Ning

My high school art teachers set up a social network for alumni in the art world earlier this year. I joined, just to be nice (I admit it) and didn't do much besides upload a photo. Little did I know, this was a ning network! I have now created my own network: http://artheal.ning.com and am blown away by the new resources at my fingertips. My page is going to focus on personal self-healing practices in relation to my artwork, and I hope that other people might join and share their knowledge on the subject...we are ever changing creatures, there is much to learn.

Juan Delgado "Who Are You Entertaining To?"

Juan Delgado, a victim placed directly in front of and below his abuser, is repeatedly struck in the face. Watching this traumatic interaction stirs uneasy feelings for me as a viewer. Fourteen minutes pass and Delgado's breath is noticeably deeper, his face red, glistening with sweat from the repetitive blows. I want to jump into the screen and hit the mysterious abuser back...or shake Delgado and say, "defend yourself!" It is these reactions that make this piece so successful.
Trauma, as Elizabeth Cowie explains in commentary of the work, are both unrememberable and unforgettable experiences. You can think back to when you broke a bone and remember how you reacted to the injury, but you will never physically experience that moment again. The unresolved feeling built by watching Who Are You Entertaining To parallels the unresolve of trauma in general which challenges us as individuals to move on from a wounding experience.
In an article I found, titled "Sex and Violence" by Penelope Harvey and Peter Gow, the writers investigate human fascination with the two subjects. Movies, sports, literature, they are all guilty of incorporating these topics which we are in turn drawn to, as a sort of desire for the "eroticization of domination and the eroticization of the dominated." Delgado being the dominated refuses us the pleasure of striking his dominator back, instead choosing to draw focus to each reaction as he slowly turns his head back into place to be struck again.
I define the generative topic of this piece as: representing the experience of violence/physical abuse. This topic becomes important in my personal studies of the use of art in relation to the process of creating such a representation. In Art Therapy and Children: A Case Study On Domestic Violence by Abha Singh, the writer explains that trauma may cause psychic numbness around the memory. In other words, an abused child may repress memories of being struck by his/her father (much like Delgado is struck in the video). Singh claims that "art is an opportunity for new learning when a gap as existed," when practiced you "enter a transitional place between internal and external reality" and truly form a relationship with your past and how it affects your present self.
This is a difficult topic to bring into the classroom. Like many of the subjects we discussed today including male stereotypes and death, we as facilitators of students growth and discovery of self are restricted by boundaries in the school system. I think these restrictions will be something I always struggle with...As an assignment to this generative topic however, I could bring the focus to a less personal level. I might be able to collaborate with a history teacher and ask the students to represent violent acts they are currently studying..for example the Holocaust or Civil War.  I would urge the students to push beyond the limits of 2D where they might be more inclined to represent a particular violent scene as opposed to the true experience of the abuser, victim, or themselves as a student of the violent act.

Midterm Generative Topic Refined...

When I am finally in front of a classroom, my goal is to spread the therapeutic value of art to each student. I myself have practiced art therapy for years and know that connecting my body and energy with my work is productive not only for school but for my own individual development. So...I made the glass/wood piece to show how breathing through muscles can ease tension in the body. If I were to incorporate this as a generative topic in the classroom I would say: create a physical image of tension in your body. This could be translated as a self-portrait, and would work best with high school students, who are constantly struggling with self representation.

Generative Topic

Immersive Environments and Eheir Effects On Art:

Physical Space (comfort vs. discomfort)

Many aspects affect the way a piece of artwork is created. The background noise in the room, the mood of the artist, the weather, the light...they all have and influence on the outcome of each creation. The artist has control over some of these factors, but can only do so much with a one bedroom basement apartment. Imagine immersing yourself in a small, dark room using only candles as a light source while painting. Sounds uncomfortable to me! It is inevitable that this dismal studio space will present itself in the final artwork. People have been studying this idea of a comfortable space for years, creating an art out of the arrangement and design of rooms known as feng shui. Wray Herbert, a writer for the Scientific American explored this art form further in his article "Arranging for Serenity: How Physical Space and Emotion Intersect." Herbert mentions two Yale psychologists, Lawrence E. Williams and John A. Bargh who ran experiments dealing with a similar subject: they created an unconscious sensation of congestion and found that those people who were not exposed to the "crowded attitude" experienced a psychological freedom that the congested volunteers did not. (You can read further at : http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=arranging-for-serenity )

If I were to use this generative topic in a classroom, I would require the students to do experiment with their own boundaries of comfort in a studio setting. I would ask them to experience both confined and non-confined spaces while creating artwork and investigate each piece for any subtle or drastic difference. I would also ask them to write how they felt during each practice; emotionally, physically, mentally... For a more interesting discussion, the art should not be labeled, so students can guess which piece came from which setting. I think it would be an awesome lesson, and fun for students at a high school level.

Mid-semester project

Our country is obsessed with the quick fix. Medication is almost always the answer for anything from a common cold to a fatal disease. I feel like we no longer slow down, listen to our bodies and perhaps prevent the need for medication in the first place. Take headaches for example. A massuse once told me that most headaches are caused by tense muscles in the neck. I decided to investigate what factors might cause tension in my own body. Bending over to carve in the woodshop and lying on an uncomfortable couch were two obvious causes of the uncomfortable knots and tight muscles. I also found that listening to my body during times of stress (the night I quit my job for example, days run on lack of sleep for another) my shoulders would often shrug, straining muscles throughout my neck, upper back, and face.
So, what if people began to listen to their bodies more often. Step outside of his/her body for just a moment, breathe, connect with the breath and physical reaction to a stressful situation? Perhaps at the very least we would have fewer headaches...
For the focus of this project I plan to do dive a little deeper into the physical research to discover what strength I have to heal or prevent muscle/heade aches. I will focus the actual sculpture on the power of breath and the physical body, creating an abstract figural wood form and glass representation of breath flow to the shoulders where most of my tension is stored.

Technological Development In The Art World

We were asked how technological development interplays with human creativity. After exploring new media artist Brian Knep's work, as well as Professor Leon Theremin's inventions I realized that the current advancements allow for a wider, more expansive artistic expression. Every artist creates his/her own style with a combination of past personal and historical knowledge, present technique, and future intention. For example, the song "Daisy Bell" composed by Harry Dacre is claimed to have been originally inspired by Daisy, the Countess of Warwick. Taken from a historical account of "one of the wealthiest and most desirable English women of [her] period" (wikipedia.org), then combined with friendly inspiration Dacre was able to make the song and lyrics one of the most well known in the United States. The classic tune became so popular in fact, that it was the first song ever to be heard on a computer! The original program, which sounded more like a robot than a human voice, paved the way for artists and musicians to share and expand their passion and talent with people all over the world.
I would not define myself as a new media artist, but it would be impossible to say that I do not use current technology in my work. Everything from looking up images on the web to taking digital photos to document my work, the tools we often take advantage quickly transforms my process from an idea into a physical product. Before taking this class, I had no interest in studying new media art. Now, I can see the artist community develop into a future of powerful creations.

Brian Knep Cont.

Brian Knep's art certainly speaks clearly to an audience. The interactive quality to his work is immediately exposed as viewers participate in uncovering the method of each design. I could assume, just by watching video accounts of his installations, that they represented a metaphor for our society, particularly the erect, emerge, expand, and escape series. The remaniscent childlike drawings combined with explosive graphic language spoke to me as a comical account of our ever repetative actions throughout history. I was surprised to hear that the simple images were chosen out of an esthetic attraction rather than a purposeful intention.
After Knep let our class in on his personal artistic development however, I learned that an artist with a science and technology background can redifine art without being too literal. Knep explained that the most attractive aspect to his healing installations is not the way each piece forces interaction between the viewer and the work or the audience with each other, but instead how it can be independant from both. The complex behavior of his artwork reaches beyond the common technique of communicating with a viewer, to creating it's own voice, history, reactions even when nobody is in the room. I was absolutely inspired by his new media relationship with art, as well as Knep's passion to experiment and learn from technological development.