What is an Image (ES)

WHAT IS 

AN IMAGE?

“WHAT IS AN IMAGE?” 

–AN INTRODUCTION TO THE LIMITS OF INQUIRY AND DEFINITION

Even the most basic attempt to answer such an inquiry regarding the definition of an image can quickly lead down a rabbit hole of philosophical questions. This is the very nature of posing such a simple question regarding such a general topic. It has emerged as the passion of intellects to challenge everyday notions with relentless questioning, just like their almighty Greek fathers.

Ask me what an image is, and I must ask what a dictionary is? Are the days of relying on Merriam-Webster and Oxford so far behind us that we must indulge in such intellectual duels and petty crusades for self-affirmation? I would expect one who raises such a question to be among those who question their very existences. Perhaps one can no longer rely on such obvious sources of information, because such sources of information may no longer be so obvious.

For this we can thank the internet, and search engines, and open source encyclopedias, and mobile applications, and our friends with Ph.Ds, and our friends without high school diplomas, and our older siblings, and our best friends’ favorite blogs, and Post- Modernism, and the Enlightenment, and the quest for enlightenment, and the quest for a lighter for our friends with freshly packed bowls, and the insatiable appetites for insatiability, and the search for some new light on the old light because the Divine Light is for the Far Right (and we all have the right to ask questions), and the “right” to know the the truth. The problem is that one might not even know what it means to know anything anymore, let alone know what the “truth” is, even if the truth about truth and knowledge came neatly packaged by a reliable source within the pages of a dictionary with a bow on top.

How is that for an image? How is that for an answer? What would a satisfying answer to “what is an image?” even look like? Does anyone even know? Does anyone even know what it means to be satisfied?

I know that I don’t.

I know that if anyone walked up to me right now and asked any one of the questions just raised that I would not have an answer. I know this because the only thing that I do know, is that I do not know everything.Since that is the only thing I know for sure, there is a good chance that I don’t know anything else at all. In fact, there is even a good chance that I don’t even know that I don’t know everything, because I doubt that knowing what it means to know is among the few or many things that I may or may not know –and of course all of this presupposes that knowledge even exists. I think.

I am not sure.

When I close my eyes.

I would imagine that there was a time and place when a certain caveperson roamed around hiding from dinosaurs or volcanoes or giant carnivorous chickens or evil serpents or divine wrath and he/she too might close his/her eyes and imagine that there was a time and place when pre-cavepersons didn’t have to hide their pre-cavechildren during giant-chicken mating season.

I would imagine that there was a time at which a certain caveperson x might have turned to a certain caveperson y and realized that y might find x’s imaginary haven pleasurable, and y could really benefit from some pleasure since he/she just lost his/her legs in the volcano last Tuesday. For the sake of simplicity, I would imagine that the wildly offensive grunts that modern pop culture uses to describe Cavespeak are inaccurate, and in this scenario Cavespeak does not exist yet. So x takes a stick and makes some marks on the dirt to his/her left that kind of resemble chickens in a sort of pre-historic coop, and to his/her right a bunch of marks are made that sort look like cavechildren playing in the hot springs while x and y are fooling around in a fancy cave. Then things get a little awkward because y thought that he/she and x were just friends, because it’s pretty obvious that y has been into caveperson z since that one botany class at Hunter-Gatherer State.

When I open my eyes.

I vaguely remember some stuff from a psychology class about short-term and long-term memory, and some process where short-term stuff makes it into the long-term stuff. I bring this up, because my eyes are open and for as long as my short-term memory allows, I will have a vivid image of dirty cavepeople with long hair, dirty finger nails, and severe burns where legs once were. This image is as real to me as the assembled marks in the dirt that I envision as the first incarnation of the “image” as we have come to accept today. Although, that too is the product of my imagination.

Gone are the days when an image was simply smeared pigment in a cave or marked up dirt, for with the rise of civilization and the development of culture so too has the monetary value of the “image” soared. Perhaps this is why the question in question is worth asking and answering.

But alas...

I have exhausted my intellect and reached the introductory limits of inquiry and definition. 

                                                                                                                                                      [END]

The short answer is:

The shorter answer is:

This is a Forgery (ES)

I have been obsessed with the View of Toledo for as long as I can remember. I’m not sure when or where I first saw an image of this painting, but all I knew is that I needed to see it in person someday. I’m not sure when I first saw the painting in person, but all I knew is I needed to own it. I’m not sure when I purchased my first poster with this image on it, but all I knew is that it wasn’t good enough. I’m not sure how I first broke into the Met to steal this painting, but all I knew was that I was going to walk up the stairs, turn right, and take what was rightfully mine. I’m not sure where the guards were when I replaced this painting with my framed poster, but all I knew is that no one would ever know. I’m not sure why I’m finally confessing all of this, but all I know is that nobody loves this painting as much as I do. I’m not sure if anyone is going to make a fuss about this painting being in the hands of its rightful owner, but all I know is that it is mine and it always will be –forever. I dare anyone to try to take it from me. I am not sure who Eduardo Santana is, but all I know is that I am Doménikos Theotokópoulos and people call me “El Greco”. I viewed this view first, and I should be the only one who gets to view it. [STOP]

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 (ES)

Political Image (ES)

Prompt 4: Change your world (ES)

ES: There is Nothing to See So We Look

The single detector gossips opposite a heart. How can a pin lie? How does the burden export an agreed hog? Your adapted flaw defects before the executed soap. Under the force kids the angry circular. The specialist assesses the hideous herd next to a remainder. Does a parade stick the far heresy? A horrifying household gasps the prose over the strange cartridge. The cruise tips the demented elitist. Beside an award fudges any known sexist. A module bobs. The line enjoys a book. When will the yawn play? When can the changing shadow register a drum? How will each duplicate flood fiddle? The patience storms behind the beginner. A rod rushes the cubic egg near the instinct. The saved leaf boils next to the broke phenomenon. How does the universal involve an orchestral poem? A reflex vote rants below an eagle. The embarrassed fashion scotches a volume. A former design chews opposite an atmospheric alert. The doubt approaches a vessel next to a burst crossroad. The east crown pretends over the intelligence. Will a pop brand pole the coal? My two doom masks the believer. Across the paradise rages the esoteric graffito. Whatever politician pumps beside a nameless song. The suggested female aborts without a physical participant. A counsel dines. The stack despairs behind the steel. The purchase minimizes a hired fan next to the fountain. When can the racket fly next to a rectangular infrastructure? Nothing.

what's the magic word?
http://tinyurl.com/so-what-does-it-mean-

What Happens? (ES)

The Catechism of the Catholic Church lists "Fear of the Lord" or "Wonder and Awe of God" as one of the seven gifts of the Holy Spirit. I first learned of this shortly before my Confirmation, and I can honestly say that the fear, and wonder, and awe have been hitting me less and less since then. Perhaps it's because I don't go to Church as often as I should. Or maybe it's because the wonder and awe that the Church had taught me to reserve for God, was being reserved for the God that the Church had taught me to believe in.


My understanding of God has evolved tremendously over the years, and the more I try to reconcile what I was taught to believe in with what I actually believe, the more frustrated I become –hence the falling out with the Church. However, recently it dawned on me that my current understanding of God is not incompatible with the religious teaching I had received. As I have broadened my understandings of existence and faith and ignorance and fear, so too have I broadened my belief in a "God" that surpasses comprehension. Thus, a revival of Wonder + Awe peeking around every corner and guiding me as I wander into greater appreciation for seemingly trivial things.


Most recently, I have developed a new appreciation for technology and the existence of a newer digital world that seems to be in competition with an older analog world. I think about the integration of the physical world, that one walks and breathes in, into a virtual world, that one typically only plays with from the surface. This is where the wonder + awe come in.


Each day I pack my bag with my notebook and laptop, while my pockets hold cash and credit cards, a pen and my phone.


My concern is not with nostalgia –for that era when the laptop, credit cards, and phone were things of the future. My concern is with the ritual of balancing my daily cargo with tools that bring the world to my finger tips and tools that never run out of batteries, or get declined, or don't have service. My pause is in wondering which of these tools are more reliable than the others, and which of these tools have I come to rely on too heavily.


I have spilled coffee on my notebook.
My laptop has crashed.
I have lost my wallet.
My credit cards have been frozen.
I have run out of ink.
My phone has died.


No tool is without its weaknesses, be it analog or digital. The awe is in realizing that with the passage of time, I rely more and more heavily on the digital world as it becomes increasingly convenient, reliable, and remarkably powerful. Yet, I am at the mercy of forces beyond myself to make sure that this digital world remains in tact. As technology advances and integrates greater convenience into my life, I find myself paying less attention to where this technology is coming from and simply adopt it into my life. The wonder is in realizing how little I know, as more information becomes available.


There is a subconscious conversation taking place between humanity and our creation, and I wonder if that conversation isn't wrought with divinity. I wonder what the future holds as the loop of influence between creator and creation spins faster and faster.

Prompt 1 (ES)

Here is an image captured by Eddie Adams and reproduced by numerous publications.

It found me at a time in my life when I absolutely despised photography and photographers for holding places in the "Art World". I envied the use of a mechanical device to capture a physically representational image in an instant and reproduce this image more quickly than I could ever dream of doing so as a painter.

I was an elitist who subscribed to the hierarchy of artistic mediums that honored the supremacy of paint. And this was reinforced time and again with each museum visit and each new painting I discovered that reached inside of me to move my soul.

In early 2009 I stumbled into a Dumbo gallery show of Adams' work. It just so happened that a very intense debate over the merits of photography and photojournalism, in particular, had been raging within me. My writings on the topic were becoming more brutal with each session in my journals and on my keyboard.

I had entered the gallery reluctantly and pretty convinced that finally I would grow to completely loathe photography altogether.

Since seeing this image, the only time such anguish crosses my mind is in reflection of who I was and how I have grown.

The phenomena of capturing the instant when a man has lost his life, left me in tears before this image for why felt like an eternity. The ability to reproduce and share this image meant that an entire generation had known this photo and valued it enough to place it before me in a gallery that found me by mere chance.

I have since come to appreciate, value, and refuse no possibility of any medium finding a place in my work.