social justice

so i think i've posted on here before about the piece i wanted to do that involved signs and bumper stickers.

i have an update on that thought. i got it last night, driving home after having watched some of mississippi chicken.

it'll be a 2-part series, entitled "poverty and riches." one panel will have a jumble of phrases on signs i've seen around town held by people on street corners. over top of all of it, it'll say HELP. the other panel will be neatly organized, but occasionally overlapping phrases from bumper stickers i've seen around town. i imagine both of these being rather large panels [2-3 ft. across, min.], of equal size.

Baraka

this tuesday we watched Baraka, a breathtaking film filled with beautiful footage from 24 countries. it explores cultural, social, and environmental themes in such a way that weaves the world together so that we see the world as a citizen of earth, instead of through our cultural filter. it is really hard to describe, but is one of the most moving films i have ever seen. if you have not seen it, i would highly recommend it. and in case you were wondering, baraka means "blessing" in multiple languages. beautiful.

since it was rather late when we finished the film, our "homework" assignment is to post a blog with our thoughts on the film. that post could be rather long for me. :) if you weren't there, but have seen the film, feel free to join the discussion.

and for those of you who missed last week...we miss you! next time (4/24) we will meet at cary-anne's house and we will have a meal beforehand. we haven't planned our art exercise yet, but we'll keep you posted.

second day

well, last tuesday was the second time we've met officially, but third time if you count the first, unofficial one where we had our brainstorming session.

what we did at this one was amy and i picked a word, wrote it out on a banner, and had everyone write a response to it. we had a great-sized group and it worked perfectly. we had a lot of good work come out of it, and definitely several excellent starting points for deeper, extended pieces of prose from what we did at the group.

so for next time we have some homework: each person is going to bring something that either influenced a season in your life or was reflective of a season. it could be a scene from a movie, a song, a passage in a book, a picture, an image, an article... it's wiiiiide open. so be thinking.

can't wait to see what the result is!

Art that I like

here's the artist I mentioned last night, Samantha Wedelich. Michael, your idea about the "immature" bird reminded me of her art.

http://www.dwelldeep.com/

Arts Group: Round One

So tonight was our first meeting; and albeit small, ideas were big. Here are my notes:

• Pieces based on dreams (keep dream logs online?)
• Works in progress weeks
• Word art--collaborative pieces on a word
• Make short films
• Watch films
• Explore humor in art--irony, satire, puns, etc.
• Show/Discuss art we like/that inspires us
• Explore ways mediums lend themselves to communicating certain things
• Stream of consciousness art
• Exploration of color--how it affects moods, etc. Would like to do an interactive exhibit with a different space for each basic color and observe how it affects people.

Please comment if you have any suggestions or additions to make. Next time (2/27), we will explore these a little further and do the collaborative piece we had planned for tonight.

supplemental ideas

i had some other ideas going home tonight from the arts group. they both involve a sort of series.

1. this one would be called "diagram of an explosion" or "diagram of a color explosion" and it would be diagrammed from several different angles and stages of the explosion, the final one being one looking straight on at it. the center/smallest part of the explosion would be purple and the rim/largest part of the explosion would be red.

2. this one would be called "words on moving objects: a study of buses, cars and people." the people one was the one i thought of first and the words on this piece/series would be taken solely from the signs homeless people who are begging on street corners, and would identify whether the statement was made by a female or male holding the sign. the buses one would be words from the big advertisements on the sides of buses and would identify what kind of bus the bus was--capital metro, ut shuttle, etc. and the cars one would be words taken from bumper stickers and would identify the kind of car it is.

the beginning

today amy and i talked about setting a date for the beginning of our arts group. here's some of our ideas:
1. start the group with a question like "what has impacted you this week?" or "what has influenced you this week?"
2. have it be a collaborative group, focused on creating a piece of art with a group
3. meet every other week
4. draw other creative people together to help inspire us with our own personal creative endeavors, in whatever medium that may be

looks like at this point we'll be starting a few weeks from now and alternating hosting the group.

we're hoping other people get on board with us and participate.

it also may or may not include going to shows together [!]

we're excited about starting this group and getting to be a part of a community of unpretentious and talented artists.