Writing Three - Group C Reaction

Writing Three - Group C Reaction

Ramon Riley

I found James Battistelli’s description of his work fascinating!  Is there a blog with pix?  The idea of science fictions impact opens a new discussion that I hope the book gets into further.  I think how we are portrayed in science fiction sometimes tells us more about our culture than movies based in reality or even based on true stories.  Battistelli say’s, “What I plan to do in my work this semester is incorporate body extension and performance into these new creatures I am creating,” which hooked me in based on the concept alone. 

I found Michelle Coulbaugh’s take on the chapter and the impact of branding and labels compelling saying “Specifically, my paintings focus on creating new representations and relationships between the spectator and the fast food industry. I strive to break down the industry’s power over our buying choices by removing branding from their food packaging. What is left is a stark, blank slate upon which we can apply a fresh judgment on what and why we are buying.”   After seeing her current pieces in Kipp Gallery, I realize my mind had added the labels to the product. My mind completed the picture.  There is a difference in a McDonald’s yellow and a Wendy’s yellow.  My mind immediately saw that paler Wendy’s yellow and filled in the blanks.  These big companies are watching us and directing us.  We are the market in market research.  Repetition fosters familiarity, which is difficult to resist even if the result is unfulfilling.  I am trained to go back again and again.

Crystal Miller’s point that the scale of her work is very important to addressing/engaging people was well stated.  Having worked on illustration size drawings for the past five years versus putting work in a gallery environment is a daunting task because how it will ultimately be received  is dependent on variable I had not been considering.  The intimacy of holding a book is very different from luring viewers in to see you work.  What I thought was large can be dwarfed by the context of a wall.  Having been in class with the artist, I wanted to hear more about how she chooses her subjects for her photographs.  I wonder what makes something worthy of this creative treatment of printing and scaling to turn it into art.  I wonder is it being at the right place at the right time, or is there some part of the plan that is consistent when you are looking?

Crystal’s paper addressed the sexual undertones of the “gazing” process that I focused on in my writing, but I thought  Eric Brennan’s stating “Men may like to imagine they are in control but women love knowing they DO control men’s gaze,” was addressing the elephant in the room.  As he states in his blog, (we are) “Surrounded by people and society that are always trying to influence us,” I am finding I grow impatient with people who are unwilling to take a stance, state an opinion or aren’t willing to acknowledge their emotions and feelings.  Ironically, many art students try to adhere to unreachable standards of purity.  I feel this is out of fear of having to defend one’s self.  Brennan’s paper also references the the repression of feelings seen as inappropriate.  My question is inappropriate by who?

Why do we have this standard that any and every question is worthy of answer?  Group C re-evaluated their work based on Mulvey.  Why?  I would have to commit time to see her work as a filmmaker before I put so much stock in her criticism.

“She instead stated that she intended to use Freud and Lacan's concepts as a "political weapon." She then used some of their concepts to argue that the cinematic apparatus of classical Hollywood cinema inevitably put the spectator in a masculine subject position, with the figure of the woman on screen as the object of desire...

Mulvey argued that the only way to annihilate the "patriarchal" Hollywood system was to radically challenge and re-shape the filmic strategies of classical Hollywood with alternative feminist methods. She called for a new feminist avant-garde filmmaking that would rupture the magic and pleasure of classical Hollywood filmmaking. She wrote, "It is said that analyzing pleasure or beauty annihilates it. That is the intention of this article..."

That just sounds sterile and bitter.  Are her films void of beauty and pleasure?Why would I want that for myself?  Before I punish myself, I will consider and analyze the source.

Writing THREE - My Visual Pleasure

Writing Three - My Visual Pleasure

Ramon Riley

I am guilty of looking...  

Mulvey’s article proclaims that it intends to destroy pleasure and beauty by analyzing it.  Nice try.  Not even close.  

This week I combine the writing of Mulvey “Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema” and Chapter Three, “Spectatorship, Power and Knowledge”, of the Sturken and Cartwright book “Practices of Looking...” to discuss my own practice and process.

In my work, I am driven by muses, or goddesses of inspiration.  My earliest memory of this was seeing the replica sculpture of Nike of Samothrace at the Carnegie Museum in Pittsburgh, who, like the origin of the word “muse”, is also Greek.  The female body draped with thin fabric clinging in a way that accentuated her curves, especially between her thighs, motivates me still to seek out moments of visual pleasure in life, thus blurring the line between art and life. That this sculpture in its current form is headless is reason for some to criticize me.  Oh well.  

Nike of Samothrace,
 2nd century BC marble sculpture of the Greek goddess Nike

A sculpture, even more than a painting, because it is three-dimensional is the highest form of looking because every curve is studied and touched intimately.  In my latest works, I wanted to bring my drawings close to this level of intimacy and study.  I treat the graphite like a chisel to reveal the image from the paper.  This involves a long hard look.  My intention is to get the viewer to also take a long hard look.

"Untitled"
Ramon Riley 2012

The concept of the “gaze” in both articles was well presented and focused on the voyeur having power, at least at first.  The negative connotation it puts on instinct to look as an abuse of power, however, causes me to distance myself from such a definition.  To look is powerful.  One does not have to make another weak to make one’s self powerful. Mulvey talks about a world of sexual imbalance between the “active/ male and passive/ female”.  Reading this article conjured feelings from my youth as the sympathetic male who was missing the boat.  I spent too much time listening to insecure self-haters who want others to hate themselves too.   

I seek to articulate the power the muse already has, so one may be inspired as I am.  The Winged Nike of Samothrace is powerful.  She is the symbol of victory for goodness sake and not just in title.  She is not passive.  Her stance is strong and assertive. That she is actually an object immortalizes her, and makes me wonder who was the muse that inspired the sculpture. To see her image, likeness or qualities in women is cyclical because I am not sure which came first.  

   

I do believe there is a vast difference, despite subtle distinctions, between the look, the gaze, the scope of an individual predator or the panopticon theory as discussed in the Sturken and Cartwright chapter (p. 96 -100).  The distinction is in the access and motive of discovery.  It should not be a violation of ownership.  The half-cocked can argue that they are one in the same, but I argue in the subtle distinction... there is the art.

The metamorphosis of our capitalist culture to give cheap (not necessarily inexpensive, but cheap) easy access to everything, lowers our standards despite the illusion of “high definition” being the so-called standard.  Putting cameras in everyone’s hands and convincing them they are photographers and directors sabotages the artist, model and potential audience because the work and the venue is tainted.  This results in poor representation of a given medium.  But it makes me more confident and determined as an artist.  I like being me, though it comes at the price of constant self-examination.  I constantly ask myself difficult questions.  My art work stems from the remaining questions I am unable to verbalize that probably have no set answer.  This process makes me the proud co-owner of my discoveries and my art.  

I believe in muses, and I appreciate beauty.  I will not surrender my passion to follow the uninspired nor the uninspiring .  Karen Rosenberg wrote in an article for a Matisse gallery show, “Matisse and the Model,” about the power the model had over him quoting the artist’s words from a 1939 essay:  ‘“I depend entirely on my model, whom I observe at liberty, and then I decide on the pose which best suits her nature.” He continued, “And then I become the slave of that pose.”’(1)  Coincidentally, Matisse’s Large Seated Nudes were inspired by Michaelangelo’s “Night” sculpture at the Medici Chapel in Florence, which was not a flesh woman, but Matisse understood the power of the model was the first critical part to the art work, stating about Michaelangelo’s sculpture:   “Forgive me, I’ve been completely ensnared by a woman.”

...ditto.

Henry Matisse Seated Nude [lithograph and sculpture] 1925-1929

Michelangelo
 Night on the Medici Tomb




(1). Karen Rosenberg, "Matisse and the Model". The New York Times: Art and Design November 17, 2011–http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/18/arts/design/matisse-and-the-model.html

Writing TWO Group C Reaction

Writing Two Group C Reaction

Ramon Riley

This is the second writing by Eric Brennan where I found reading to be enjoyable because the writer’s points are clear and well stated.  Not that I always agree or even disagree.  There is a strong writer’s voice I hear, and that makes it enjoyable.  There was one point made, however, that sounded too academic, void of personality.  Brennan says that because viewers often misinterpret the producers intent, “This is why advertisers always consider viewers when producing images. Marketing firms are very successful because they acknowledge viewers as individuals.This is why advertisers always consider viewers when producing images. Marketing firms are very successful because they acknowledge viewers as individuals.”  Call me a pessimist, but I think there is a process of creating consumers, so that marketing firms don’t get it wrong because they have trained us.  When quality visuals are hard to find we “make do”.  The word consider implied some altruistic context.  I liken it more to manipulation.  

Michelle Colbaugh’s statement about how propaganda posters from World War II Germany and Stalin’s Russia to “brainwash the minds of the people through school, religion, and imagery to the point where their individual sense of looking was diseased by inherited slander that skewed their perception of reading the posters,” was profound, and made me think about republican and democratic conventions currently taking place... the camera angles, panning to the black guy or the senior in the audience tactics to target demographics.  It seems transparent, but apparently, someone knows that the stuff works. 

James Battistelli says, “We as individuals in a digital age have the resources to produce anything we want digitally and then comment on it and other media like it.”  I agree with this, but, being a teacher, I hear the praise but I read complaints.  I think when people are happy, they go about their day happy.  I question if this age of rating makes us seek to knit pick instead of thinking enjoyment first. I don’t know.  Also, the mentioning of youtube made me think about what ends up getting attention is childish stuff, but thank goodness for the inventions.  The resources are powerful.  Battistelli sums up the readings by stating that the viewer is given power as producer. I am questioning in my head if this is the same as empowering viewers.  I wonder.

I also enjoyed what Brennan wrote about aesthetics and a hierarchy of taste.  The power of those in charge of declaring what is valuable should always be questioned, so I was completely on board with this portion of the writing.  Crystal Miller’s summaries, “When viewing a representation/symbol, we have evolved our thinking to that the object and its’ representation are now visual equals, even though functionality renders them different.” It is this statement that connects taste.  I think understanding, or being, in tune with what we really are seeing refines our taste.  Miller goes on to say that our individual taste has more widely acceptable standards because it belongs to the individual.  That said there is still acceptance culturally based on that hierarchy Brennan was referring to in his paper.  

After reading everyone’s statements, I thought about how our taste changes or evolves, and I wondered if we mature or if we simply become worn down by the culture.  I also thought about the chosen one’s whose job it is to be in the front of us, our tastes, visually.  Where do they get their taste, or how are their sensibilities formed?  My inner pessimism says it is all to change the direction of the sheep...

Writing TWO: Visual Culture and Historical Research

Writing Two - Visual Culture and Historical Research

Ramon Riley

I saw an exhibit at the Carnegie Museum in Pittsburgh entitled “Impressionism In A New Light: From Monet to Stieglitz”.  The show was a look at how Impressionism had impacted photography.  As an art student, I was taught photography changed the need to render realistically, and Impressionism and Expressionism grew from the camera relieving the artist from the role of documenter.  This show made the case that Impressionism created “Pictorialism”, where photographers were using techniques in both the taking photos and the development of photographs to show photography as art and more than “point-and-shoot” (1).   

But there were two photographs that made me return to the museum a day later.  The subject of this paper is a photograph of Georgia O’Keeffe by Alfred Stieglitz and the art of O'Keeffe.  I will intertwine my findings with my understanding of the assigned readings:  Chapter 2 of the Sturken and Cartwright book “Practices of Looking...” and the article “Welcome to the Cultural Revolution” by Krauss.

In the photograph of O’Keeffe, Stieglitz knew how to capture the beauty of the woman he loved.  This portrait shows a side profile with the artist’s (O’Keeffe’s) nude shoulder seducing the viewer and her uplifted hands playing the air like an instrument.  Stieglitz displayed O’Keeffe’s elongated and elegant fingers and portrayed her skin as fair against the stark contrast of a black background.

Alfred Stieglitz "Georgia O'Keeffe" 1920

As I sat for hours cherishing the opportunity to see O’Keeffe as Stieglitz might have seen her.  I thought about O’Keeffe’s art work which added greatly to the power of the image.  I was looking at an American Master photographed tenderly by the man who loved her before the stardom and before her legacy had been overanalyzed, bastardized and regurgitated.

Thinking about the Sturken and Cartwright reading and the concept of the dominant-hegemonic reading theory (p.53-57), I recalled a professor during my days as an undergrad “informing” me that O’Keeffe’s paintings were seen as subconscious images of tribute to the vagina.  And the more I looked at her work, I saw it too.  I accepted this as truth, and I carried that deduction with me... until I saw the photograph of in the show at the Carnegie.  It’s accepted that the artist doesn’t always “know” the symbolism in their own work, and this is where critics and historians can help to uncover the subconscious of the artist.  So I accepted my professor's statement despite O'Keeffe's public denial.  There is nothing wrong with seeing the flower paintings by Georgia O’Keeffe in the way the love of a woman can soothe the angst man.   Plus it contrasted the chaotic work of the time (2).  

Georgia O'Keeffe's Black Iris Series 1926

It was not until I witnessed the oversimplification and immature giggles toward her work that I felt perplexed.  I heard other undergrads, “...she just paints vaginas.”  There was that damned word “just” to reduce the significance of something, and the loaded word “vagina” which carries much more baggage (both selfish and commercial).  This is the opposite of rappers trying to validate the “n-word” by saying they are re-purposing its meaning (Sturken and Cartwright p. 63).  This is our culture claiming ownership of something intangible and trying to sell it, thus, cheapening it (Either option is misguided), and these idiots were allowed to speak that way, let alone think that way.  The context of OUR culture was contaminating this fresh experience of looking at O’Keeffe’s art (Sturken and Cartwright p. 57) for me.

Maybe Georgia O’Keeffe did paint vaginas subconsciously.  Then the definition or connotaion of “vagina” must be refined to align with the impression made upon me by the art and image of the woman in Stieglitz’s portrait.  Looking at the photo of O’Keeffe by Stieglitz, one could see in her image the contrast of strength and vulnerability, seduction and unawareness, sophistication and informality... I saw it in Stieglitz’s photograph.  So, if the artist IS the work, and the work IS the artist, to say Georgia O’Keeffe paints vaginas can still be accepted (if YOU need to label things), but one best get their understanding of the vagina as symbol correct first and remove the marketing baggage, bastardization, prostitution and pimping of “pussy” out of the equation.  

This is not some up-skirt shot of Brittany Spears on TMZ, but unfortunately, many “intelligent” people among us use knowledge to sell garbage to the majority of us to make themselves rich.  When it comes to visual culture, or culture period, there should be required courses in visual art, symbolism, and ethics.  This is where the Krauss reading comes in.  It seeks to critique and expose “unexamined assumptions about representation” (p.83). There are too many “smart” people saying stupid “shit”.  Sturken and Cartwright might say people “make do” because our introduction to most things come from a passive state of boredom (p.59), which would fit in with Krauss stating that our capitalist culture prepares us in order to sell TO us (p.84).  We kinda, sorta channel surf through life, and in that sense, I hate when people disrespect or don’t get the things I find inspirational. I guess, by living to be inspired, I am a bad consumer.

So, as I draw my own comparisons, through conversations with other inspired people, I compare O’Keeffe’s hands in the Stieglitz photograph to the artist Rodin’s sculpture “The Hand of God” using the symbol of the hands as the original Creator.  Rodin, also saw hands as being able to express the emotions of the entire body (3).  The similarity of Rodin’s sculpted fingers and O’Keeffe’s fingers is uncanny... or is it?  The more I am around creative people, and the more photographs of O’Keeffe by Stieglitz I seek out, the more I see there are common trait’s that artists have, and O’Keeffe’s likeness exuded many if not all of the best of these traits.  I am not proclaiming her to be perfect.  I am, however, applauding the value of O’Keeffe as creator and as muse. I do not want to reduce her or her creations.  It took seeing O’Keeffe in photograph form and revisiting her work as an adult to see the energy and power in her and her ART.  I would rather falter on the side of treating O’Keeffe as God-like than mistakingly reduce her. 

Auguste Rodin
"The Hand of God" 1907

Alfred Stieglitz
"Hands and Thimble - Georgia O'Keeffe" 1920

Our visual culture often uses the lowest common denominator to unite us or relate to us, but it only treats us like children devaluing what is important under the guise of simplifying information.  Simultaneously, our culture inflates the status of molesters who can sell and make capital.  Krauss’s article proclaims art both representational and non-objective to be language that needs to be analyzed to understand providing the tools to fight the hard sell and avoid being misled.  Conscious art education begins there.  When deconstructing visual language/culture, we must be careful not to lose the subtlety of the art in exchange for a fast explanation, or an explanation at all.   

Thankfully, through education, I am learning that there is so much more to learn.  Like Stieglitz and the photographers in that show, I can stand up for ART despite my fear that we will always be a “point-and-shoot” culture.  We tolerate the quick conclusion because it is catchy, and it sells.  I have to maintain my filter which will not allow my appreciation to be contaminated and penetrated by someone else’s disease.  Not without a fight.

1. Christina Rouvalis, “First Impressions,” CARNEGIE, (Summer, 2012): 13-17.
2. Author Unknown. “Georgia O’Keefe: About the Painter,” American Masters, 2006  <http://www.pbs.org/wnet/americanmasters/episodes/georgia-okeeffe/about-the-painter/55/> (28 April 2006).
3. "Auguste Rodin: The Hand of God (08.210)". In Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2000–. http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/works-of-art/08.210 (October 2006)

Writing ONE Group C Reaction

Kipp Gallery, September 07, 2012

Writing ONE Group C Reaction

Ramon Riley

After reading the entries from my group,  I was left with the impression that we are, for the most part agreeable with the reading, and we all acknowledge the impact of Visual Culture on our work.  However, I found myself asking “Should we care”?  “How much should we care”?  “What should we care about”?

In Michelle Colbaugh’s paper, she talked about “creating illusions through photo representation and abstraction in paint”.  James Batistelli echoed the usefulness and accessibility of being able to manipulate photography.  Coincidentally, I had not incorporated photography in my work for over 10 years, until recently.  While I have set rules for myself (which may be silly and a waste of time), where I only use MY photographs, I know my “rules” are a direct reaction to the ease of use and blurring of appropriation versus stealing.  

Crystal Miller’s paper did a wonderful job of laying this out, and her blog page was sharp and convincing on just how easy it is to get US to look.  There are color theory classes.  There is market research...etc.  In the twenty-first century we have more tools at our disposal to manipulate the viewer to look. I found myself thinking about seeing work and asking myself, if I would consciously be trying to break down the “illusion” because I too am an artist and am obligated to serve as a visual docent, artistic awareness gatekeeper, or if I would simply allow myself to be the kid in the candy store...

I loved this statement in Eric Brennan’s paper:  “I believe all visual art is part of visual culture but visual culture is not always a part of the visual arts.”  I thought Eric’s writing about the inevitability of the impact of visual culture on us spoke to my feelings and opinions.  Yet, by stating that there is a connectedness and separation between visual art and visual culture gives one hope that what an artist does can expand and shape the culture in whatever way, big or small, instead of inevitably succumbing to the culture.  

I am unfulfilled when I catch myself tearing things down unless I find something to lift up.  The connectedness of culture, media and visual art is complex, but I struggle with walking the line of being a critical artist without being a critic who doesn’t make art, because it is easiest to overanalyze and criticize one’s self.  When I set up rigid rules, I am bound to break them and feel like a hypocrite.  That sucks.

When I am engaged, I am not thinking about culture or trends or marketability or illusion or validity or impact.  I am in love.  I am all of that and none of that.  I care about what I care about until I care about something else, so if my love is strong enough, then it will be worthy of attention.  I can be a magnet instead of spending my life trying to become a magnet.  I can be the result of the best of what I have experienced and taken in, instead of constantly scrutinizing what I am taking in with a false sense of security that such a process will make me better. Perhaps.  

Writing ONE

Writing One

Ramon Riley

For some reason the words visual culture puts a bad taste in my mouth.  It is labeling the unnecessary.  Perhaps that is my artist angst that simply hates labels.  Or perhaps it is an ignorance that will evolve through understanding.  As an American, I think we struggle with the word culture.  We are a mix of many cultures.  We are bombarded with imagery.  Sometimes it is too much to take, and even more to think about.

...but in my world, I can filter out what I do not want.  I have the freedom to choose what I want to spend time seeing.  I can go to the museum and choose one artist, or one painting, and I can sit for hours.  This is the other part of being American.  We have much to choose from and much to arouse us.

I think visual art can be defined as our filter.  If we do not see it, then we do not see it.  If I visit the museum in my teens, but I do not get Matisse until I’m in my thirties, then it is only then, in my thirties that Matisse is an artist.  As a teacher, I see that all the time.  I can only introduce and hope that my students are prepared for when they are ready to receive a particular artist.  

I am learning that my art history has been shaped by memories, and I am just now able to uncover them and explore them.  For example,  I have been surrounded by gothic architecture and “greek-like” sculpture my entire life, yet I owned it before I knew it.  So my palette has been shaped by this, and I seek these things out with more conviction now. Thus, I consider my own experience with art and art culture to be an excavation.  I am hoping someday to catch up.  Then maybe I can stand assured in the present.

Until we are confident, we imitate in words and actions.  I like it because you like it.  I like it because I think I should.  It’s art because it is famous.  I have looked back on my own work and thought, “I was on to something,” but only in hindsight.  It was not until this summer that I started feeling like an artist in the moment.  I felt a rush through my body that engaged all of my senses and told me that what I was doing mattered even if only to myself.  I wasn’t working for a grade, a show, a critique, compensation... I felt the power of things learned and forgotten culminate through me.  I was the vessel.  Is that culture?  I mean in a larger sense???

Do we need artists to be the bookmarks of our lives?  Do we need artists to say IT?  Do we need artists to be our collective voice?  Because an artist can do that.  An artist strike universal cord or a nerve that we did not know was there to be played or explored.  That is why art changes and evolves, I think.  Because our world changes and evolves, even if we never do or did not want to.