Day Five

Day Five

The MOMA and the Whitney

Well. I was correct in my assumption that I would forget a lot of things if I didn't write this blog right away. I was so exhausted when I got back that I slept for two days and then started class. Oh well. Lets begin and maybe it will come back to me.

I thoroughly enjoyed the Jeff Wall exhibit. It seems strange yet familiar that at the end of my college career I seem to know more, or at least be aware of more artists than I thought. A year ago I couldn't have told you who Jeff Wall even was, and all of a sudden I show up in New York with a college degree in art and I'm like "oh right. Jeff Wall. I know about that guy." It's like all those art history classes actually did something for me! It really made me confident that, contrary to what my dad and step mom believe, I've actually gotten something out of the last 7 years. It made me proud of myself. Feeling knowlegdable about all sorts of artists, from 6th cent. b.c to the present, is wonderful. Awakened to the idea that I learned more than I thought. When it happens I feel like I did the right thing. Made the right choice. The path I'm walking down must be the right one.

The same thing happened when I saw the Pipilotti Rist video. I felt really good that I had already seen this video several times. Like I'm up to date on what's going on in the world of art. I often feel like I don't know anything. It's nice to be proven wrong sometimes :)

I saw a lot of art on this day. It was one of those overwhelming experiences. Of course it didn't help that Nathan and I sat in the cafe for over an hour, not realizing time was passing us by, and then had to practically run through 2 floors of the MoMa trying to see a bunch of stuff we'd missed. I went straight for Starry Night, had Nathan take a picture, and that was that. Off to the Whitney.

I had a similar experience, time-wise, in the Whitney. I was terribly exhausted so I decided that I wasn't going to waste anymore time looking at anything that I didn't feel was relevent or interesting to me. So I went straight to the video art and found a movie/video in progess and sat down to watch it. It was freaking amazing. To say the least. I hope I can make something that good one day. The video was called "Dial H-I-S-T-O-R-Y" and was made by a guy name Johan Grimonprez. It consisted of what appeared to be all found footage that he probably pulled straight off an internet archive. Maybe not. But it was 90 percent old footage, beginning in the 70's, that related to the onset of airplane terrorism and hijacking. The video intertwined footage of the newly commercial airline industry and the security measures that undoubtably followed as this new mode of transportation was now also a new mode of terrorism. There was also footage of interviews from hostages, plane crashes, presidents, and much more.

Now that I think about it, this piece makes me worry that my own work is far too trivial. I make personal pieces about myself and my family and they almost always tend to be melodramatic. They never encompass some bigger picture like war, or terrorism, or politics. It makes me feel a little shallow and selfish, I guess, that I can't seem to see outside my own little world. Or that I think my own life is so damn interesting that I need to document it for people to see.

I came into the video about a third of the way in and it was a 68 minute video. What I'm getting at is I spent my entire time at the Whitney watching this one video. But it was worth it.

Day Four

Day Four

I'm going to come back to this day because I've only got 20 minutes and 37 seconds left on the computer and I'd rather write about day 5.

Day Three

Day Three

The Dia: Beacon

Well. I don't really like minimalist art. I enjoyed a piece by Gerhard Richter, it consisted of giant reflective panels. It was very calming. I turned on my headphones and just sat there for a good amount of time and stared at the things being reflected in the mirror like panels.. windows.. the room.. myself, etc. I am very interested in how people make such grandiose objects/art, like how did this person craft these?

Then I saw Nathan and he told me there was Warhol in the gallery and my jaw hit the floor. I went immediately to that room and almost lost my composure. In fact.. if I hadn't had my dark eye makeup on I probably would have started crying. Andy Warhol is one of my idols. For two reasons. 1 - he represents every shallow desire I have inside myself that I try to hide. He doesn't hide his and I love it. Try as I might to supress the desire to be shallow I find myself wanting to embrace it more and more. 2 - He is truly a multimedia artist. He did it all. Painting, photography, film, etc. And is surrounded by movie stars and high fashion personalities. I made myself a playlist of all the songs I had on my ipod that came out when he was popular.. or close.. which was only about 7 songs and just sat on the gallery bench and absorbed everything I could. Songs included America by Simon and Garfunkle, Here comes my baby by Cat Stevens, Oh Yoko by John Lennon, I'll Stand by You by the Pretenders, Wish You Were Here by Pink Floyd, and Space Oddity by David Bowie. Not that Andy Warhol would endorse any of those songs.. too bad I didn't have any Velvet Underground.. I think that's the band he was associated with anyway. I also put Soul Asylum's "Misery" on the play list.

I also enjoyed the John Chamberlin piece. So far it is the piece that I feel the strongest connection to. But not in the sense of the craft.. seeing as how I am not a sculptor. It was particularly a quote that I liked - He said he was drawn to scrap metal because "it was free and plentiful" Just as I am drawn to making video stories about human nature and emotion.. I think I like human nature and emotion because they are plentiful, free, and they appeal to me.

Day Two

Man I'm so tired. I've only been here to three days and had very little sleep. Writing blogs right now is so hard because I feel as though I should be catching up on sleep or out seeing ny. Anyway.. on with the blog

Day Two

I just remember that I wanted to talk about these performing artists in the subway. They were a group of four breakdancers and they were so cool I couldn't believe my eyes. I will post a video of them.. or a link to the video and you can see for yourself. Unfortunately I cut it off before the coolest guy came out :(

Alright.. Brooklyn. My favorite place so far. I could really see myself living there.

I'm too tired to talk about the visit to David Kramer's studio so I'm just going to make a note of it and come back to it later.

I wasn't too impressed with the galleries we went to. Not unimpressed.. but not impressed either. Except by one artist whose name I can't seem to find if I wrote it down or not.. let me look.. nope.. too bad. Maybe Nathan has it.

Day One

Day One.

Arrived at the hostel at 10:36 (ish) after a red eye flight, on which I got only an hour and half of sleep. Suck it up I told myself. You are in freaking New York City and it never sleeps, or so I hear. Pulled myself together after a great breakfast and off we went for my first experience on the ny subway. Very efficient mode of transportation. I can't believe the ingeniousness of the schedule and the use of underground space.

Our first stop was Sculpture Center. There were a couple of pieces that I really enjoyed. The plexiglass/lighting installation was amazing. I was also very intrigued by the video piece by Garrett Ricciard and Ross Cisneros "Etheric Project" This was a rear projection video installation that involved a 2d/3d composite and a track built to look like the ramp of a rollercoaster ride.

After that we made a quick stop, or what was a quick stop for most, to a place called the 5 points.. not the original 5 points I don't think, where the entire block was covered in the most amazing graffiti that I've ever seen. 5 story high buildings, fire hydrants, sidewalks... all covered. and this isn't the petty vadalistic tags you see in eugene and portland. These people knew what they were doing. I'll never look at pathetic graffiti in the same light again. While standing outside I was approached by a man in jeans and a leather jacket. He hesitated to talk to me but then after I smiled at him he came over. He told me that he was an artist with a conundrum(sp?) and if I might be interested in helping him solve said conundrum. I said "probably" and he proceeded to tell me that he need to take photographs of his wearable sculptures and his photographer never showed.. so he needed to take them himself and find someone else to wear the suit and that I was small enough to fit in it. I said sure but as I walked past Nathan I motioned that he needed to come with me on this escapade. Like a good friend he did and it ended up that the guy liked him better and asked him to do it. Which I didn't mind because apparently it involved being in your underwear which I would have probably said no to. When I get home I'll post the pictures. Or you can find him online - and see pictures of Nathan - his name is Jason Hackenwerth.

That done we headed to PS1. Which I thought was a good choice for our first day. I really enjoyed the work of Vik Muniz, Senam Okudzeto, Peter Caine, Jonas Mekas (who had video of one of my favorite idols, Martin Scorsese) and Meridith Allen. I'd say my favorite was Vik Muniz who had amazing photographs of all his work (which is mostly collage sculpture of random materials that seem to have absolutely no connection to each other.) I read a great quote from artist Stepfan Eins "coincidence takes place necessarily. If coincidence takes place necessarily then nothing is a coincedence"

Lastly went to dinner, then drinks, then moved locations.. then more drinks.. then home to the hostel