2-14-10: Artist Post, Kiki Smith

Kiki Smith


As instructed, I watched the Art:21 episode "stories" featuring Kiki Smith. We have several common interests and concepts of how to make art. "The more you manipulate it (art), the more actual life you put into it," she says. I too am a very hands-on person and feel that my strongest art is that in which physical manipulation can be seen. She goes on to explain that "90% of the time you physically work on the creation of your art." Artist may be 'inspired' and constantly creating, but creation is not momentary and there are many unseen hours. This isn't a concept that is new to me, particularly after I added a craft minor. I have begun to appreciate the amount of time and physical work I put into my art. My time has become more valuable. This physical ability is also very important to Kiki Smith.

We have other similar interests/beliefs such as domestic life, mythological stories, intuition, and the strength of expressing your work and ideas through different media.

I was somewhat disappointed in the short video. She explained some beliefs and ideas in her work, but I would have liked to hear more about the driving forces behind them. What does she want her viewers to take away from her work? I suppose the whole point of the video is to get people interested and inspire them to look her up.

Smith's upbringing in the Catholic Church is an obvious inspiration. Common themes are life, death, resurrection, mythology, folk tales, domestic objects, and animals.

"Born" 2002

"Friend" 2008

"Walking Pig" 2004

2-11-10: Individual Meeting with Tom

Today's meeting was interesting. Communication was trying, but in the end I think we were both understood.

I showed Tom my work over the past few weeks, including my scan/reprints from a copyright free animal illustration book.




Tom pushed me again to explain my work. His questions forced me to think about my work from a different point of view. He asked me to explain myself as an artist as if I were talking to someone I had never met before. I responded saying I like to work with my hands to create realistic representations of animals and death. He pointed out that my work contains "residue of animals." AKA representations of animals but never the real living thing. I need to push this residue into an area that my target audience can more readily comprehend and connect. For example, a fur or pelt may be beautiful in my eyes, but repulsive, dirty, or disgusting in another person's eyes. I need to find representations that everyone can connect to in the same manner. Representations like this:

http://disney-clipart.com/bambi/jpg/Thumper.php

Audiences see Disney's Thumper and think, "What a cute rabbit!" They have similar reactions in which they assign positive anthropomorphic characteristics to a representation of an animal. By first establishing this connection and then manipulating the animal representations, my audience will better understand my work.

Tom gave me artists to look up. I am required to watch the Art:21 episodes for Kiki Smith, Arturo Herrera, Kara Walker, and Walton Ford. I love it when research is assigned for me!

Questions: What are the first five words that come to mind when you think of fur (fur as in a pelt, not a fur coat)? Honesty is a must no matter how strange your reaction might be. How about meat?

Do you think you would respond more to my images if the animal representations were more mainstream, friendly, and recognizable? Do you think I should continue to use fur or physical remnants of animals in some of my images as well as animal representations understood by the masses? Suggestions? Artists? Thoughts? Reactions?

2-10-10 Idea Post

Last night I stopped by Tan A Grocery Store and picked up 2 squid, 2-3 different kinds of whole fresh fish, pork bones, and a frozen duck. Asking the attendant to weight and price everything for me was awkward. I'm pretty sure he thought my random combination was near insane. =) The good news is that all that great material was only around 20 dollars!

I really wish I had a photograph of their amazing seafood/meat spread in the back of the store. It's pretty intense... and so is the smell.


I am planning on executing the meat pile still life this weekend and visit Staunton, Va the following Friday.

During the 'snow storm' this past weekend, I spent several hours inside another Barne's and Noble searching for information. I came across a book filled with 19th century animal wood engraving reproductions. "Animals" (Jim Harter) is filled with over 1,000 species of copyright-free illustrations that I eagerly snatched up and brought home. I scanned over 160 pages of the book and plan to reprint and use as a collage wallpaper or place mat in some of my images. The choice of animals to include in the photographs must be considered carefully, of course. This is why I checked out Hope Werness' "The Continuum Encyclopedia of Animal Symbolism in Art."




I also put in an order for several furs at Moscow Hide and Fur (hideandfur.com). I hope they arrive SOON! I have been feeling stunted on ideas as of late and hope these new materials will spark something.

2-7-10 Artist Post, Peter Gronquist

Does this font look familiar? I simply love that his home page is titled using the Disney font! Coincidence? I have been running into a lot of coincidences lately. The more research I do, the more interconnected different aspects of my life become.

Peter Gronquist

I found Peter's name in a magazine at Barnes and Noble: "Hi-Fructose". His sculptural work relies heavily on juxtaposition, particularly his Sculpture + Weapons series. Disabled grenades, chainsaws, and guns are embellished with designer fashion labels as humorous commentary on "our culture's [Western culture] glamorization of violence, rampant consumerism, [and] war profiteering."

"I really wanted to make something completely ridiculous. Then people gave me money for them. So, I made a ton of them because I'm a whore. I find that it's a parody of myself because I also like rediculous things sometimes for no logical reason. I'm a victim of the rampant consumerism that I parody. It's all very confusing."
http://lostinasupermarket.com/2009/08/sculpture-weapons-by-peter-gronquist/

Gronquist's weapons have become so popular that Louis Vuitton sent him a Cease and Desist. This doesn't stop his production.

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I am also interested in another series in which he pairs animals with designer fashion labels and guns. One word: juxtaposition.

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petergronquist.com

2-4-10 Idea Post

I have been doing so much research lately, I don't know where to start. All of the images I produced last semester were still lifes, so I thought it was imperative that I research still lifes. The most recent book I read was about the early history of still lifes ("Still Life" by Norbert Schneider). I was particularly interested in the use of dead game, meat, and the inclusion of live animals.

Still life: a work of art depicting mostly inanimate subject matter, typically commonplace objects which may be either natural or man-made in an artificial setting.

The abundance of game, fish, and meat in still lifes reflects the economy. Only royalty and aristocrats were permitted to hunt (15th century law) and only they could afford to overindulge, therefore large spreads of meat (particularly in kitchen settings) came to represent wealth. Dead animal flesh also represented the temptations of the flesh and a lack of sensibility known as "voluptas carnis."

"Kitchen Scene" Adriaen van Nieulandt, 1616

"Kitchen Scene" Joachim Antonisz Uytewael, 1605

16th/17th century representations of dead animals were also warnings to religious followers.

"You who with much pleasure
Slay a swine or calf,
Think how on the Lord's Day
You will stand before God's Judgment"
"Still Life," Norbert Schneider (pg 34-35)

"Butcher's Stall" Pierter Aertsen, 1551

Finally, paintings of dead game were forms of trophies. These trompe-l'oeil pictures were often hung in hunting lodges.

"Still Life with Dead Birds and Hunting Weapons" Willem van Aelst, 1660

I came across many Latin sayings or words that I find relevant and I have been considering incorporating them through title, artist statement, or in the photos.

"Vogelen" - 'to catch birds' AKA 'to have sexual intercourse' (pg 40)

"Sub specie aeternitatis" - in the face of death (pg 79)

"Vanitas" - emptiness, meaninglessness of life and the transient nature of vanity (pg 76-87)

"Omnia morte cadont" - everything decays with death (pg 77)

"Mors ultima linea rerum/sic transit gloria mundi" - death is the line that marks the end of all/thus passes the blory of the world ("Still Life" by Gian Casper Bott pg 14-15)

In conclusion, this reading, as well as several others, has given me an idea for a photograph. A pile of meat (whole fish, slabs of beef, uncooked crustaceans, and generally anything else I can find of a similar nature) rests on a large platter while two animal figurines (children's toys) appear to be engaged in sexual intercourse in the foreground. I was thinking of using horse figures because of human intervention with reproduction (breeding), even from the days of early still lifes- particularly for 'the hunt.'

Other ideas will branch off from my research on still lifes.

2-2-10 The Humane Society Photo Contest

Though this contest may not be as well respected as National Geographic's International Photography Contest, I thought I'd enter it just the same. I love my pet!

This is Sergeant Pepper, adopted through the Richmond Ferret Rescue League:


Support the Humane Society's International Spay Day here:

https://photocontest.humanesociety.org/contest.html?page=viewInd&id=59488&contestId=2

1-28-10: Individual Meeting with Tom

I brought both images from last semester and more recent photos to the meeting today. It was great to get more response to final images from last semester (since we all didn't see or talk about them) and to discuss my current research/ideas.

Images from fall semester:






The major breakthrough I experienced at the end of last semester was my realization that I had been using animals to represent myself. In "Still In Life," I had been projecting myself into stiff domestic landscapes in which I was forced to coexist with humanness and impermanence. Asking myself why I had made this animal-human relation, I found several great resources.

The most informative book I found was "The Idea of Nature in Disney Animation" that finally opened my mind to the realization of man's drive to domesticate nature AND anthropomorphism. Anthropomorphism is the attribution of human characteristics to non-human creatures and beings, material states, and abstract concepts. I was first introduced (as a child) to anthropomorphism through Disney's animations that used and continues to use animals (anthropomorphically) as totemic-devices. As the viewer, I associated myself with the animal's imagined capacities and values. Disney also used these animal totemic-devices to heal man's (or my) separation from wild nature (particularly in western culture). I had been feeding off this established relationship that had been subconsciously ingrained in my head since I was a child.

It all makes sense now, right?

Tom simply smiled at me as I read him this quote:

"If our only access to animals in the past is through documents written by humans, then we are never looking at the animals, only ever at the representation of the animals by Humans." -"Representing Animals, Erica Fudge, pg 6

From here I stated that I want to continue the work from last semester, but building off this recent research. I narrowed down that my work applies to Western Culture, that it originates in childhood (particularly mine) and that it is an exploration of innocence through my anthropomorphic relationship with animals.

Tom suggested that pop culture, neo spiritualism, and animal effigies are all subjects I need to continue to research and consider including in my work. He told me to focus on determining how my work is supposed to function (a commentary, political statement, narrative, etc) and how the creation of images will be driven (aesthetically, intelligently, etc). I have a lot to think about and even more to experiment and RESEARCH!

Several questions I posed during the meeting included: How does Western Culture (based on the above explanation of anthropomorphism) relate to dead animals? Does the anthropomorphic behavior continue to take place? Do you think the above works are more aesthetically based (in terms of composition, subject matter) or intelligent? What are particular responses you are having to any image above?

2-1-10 Photographer's Forum 30th Annual Spring Competition