Reading Response: John Cage

John Cage is an example of a very smart and talented artist that is also a philosopher. He was so intelligent  and was brought up in a very normal environment in a very well to do family. He was interested in music and noise as an art medium. The story of his life as the son of a wealthy inventor and composer with great grades and a high college education is very interesting to his practices later as an artist. It seemed that his failings as a composer, even though he did compose simple and beautiful pieces, and his rejection of the idea of becoming a man of religion led him to examine things more closely than some of us do. He had a love for sound, just simple and raw sound being the thing that draws people together as a sort of international language. Sound gives people much pleasure as it is and his work drew on the happiness and universal understanding that comes from experiencing sound. This of course could be done in a dramatic and dark way as well for there are some sounds that we know mean trouble, hurt or pain but I think that John Cage wanted to light people up rather than expose darkness. He did a piece 4'33'' that showed the inner workings of an orchestra and the relationship between the conductor and the musicians that is comedic in a way but also very expressive of how music is done and that the sounds of the people themselves could be examines and considered musical as well. His composition "Dream" is a piano piece that I think is really lovely and relaxing. I used to sit as a kid and play on the piano stringing together notes that sounded good to me and that's what his compositional work reminds me of. I never had any trining in the musical field but I always enjoyed doing this sort of thing.  He had talent for pieces that would be a string of sounds that were nice when put together if nothing else. His work has a sort of existentialist theme to it because it invites the listener to realize their own place in the world and the sound that they make and those that surround them. I also enjoyed listening to his ideas on sound and silence in the Video "about silence on youtube. It tells his philosophy behind his work.
Link to "about silence": http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pcHnL7aS64Y
Link to "Dream":http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ExUosomc8Uc
Link to 4'33'': http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hUJagb7hL0E

Art Show Review

Today I went to the Santa Barbara Museum or art. I wanted to check it out and see how it compared to the LA museums that I am used to. It was a lot smaller but they did have some good exhibitions going on right now. It is a formal and small museum. I was kind of sad that they didn't have any garden areas but it was really great all the same.

The exhibition that I paid special attention to was the Tsukioka Kōgy exhibition of Japanese wood block prints made from scenes in theatre productions. The exhibition was called Noh Drama. It was an action filled exhibition that featured great traditional style wood block art. The style was a little more modern than that of Hiroshige who died about 50 years before Kogy was boen but I could still see the definite traditional style present in the work. This exhibition was extremely interesting to me because I had seen a massive collection of Hiroshige's work on display at the Norton Simon Museum in Pasadena and was curious to compare the two artists. I think one of the main differences in the work was that in Kogy's pieces the background was often in grey creating a lot of contrast between the subjects of the print and the background whereas Hiroshige preserved a lot of detail in a very vivid background. It was interesting to see the evolution of this tradition and one of Kogy's pieces even reminded me of modern anime. (below). I couldn't help but notice the recurring theme of the ocean. It makes sense that the ocean which is so important to the Japanese because it's a main source of where they get their food from. It is a great symbol of their culture.

Kogy's piece titled Nue (1925-1928)

Hiroshige's Naruto Rapids

I think that the art of wood block printing is so beautiful and so stylistically appealing. I love to go to see these kind of exhibitions when I can.

Press Release of the exhibition that I went to: http://www.sbma.net/library/files/Noh%20Drama%20release%20FINAL.pdf

Comics Reading Response

The topics of the readings this week were how to convey emotion and message through lines and text.
Lines can convey many emotions when they are manipulated into images. Fear, confusion, control and order are among these emotions and feelings that the viewer can believe are conveyed by images. The concept of  dynamically provocative lines is one of the oldest concepts used in art. I actually was assigned to convey emotions using only lines in my Design 1 class at my CC. It is very interesting to go from conveying feeling abstractly using only lines and then also implementing them in larger more detailed pieces to emphasize the meaning of the piece.

The second part of the reading was all about text. The earliest form of text was actually closer to art than one would expect. Pictographs were the earliest text and followed early art. The text in art can be used to enhance the meaning or to add to the art piece visually but usually it is used in a meaningful way that informs the reader as to the purpose or concept behind it. Text can also be a sort of art itself. typography has always interested me. Sometimes the way a word is written can be more powerful than the word itself. Type can be used as a medium even such as the picture below. Opening ones mind to the use of fundamentals like lines and text in art can be very effective. It's important not to forget the simple things.

Scariest Moment

My life hasn't had many scary moments where I had to fear for anything.
I've been lucky that way.
I'd have to say the time that I was probably the most fearful in my life would have to be when I was 9 years old. I had to get 2 teeth pulled. My canines needed to come out so that I could get braces. I had always been afraid of the dentist and he was always super creepy. I hated him so much. When I learned my fate I was so angry with my mom for letting him do this to me. I didn't see why I needed braces anyway...who knew what my mouth would look like when there were all permanent teeth in there. How could I possibly still have gaps then?

On the day of doom I cried all day. I refused to get out of bed, didn't go to school. I had a lot of anxiety. I fought nurses who tried to give me shots, I couldn't allow someone to forcibly remove my teeth! It had taken 4 nurses to hold me down to give me a shot once, I was going to give this dentist a run for his money. They were not getting my teeth! I sat in the chair, still crying. The nurses came to inject local anesthetic, I fought them off. I squirmed, screamed and wriggled around until they gave up

....little did I know that they had called in the big guns. My dentist came out I informed him that I hated him. He informed me that I would have a great smile when I grew up. I didn't care. They were torturing me and I wasn't about to go down without a fight. After a struggle with the dentist that lasted about 5 more minutes he got up and left.

SUCCESS! I had fought for my life and won!! He came back with my mom. Hahahah big deal like she would change anything, she was possibly the most easily defeated person in the whole room. He sat down again and explained the situation to her. She apologized, which I thought was ironic because I had already told her that they were not going to get my teeth out of my head easily. She was there with the nurses who had tried to give me shots at various points of my life. She knew how hard I would fight if I was in danger. At the end of the debriefing, he calmly told my mom that in order to get my teeth out he was going to have to put me in a headlock. FUCK. My mom would never agree to this, I knew a headlock was only for WWF Wrestlers that the boys at my school were in love with. She agreed to this abuse. I panicked inside but I was immobilized within seconds as the biggest needle I had ever seen came straight at my face. Injection. Ouch. Then I closed my eyes. This was horrible. This was outrageous.

I was gonna die. I heard a strange crunching sound and pressure on my tooth and within seconds i was gushing blood everywhere and the dentist had a large pointy bloody tooth on his tray. Repeat. Now my mouth was full of blood and I knew I was going to die any second.   Two of my teeth were gone gaping bleeding holes in their wake, but I had lived. Somehow I had lived. I stopped crying relief swept over me.

I looked to my right and there was a little boy sitting there waiting to be seen for his first dentist appointment. Open mouthed and tearing up, undoubtedly wondering if what had happened to me to make me scream and cry so much would await him.
"It's not that bad" I said to reassure him, though as I spoke the bloody gauze fell out.
I left afterwards, probably instilling the same fear in the little boy as I had had in me.
Never before have I feared so much for my life.

Proudest Moment

My proudest moment would have to be getting my acceptance letter from UCSB, not that it wasn't expected or anything, I fully knew that I would get in, it was just all the hard work that brought me to that moment that I was proud of. In high school I had a 3.8 GPA. I was smart and completely able to go to college but neither of my parents were college graduates so they knew nothing about the application process or anything. My counselors never pushed me and neither did my parents and I had no idea what I wanted to be when I grew up so the college application period came and went and I didn't even take the SAT. This is one of my biggest regrets. So I went off to GCC the local community college. It was literally hell on earth. For everyone that doesn't know there are a few defining characteristics of the population of Glendale. 1. They drive crazy expensive foreign cars....extremely angrily 2. They smoke A LOT literally everywhere and anywhere doesn't matter if they are in the doorway of a classroom. 3. They don't give a fuck about anyone who has a problem with any of this or anything else. I had to dodge my way through clouds of armani cologne, smoke, crying babies and try to not get hit or cussed out by anyone in the parking lot every day.  I endured extreme apathy and indifference from all the staff there, teachers, counselors, everyone. I had to figure out my own course schedule in order to leave and was mislead by the counselors into taking classes that didn't matter. Literally no one cared at all help was nowhere and I only had 1 friend. I hated it. I went to school year round so that I could finish all my coursework in time to apply. I finished 70 units in 2 years there which I think is equal to about 110 here since they were semester units. I applied and was so excited that my life would finally change for the better. Living at home and going to that school were literally killing me inside. I was depressed and mad all the time.

When I logged in to my application online and saw that I had been accepted I was so happy. I had made it through and I was done with this horrible stage in my life. I had worked so hard, taking summer school and winter sessions while everyone else was having fun. I felt relief and happiness and proud all at the same time and I felt amazing. My life was about to take a turn for the better finally. It is hard being a transfer and sometimes the cliques are hard to infiltrate. It can be hard to carve out a place for yourself among all the people who did have a freshmen and sophomore year. Sometimes it can be lonely here, but at least I have freedom, a campus I don't despise going to and more than 1 friend that I can hang out with. I was and am proud of myself for being the first person in my family to be going to college.

My Greatest Art Piece

The above painting took me 50 hours to paint over 10 days.

I took design 2 at my CC and was immediately struck with how intense my teacher Megan Geckler was (show was featured last week in entries). She emphasized how perfect lines and completely opaque made a clean look that would mimic the precision of digital prints if done correctly. Then she gave us our assignment. It was to create a kaleidoscopic image and paint it using only tints tones and shades of 3 colors. First I had to design 1/8 of the kaleidoscope. Once I had a design that I thought I liked I flipped, matched and duplicated the image on photoshop. Then after that was done, I got a print of that image on a 13x 13 square. I then had to transfer the image from the paper to illustration board to paint which meant that I had to cover the back of the paper with graphite and trace the whole image so that the image was on the illustration board now. After all this work I had to mix my colors. I made 11 tints tones and shades of blue, yellow and blue-green. Then came the excruciating part... I had to paint this with the precision and skill that my teacher had so emphasized. I painted with a number 1 brush using layers of opacity to create a full opaque and completely flat no lumpy pieces of paint surface. There were some days where I'd sit down for 9 hours straight and only get a tiny corner done. I would be so grumpy at the end of the day after having sat for 9 hours painting. I would have dreams about me painting this stupid 13 by 13 square. There were some days that I thought that when I finished, I'd most like to light the piece on fire. It was sucking up my life putting all this work into a painting for a deadline it left me achey and frustrated at the end of each session. I finally did finish it though and was one of the only people in my class to actually turn it in on time. The teacher ranted and raved about my fine work and I almost cried because I was so happy to be done and so proud of how beautiful it had turned out. this is the work that I put the most of my energy at a time into and I love it. Its hanging in my room today...I didn't light it on fire.I love it and I'm extremely proud of it.

Embarrassing Moment

"HAVE YOU SEEN VIDEO OF THE MIDGET JUMPING ON A TRAMPOLINE?"
There are so many things to be seen and heard in a frat house.
Some better than others.

I was in a room hanging out with my boyfriend Ian when a few other guys came in and chatted for a bit. At the end of the small talk they asked Ian  if he had seen the video of the midget jumping on a trampoline. My interest was peaked. I knew that frat houses were the ultimate source for hilarious viral videos and I was going to be the first of my girl friends to see this one and introduce them to it. Ideas began swirling in my mind about what the funny point of this video could be, "Does the midget fall and eat shit?, Does the midget jump and magically get propelled into Willy Wonka's Chocolate Factory? Does the midget do amazing gymnastic tricks on the trampoline?" It seemed a bit politically incorrect that the defining point of this obviously hilarious video was a midget, but whatever, the bros thought it was funny, and they had seen a lot of funny stuff, both fucked up and not. I asked about if it was on You Tube and what to search for. They just laughed and left the room. UGH! I knew what this was about...they wanted to keep me out of the loop because I was a girl. This was typical elementary school shit, the boys had found something awesome that they would let no girl in on. UNFAIR!

"HEY IAN COME SEE THIS!" Ian left the room and started making his way down the hall. I sat there for a second and then it hit me...This was the midget on the trampoline video! I sprinted down the hall to catch up and see too. They were not about to keep the funny from me! I had outsmarted these guys this time! I could feel elementary school revenge run through my veins. I beat the boys! I beat the boys! I was gonna see it!

Unfortunately when I got to the room there was no laptop out, no TV playing, there was just one thing.

That thing was Hunter, who had just shaved...everything. He had stretched his scrotum skin tight and created a platform for his penis to bounce on as he shook it up and down.

Get it; a midget on a trampoline?

He quickly noticed that I had trailed Ian into the room. His eyes got huge and his mouth opened wide, he grabbed a near by towel and held it where the midget had just been bouncing."Sorry."

I turned around and walked back to Ian's room embarrassed and ashamed that I had just been so dying to see what these young men had found so funny. You think he would be the one embarrassed, but I think I was. I had been just way too eager to be in on this inside joke, possibly left out of too many as a kid. Hunter didn't care. He was in the other room in a matter of 5 minutes to laugh at me. I can't look at Hunter the same way and when my girl friends say how hot they think he is I secretly laugh inside. There are just some things you don't need to know,some inside jokes should be left on the inside, especially in a frat.