. The way I measured this was using Google. I searched all of the artists i had found and took note of the number of hits for each name. There were three artists in my search who were head and shoulders above the rest and Beth Dow was the clear winner with about 807,000 hits. If the results were closer other things i would have used to pick the artist like the number of pieces which were sold out for each artist or personal preferences. Once I had my artist narrowed down I simply chose the piece by them that I liked the most.

Art in Todays World

Jen Bekman truly loves art and the idea of sharing art. She opened her small gallery on the Lower East Side in 2003 with the mission of supporting emerging artists and collectors. She took this idea one step further with 20x200 making the art available for everyone. She came up with a formula: (limited editions x low prices) + the internet = art for everyone. I feel that this formula is perfect for the world that we live in today. The 20x200 website introduces at least two new editions a week, one photo and one on paper. The smallest size costs $20 and there are 200 copies. The larger the piece of art, the more money it cost because there are less editions available. Every print is assigned a numbered certificate of authenticity that is signed by the artist along with the artist’s bio and instructions on how to care for the art.

I found the website very user friendly with a lot of information on the history of the website as well as the different artists and artwork. After going through the site I would choose to buy ‘Try Letting Go’, by Sean Greene. When I am shopping or looking at art, what I see first is usually what I end up buying. In this case, when I first went to the website this art was the first art displayed on the website because it is the newest. After browsing through the rest of the art I still liked this piece the best. The colors and use of shapes and lighting were magnificent. I liked Sean’s description of the piece how ‘bands of colored light are paths, traces of motion that lead the eye through a space and around a surface’. He said how his involvement in skateboarding influenced his art He related the canvas to the street or bowl and the forms or curves are the ways through the space. His art was very insightful and also very appealing. The art caught my eye as soon as I saw it which is the main reason why I would buy the art.

When I went to buy the art I realized that you could use a gift-certificate. I feel that this would make a great gift for a friend or family member because it allows them to choose a unique piece of art that they like and is something different. Overall, I feel that this website allows unknown artists to show their work and become available on the art market. It was a smart idea to use the internet, something that everyone is very familiar with and easily accessible. Art is something that should be shared with everyone and this website allows others to enjoy art.