art21 video response

vija celmins

Vija Celmins is an artist who focuses on surface and detail, what she describes as "extremely detailed work." Her work is photorealistic and on display at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. In the video, Celmins talked about hating to abandon a work in progress no matter how frustrating or uncertain she may feel about it. I especially liked her painting of the night sky. When you look at it, there is so much depth you feel like you could get lost in it for a long time.

elizabeth murray

Elizabeth Murray is an action painter of "intense color and cartoony shapes." I thought it was interesting that Murray cited William de Kooning as an inspiration because when I saw her work his name came to mind. Murrary also offered the sentiment that "being an artist is one of the most impossible things in the world" and I strongly agree with that statement.

ann hamilton

Ann Hamilton's work was interesting because of the way in which she blended words and new media to create unique art. She represented America in the Venice Biennale, which I thought was interesting because she is not a representational artist. Her piece "Echo" for this show was really intriguing. Also, she named Wallace Stevens as an inspiration and I really like his poetry.

bruce nauman

I wasn't as interested in Bruce Nauman's work as I was in the previous artists. I think this was because the type of art that he creates is so extensive that it's hard to catalogue any of it in such a short segment. 

matthew barney

Matthew Barney was intriguing. His Cremaster film seems interesting but I'm not sure that I understand it. Also, I thought it was pretty cool that they shot part of it at the Guggenheim because that architecture is so awesome and unique, which seems to fit Barney's style. 

class response

Yesterday in class we looked at images and tried to talk about their meaning and connotations and stuff. The group of images I was looking at were all portraits. Two of them were advertisements. It occurred to me how different the pictures could be interpreted if they had words on them as opposed to being solely images. The first image in the set was pretty ambiguous, nearly all whited out with just the facial features showing. Once I got the idea about advertisements this image really stuck with me in a disturbing way. This girl could be the face of a skin care product. Or a crisis center. I'm not even sure that the face is a girl's face. 

The set of images that most interested me was the third set with all of the car pictures. I especially like the United Colors of Benetton advertisement with the car burning. I am really interested in the way advertisements manipulate people, in that it disturbs me. Not that I think that ad was trying to get people to set cars on fire, but that it is supposed to depict, like, what the brand stands for or against or the kind of image you'll have if you wear their clothes. Last semester, I was researching Iraq War protest art and I came across this series of posters. It would be an image of an Iraqi civilian crying or showing some kind of very negative, victimized emotion and then there would be one word like "Liberated" and then in the corner a green tab with the words "United States of America." I knew it was using the Benetton logo but I didn't realize that the store used to advertise with images like these. In context, it's as if the Iraq War images are saying that if you're part of the United States of America, this is what you stand for and this is your image. 

shu lea cheang

Shu Lea Cheang is an experimental new media artist. She works with combinations of video, photography, and what she calls "net-based installation" art. Cheang's work often confronts different sociopolitical issues, primarily including ones of gender and sexuality. Her most prominent works belong to the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis and the Guggenheim collections.

This particular piece is called "Brandon." Cheang was commissioned by the Guggenheim to create this piece of new media art based on the life of Teena Brandon, a transsexual who, in 1993, was raped and murdered because of her sexuality. "Brandon" can be found here. The viewer first sees the image of a baby becoming a woman becoming a man, which is a literal allusion to Brandon's life. When the viewer, clicks on the morphing image, the curser can be moved around the screen to illustrate different images relating to transsexuality, and more specifically, Teen Brandon.

As the curser is dragged around the screen, the images continue to change. It is unsettling and the viewer feels confronted or targeted. Phrases from newspaper headlines like "she's a he," "killed for," "romance," "all," "exposure," and "rage" make the narrative undeniably human and from there common. That the viewer can relate to the art is what is most disturbing and sad about the way in which Cheang has portrayed Teena Brandon's tragedy.

hello hello

these are mario clouds

cory arcangel