Walk #4 Cocooned vs Engaged

Listen to this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XgP5Q9vZal8

I took the following with my IPhone

Trestles.

I pressed play.

Jonsi- Indian Summer

I walk this trail a lot. It's one of my favorite places, if not my favorite place to surf. However, this spot is ridden with people, its an extremely popular place to surf. The waves are great and the walk down puts you into another world. Much of it is unchanged from even 40 years ago when people first started surfing the break.

While I listened to my song, it was hard for me not meditate. I really blocked much of everything out. A small lizard even hit my foot as I turned the corner, I was really in my own world. The terrible thing is that I usually like to do this. Plug in the music, zone out and watch the world. Whenever I'm photographing by myself I tend to listen to music. When I was in Europe last summer its half of what I did.

The world looks different. Physical colors begin start conversation with the music. I find a strong connection to color and tonality, music tonality that is. Greens and blues generally put me in a meditative state. I guess that's why I find a lot, and why a lot of other people, fine solace in the ocean.

Jonsi is an Icelandic artist and is inspired by the Grandeur of Iceland. It translates. I begin to look up. I see the open air and the ground that is dwarfed by it. I'm reminded of my brother in New York. The skyscrapers, the lack of natural grandeur. The steel. The smelly smell. Though it is not the golden hour. My music puts a strong filter to the mid day sun. My eyes see what my brain feels. Blue, Green, Brown with the filter of a warm Van Gogh yellow.

Walk #2 Desired Lines

"No U turn".

Fuck.

I missed my turn and now it was taking me into a neighborhood.

I drove a little and saw a good spot to turn around. But then to my left I saw a gate that led to where I wanted to go all along.

It's interesting when you set out to do something and the world directs you to the contrary, somewhere, where your out of the control zone, the sphere of a plan, a set path, the so called desired line.

The Back Bay in Newport Beach is probably one of my favorite places to take a walk. Environmentalists have pretty much established their ground here, most of it is untouched and will remain to be. I like it that way. Paths and trails are usually created from the winter rain drain off. Small narrow lines pepper the ground, acting like a bike tire had flattened them on a soggy day.

It was around sundown, and if your ever thinking about hiking around here, just like mostly anywhere, this is the time to go. The idea of the golden hour really comes to play in this space. The amount of green and blue really begins to play. It's quiet. A gentle breeze comes through the bay. The smells. The smell of strong california leaves consumes the area. Sage. Basil. Lavender. All those come to mind.

Before I began to walk, a small family, well a dog, a mom, a dad and baby all were beginning to go on a walk. They left their car door open. I closed it after they left(and no I didn't take anything).

It felt like Australia. Back Bay feels like it did, I mean, I didn't live in California, nor was I alive 25 years ago, but if I could say it, this place feels like it was 25 years ago. My focus is blurred beyond a certain point. Cars, houses, planes, they all become a part of an idea and not a reality when I'm out here. They're blurred. The only clear thing to me is the ground beneath me and the sound that my boots makes when it hits the course dirt.

I went off trail a couple of times. The brush gave me a couple of friendly cuts and I was reminded of the time when I got poison oak behind my house. The strong smelly odor of the green gunk. Frogs. Cranes. Seagulls. A large Pelican began to fly. Then it dove splashing into the water. Every minute here began to unveil something new. As the sun began to go down, the Back Bay's curtain came up.

Project #2 Option #2 Inside/Outside the "scene"

This project is inspired by both Style Wars and a "missing dog" post that could have been found throughout the school of art in the past 2-3 months. It's not that I don't like dogs, I love dogs and think that everyone of them needs a home, but it was the post throughout the school that concerned me, or yet amused me. It's perfectly straight and illuminated face, set in front of a sunburst Arizona sunset all seemed so odd to me. Maybe a sidewalk could have been better, something a little more about the dog and not about an alternate story that my mind might make up. It looked like a Wes Anderson movie still or something. Though the posting could have been completely legitemate, my experience led me to believe otherwise.

Throughout my time growing up as a young adult, it has been hard for me to understand that everyone in the world has their own concerns, their own dreams, their own possessions of whom they care about that no one else does. I just always thought it confusing that if you saw a homeless person on the street, why wouldn't someone give him a home? It was hard for me, and it still troubles me. I find a great deal of irony in the push and pull of what is and isn't appropriate.

In posting my missing chap-stick to craigslist I am not only addressing my reaction to both the world around me and their own concerns, but also of my own life. (My possessions, my car, my life, maybe even if I had a dog(but I don't) etc). In creating a completely hyperbolic situation, I'm attempting to break the social construct of what is and isn't appropriate. (Who would in real life post a missing chapstick... I know I lose them all the time, I usually just buy another one) Like my reaction to the posting of the missing dog, I hope to have the viewer find the missing chap-stick to be odd, ironic and maybe even amusing. All in all, I would like to point out the irony of it all and that there is, generally, something wrong with how we view ourselves and the world around us, I included.

Here is the post: http://orangecounty.craigslist.org/com/2408397297.html

Style Wars Response

When I was younger, my sister would write her name, Kelly, over everything. She still does. The infatuation with her name not only gave her the reassurance that “Kelly Green” not only stood as color but also the “cutest” color. (She had an infatuation with wallets and what not with the color, it continues today). She took pride in her name and let everyone know. Her name became a symbol. As I continued to see the name Kelly and the color green, I quickly developed a brand, something more local than the marketing of Coca-Cola, but yet just as powerful. As a little boy, I was confused, sometimes angry. My manila envelope filled with the weekly news in my 2^nd grade class to my mother was tagged on both the back and the front with a delicately and artistically rendered version of the name Kelly. It was not only an art, but also an obsession to my sister. I don’t even know if she could tell you why she did. She just liked doing it.

“Graffiti...is not an art…Graffiti is the application of a medium to a surface. Is that an art form? I don’t know, I’m not an art critic. But I sure as hell can tell you that that is a crime…” said detective Burny Jacobs. Hell, if I didn’t believe in artists like Banksy, Shepard Fairy or any other contemporary street artists I might have an easy time agreeing with the detective. However, isn’t the “application of a medium to a surface” apply to most art throughout time, isn’t that, from what I’ve been taught at the basic level, art? Isn’t it an expression of the individual? It can sure as hell get me mad that my sister tagged my folder and that New York City youth ruined half of Manhattan’s rail system because of a personal expression. I’d say that both my sister and the New York City youth dealt with a similar problem. I believe that both the physical and metaphorical vehicle for which they both expressed themselves was and is partially incorrect and that in the time between 1982 and now, vehicles like the internet, student galleries and liberal publications has allowed for the younger generation, one who is interested in a jazz-like, bop form of expression to bring their symbol and voice to the world.

Today’s “graffiti artists have taken the form and idea of street art into a proper and more appropriate space. I’m not saying that vandalism is acceptable is appropriate, but I do believe that the symbols and ideas that the artists now today are expressing are far more advanced and developed than those in the short film ‘Style Wars’.

Banksy may be the most respected street artist today. He has turned what even I found unattractive in earlier street art and graffiti into works that are purposeful and meaningful. Pieces on Israel’s west bank barrier have not only become a symbol of the artist, but also an act and address of the something wrong. Kids playing amongst the wall with the gate to a “paradise”. The kids are playing right? Or are they painting? Are they waiting? What is odd and wrong about this? What is odd and wrong about our world? Questions are asked by the artist and not by the viewer. Banksy writes, “How illegal is it to vandalize a wall,” asks Banksy in his website introduction to his Wall project, “if the wall itself has been deemed unlawful by the International Court of Justice? The Israeli government is building a wall surrounding the occupied Palestinian territories. It stands three times the height of the Berlin wall and will eventually run for over 700km - the distance from London to Zurich. The International Court of Justice last year ruled the wall and its associated regime is illegal. It essentially turns Palestine into the world’s largest open-air prison.”

Back to my vehicle. Back to my sister. Back to the beginnings of street art. Just the beginning. Street artists, or writers, and you can include my sister if you want to, found a physical and metaphorical vehicle to express themselves that the local world around them would see. The train would pass through downtown, in and around Manhattan for everyone to see their name, their symbol, themselves. These young artists took pride in what they did. My sister took pride in what she did despite my disappointment.

With the advancements of technology and especially the Internet, street art and graffiti has begun to take hold of a more respected market. It is now not only trains that are tagged, but it is also the street walls, streets, lampposts, signs; everything and anything that the world takes in daily. The world now becomes flipped upside down. Someone in Nebraska notices Banksy’s piece of a paradise in Gaza and wonder’s, “wow…that is powerful”. While locals in Israel debate whether or not it is art, much like the angry locals in NY, He or she in Nebraska is sending the art via email to his friend over instant messenger. The idea of the wall, in Nebraska, no longer becomes a local idea but a global idea and metaphor. Street art has only really begun to show itself in an articulate manner. Artists like Banksy have forwarded the idea that this work brings about what really needs to be written.

Whatever the case may be, it is hard to now criticize earlier graffiti and street artists who found their medium as a respected and legitimate form of expression. It’s similar to Lebron James boasting about his pre-season predictions of multiple championships. (Even though I hate Lebron, I’m sure great things will come from the earlier turmoil of the Heat). Earlier street artists saw something great. They believed in their art. Some even lost limbs, some lost the respect of their family, and most lost the respect of the community. But whatever it was, they saw their vision. They saw a wall that needed to be painted over with a view of paradise.

Walking: Mapping Senses

I walked along the route I take when I go surfing. It is along the beach. It's generally quiet and gives me time to escape and think.

The thud of my car door signals my beginning. I walk down the wooden stairs and I can hear the sand between the wood and my boots.

I can hear smooth crackle of the sand and the ocean. The waves crashing. Someone's faint voice in the distance. Once in a while the train goes by. It comes slowly from a distance with its lights like eyes and ubruptly yonks it's horn right before it gets to me. Crash. A waves hits. Ssssssss and it cleans the sand. There is a tickling sound from the ocean breeze.

I can taste nothing but the combination of chips and salsa with the salty ocean air. Wait, I can taste some Dr. Pepper! Yes, I've been eating mexican food, Pedros Tacos to be exact.

It's fairly bright. My sensitive eyes need to squint in order to survive this time of day. I can see the ocean stretching far and wide. It's vastness allows my mind to think. The rocking of the ocean wraps a blanket around me, like a comforting little lullaby. Don't get me wrong, I respect its vastness and its power, but I'd like to say it's really opening up to me right now. Leaves are bright green from a good season of rain. Summer hasn't stated just yet, no not yet, I don't see the tourists walking around.

I can feel my camera, its plastic, weighted and cold body welcome my fingers. The wood guard rail helps me on the way down. The corse wood reminds me that I'm experiencing something authentic, maybe this is how they did it thirty years ago. Maybe this is how my mother and father did it... The sand is at is always is. Uncomfortable and a pest, it doesn't want to leave my hands. It sticks and it rubs between the crevices of my fingers. Yep, and the water is a bitter cold, still waiting for the south swell and still walking its way towards the August warmth.

Project #1

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i67LYJnDkbg

It's been on my mind for sometime now the idea of this campus fading away. I'll remember a few minor and probably irrelevant aspects of the school after its all said and done. Many of my friends graduated last week. I wanted to go beyond the use of something material and use what was around me. Andy Goldsworthy worked with available objects. In this video I want to explore the idea of something gone and something fading. Whether that be your attention, your ideas, your mind, your eyes, your senses, etc.

This A M E R I C A N l i f e

As I began listening to the introduction, I immediately began thinking of the novel "White Noise" by Don Delillo. The novel displays critique of an American society governed by white noise: the constant fear of nuclear war, technology, the metaphysical bond of relationships and how that effects they way in which we perceive the world, etc. These outside influences, that seem to be so incogito, so descrete, yet they provide such a profound influence on our day to day lives. This is where they were getting to. An analyzation of the unconscious OCD within all of us.

The first Act was an introduction to the more familiar map. A physical and mathematical representation of one singular idea and how that interprets or effects the sphere around it. Pumpkins, for example, were explained as a reference to the economic status of that household, or yet a reference to the participation of which the household within the community. Street signs, specks of light and underground systems were all mentioned of a way of mapping our sphere. It all reminds me of the existential principal of how everything is connected in some manner. Like they said, "the community is almost like a living organism", and yet it is. If you were to print each map on a transperancy and then overlap each one, it would ultimately, with the cooporation of each individual map, create a group, a whole, a community, a more understandable and functional representation of our world as we know it.

I really believe strongly in the interpretation of the droning sounds around us and how that effects the sphere around us. As someone who has studied music, I believe that the musical principle of consonance and dissonance rings true within all the scopes of life. It is that push and pull, light and dark, it is the contrast, yet the balance of opposites that ultimately creates one harmonious chord. Denis wood ultimately believes that the machines and constant noises around us have a significant effect on the way in which we perceive the world. Much like the progression of a pop song pumps you up while you work out, the constant combination and mundane humming of your appliances may drain your mood.

I didn't particularly connect with the act of mapping the world through our senses.. I see the purpose in mapping our senses with a machine or computer, but I didn't see how it related to the entire program. However, the way in which the computer mapped in individual smell can be relayed to the way in which our own brain maps in smell. The complexity and esoteric nature of how that mapping is done can, maybe, ultimately explain of how the mapping of our own brain is so esoteric.

What I've noticed that most of these individuals seem to be very intelligent, almost autistic in some sort of way. They pay attention to the most minute details of the sphere around them, and in that they had discovered something very obvious yet hidden. The man who ate at every restaurant on Pico discovered something organic by following a mathematical route or map.

Does all this relate to the idea that the world is indeed, through all the chaos, something very mathematical and organized. I think it is...

R i v e r s and T i d e s

There was something so soothing about the video of Rivers and Tides. The sound of the water, the crack and snap of the wood. It all brought me closer to the artist's hands, it reminded me of my grandfather and when he would work on his ranch. I remember him telling me that there was something so satisfying about working with your hands, creating something, something tangible, something that anyone could use and appreciate, something that was well made and that could last forever. My grandfather was a contractor, yet he never physically built the buildings himself. He watched. He said that he envied his workers because they made something tangible. Something that they could go home feeling satisfied with. They could go home and say they created something for someone else. Something that will last.

Andy Goldsworthy is an artist, a teacher, a father and a lover of the out doors. He seems to enjoy the morning and the solitude that it brings. The coming and going, the ebb and the flow, the balance between destruction and creation. Andy's art is exactly that. Like my grandfather, he works with his hands. However, his art does not last. When working with icicles, he included that working with gloves, despite that it was bitterly cold outside, restricted him from the proper attention to his art.

"I am influenced by the rivers and the ocean", he said. And in response, his art clearly mimics his inspiration. His icicle creation lasted minutes, much like a song, building slowly to its crescendo lit by the sun behind it, and then its demise, it fell. It was amazing to watch the ice glow in contrast to the rock it was glued to. It seemed as if it was once piece of radioactive material. It is that fleeting and precious quality of his work that makes it so unique and special. But the fleeting quality of it is also tragic, because only he or sometimes a passerby are the only who witness his work. Andy commented about its particular quality of it being created and destroyed by what it was created by.

Though his work may flee the mind, his work does not escape documentation. With every work, Andy documents the final creation by photographing it. Whether it was good or bad, its film negative sits gingerly in his workshop behind all his other works, documented, organized and placed against light tables. The photos of his work deliver an appropriate message to how strong photography can be. Not about the technical capabilities, but about its ability to capture something as fleeting as the ocean's tide, a pigment of read amongst a slew of water, an icicle burnt by the sun, a collection of sticks blowing in the wind.

Though I probably shouldn't have, I found it particularly interesting, amusing, and tragic when one of his pieces collapsed while he was creating it. You could see a real connection in the despair of his face. He really felt disappointed. Unlike a mistake made in the comfort of a studio where in the mediums photography, painting, or sculpture can be repaired; his ability to repair is replaced by rebuilding. Every time one of his works fails, he must start again, from the beginning. But in the end, proved by meticulous and delicate work, his masterpiece and crescendo come full force. You see the beauty of his work framed against the nature that has both created and will destroy the piece. It is this connection and relationship that he has with the land that keeps him coming back for more. It is not the land that needs Andy, as he puts it, but it is he who needs the land. I think in that understanding is what every artist should be humbled by. Too much do I see, or even that I believe myself has created something special from something bleak or mundane. We have yes, but it has also been set forth for us, created by something other than the forces within ourselves. Like the rocks that created his eggs, our subjects are randomly placed in front, sitting there only for us to manipulate and interpret through our own medium.

His artistry reminds me of the character Howard Roark of the novel "The Fountainhead", by Ayn Rand. The novel is based loosely on the genre of architecture and the creative process behind it. But what really stands out is the singular creative vision of Howard Roark, the individual against society. Howard says, "I do not create in order to have clients, but that I have clients in order to create". It is this same principle that I believe Andy is driven by. Its almost as if the land has commissioned him to make his work. Just as Roark needs his clients to commission and inspire his work, Andy needs his land to commission and inspire his also. In his description of the and that was flattened by the sheep, he pays homage to that destruction through a line of sheep wool that acts as a metaphor for the control and dominance of the sheep on the land. Much like Roark also, Andy is really set upon the world as an individual. His work is mostly done by himself with the help of others occasionally and sparingly. Hs work is a representation of his singular vision of the world, and my god is it beautiful.

As I have been alluding to architecture, his work draws the lines and shapes, much like the modern and contemporary architects; from nature and the rhythms it creates. Frank Lloyd Wright believed that his work, especially his work "Falling Water", was meant to be a part of the world around it. Andy too, feels the same way. His piece made of swirling branches imitates the forms and rhythms of the tide pool it eventually becomes apart of. It is that symbiosis and cooperation of nature and man that is a balance that I find particularly attractive. It is something that I believe our world should look further into.