What is an Image (CS)

An image is anything visual that has been deliberately created, where the creation deals with composition, framing, or the deliberate lack of composition, etc. A painting is an image because it has been deliberately created or put together. A photo is an image because it has been deliberately composed or just framed (even a snapshot counts, because the photographer was still deliberately creating an image out of real life). Even a picture that exists only in your mind is still an image, because you have deliberately composed it.

It is a representation of something - it refers to something other than itself. A photo (image) refers to something that exists in the 'real world' (non-image). A painting is representative - either of something in real life, or of something in the artist's/viewer's mind. Even an image in your mind refers to something else - what it's 'real' counterpart is, or a description you heard, or whatever inspired the image.

This is a Forgery (CS)

My absolute favorite painting in the world is Monet's Water Lilies (the series of paintings at the Musée de l'Orangeries in Paris, in particular). There's something about the colors, the half abstractedness, the brushstrokes and blends and faint figuration/imagery that is really beautiful. Each painting is very similar, with just enough differences in color schemes and composition to make it unique. They are made all the more interesting because Monet did them when he was going blind, which is essentially an artist's worst fear - and yet he managed to turn it into this.

I don't have a favorite - I love all the paintings in the series an equal amount. I have a poster of one of them in my room (I picked it at random out of a pile, since I couldn't decide which was my favorite). My mother, who is as in love with them as I am, painted her own version, just as big, which is now displayed in our living room at home.

In my opinion, in this case, it's not the artist that is important, not the name or prestige associated with the name "Monet," but the painting itself - which is why I like my mother's version just as much as his. The beauty of the painting, which is why I like it, comes from the painting itself, never mind who painted it. So, that being said, to commit a forgery, I would just paint my own version, like my mother did. I wouldn't sign it with his name, as his name isn't important, and I wouldn't pass it off as his. (Does that mean it's not a forgery, if I admit I did it myself?) The only reason I would recreate it is so that I could have it for myself - I'm not interested in creating a forgery to make money or gain prestige or pull one over on the public. I'm only interested so that I can have one for myself, in my home, to look at whenever I want, because it's beautiful and visually pleasing to have. So I would create my own version and keep it, just simply because I like to look at it.

MANIFESTO 2012

To follow are 139 statements towards a working Manifesto by the members of Eye & Idea 2012.

PAY ATTENTION MOTHERFUCKERS

1. Curiosity is my inspiration. The class is the reason I took this class.
2. My work is about the suspense that comes with the loss of balance, and the resulting tales that come with the process of regaining equilibrium.
3. Balance is:
4. …About things in moderation.
5. …Things in various perspectives.
6. …Expensive Jordans and an unassuming gait on Erie Ave.
7. …Understanding nature, yet avoiding animals.
8. …Using both experience and knowledge to inform lines.
9. …Knowing when to hang it up.
10. Art is for the birds, flamboyant types, but I couldn’t stand to let it go, the craft, the gaggle, so they kept flappin’ until I ended up in Manhattan where all of the artists live.
11. Was it better the way it used to be,
12. When we could all speak telepathically,
13. With no need for science, religion, or math,
14. Because we knew everything, and knew not to ask?
15. «We are circling around in the night and are devoured by fire » : I have no time, I have no more time, I am the burn, and I am elsewhere. We do not have enough of one life to taste what this entire universe harbors, every opportunity must be ceased.
16. get it out of your head
17. look
18. digest
19. execute
20. mock
21. be kind
22. primal
23. artificial
24. mislead
25. misunderstand
26. misrepresent
27. not always a wall
28. multiple
29. Everyone interprets truth differently.
30. Believe in something.
31. Love someone.
32. Love something.
33. Eat healthy.
34. There are people who manipulate. Avoid these people.
35. Treat people with respect.
36. Everything ok?
37. Hey, are you back yet?
38. What’s up?
39. Are you alive?
40. What do you want to do?
41. What’s going on?
42. Where are you?
43. What do you mean, “I’m not sure?”
44. Why?
45. What is your reasoning?
46. What’re you doing tonight?
47. What the FUCK?
48. Where are you?
49. What do you want out of this?
50. Pay attention
51. Frustration is an opportunity
52. Become a ninja
53. Be ruthless about your intentions
54. Embarrass yourself
55. Wax
56. Notice what keeps you up at night
57. Appropriate the accident for your own intention
58. emancipation
59. alien
60. memory
61. mythology
62. Are you doing art work to satisfy yourself or please others?
63. One day, I’m angry at the world and decide to do whatever pleases me, weird, exotic, odd, and random.
64. Strangers pass by, cold, numb, without looking at me, without answering any questions, until I finally find out that word, that password, for any reaction----Pick a random one, say “I love you”, say “Je t’aime”, say “Te amo”.
65. Open the third door, I fell into the gap between times and places, a journey begins, different scenes are altering in front of me, until I catch the real one, the concrete one, something not an illusion.
66. Feel it.
67. I WANT TO MAKE THE KIND OF ART I WANT TO INHABIT. I WANT TO STOP STUMBLING OVER CONCEPTS I WANT TO MAKE A SPACE FOR CONCEPTS TO BREED AND MULTIPLY AND DISSOLVE.
68. I WANT TO MAKE ART TO GET STUCK IN. I WANT TO STICK YOU.
69. I WANT YOU FORGET I WAS EVER THERE AND GET LOST IN YOURSELF. I WANT YOU TO PUT YOUR EAR TO STONE & OPEN YOUR HEART TO THE SKY EXCEPT NOT AS ANNOYING.
70. Language is death. Art points beyond itself.
71. THAT BLIND FARMER ONCE TOLD SKI THAT CHORE BIGGEST CRIME STUCK
A RAISIN IN THE SHADE MY BRAVE LIT TIL ENGINE [TH] AT COULD [STOP] THE PARTY UP HIS RALLY [ING] HAND EDUCATION
TO FRUITION ON MY PARTION BE TWEENS LIKE TO SUCKLE AND CU DDLEPUDDLEPU BURP SNEEZE NO
72. The history of the present institution is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these artistic minds. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world. The Academy has refused enough freedom, the most wholesome and necessary for the artistic good.
73. Her Majesty
74. Trying to Not fall off of the back of bicycles..
75. This: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S2OdPDEG6aQ
76. Also This: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GHf7TD4qwjk
77. Also This: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ELxeSadruMI
78. Being Hilarious
79. Being Super F*cking Hilarious
80. Being Quiet. Chocolate Jesus. The Jerk. "You mean I'm gonna stay this color"
81. ONE LINERS
82. Everything about this. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AI8NuFAETMQ
83. It takes courage to follow one’s intuition and creativity but the rewards tend to be great. I like the sense of experimentation and collaboration in art. You can try something and fail or succeed, and look at the work of someone who had the same idea, and what they did with it: you’re never alone in your explorations.
84. Just need to learn to see it.
85. Photos - camera is eye.
86. No significant alterations though. (Where is the line drawn? Is there one?)
87. We all see things differently anyway. Who’s to say someone doesn’t already see it that way?
88. Closeups.
89. Me. For me.
90. Not creating - altering.
91. an event that is different from real life makes you think about "real life"
92. the opening as a performance, the exhibition is its afterlife and the objects are the artifacts
93. artist as producer, organizer, catalyst of object-making environment
94. MAKE 1 GOOD PAINTING
95. The object carries the story of how it was made but it is also beautiful, it can travel independently. The value of how it came to be is now inextricable from an object. So the object is a story.
96. the audience came freely but now they are trapped
97. CHOICE
98. lead me by the hand, spoon-feed it to me
99. "Trooping into her apartment as individuals, her subjects nonetheless left behind likenesses that formed groups along its walls and ultimately a crowd"
100. and then THAT happened
101. The way that you show it relates to the initial experience: if you were there, you know. if not you're still cool
102. אותי זה מעניין אז אותך זה יעניין
לא -- רק אותי זה מעניין. ואם אני רוצה שזה יעניין אותך אני צריכה לעניין אותך
103. Debris/piles of stuff/leftovers
104. Thigh Masters
105. Consumer Culture
106. Fabio, spokesman for fake butter
107. Reality TV
108. Disposable pop culture
109. Contradiction
110. Sweating to the Oldies
111. Amish livestock auctions
112. Interchanging Vowel Sounds
113. Whoever designs the packaging for generic laundry detergent
114. Plastic Surgery=New Media
115. Departures without arrivals
116. Unreal/ uncomfortable/ untrue
117. Eye sore
118. Eyeball
119. Delineate conditions of the seen
120. Absent arrivals
121. Looking and seeing
122. Modes of seeing
123. Is color that important?
124. Non-color dreams:
125. The continuous life span of found objects: object-hood
126. Found identity
127. Sexuality in excess
128. To Do / To Don’t Do:
129. Overanalyze
130. Overreact
131. Be stubborn
132. It’s not my fault
133. Learn to drive
134. Repeat mistakes
135. Be pissed
136. Forgive
137. Judge
138. Read literature
139. Let it go

Interior/Exterior (CS)

Political Image (CS)

Prompt 4: Change your world (CS)

I've always been intrigued by Greenberg's theory that abstract art is the 'purest' form of art. Whenever I feel like I'm lacking inspiration or even just creativity, which I'm always striving for, I try to see art in the world. I don't mean just looking at other artists (though I do that too), I mean trying to visualize art where I wouldn't normally see it. Lately I've been taking photographs of nature in an increasingly abstract way, whether it's a focus on just the texture, or the colors, or a close up of the details; I try to portray the nature as if it's an abstract image. (There should be an image attached - it's an example of what I'm talking about). This is a way for me to try and train my eye and my mind to be able to see see the potential for art everywhere and anywhere, so that hopefully I'll never run out of inspiration or creativity.

CS: There is Nothing to See So We Look

There is nothing to see here except some (STATIONARY) shapes and colors, but when you glance at one part of the image the others appear to be moving. But you know there is nothing actually there that is moving, so you look to try and see what exactly is going on - and as soon as you look, that section stops moving, while the one you just looked away from starts to move. Again, you know there is nothing actually there that is moving, but you look anyway, trying to find the source of the confusion, and the cycle repeats over and over. There is nothing to see, but you don't quite believe it, so you look.

What Happens? (CS)

I have never considered myself to be a person who becomes interested in sport, any kind of sport. So while a ping pong ball does flip a switch in my mind that makes me recognize that, "Oh, this is related to ping pong," this is about the extent of my thoughts. Ping pong holds no real meaning for me, no enticing draw, and I would glance past a ping pong ball immediately. It would not hold my eye at all.

I am also not American, and until recently I had never even seen a solo cup, let alone realized what it was for. Seeing a red cup, I would think, "Oh, there's a plastic red cup," and that's about it. I might consider a picnic, or some kind of school event with cheap plastic cutlery, for a brief second, but then I would move on - because, really, who spends time dwelling on the topic of plastic cups? It would have never occurred to me that a solo cup isn't just a plastic cup - in American culture, this red plastic cup is much more meaningful, it's a glaring signifier of a PARTY.


Separately, I would barely spare a second thought on either of these two items. Together, though, I know immediately what their relationship comes to mean. I may not be American, but I still know what beer pong is, and seeing these two objects together creates an automatic and instantaneous reaction in my mind: beer pong. These two objects are entirely unrelated, and yet they come together for this sole reason, which is why the reaction is instant - because it is the only possible reaction, the only possible conclusion that you could draw from placing them together. (At least, the only reaction any college student would have!) The pairing seem unlikely and random, but they fit perfectly together. If I was a real frat bro, I might even consider it fate.

Prompt 1 (CS)

I love raw nature, forests, giant waves, volcanoes, and so on, and at first I thought this was lava. It seemed like a beautiful photograph of a volcano, which I do like, but what really made me appreciate the image was finding out that it's NOT lava. It's nickel tailings, formed by industrial pollution and construction, and shows how man is completely changing the landscape around him. For me, art has always been primarily about aesthetics, which is why I like landscape photography - it's pretty, to put it simply. But this image is more than that, it's also a comment on industrialization and what we're doing to the world around us. I don't normally like political art, because I feel that most of it isn't visually/aesthetically pleasing, but this image somehow manages to combine both - it's strangely beautiful, but also has a message that I do agree with. We're changing the world and, though it may still look beautiful, like this photograph, the pretty colors are indicative of something very wrong.

















Edward Burtynsky, Nickel Tailings No. 34, Sudbury, Ontario, Canada, 1996