Artest statement

I'd rather be taking photos right now.

Art proposal

Color is something that I always pay close attention to in my work. It’s presence or absences from a piece can have a profound impact its mood, contrast and subject matter. In my photography I typical choose to leave color out of my images. I feel it can take away from the subject and I enjoy the aesthetics of a black and white image. I find my paintings really benefit from use of color but I can’t help but feel a detachment from my paints and the actual subject I’m painting. For my next project I hope to bridge this gap between the colors of my subjects and the paint on my canvas.

Since early cave painting humans have been painting from their surroundings. I hope to recreate this act of painting with what is naturally around me but with a twist, using my subjects themselves. If there is a spilled package of Ketchup in the image then it will be squirted on the canvas. If there happens to be bird crap on a rock then it will get smeared onto the image. Some subjects simply will not rub off on the canvas and these I will use as a sort of pallet knife. The goal of this project is to have a bit of reality rub off on something that is a creation of our minds and a struggle of our hands.

            

            

Table

300 dollars and 12 hours of strait wood working later I finally have finished my table. I'm very pleased with the results aside from the table top not being very functional. It will support a fare amount of coffee mugs but Im still worried about feet and heavier objects. I really like how the stepping down effect came out. I played around with grain, thickness of wood and distance from the top and I think they came together nicely. A last minute addition with the little support beam really helps attract your eye to the top of the piece and then step down from there. The concept of having the most dominant piece of the table being the glass I feel was also a success. 

Painting

I'm wrapping up my painting class this week and I finally made a painting I'm happy with. We were supposed to paint outside but due to bad weather we were stuck painting donuts in the classroom. I was a little bored at painting it accurately and chose to step outside of my comfort zone and portray how I saw it. It looked like this discussing ring of fat that I could only see Homer Simpson liking. I painted it with the gross details I saw in it and added sickly green frosting. To drive the point home I knifed in a pink back drop that I ended up filling in but is not pictured.

BFA exhabition

The UNH museum is currently exhibiting the works of the graduating BFA students. I was really psyched on everyones art especial the painters. Not to say that the photos and woodworking was by any means bad just that the paintings really kept running through my head long after I left the show. It also wasn't a result of the majority of the pieces being painting it was just that they were stronger pieces. It seemed like the woodworking and photo was a result of allot of problems and dealing with them anyway they could and struggling. The paintings appeared like they successfully put their ideas on the canvas the way they desired. It really made me think more about the mediums that I choose being a photographer I have to use some sort of reality and it can be restraining. 

ICA boston field trip

Hanging Fire by Cornelia Parker stood out as my favorite piece at the ICA. It is an amazing 3 dimensional collection of suspended charcoal. When one first enters the room its exhibited in its beauty commands your attention and it consumes the room forcing the viewer to examine it more closely. It almost appears to be a charcoal drawing with the jet black pieces of wood against the brilliantly white backdrop of the wall. Then some more sinister meanings seem to drift through my thoughts as charcoal is often a somber sight seen on the ground. It is juxtaposed and organized as though it is still a fire with the larger pieces at the base. By doing this she successfully brings weight to something that should have none. Something destroyed but brought back to life by suspension. This maybe even a study of how so many artist used this piece of death and destruction in charcoal drawings to create something again. Its subtitle Suspected Arson and that she stole the charcoal from a crime scene also works with this theme.

Bandsaw box

After spending 15 of the last 24 hours in the wood shop I'm very happy to say that I've completed my first woodworking assignment. Creating a bandsaw box uses a different process then I am accustomed to. With a bandsaw box its is an almost entirely subtractive process. This meant that any messups would be very hard to fix and turned out to be really stressful. It also allows for allot more freedom in creating curves and unique shapes. I decided to create a sort of 50's fridge style box. I wanted something clean, functional and simple. The idea also works with the way I approach photography, which is taking something real and bending it a little and somehow making it surreal. With my box I made it appear as though the doors would swing open but really they slide out and have a strange curved wall. I also was attracted to the idea of a static fridge that will last forever like the ones of the 50's but juxtaposed  in creating it with a very organic and perishable substance like wood. I took the concept of the fridge and twisted it a little and used more of the characteristics that I found interesting and successful aspects of the design. One being making three doors instead of two. This created another round spaced along the side between the doors create a nice repeating bubble form.