From "An Alchemist With One Eye on Fire" by Clayton Eshleman

So we have this reading for senior seminar that we were supposed to "translate in terms of visual art"...but I have a real problem with this, because I think it already applies;

What might a responsible avant-garde in poetry today include?

1. Radical, investigational writing that is raw, often wayward, in process; poetry as an intervention within culture against static forms of knowledge, schooled conception, cliched formulations.

(Now with this passage, if you just replace the words; investigational writing and poetry with words like art, this totally applies.)

2. Writing that envinces a thoughtful awareness of racism, imperialism, ecological issues, disasters and war. 

(and wants to do something about it...again switch writing with art)

3. Multiple levels of (visual) language- the arcane, the idiomatic, the erudite, the vulgar, the scientific; relentless probing; say anything; not just "free speech" but freed speech

4.  Transgression, openning up of the sealed sexual strong rooms; inspection of occult systems for psychic networks; the archaic and the tribal viewed as part of everyone's fate.

5.  Treating boundaries like stage scenery.

Notes from class: WHAT IS THE FUNCTION OF ART IN THE 21st CENTURY?

-Art used to be made for the world, now art is made for the ART world, completely disconnected with the actual world.

-Gary Gaffney says "Art is the collision between man and universe."- 

Installation views from my thesis exhibition

Salty Cheeks Series (1-4)

On Criteria (Walter Darby Bannard)

What is good art? Bannard states that questions like this are "intrinsically unanswerable and that bearing down on them doggedly and fruitlessly merely compounds the misunderstanding which leads to their asking." Alright, fine, I agree, but that's just a really scholarly way of saying what I have learned in the past four years....In art, THERE ARE NO ANSWERS, ONLY QUESTIONS!

"Goodness, goodness in general is not identifiable. It is not substantive; is has no characteristics. It cannot be an entity in itself. Goodness is a consequence of particular judgement and exists only within the setting of that judgement. "

"Great art always presents itself for reevaluation. It is always brand-new. It comes to each of us with no assumptions, no criteria, no history, no pedigree, no "consensus." 

yes,

I cannot believe my senior show is up. I always knew it would eventually happen but the whole thing is really surreal and kind of anti-climatic. While setting up I realized I didn't have enough work, so I ended up cutting two entire pieces on Sunday, I had a mini-breakdown but got it done and I'm actually pleased, not nit-picking at the way the show is, I'm calm. I feel this big wave of relief, like I'm going to graduate and I did what I thought was impossible. The gallery talk was the worst part for me, I was just uncomfortable and completely rushed through it but the thesis review which I anticipated being horrible wasn't bad at all. Yay! I'm finally able to just BREATH.

Ho Hum

Why why why do I always seem to find the exact same thing that I am doing, but someone has already done it, and thought it through more? Meghann left a print out from this website in my studio and this jewelry is badass and it makes me 

angry...I hate that I want it. But this is a push for me to tweak my work into a different direction to 

stand out. 

This is an example of the work that I am making right now. I am working with cutting paper into lacelike, organic forms. These works are technically about cycles; in terms of life and death, cycles in nature, personal process...CYCLES.

The State of The Art...by Arthur C. Danto

There is absolutely no reason why Jackson Pollock is a household name, and his wife, and better artist, Lee Krasner is not....sexism is always present in the art field.

What is art for? by Tom Marioni

For beauty,
For history,
For decorating apartments,
For people to laugh at,
For imitating nature,
For therapy,
For seeing in a new way,
For an educated audience,
For enlightenment,
For political agendas,
For glorifying the church in the Renaissance,
For glorifying the state under Communism,
For glorifying the rich in capitalism,
For recording society in a poetic way,

Beer, Art, and Philosophy, Tom Marioni


I think MY art is for:
imitating nature
therapy
seeing in a new way
educated audience
enlightenment
and sadly, for decorating apartments.

School is Out- rethinking art education today

" Should the art school be a reseach center that enlightens conceptual practices while de-emphasizing skills, or a course of study in entrepreneurship, presentation, strategic thinking, and other matters to prepare young artists for the ruthlessness of the market?"

When Form Has Become Attitude- And Beyond Thierry de Duve

TALENT VS. CREATIVITY

"Never, though was art equated with skill. What deserved admiration in the accomplished artist was talent, not craftsmanship. Skill could be acquired, talent could not, since talent was thought of as a gift of nature- a gift, however, which could niether develop nor express itself outside the rules, conventions, and codes provided by the tradition".

"His definition of painting would have been simply: what painters do. That an artist works in the medium of painting means that he questions painting for what it has to say about itself and hasn't said yet. His definition of painting might be: what no painter has done yet".

"....imitation reproduces, invention produces: whereas imitation generates sameness, invention generates otherness: wheres imitation seeks continuity, invention seeks novelty".

"Creativity being the source of invention, the medium, its target, the teacher - who is no longer a master- owes his authority to the very constraints of the medium while he invites the student to transgress the medium's limits in order to prove his creativity".

"Linguistics, semiotics, anthropology, psychoanalysis, Marxism, feminism, structuralism, and post structuralism, in short, "theory" ( or so-called "French theory") entered art schools and succeeded in displacing- sometimes replacing-studio practice while renewing the critical vocabulary and intellectual tools with which to approach the making and the appreciating of art".

Butterflies are free

We talked about this in seminar today, but the reality of the situation is pretty depressing. To be a "successful artist"(if monitary compensation and being the new hot thing is how you define success) is really about the networking game. A lot of mediocre artists make more money than ridiculously talented artists simply based on who they know and it sucks. Yeah, going to Yale for an MFA would be amazing and getting solo shows in Chelsea would be mindblowing, but I'm not sure how I want to define success. How do you become an art dealer?