Briana Carter
12/5/14
Final Project

     For my final project, I have decided to mix a couple artist together to create the earths elements. Ice, wind, and fire are all coming together in my exhibit with the use of these three artist. Size is also important in this exhibit because all of these artist use size to create attention. I had a lot of fun doing this project. The Curatorial statement was hard to put together, but I caught on eventually.

Ice: Maya Lin

       "Grand Rapids"



 Wind: Mike Tonkin and Ana Liu

"Singing Ringing Tree"

 

 

 

Fire: Cristo and Jeanne Claude

"Pont Neuf" and "The Gates"

Curatorial Statement

            Ice, Wind, and Fire are mostly known as three of the four elements on this earth. They all fight against each other in nature, but here, they are working together to become one. All three of these artist use nature as a resource to make their particular art stand out.

Ice is exhibited in the architecture done by Maya Lin. Her design of a park included an ice rink where many came to take part in a family oriented setting. Mike Tonkin and Anna Liu use wind as a source of energy in their piece called the singing ringing tree. It gives off a chilling sound that one can only experience for themselves. Fire is exhibited through the flaming red/orange cloth that Cristo and Jeanne Claude lay over huge landscapes and architecture. This includes “The Gates” that spanned out through New York City and covering the Pont Neuf in London with this elaborate red/orange cloth.  They do this to address the beauty and peace of nature that many ignore. In this exhibit, art is being used through size to express how beautiful nature’s elements are.

 

Briana Carter
11-25-14
Reading


To me, this article displays how different people achieve success and also how they personally define success. Personally, I believe that art has is no right or wrong, as there is in other subjects such as math. I believe success in art has gone in an awkward direction because I see some pieces of artwork where there is just boxes or a bunch of scattered lines that do not make any since to me. In all though, I believe if you do not personally love your own art then you will never be successful in the world of art. So many people in this world only believe they are successful if the world tells them they are, but personally I believe no matter what the people say on the outside, if you can love what you do, you are already successful at it.

Briana Carter
11/19/14
Project

 I was fairly happy with the outcome of my project. I think that other viewers seemed to like it more than I did. The whole reason behind it was the fact that my family has been broken apart by hoarding. My grandmother is a compulsive hoarder and it has torn her away from everyone. Instead of being there for us, she has consumed her life with her things. I wanted people to know that people who are hoarders are not just crazy. They have a illness and they need help. I liked the font and boldness of my letters on the final project, but my equal sign did not come out as clear as I had hoped. The equal sign had pictures of my grandmothers warehouse where she lives, but they seemed to sketchy to me. I liked the comments I got and it did turn out good on a big sheet. A lot of the posters that I saw were really good. Some had few issues, but overall they looked like posters that should be hanging around campus.

Briana Carter
11/18/14
Weekly Post

11/11- Today we had to bring in our rough draft ideas for this upcoming project. Mine were vey rough because I was still on the edge of what my words should be and how to arrange them .

First, we got into our small groups and discussed what we thought of each others posters. A lot of people did not really have theirs, but instead had a drawing and that did not give me the same effect that a actual poster would give me so I was probably no help to them. I did get some great comments though about how long my poster was and I got to describe to my group members the true meaning behind my piece. After that, we went around to write a note about everybodys ideas. I got some really helpsul comments. They told me to arrange my photograph differently, and they thought that one of them was too wordy. That I should just say Hoarding=Illness, and I had a couple spelling errors.  I had a clear idea of what I was going to do after that class to fix my mistakes.

11/13- Today, we did a full class critique.

I had some wonderful remarks about mine. They liked the one where the trash was the equal sighn, but wished that the words were in a different font and did not resemble each other. Also, Illness needed to be capitalized and my words needed to be bigger. I also am going to try and make my picture a little more clear so that people will know what the  items are inside the = sighn.

Briana Carter
11/11/14
Weekly Post

11/4- We started out class by getting into our groups and discussing the reading and art 21 videos. While discussing the reading, we got stuck on Daniel Martinez' self portrait that he done of himself. We were so fascinated by the such reality of him getting shot in the head. We discussed how his work really expresses his culture and how most people could do that for this poster project. With the art 21 videos, Ryan was discussing the artist Krzysztof Wodiczko. I really wish that I would have picked this artist to watch instead, because he sounded really interesting. Ryan was telling us that his work was very intense and on a large scale. He made a globe and had a woman in it talking about how she got raped. Another one was of people talking, but he only video taped their hand expressions. It sounded like his work was very powerful and I am very interested now. It makes me think how our work does not have to be quiet, but it can be loud and straight to the point. We also discussed in the group, our mission. I really did not ever think about a mission before, so I really had nothing to say in class, but I have been thinking about it more and I believe that my mission is to educate to others everything I have learned about art and that it is okay to be creative. I strongly feel this way because around middle school, they start to loose their focus on art. They want to be popular or play sports, so art gets pushed to the side. Then, when they start trying to draw again, they are out of practice, so they tell themselves that they are not good artist, so they never go back to it. I really want to stress to younger generations that practice makes perfect. I also heard in my group discussion that I could be a curator of a cheerleading team, which crafts creativity through routines and banners. Everything has a little bit of art in it. At the end of the class, we talked about how our projects are going and what we are thinking of doing. I have a picture, but I feel like it is a little too busy. I also feel like that is okay though because hoarding is busy. I do not really know how I am going to place the words though or what words to even say. I was thinking about making the words tiny, so that the clutter seems to be too much and say something like "feel clutered?" or maybe just go straight to the point and say "Hoarding is a health risk and mental illness." I am still on the edge of what I am going to do, but I am going to brainstorm on our day off.

Briana Carter
11/4/14
Reading

Daniel Jospeph Martinez reminds me a lot of Alfredo- Jaar. They both are part of the Spanish speaking culture, and use that in their artwork to express their feelings. Martinez "asserts, "we are living in a period of extreme crisis. The production of hatred and division is a disease that is killing the country."" He is very in tune with how the world is effected by racism and job related issues. I think that it would be a good idea to use my hoarding topic to address everybody like he does. He addresses everybody's issues in the world through his art. Maybe if I could address how hoarding is a health issue to anyone who is around it because of the smells. I know from experience how bad the smell is for the nose and throat. I like Martinez's' work because it is straight forward and to the point. He is not trying to get around any issues that is being addressed. The metal tags is a good example of this because he made them colorful and shiny so they could stand out, and there is not only one line of them, there are six multiple lines of it. Takes up more space on the wall and it is bolder.

Briana Carter
11/4/14
Weekly Post

10/28- Today, we discussed what our next project is and how we are supposed to do it. It is going to be a political poster, but it is not really going to be about politics. Some questions that got me thinking was, "What makes you mad?" and "Have you lost friends over this?" My first thoughts went to my grandmother. She is a hoarder and it makes me so mad because it is effecting her mental and inner health. We have tried for many years to help her, but she will not let go of anything. We had to make a list of things that we felt are important to us and we feel like would be good topics. Here are a few of mine.
-hoarding
-inaccurate news
-split families
-dying ecosystem
-littering
-putting children in bad situations where they can not help but be in them
-abortion
-not paying attention to children's needs
Our project has to be a 18X24 poster, 200dpi. It has to be saved under JPEG, TIFF, or PDF. This poster has to incorporate words and visual and we will have to show it to people around campus. We probably will be setting up a space outside of Rowe to show them as a class. I am really scared about this project because I know nothing about computers and I do not know anything about graphic design. Hopefully, I can get some help from somebody in the class.

10/30- Today, we went over many examples of how this project could look or make the audience feel. We saw a couple pictures of Miton Glasers work which I think is amazing. I love all of the colors and designs he uses. It really catches peoples eye. I really want to catch peoples eye, but how can you do that without all of those crazy colors? We also watched a video about Helvetica Type. I do not know how I really feel yet about this video because I like simple. I am a simple, but to the point kind of person, but they do not like this kind of stuff. They want something that has many pieces to it. I hope that I can somehow meet them in the middle. Not to crazy, but simple at the same time. After we were done watching the videos of the two committed artist, one being Susan Coe, we got into our groups and discussed what we were thinking and what our ideas were for this project. I am committed to family and I am sticking with that. Coe showed me that if you are committed, then you can do anything and make your audience think whatever you want them to think.

Briana Carter
11/4/14
art 21

Laylah Ali- Something interesting that I noticed about this artist would be the way she uses instances in her childhood to make all of her paintings. She states that she loved cartoons when she was little, and that dodge-ball and racism had a big impact on her experiences as a child. I think that it is a great idea to do something for this upcoming project based on something that means a lot to me. I have had some great examples, but I don't think that it would work unless I was passionate about the topic. I am very passionate about my family, so I am trying to incorporate this project with my family life. She reminds me a lot of the Sue Coe who is very indulged in her work also. Both are very committed to their beliefs and sticking to one area of concentration. Alis' work can also be very vulgar with its reference to slavery which reminds me of Kara Walker. All together, I have never been a fan of cartoons, but Ali is using a very clean method to her work, and I am all about being neat and clean, so hopefully I can incorporate this into my project as well.

Alfredo Jaar- He also incorporates his background into his artwork. Most of his work appeals to the Spanish speaking community because that is who he is trying to talk to. He is from Chile', so that is all he knows. I have never really thought about who I want my audience to be. I have always figured that people would like my art if they were like me at all. I guess since I want to do something that incorporates my family, I am going to speak to viewers who are also family lovers. They will understand family more than a person who has no communication with their family would. Jaar said that all of his work incorporates beauty because life is nothing without beauty. Since we are doing posters that make us mad, I don't know how I will be incorporating beauty, but I do like his point behind it. Some of his work reminds me of the Helvetica video that we watched. It is simple, but it catches your eye and speaks to you, but this is what the people in the video disliked about the old graphic designs. I do not know where I will settle in this project yet. I am going to start taking pictures soon to see what I like and what my style will be. I know I like clean, but  also want something that people will look at and feel some type of weight on their heart.

Briana Carter
10/30/14
Homework

We had to go onto this site to take a 100 question quiz.

http://community.good.is/

The questions are based on creativity, our involvement in the community, and how we feel about certain subject. The questions were a little difficult to comprehend, and it took a lot of time, but I wanted to make sure I was being efficient on the quiz. Once finished, this is what  saw.

I am a dark night. Basically, it stated that a dark night does good deeds alone and where nobody can see. That is actually really true about me though. The questions did not even seem like they dealt with who I was. I like being alone and I am good to the environment, but in small ways like picking up pieces of trash that I see and recycling in my dorm. That is why I think that it is a good idea for my project to be based off of this. Something that is small, but can make a huge difference would be nice, or maybe something that most people do not notice on a daily basis that I can bring to attention.

Briana Carter
10/28/14
Weekly post

10/21- Tuesday, we met in class and discussed our task of the day. We were going outside to perform and get accustomed to performing in front of an audience. I am really used to this sort of thing because I am a cheerleader and I am in front of crowds all the time. We warmed up with movements that made me think of theatre a little bit. When I was in theatre in High School, we always did movements across the stage so we could learn to become the character. After we were all warmed up, our task was to be put into groups and get a slip of paper. We all had to perform whatever was on the paper. I saw some really interesting acts, but a lot of people were either way too shy, or was not taking it seriously by laughing the whole time. My slip told me to become a text message. I could not think of anything to do. My first thought was the sound a message makes when it comes to your phone, so I made that sound and made a little pop-up bubble with my hands. I also did a little bit of the typing noises. This was really fun, but it was hard for me to come up with something to do. Everybody else had really easy things to become like animals for example. I could have easily have been a bee or bunny rabbit. I guess that just shows the difficulty of each one of the items. This made me realize how hard it was going to be to interact with others or have others interact with you during your performance, but the whole idea is to play off of each other.

10/23- Thursday was the day to present our projects to the class. We had to meet in Rowe, and walk to the drawing room for our photo-shoot. I have not gotten my photos yet, but I will describe my costume. I attached a red cloth to the outside of a picture frame. and crawled up inside of it. This way, you could not see anything but my shirt and face through the picture frame. I wore a black shirt that was wide on my shoulder and pearls. Also, I looked very presentable with my makeup and hair done. When I heard that we would be doing a photo-shoot, I figured that our teacher was just going to be taking a regular picture of us, but it was a professional with different lenses and a backdrop. I felt like a model getting in front of the camera, but also a little awkward because everybody in the class was watching us. The performances were really interesting. Some people were really shy and stood in the back, and others were very outgoing with their character. The mixture of characters was good in some of the groups, but bad in some. You had crazy people running around and then others who stayed still and giggled the whole time or had slow movements. My sound was playing classical music. Basically, I was trying to go for a very classical and beautiful look with my project. When I was younger, I always wanted to be "as pretty as a picture", so that is why I became a picture. I always think of pictures being perfect and flawless, so that is the look I was trying to pull off. I really liked my group. It was the baby, and the old hag lady with many items. I felt like I was mothering over them because I just stood straight up the entire time while they were down on the ground interacting with each other. I was like the person watching over them. Some comments that I heard about mine was the fact that I was a good center piece for that group and I looked like the pictures that move around and talk in the Harry Potter movies. I actually never thought about that until somebody said so. I loved this project in the end. It was fun, and it did not feel stressful at all. That is the one thing I love so much about this class. I don't have to worry about if it is wrong or not; instead everything is right, but has different meanings and differences. I feel like our class became so much closer through friendships throughout this whole project. We interacted with each other, and showed our real self through our characters; clicking with people more like us.

Briana Carter
10/16/14
Weekly Post
  
   On 10/14, we did a warm up writing exercise where we had to select an item out of a bag. The items were different kinds of clothing. We then had to write an imaginative story about the person who once wore these different parts of clothing. I pulled out a very long and colorful hat. It looked like the hats that elfs wear in the Christmas movies, so I decided to write about a little girl elf who made the hat and put her own little desighns in it to express who she was and what she liked to do. Once we had finished the writing exercise, we had been assighned a pile of different kinds of cloth and threads. With these, we had to put together our own masterpiece from all of the materials. One thing I got was a green cirle with two holes cut out of it in the shape of a slice of pie. This reminded me of a ninja turtle mask. I also had a slip of a pink bandana. This made me think of making my own little mask out of these materials, so thats what I did. In the end, my threading with a string was not very good and falling apart, but I tried my best. I have never done anything like that before, but it was a lot of fun. It makes me think of doing something that I would like to create when I start my project. At the end of the class, we got into our groups to discuss art 21 videos and readings. These are my notes: 1. 2 different "attitude" definitions.- Artistic is what they feel will work best and attract their audience while attitude is who they really are as a person and what they like to do. 2. Lorna Simpson- She reveals the real self through her photographs like with the telephone project, because they can not see each others faces on the phone. If they can not see the faces of one another then they can make whatever face they want on the phone. Sometimes, she even makes it an illusion when she has her models facing the back or only having them shoulders and down. 3. Jeff Koons- He portrayed fantacy really well. It may remind somebody of their own childhood because of all the circus like colors he uses in his work. He may sometimes pull concepts out of no where because it seems like his meanings make no sence. Its like he comes up with an amazing project and just makes up a meaning to back it up.

   On 10/16, we were suposed to meet at the Mint Musium on Randolph Street. Because I went with another class the day before, I did not go when the rest of the Concepts class went. The moment I walked up to the Mint Musium, I felt this amazing presence. That feild in front of the building made me feel at home. The beautiful green grass and huge trees witht he sun glaring off of it was amazing. I love sceneries like that because it just makes me want to lay out there and just absorb the sun and let out all of my stress. There were a couple of areas inside the Mint Musium that can be compared to our project coming up. The older costumes that were presented on manakins were different I think. This would be a great idea, but it looked like that artist spent so much time on her work. It paid off though because everything was absolutely beautiful. Also, the different mask from the different cultures were really neat. I have a hard time apreciating those kinds of mask sometimes because they always remind me of something from a horror film, but I understand how well it would work in our Fantacy project. I got a couple of ideas from this feild trip. I could always be somebody I like in the movies or on telivision. Maybe make an outfit in comparison to them. I also really liked the African shirts that were in glass boxes in the hallways. These were interesting to me because usually people do not acknolegde clothing from todays society in musiums like that. All together, it was a great experience and I collected a lot of information from that trip.

  

Briana Carter
10/14/14
Art 21

     Nick Caves artwork is unlike any others and it is the one that stands out to me the most. It gives me the most creative ideas and ways I could go with this project. His design skills and wonderful costumes are amazing. I just wish that I could do something just like that. And the fact that his costumes make a ruffling noise to set an edge to everything he does is just amazing in my mind. I have a couple ideas that I could use relating to his work. It made me think of the clanking of chains together and how that would attract my audience. The only problem with this though, is that would be really heavy. Another idea was to become a homeless person with a buggy and rolling it around the classroom with a bunch of junk inside it. I have no idea how I could get a buggy though, so maybe a lot of trash bags with cans inside them would work also. Maybe even making a suit out of cans would also work. Once our instructor explained how we have to make it about ourselves, I got really confused because I don't really remember much about my childhood and what I used to like or do. I just really hope I can use something that is like Caves work to express my project, even if it has no relation to me. His work does remind me a lot of the characters of children's shows like tellitubbies.

   Jeff Koons is a very interesting artist. His balloon projects are out of this world, but at first I was kind of confused because I really thought they were just huge baloons, when in reality they are hard steel or metal of some sort.  He is very different when it comes to artist because most artist stick to one kind of art and stay with that until they die, but Koons is experimenting with so many different types of media and I believe that this is why he is so known around the world. He is literally speaking to every kind of viewer their is. He has wood, metal, painting, and many many more. Some of his work is just so random. Imsure his viewers are always interested because you would never know what he would come up with next. One thing that is hard for me to contain would be the fact that he works in this huge factory with so many people. He even states in the video that he "likes paying attention to detail", but he never touches his work. He basacally desighns it all on the computor and his workers do it for him. I think that this is going to be something normal from now on. I never would have known that artist did this so much as they do. I guess that if your business is so big though, there is not anything you can do about it or you would never get anything finished. I dont really get any ideas from his work because they are so out there. I could always cover my whole body with baloons, but that would be very difficult to pull off.

Briana Carter
9/14/14
Reading

     The article I read this week was in the "Expressing an Artistic Attitude" category of our books and her name is Lorna Simpson. I was a bit confused on what she was really trying to prove or say in this passage. I understand that she is an advocate for the African American society and relates them in a lot of her work. Mostly she did this in a more opposite way than people are used to seeing African Americans. Instead of photographing ideas that make the black culture seem helpless, like during slavery, she took photographs of them in jail and committing crimes. The passage stated that "it investigates the thoughtful process of investigation." I felt like this was interesting because everyone try's to make people feel bad for the pictures of children starving, and puppies being abused, but no one takes shots of the other side of it all. The strange thing about her photographs though is the fact that they are all taken of people with no faces and their backs turned. Most of them are only shoulders down. They wear clothing that do not state what age they are or where they would be from. She states that she does this because she likes the "simplicity" of it all. I think this is so strange because we as humans are always putting a name on people. She is popular, geeky, fashionable. In this way, you don't really know, but wonder what this person is like when in fact, it gives you no information at all. This reminds me a lot of Kara Walker because she is using African Americans in her art, but in a totally opposite way. I think that this would be interesting in my art work, because I could actually go up in front of the class with no face. That might be an interesting piece to do. Maybe if I covered my face and put on clothes that doesn't show my age. I might look like a creepy horror film character, but it is an interesting idea. Lorna Simpson has opened my eyes to a bunch of new ideas. I never thought of doing something so different. I need to start learning how to think outside the box because I have been stuck inside lately.

Briana Carter
10/07/14
Weekly Post

On 9/30, we filled out a worksheet of our personal life. This paper did get really personal, like on religion and beliefs in politics, but I did not mind that because I am not afraid to show who I am and what im about. The only thing that I did not understad was what all of this was about. Does it have to do with our next project? Then, once we were done filling out the personal area of the sheet, we had to fill out the back with our groups. These were descriptive words that described certain artist that we have discussed the whole simester so far. Artist who came up alot was Charles Ray and Kara Walker. I think that these artist came up so much because they have such a different kind of media, style, and meaning towards everything that they do. This was a good experiement because I had almost forgot about a bunch of those artist.

On 10/2, we had our project presentations. One of my favorate presentations was the bug ones. I loved how close up they got on the bugs and how detailed the pictures were. I really wish I could have gotten that close up on my pictures like that. I think that my presentation went really well. I think that a lot of people liked mine too because it was a different kind of subject while alot of people did trees and buildings. I was not feeling too good about my pictures, but once everybody was telling me that they were good, it made me feel better about myself.

Briana Carter
10/07/14
Project

     Research: My biggest inspiration was Mark Dion. His work was absolutely amazing and my whole idea of the bees project hit me whenever he said that "ecology is a balance in life."

     Intent:  My intent in this project was to show what bees meant in the world. Bees basacally keep a balance in life. Without bees, we would not have pollunitation, and without pollination, we would have plants. Without those plants, there will be no animals, and then, no us. Bees are one of the most basic structures in life itself, but make such a big impact. Instead of pin pointing all of the bad in ecology like most people like to do, I decided to look at the good and what helps our world.

     Reflection: I think that my project went really well. I was a little upset that I did not particularly get to take the best photographs because the face mask disabled me to look through the lense, but I did the best I could do with the little I had. Also, I wish that I could have gotten alot closer up onto the bees to see the really detailed parts about them like the yellow pollen on their legs, and the little larva eggs in the nest. I just did not have that kind of camera, but I will know that next time when photographing such small organisms. All together, I think that my project was a sucess. I  may have alot of the same images, but I didnt mind it because bees are a pretty interesting subject area.

Briana Carter
9/30/14
Weekly Post

     On 9/23, Megan Garner came to talk to our class about supporting services. These services are free to all UNC Charlotte students and she basically told us that it would benefit our learning if we attended some of them. Some of the advantages include tutoring, and the Writing resource center. I knew about these two, but I did not know about the counseling center. I did not even know that we had something like that. It benefit me form listening to her speak because I now know that if I have problems in any subject or area of my life, I can get help with it. After Megan had left, we had a class discussion on Andy Goldsworthy. His work was very beautiful and I got a couple of ideas from his work that may make mine more prosperous. Once we got an idea of what our projects were supposed to be about more effectively, we all got a slip of paper and it had a site on campus where we had to walk around and list what senses we were feeling. My slip said to walk around the Rowe art building. These were my senses. Sounds: Generator, Leaves, Keys, Cars, Construction, Fountain, Talking, Footsteps, and Leaf Blower. Smells: Rain, Trash, and Fish. Touch: Wind, Rain, Gravel Under Feet, and Cold. Sights: Plants, People, Buildings, Machines, Tools, Trash, Art, Cars, Bikes, and Flyers. We also had to take pictures of interesting object that we saw along the way.

   When we got back into the classroom, our teacher asked us to create a memory map. Although I did not finish, this is what one looks like.

 
     On 9/25 we took a field trip to the McColl Center in downtown Charlotte. Seeing the outside building, you would believe that it was a church and in fact, it was a church once that had been burnt down, but they redone the inside and has now made it an art show. It was very interesting because one of the faculty members here at UNC Charlotte had an exhibit up at the McColl center, so that was exciting. Also, it was the first thing that we saw when we walked in. It was a huge gold material folded in all direction and had bags of shredded fake money holding it down at the bottom of the piece. This thing was as tall as the building itself. It had little white fuzzy balls everywhere sticking to the gold. It was such a large scale piece and I was interested in how he did it. My favorite exhibit was the quilts. These quilts were all kinds of different colors and sizes and I am a sucker for color. It absolutely amazed me because they were all so beautiful. It looked like a lot of fun. One of the exhibits that I did not like as much and thought to be a little strange was the underwear hanging from a clothes line. This artist promoted sex and youth. Overall, I liked the exhibit and it was a wonderful experience. It is always fun to get out of the classroom sometimes.

 

Briana Carter
9/25/14
Project

My three ideas for ecology
-Bees create honey and basically make the world go round. So, I am visualizing me taking pictures of bees sucking on flowers, and going to a bee farm so I can get real close and personal with the bees. Taking pictures of their homes and honey and everything about their lives. Bees are the main reason that we have flowers or any kind of plant really, because of pollination. Without them, we would not have plant,s which would leave us with no vegetables and fruits to eat.
-My second idea is something that somebody has to think about really hard. I think that I could take some really good photographs of old and abandoned buildings. One of the artist that was in the art 21 videos reminded me that the dead can give life to the living. That is where my abandoned buildings come in. They are old and nobody is keeping them up, but they have life growing all around them, and their is always room for something new to be built or created from the old if anybody wanted to rebuild it.
-I do not really have any other ideas, but if I had to choose, I was thinking about making a huge bird feeder, so that all the bird can gather around and be as one. One big happy community of birds.

Briana Carter
9/23/14
Text

     Goldin has photographs of the 1970's. This was a time when everybody was going through hardships. Since most people was affected by this era, nobody really got any good photographs of what anyone was going through in that time; except Goldin. Her photographs open a new section up in this project because I never thought about people being a organism in a environment. Only animals. I could always find a different kind of religion or somebody who has a different style of living other than the norm. My only issue with this is that most people who have different life styles usually do not live in the United States. Goldin's pictures play off of the photographs taken by Neshat. The difference with Neshat though is the fact that she has to blend in with her surroundings before she is allowed to take these pictures. She has to go to the extent of dressing the way that she usually does not, even though that is her real religion and background.

Briana Carter
9/23/14
Art 21

     Mark Dion's work is really interesting. Especially the dead tar rats. Something that really caught my attention was the part where he said that the tree he had found was dead, but it was still giving off life. That opened up my mind to so many new passageways. I was thinking about death, and how death gives room in this world for the new. Maybe a possibility of tomb stones? It also comes back to my other thought about the abandoned buildings. It is something dead, but things are growing on it and it is giving room for people to replace them.
     Intigo Mangiano-Ovalle's work really confused me. He is talking about black wholes and his one piece was a man standing on water surrounded  by plants. Trapped. But when he started speaking about his large painting with the script, it hit me that it was kind of like cancer. How you are kind of stuck in this body and can never get out or away from the cancer if it can not be cured.

Briana Carter
8/23/14
Weekly Post

     9/16, all we did was present our projects for time. I really liked the Frankenstein one because it was just an amazing animation and so different. It stood out to me more than any of the other ones. One that I was really interested in was the animation of aliens because I love a good comedy. I was really nervous while I presented, but I am sure glad that nothing messed up electronically. Everyone was seeming to have so many computer problems, but I am glad that I did not have any because I did not need any more stress. We also had to give insight to our group members on their project presentations also.

     9/18, we had a discussion on our tours of the different studios this week. As a student in a beginner classes, we all have to go and see different studios so that we know what it is going to be like in the future. We also had to give our teacher insight on what we like and what we dislike about group discussions and if we wanted to change groups. After that, we received our peer responses from our group members. I had some really good and insightful advise and comments. One of them discussed how my images were cropped very strange, but I did discuss how it messed up in giff when I was talking through my power point. The rest of the comments were very positive and it made me feel much better about my project because I did not like it at all. It gave me a confidence booster. We also discussed our new project topic which is ecology. We looked at a couple of artist who showed this through their work. Ones that really stood out to me were Andy Goldsworthy and Casto and Jeanne Claude. Andy made me think of photographing maybe a used car lot, construction site, or maybe even old building sites that have been their for a really long time while Casto and Jeanne Claude makes me think of building something in nature like a huge bird feeder or a dragon that wraps around trees to guard the woods. I'm not sure where all of these ideas are taking me, but I am going to keep brainstorming.

Briana Carter
9/18/14
Project

     What I have done was decide to use makeup to show time. Here is my link if you would like to watch my video.

http://makeagif.com/i/1RqBHd

My idea was to have the viewer feel like makeup makes people a feel certain ways depending upon their age, but as my time trying to put this video together pulled through, I could not get the feeling from the video that I wanted. I originally wanted the pictures of my niece and grandmother to take much longer time so that everybody could see the pictures, but giff would only allow me to upload one copy of the same picture, so this made the transition way too fast and sloppy. Also, I wanted my whole face to be visible within the screen, but once I uploaded it to giff, it immediately cropped all of my photos down so that they were the same size and it cropped in way to much on my face. I wish I would have known more about stop motion media, but I will definitely know what I am getting myself into next time. Over all, I am not that happy with the outcome, but I did full fill most of my goals of the project. I did my best and that's all I could ask of myself.

Briana Carter
9/16/14
Weekly post

     On 9/9, we discussed the art 21 videos, reading, and got into our groups for discussion of these topics. Our group discussed Kara walker. We listened in on what other groups had to say and we discussed how we felt Kara Walker portrayed time through her pieces. I used the example where she had the projector in front of her silhouette and it made her audience feel like they are really there. Our homework was then to come up with three ideas for our time project. I came up with two because I believed that they were two really good ideas.  My ideas were having myself doing my own make up and the other one was of silhouette dancers dancing across a building from my home town. On 9/11, we watched the video on the sugar baby by Kara Walker. It was absolutely amazing and I think that it stunned so many people because there are artist in this world that do not particularly do their own artwork; but how could she on such a large scale. After that, we walked around to comment on everybody's ideas. I saw a lot of really good ideas and some not so good ones because she clearly stated that it could not be cliché like an hour glass or seasons changing and I saw plenty of those. The feedback that I got on my project was that it needed to be different in some way than make up commercials and it needed to become open to a wider audience. So, my idea was to incorporate a child and an older adult. I want the child to open up the video by her smiling and happy and then she puts on make up and she is still happy. Women my age have to wear make up to be happy and older people just wear it as habit, but do not particularly see themselves as being more beautiful. This is the kind of transition I am hoping to make.

Project
Briana Carter
9/11/14
Ideas about time project
    
     I have two ideas for my time project and I would really love some insight on what anybody thinks is a better idea.

1. I was thinking about taking a picture of a building with no writing or doors on it in my home town. Just a big black wall that lies in the middle of my town with old falling out bricks in it and a little bit of my actual town in the background. I wanted to take that picture and print it out fairly big on regular paper and not the lusty kind so that when I photograph the photograph, it does not shine. I want to cut out three sets of silhouettes dancers. I want the first one to be two dancers holding hands and the girl have a poufy dress. They will waltz across the wall. The second one, I would like a guy holding a big radio on his shoulder coming through while another guy starts break dancing. For the last one, I am still not sure what I would want to do for todays dance culture, so ideas would be great help. And the reason this is important to me is because we used to have town dances where everyone would come out and dance to the different styles of music played. I wanted to show time through each era of dance.

2. My second idea was to take pictures of my own face evolving from having no make up on to having a lot of make up on. How I would do this was by slowly, one section at a time, putting on makeup to my face and taking a picture of it. This is important to me because I grew up with no make up as a child and I felt okay with that, but once I got older, I felt as if make up was a main necessity in my life. This shows time through the way girls evolve into these women that we know today through make up.

Briana Carter
9/9/14
Review
    
     The difference between William Kentridge and Chris Oflili if the fact that Oflili is all about heritage and bright elaborate colors while Kentridge always has a very bland sense to his work. It sometimes is black and white which does not stand out much while Oflili has work that is asking to stand out. He uses glitter and paint and collage. Both have very powerful messages, but two totally different styles. I do not particularly like Kentridges work because I like work that is going to catch my eye, but he is a brilliant man.
     While watching the art 21 videos, I got a little confused because I really didn't understand how time plays into these artist, but as I dug a little deeper, I started understanding it more and more even though that our project is necessarily not like their work at all.
      Paryear built things. He built things that did not quite make sense to anybody who walked into a room and saw his piece, but he knew exactly what he wanted to say in each one of his pieces. There was some long story he went through talking about the brick wall for example. I would never have known that it was a wall separating a larger and more masculine figure from a smaller figure.
     Walker's silhouette's were absolutely amazing. I loved her meaning behind every single piece that she did. A lot of them were very strange and horrifying, but slavery was a horrible and tragic state. Everybody is choosing to let go of the past when she is just elaborating it. I am really interested in doing a silhouette for my time project. She has inspired me.
     The last artist was Sally Mann. Her photographs were different. I have never seen anybody take so many nude photographs of their children before. And it was strange because she felt as if it was so normal. Her kids were even in the video expressing how they felt about their childhood. "It was like they didn't even have a mother anymore." They said that she judges everything in the world as if it art. I just didn't even know how to take it when she showed the photographs of her nude children. Even when they got older, she still took nudes of them. Her photographs are a example of time because it is nudes of her children as they grow up. Their changing bodies.

 

Briana Carter

9/4/14

Documentation

 

 

 

 

Questions:

1)Do you personally like the competitive kind of "play?"

yes

It depends on the reward/outcome.

yes

yes

No, did not get candy.

2)How was round one different from round two?

S was harder to make.

We could talk/communicate in round two.

Not very. We didn't talk either round.

We didn't really communicate.

We were confused with communicating because it was upside down.

3)Did this feel like "play" to you?

yes

yes

yes

yes

Sort of. 

 

 Images

-Click on images for better quality!

 

Briana Carter
9/4/14
Reflection and peer critiques

Reflection

     Today in class, everyone went around and either showed us their pieces of play or interacted with the class with their form of play. I thought that this was a real eye opener for a lot of people in the class because we were all very confused about what we were really supposed to be doing. It was a great project to start with. Also, even though we all had totally different ideas, we all did very well I thought. I saw a coule things that I could of done different, like I probably should not have showed them the people laying down making letters. Our professor even pointed out that it was like I was doing two projects instead of one. I now understand that I should just forget about the laying people and only think about the project with the beans. I really felt good about my project afterwards though because it actually had a meaning behind it and a lot of my peers liked my short essay assignment afterwards. They said they wish they had thought about that.

 

Critique

 

     Ryan Scott- I really liked your project and I thought it had a great meaning. It is something I done as a kid, but with a bit of a twist. The black ball of string represents not being able to communicate. Instead of all the string being attached to one another like a usual can phone, the black ball of string separates it all to where nobody will ever be able to really communicate. I think it is a very successful project and I can see clearly where play is represented. I would have liked to actually play with the can phone, so everyone could feel the way it felt to not be able to communicate and be cut off from the world around them.

     Jayne Dinh- I like the thought process that you took and I understand where you are going, but I did not understand anything other than maybe bored people play and interact with things.  I am sure you put a lot of work into it at home and you have a lot of pictures of your process, but it just was not that strong. What I think could make it better is if you made the class interact with the paint and splat in on a big canvas or something like that. 

Briana Carter
9/2/14
Process Post

Process images:

 

Ideas:



     I grew up in a world full of competition. My first sports were cheerleading and gymnastics. I feel like "play" in my life has always been described as competitive. In cheerleading we compete for our spots and titles. A lot of people describe play as something else, but this is how I visualize it because this is the only way I had fun as child; By competing and winning against other children. I told my friends making the letters that if they made the letters in a certain amount of time that they could get candy. The first two letters were made by not talking to each other and the last two they could convers with each other. It took a considerably longer time to create the first two, but because they are competitive, they worked hard to finish quickly to get the candy. Since the classroom is small, I am going to do this same task, but with beans. I will slip instructions and a questionnaire inside the bag with the beans. I am interested in learning if the competitive side of play is any different than just sitting and playing with play-do and how did the adrenalin feel?  How was working together and being able to talk to each other different than not talking? Were they more stressed than happy?

Research: I did not do any research for this project. This was all from my own memory and how I grew up. I also got a lot of my ideas from my teacher.

Text Notes
Due: August 26th

Jessica Stockholder- Not everybody can relate to these pieces of work. She stated that her piece is in remembrance of her mother who loved theatre. This most likely speaks to people who understand how it feels to be on a theatrical setting. It shows them how to react with the objects around them. This piece is a really good example of play because the audience can actually interact or "play" with the set. They can go through the little tunnels and find joy in messing with the Lego like features. Humans find joy in the little things. She even said that most people like feeling like they are on stage, and that is right where she wanted them to feel.

Arturo Herrera- Most people are not interested in this kind of artwork. They think that just because it does not look like anything, it can not be anything important, but I think that his audience would be the people who find joy in problem solving. They sit and wonder and try to figure out what his pictures are all about. Obviously if it was a photograph of a dog, we all know it is just a dog, but the shapes and images he makes is unknown and a lot of people find joy in this kind of problem solving. He can really communicate to other artist that art does not have to be perfect. He creates beautiful pieces out of his mistakes sometimes. He sits around with many different pieces of shaped paper, and plays around with his artwork. He sits and tries to figure out what works and what does not. Just like when we put together Lego pieces. We knew what pieces we wanted to be together and which ones we did not.

Weekly Notes
Due: August 26th

This week was the very first week of school. It was the time to get to know each other and start on our very first task. The first day, we had to interact with each other and explain why we chose art and what is so special about art. One of the questions was who your favorite artist was. I had to think a while before writing an answer down because I don't know many artist. That was harder to do than I thought it would be. On the second day of class, we started discussing our first topic which is Play. I was getting really confused, but she really meant playing with something. I felt like there was some huge meaning to the word play, but there was not. She set Plato and Lego's in front of us and asked us to play with them.  I was sitting there looking around wondering why we had to play with these things. I soon realized that play is something that we like to do. Something that distracts us from daily problems and makes us feel good inside. That is really how I felt when I started to play with these items. I felt like all of my worries started to fade away.

Text Notes
Due: August 26th

Thomas Kinkade-
   As it states in the text, "Kinkade's work appeals to an all-pervasive impulse, the "nesting" instinct." Mostly, his pictures are of homes and light houses and water falls. People relate to these kind of photos because it feels more like home to them. That is the main reason that almost every American can relate to and wants his photographs hung in their home. They want people to come into their home and feel comfortable with their surroundings. Kinkade can communicate to his audience because his work is so home like, but a another form of communication is through his continuous sales of many products. An example is how he sells Kinkade pillows, blankets, and mugs. He also sells his items through other companies. I do not know if people love it as much as people see it so often. He just really knows how to communicate with people through diversion and media. By putting it out there. All it is for most people is "emotional fulfillment." Since my visual of play is something that you enjoy or take relaxation in doing, Kinkades photographs in general could be a sense of play to his audience. Just like the passage explains; "he owns the hearts of the people." He catches the souls of his audience. They find peace and enjoyment and stress relief to look at his pictures.

Charles Ray-
   "Ray's work attracts notice." That is the only thing that is really does. Only people who understand art and appreciate it can take pride and joy in his work. Other than that, his work stands out in a crowd of art and is always turning heads. Most of the time, it is not even good head turning. His audience is usually the people who find joy in their own bodies and are not afraid to show it off just like how he stands around nude. People enjoy his work who find the human body beautiful. I feels like with Mr. Ray, play and communication tie in together. I feel as if he communicates through his work, but because his work looks so playful, it becomes a visual sense of play. An example is the picture of the fire truck and the clock with little hanging feet. It is almost like I can see myself mentally wanting to play with those objects and interact with those objects. That's the main reason he can communicate to his audience. He wants them to wonder why he did these sorts of things to his piece.

My name is Briana Carter and I am a sophomore at UNC Charlotte majoring in art education. I am also a cheerleader at the University. I am kind of a goof ball and love making people happy, so thought that this video would really make somebody smile along the way.