Western Speghetti

I know that I have been posting a lot of stop-motion photography work but it is only because I am so memorized by it. It is such a unique and creative art. I keep coming across more amazing videos that are so fun to watch. I have discovered that the PES group seems to top most of the stop-motion pieces that I have seen when it comes to this genre of work. This is also evident by the countless awards that PES has received.

In most of the PES group’s work, they use ordinary objects in unexpected ways. I this particular short film, different household objects are used to simulate the cooking of a spaghetti dinner. The creators have such an incredible way of imitating the boiling of water using bubble wrap, slicing post-its like butter, and squishing pincushions like tomatoes. I love the way that they use multi-colored pick-up sticks as the dry spaghetti and how they turn to colored rubber bands when they are cooked. PES is so innovative.

It is so interesting to think of the exhaustive work that went into making this very short film. The process seems to be very similar to clay-mation work. It takes the compilation of so many progressive still shots to create the effect of smooth movement. The process of stop-motion photography seems so primitive yet is so complex; I think that this is one of the reason it intrigues me.


I have never created a stop-motion photography piece but I would really like to sometime soon. I think I have been discouraged because I don’t think I could possible think of anything as creative as I have seen from PES or any of the other artists that I have discussed previously. PES is so entertaining and in many of there short films they use a lot of humor and sarcasm. PES’s films are unlike any others and are such a pleasure to watch. Stop-motion photography is such a unique art.

The Edsel Ford Mansion

This weekend my husband and I visited the Edsel and Eleanor Ford Mansion in Gross Pointe, Michigan. I mention it on my art blog because the Ford mansion was like its own art museum. I had no idea that I would learn so much about art history and culture from visiting this local treasure. I would highly recommend a tour to anyone who has a love and appreciation for art.

Edsel Ford was the son of Henry Ford and was a big part of the company. He designed the highly renowned Lincoln Continental. Him and his wife Elinore had an deep appreciation for art which was highly evident from the tour of their home. When they built their 30,000 square foot home, they wanted to ensure that they could make their home a place to display and collect fine art. Nearly every room in the mansion had historical pieces of fine art from a variety of artist from all different times.

The house itself was modeled after English architecture and styles. Many of the rooms were completely shipped in from Europe with elaborately engraved wooden walls. Every element in the mansion reflects a particular time period and it is filled with treasures from all eras. The Fords had a lot of famous original paintings throughout the house. They had furniture from the thirteenth century and stained glass from the fourteenth. It was remarkable to see the collection of invaluable treasures that one family had.

When learning about the Ford family I was really able to see what wonderful people they were. They were a huge contributor to the Detroit Institute of Arts and other museums throughout the country. They were especially interested in sharing the importance of the arts with the underprivileged and had many organizations to do so. Eleanor made certain that their entire mansion was preserved and kept as a museum to share their art and influence on the future generations. The Fords wanted art to influence and enrich the lives of all.

Panoramic Sphere

Vitruvian Man

The Vitruvain Man is one of my favorite works done by Leonardo DaVinci. It’s beautiful renderings and calligraphic texts make this work one of a kind. DaVinci has created many beautiful paintings, yet I enjoy the sketches from his workbooks more. Only through Davinci’s sketches and notes can one get a sense of what a true genius he truly was. He was a very brilliantly scientific artist.

This drawing was named after a famous architect of the Renaissance. This is fitting because the drawing relates to the architecture of the human form. In this drawing, DaVinci studies the proportions of the human body. He shows the proportions of the body and how they relate to shapes such as the square and circle. He also demonstrates the proportions of the different body parts in relation to others.

“Leonardo’s famous drawings of the Vitruvian proportions of a man’s body first standing inscribed in a square and then with feet and arms outspread inscribed in a circle provides an excellent early example of the way in which his studies of proportion fuse artistic and scientific objectives. It is Leonardo, not Vitruvius, who points out that ‘If you open the legs so as to reduce the stature by one-fourteenth and open and raise your arms so that your middle fingers touch the line through the top of the head, know that the centre of the extremities of the outspread limbs will be the umbilicus, and the space between the legs will make and equilateral triangle’ (Accademia, Venice). Here he provides one of his simplest illustrations of a shifting ‘centre of magnitude’ without a corresponding change of ‘centre of normal gravity’. This remains passing through the central line from the pit of the throat through the umbilicus and pubis between the legs. Leonardo repeatedly distinguishes these two different ‘centres’ of a body, i.e., the centers of ‘magnitude’ and ‘gravity (Keele 252).”

Though this work of Davinci’s is just from his sketchbook, I consider it a beautiful piece of art. I particularly like the wispiness of the lines in the drawing. The lines of the body of the man are reflected in the body of text that surrounds the image. This text in the work are merely DaVinci’s hand-written notes but posses an organic and graceful quality. I think that the image and the text surrounding it make a complete and beautiful composition.

Another reason that I like Vitruvian Man is because of the anatomical representation that it holds. I am a massage therapist and I have a very large print of this work hanging in my workspace. The work greatly reflects the beauty and strength of the human body, which is shard by the art of massage. I love the atmosphere that it creates in my environment. In addition, its antique color is a very neutral and beautiful tone.

Quotation from: http://leonardodavinci.stanford.edu/submissions/clabaugh/welcome.html

http://www.miauk.com

Warning this site may cause seizers! This website is most unusual. It is very colorful and bright in a way that looks over the top and tacky. This is what first thought until I started looking into who M.I.A. really is and what she represents. She is a very interesting, multitalented artist with a lot to say.

M.I.A. is a singer, song writer, rapper, fashion designer, music video producer, and graphic desinger from England. When viewing M.I.A.'s music videos, fashion, and graphic design, her striking style is apparent and is carried through them all. I think it is pretty amazing that one woman can posses such versatile talent.

M.I.A.'s website is very random and looks almost like a preteen explosion of gaudy color and graphics. Each page uses florescent colors that flash like a strobe light. This defiantly makes viewing the site somewhat difficult. Her raw graphics and creative style reflect the european culture. To me, it almost seems like her style is reflective of the early nineties because of the colors and graphic technology of the time. I feel like M.I.A. is using elements of the past for her own purpose and identity.

M.I.A. is truly an authentic artist, which I really rescpect. She catagorizes her musical style as "other" because it is one of a kind. She incorporates, poetry, politics, rap, techno (just to name a few) into her work. She is known for her influential style and for this was listed in Time Magazine's "100 most influencail peole" in 2009. I especially like M.I.A.'s song Paper Planes.

Tony Vs. Paul

I think that Tony Vs. Paul is an incredibly imaginative stop-motion video. The unnatural movements of the characters created by the stop-motion photography are so interesting to watch. It is mind boggling to think of the technical difficulty that was required to produce this video. I think that this short film is very well done.

The story of Tony vs. Paul is bout a fight between two friends. In the beginning of the video, it shows Paul writing a letter to Tony telling him that he is a jerk. The funny thing is that He points to the paper and the words just appear on the paper, he points to an envelope, which the paper slides into and the envelope is closed and slides out of the door without a single touch. They show the envelope traveling through the city and into Tony's house. The video continues with a fight between the two characters that involves many interesting Matrix-like moves and unnatural gliding and sliding across the landscape. This comical fight ends with a hand truce and handshake and the two men glide off into the sunset.

My three-year-old nephew watched this video with me. It was so fun to see the video through a child’s eyes. He was not able to distinguish between reality and fantasy. He watched the video in amazement and insisted on watching it over and over again. He then tried tirelessly to recreate the fighting moves of the video. He asked over and over “how they do that?”

This video reminds me of the imagination of a child. It seems like all little boys dream of flying through the air like a super hero and fighting bad guys. The character’s ninja-like movements are very representative of little boy’s imaginative thoughts. It is obvious that the creators of this video had so much fun making this. It is obvious that little boys never really grow up. It is very refreshing to see grown men having so much fun and tapping into their inner child.

Art and My Life

Art engrosses all of my life. It is a part of everything that I do and am. I tend to see the beauty in everything and am inspired by so much around me. In this world of ugliness and dread, there is so much life and beauty. I love the endless possibilities of art and creativity in my life.

I find myself staring at advertisements, labels, movies, and ordinary objects thinking about all of the creativity and thought that went into creating them. It amazes me. I am sometimes overwhelmed and discouraged at the prospect of never being able to be as good as the next or create something as wonderful as the next. I too often ask myself, “Why didn’t I think of that?” or star at a famous art piece and think “ I could’ve done that!”.

I think that going to school for art has a huge impact on my life. In art school, one are constantly surrounded by artists who are very gifted. It is so inspiring to see other students’ work and to learn from each other. It is amazing how much talent lives in these students. Art school forces one to stay creative and work on art consistently. I find that if I am not in school, and if it is not required of me, it is easy to get lazy and not do what I love. One must work at growing their passion and it is not always fun.

I see almost everything that I do in life as art. I love to cook using beautiful, colorful, and fragrant fruits, vegetables and spices in different ways. I love decorating my home and making things beautiful. I love doing hair and makeup and all things fashion. I love gift-wrapping, event planning, and invitation making. Finally, I love painting, photography, graphic design and playing the piano. I consider all of these things important and fulfilling things in my life.

What Inspires Me in Art?

I get inspiration for my art from everything around me. There is so much in nature and in the art world that continuously influence me. I carry a notepad with me in my purse everywhere I go so that I can jot down ideas at a moments notice. If I don’t write things down right away, I will most likely forget them. I think you should use anything and everything to inspire you.

I am so often inspired by nature. The vibrant colors of flowers often influence the color schemes and color combinations that I use. Sometimes unusual color combinations exist in nature that reveal themselves in my work. I also am inspired by the texture of nature. I love the rich texture of bark and the leaves of trees and often use them in my art.

I often am inspired by images that do not exist. I sometimes see images in cloud formations, in the swirls in marble tile, and in grains of wood. I see things in these things that I could not have thought of on my own. I know that this sounds strange. I think it stems from when I was a little girl. My sisters and I would lay in bed with my parents and look up at their textured, plaster ceiling and find objects in it. I swear we saw goats, bathtubs, dogs, whatever our minds could fathom. We also did this with the stones in our fireplace.

Lastly, other artists and their work inspire me. I really admire all of the different ideas and styles that artists use. I particularly love looking at different photographers’ work to get ideas for unique shots. I don’t feel like I am stealing their ideas because most of them have taken the idea form someone else. Plus, using different subjects always changes the shot. I am very inspired by portraitures of all types.

Fun with a Scanner

This image in one that I created using a scanner, myself, and superman ice cream cone. It was inspired by faceyourpockets.com which uses a scanner to create images. I attempted to get creative by using different textures and colors. The texture of the taste buds on the tongue is particularly detailed. It is a lot of fun using the scanner in an untraditional way. The scanner can create very unique and interesting images in a way that is difficult to achieve in any other way.

It was very fun playing with the effects that a scanner can create. I was trying to scan my nephew's little hands. He had trouble staying still during the scan and the movement of his finger created a distubing effect. In the scan, because he moved his finger, the scan gave the illusion of the finger being severd from his hand. I thought that this was an accidental achevement. The scanner really picks up the textures of his hands differently than a photograph would.

In this scan, I was experimenting with the effect that distance from the scanner has on the appearance of the image. Her lips were placed directly onto the scanner so they are very detailed and in focus. The further away from the glass of the scanner that her face falls, the more out of focus it becomes. I think that because not all of the image is in focus that it places emphasis on the lips. I like the softness of the majority of the the image. I think that this image leaves the viewer confused and intrigued that sets a quiet mood.
In this scan, I really wanted to capture the color and texture of these dying asparagus. The scanner was able to pick up great detail that an ordinary photograph would not. Scanners seem to have a great macro capability that only a camera with an expensive macro lens could capture. If you look closely, you can actually see the goo that is on the rotting tips of the asparagus. I think that the vibrant color and textures of the asparagus are exaggerated by the black cloth in the background.

www.faceyourpockets.com

Faceyourpockets.com is a very interesting website that I find myself continually going back to, to look at the compositions posted. This website is an on going project that encourages anyone to contribute to. At my last inquiry, there were 232 contributions to the site. The site asks people to empty their pockets onto a scanner and create a composition with the items that they carry on them. The end results are very interesting.

I think that the items a person carry on them can really say a lot about a person. You can really get a feel for what a person is like by looking at the things from their pockets. I like that in many of the submissions, the artists have carefully laid out a composition. The placement of the objects on the scanner were carefully thought out and many of the artists are interacting with their belongings.

I think that the things in a person’s pocket create an environmental portrait of that person. In an environmental portrait, a person uses an environment and objects within an environment to portray who they are. The things in the environmental portrait are very telling of their lives. Many environmental portraits use metaphors.

In the submissions on this website, one can really tell what a person is like by what is in their pockets. One can tell if a person is simple and carefree if they do not carry a lot of stuff on them. In many of the submissions, people have an overwhelming amount of things in their pockets. I think this is more telling of what these people are like, complicated and busy. Many of the submissions include photos of loved ones and most include a cell phone and money of some sort. It is all very interesting and telling of the times.