christine + ism

i went to school today to work on Printmaking and whilst working, my friend MattSatch mentioned that he had 4 tickets to the opening of the art gallery.  as a result, we ended up going with Emily and Hannah at 6:30 after eating a yummy wrap from Bad Ass Jack’s on 109th.

the art gallery is so fantastic, it makes me feel so happy.  i forgot i was even in this lame city and somewhere much more fabulous and i plan on getting a membership so that i can come and go whenever i want without paying to see different exhibitions.  

I got to finally see “The Little Dancer, Aged Fourteen”, a sculpture by Edgar Degas that i am absolutely in love with, and I got to see “The Dream of the Reason Produces Monsters” by Francisco Goya which inspired the piece by Cardiff & Bures Miller called “The Murder of Crows”.  it was all so amazing and i can’t wait to go back.

so the hotel we are staying at is called Park Central and it’s located in Manhattan!  so excited!!  and the design conference is being held at Parson’s!!

they met at the U of A while completing their degrees in this artistic field (Cardiff has a masters in visual arts).  Liz Ingram mentioned how she also met her husband the same way and then hinted to us all that the same would happen to us. i may have already met my constant and i don’t even know it yet.

Janet Cardiff & George Bures Miller are very cool people, and have very cool ideas.  a lot of their work mostly deals with the combination of audio and visual things, our senses, our perception of things, and then messing with it and challenging it.  i thought a lot of it was brilliant.  but i could not help but be more amazed with the process and work that was carried out to reach the end result. it made me think of art class and how Sheri said that a lot of the time the true art is the process and the end result is merely just a representation of the process.  

i understand this and mostly think it’s true, but as the talk went on, i noticed how much more mechanical and technical they’re installations became (to the point where robotics were involved) and i found myself not enjoying it as much.  it became too chaotic and too artificial and although the artificiality was not something they tried to avoid, and knowing it is still qualified as art, something about it made me feel uncomfortable.  

and perhaps this kind of reaction is the end result they were looking for but i can’t help but think that just like science and math, art can have a formula as well.  this formula, in a nutshell, is go big or go home.  

create something with 1,000 lightbulbs instead of 100 lightbulbs.  make it 20 feet high instead of 2 feet high.  my art teacher for two semesters liked to grill this into our heads and it sort of became something to mock after class was through.  want a successful sculpture or installation?  disguise the material being used.  suggestions?  dip it in wax, spray paint it all one color, cover it in hot glue.  there is a real formula to all of this artificiality deemed as art. 

they ended their talk with a question & answer session, where someone had asked for a few hints as to what their exhibition consisted of for the opening of the Art Gallery of Alberta.  i was easily zoning out at this point due to lack of sleep and long hours at school but when i heard them say “we wanted to have 1000 speakers but settled for 98”, my thoughts went back to art class and that joke of a formula that Sheri tried to instill in us for two semesters and i couldn’t help but really really resent the fact that maybe she was right.  

looking up and down the platform i felt a real anxiousness and frustration waiting for the train 

for once

and then i saw someone looking just as anxious, 

but not anxious. i had just seen him before.  the train came, and i followed him through the doors.  we 

sat back to back.  he followed me out, down the stairs to the left up the ramp 

me to my car, him to his.  he followed me to the intersection

we were side by side on the highway.  he turned left and i turned right. 

i think i’ve served him coffee before, and i think i felt the same way about him then as i did tonight. 

You’re bound to be focusing a lot of energy and attention on your romantic relationships today, and any romantic encounters should prove to be very rewarding right now. If you’re not already involved, you could be getting ready to allow new love into your life. And it should be a good day to take a few chances.

You should find that you’ll have a very confident and optimistic attitude today. You may be eager to have some more interesting experiences in your life, and you’re bound to benefit from trusting your heart right now. You should also try to take some time to pay attention to any creative impulses you might be having at this time.

that i’m going to dedicate each month to a certain director, and watch all their best movies in that month.  

starting with February and Martin Scorsese

i spent most of the movie trying to articulate my thoughts and feelings about the human race and how completely dead we are.

but on another level, how completely un-dead we are, to have the capabilities to create such beautiful things to help us understand and learn things we might not have figured out without these manifestations. 

my mind was completely blown and movies like this make me 100% believe that the film industry can change the world.

You need to realize that you probably have a lot more control over things than you might think right now. You may find yourself encountering a few delays at this time, but these can always be used to rethink a few things.

basically, project 1 in Design 394 is create 3  15cmx20cm layouts (1 color, 2 black&white) for each of the following:

-only type

-textually dominant

-visually dominant

-visually and textually balanced

so in total, 12 layouts, and the images can be photo-manipulated and cropped but have to be from the same single photo of our choosing of 24 photos we shot specifically for this project. the inspiration?  a quote that we drew out of a hat on the first day of class.  my quote was “Pity the meek for they shall inherit the earth.” -Don Marquis

 here’s what i have so far…

i did schoolwork for 13 hours non-stop today.  plus an hour on the train in the morning when i finished reading Fight Club, the first book i’ve successfully completed in about 2 years.  i feel really good at my accomplishments today and i am excited to work just as hard the next two days.  

then i can breathe,

for about a day anyways

this too shall pass

You might prefer to spend a little time alone today if you can, and you could find yourself coming up with a few interesting and creative new ideas before the day is through.

and my homework, woohoo!

when i think about it,  i feel so lucky to be surrounded by so many amazing people

next Halloween