Monday, October 17, 2011

First half of the semester



Even though this class is only a 100 level course it is challenging for me because it does not just have one focus. It is all over the place as far as mediums of art. i was never interested in art as a child, which broke my mother's heart, since she was an artist in her younger days. I elected not to take an intro art course in high school, so I never learned the artistic basics past middle school. So when we have to create simple art works in class it is slightly more challenging for me. I am happy that I elected not to take an art course in high school though because in place of that class I too Communications Technology which focused a lot on film photography. This is when I first got into the photography medium and never looked back.

Since this is an art class and I am a photography major so this counts toward my core requirements, but I am also an Environmental Studies minor, I have been trying my best focus all my work on photography along with the environment. I have a huge passion for both the environment and photography. I believe that you cannot convince people to save the environment and this beautiful world if they have not experienced it first hand. Whether that be in person or through a photograph.

This class specifically focuses on Time and how it is incorporated into art. It has been very interesting how much our world and the art world revolve around time. It is shown in paintings and music videos. We watched a couple music videos which based their hole set up on time and reversing and distorting it. The videos went in reverse and repeated and just confused me completely until I watched it multiple times. i guess time itself is a lot like this. You may not realize what has happened as it is happening but once you look back and reflect it may begin to make clearer sense. Then we watched the movie and that just had so many flash backs and was a web of people and time and lies to create the back wards motive of the main character to kill an innocent man.
As we created the collage and post card we had to think about time and the outside world and how to show ideas in art. in the collage I wanted to incorporate photos and the cameras themselves as a sort of portal into time. For the post card I focused on St. Mary's beauties and the people. Just all switched around and misplaced to create an alternate world. We also listened to musical selections and drew during them to express the feeling we contracted from listening to the music. The music that was chosen was very different in styles and sounds so each art work was fairly different. The readings we have completed have helped up understand how time is incorporated into life and art and how time can be percieved in different ways. Some people much like myself believe that time exists in nature and is based off of nature and that the natural creatures of the world do have a sense of time. Then there are those who believe that time is artifical and concrete for the sole purpose of society.

In the end I think this class is helping me to understand art in are broader view then just photography. Yet it will still be my focus an all the outside perspectives and ideas are helping me thing about photography and my photos in a more abstract manner and is helping me to come into shoots with new ideas and perspectives. I think about time more and more about how photos are visual archives of time and without those frozen moments, those times may be forgotten.


Artist proposals

I have decided to propose three photographers that make a career out of the topics I also find interesting.

Kevin Fleming: Nature and News photographer from Delmarva. Mainly a nature photographer, that has worked for National Geographic and has also covered events and places in his career. i have seen his photos my whole life and I admire him very much. I have done small amounts of research on him before but if I choose him this time I wish to personally contact him and find some further info on him that is not available on the internet.

Walter Iooss: A sports photographer who photographs many sports not only game play but portraits of the athletes. He was successful at a young age and has had many images in Sports Illustrated. I am getting more and more into sports photography so I think researching a professional further may help me.

Toni Frissell: First ever woman photographer to work for Sports Illustrated, worked as the photographer for Women's Army Corps and took photos of presidents and other famous individuals. She was a pioneer in sports photography and her work is so famous it in in the Library of Congress. It would be interesting to research her more because of the simple fact that she pioneer women sports photographer which I am.