“In three words I can sum up everything I’ve learned about life: it goes on.”

- Robert Frost

Assignment 8: PMA Visit

As if I was wandering through an art themed maze, I found myself in the Arsenberg archive face to face with something way too familiar and hilariously nostalgic to me. Growing up my father painted as not only a hobby but also for his career. His abstract works were around the entire house and his pieces in progress were kept in the basement or in the garage. It wasn’t until I was in ninth grade when I realized that the painting that hung in my downstairs bathroom wasn’t a painting that was of my father’s own creation. Flipping through a slideshow in art class the same picture came up and I raised my hand saying that my father painted this. Everyone laughed. His copy of Marcel DuChamp’s “Nude Descending a Staircase No. 2” Oil on canvas, 1912 collection, was a perfect replica, so perfect that it made me have one of the most memorable embarrassing moments of my entire life. In all of my trips to the Philadelphia Museum of Art I never stood close enough to the piece. I never notice how similar my father’s brush strokes were to DuChamp’s, or how precise his color mixing was that he focused on so consciously. 

I haven’t been to this particular museum since I’ve gained all of the knowledge from my AP class last year. It was so interesting to have a background in the majority of artists and made the work so much more fascinating. Starting from the outside, the architecture of the building holds such immense value. From Eakins to VanGough the collection there is so endless. I could spend days in there and still not be finished roaming and studying. I never took necessary appreciation for the locality of the museum and how something so significant is literally in my backyard. 

Something almost as interesting as the collections was to watch and study the people who are studying the pieces. At points I would stand at a piece surrounded with people and watch their eyes follow the piece, their gestures relating to, or explaining the piece. There were people of different ethnicities, cultural backgrounds, color, religions, and everyone related and everyone reacted. Art is a beautiful, unifying thing. 

Assignment 6: Review/Rant

Art Fag City At The L Magazine: I Got My MFA Now What?

http://www.artfagcity.com/2011/09/28/art-fag-city-at-the-l-magazine-i-got-my-mfa-now-what/

I dwell on the past. I am so afraid of the present.  Petrified of the future.

After reading “At The L Magazine: I Got My MFA Now What?” posted on Art Fag City’s blog, my fears were enforced on such a level that I’m now starting to sweat. Now, short of breath, I am writing this desperate ramble in response to the posted article. The only thing I am certain of is not much more than my name and age, I don’t necessarily know who I am or who I want to be in the later years of my life. My sense of clarity is missing and I am living day by day.

Being completely unsure and so indecisive, I am surprised I chose art school; I am surprised I chose any school at all. I stuck to something that I love and making a talent into a career was seemingly flawless. I will create and be just that, a creator. Now that I am in my first year I realize that it is not as beautiful as it sounds and what my father had always told me holds true, “art is hard, really fucking hard but you have to let it break you down sometimes and something beautiful will be the outcome.” Art is breaking me down and for what? I don’t know what I want to do with it, I don’t know how much money I will end up making or if my life salary will be able to pay back my loans. I’m not sure what my intended major is or if I should already know that already or not. However, all I do know is I will work and work… and work my hardest.

“I’ve been in New York two years and have nothing to show for it. Suck it up. Critics, artists, curators and dealers should all expect to spend no less than 10 years working independently before receiving any kind of recognition.” Paddy Johnson, the writer of this specific article writes. Suddenly I find myself short of breath. The article, just like the title leaves me guessing. I’m in art school, now what. Thinking I had time to just to make art and do whatever I wanted was completely flushed down the drain. My life is a time bomb. Assignments are due, papers, critiques consume me and suddenly time is going by a lot faster than it ever had before. I have no time to not know who I am, it’s almost time to declare my major. WHAT AM I GOING TO DO WITH MY LIFE? “There are only about 300 spaces for A-list art professionals—whether writers, curators, or artists—and that’s the only list with any job security.” Time to panic.

But then an epiphany stuck, suddenly my class is half full, these people who are writing this blog are much older than me, much more experienced, went to school for the same thing and still at least eight years later don’t know what to do with their own life. Do I still have time? “Hopefully” I say to myself with some sort of sigh of relief and concern. I need to take a step back sometimes and worry about the present before I begin to fill in my future. I keep reading the blog. “Yes, that means most New York artists won’t land a solo show for a very long time. This is usually a good thing, as it gives an artist the time to mature”. I, just like my fellow future art school alumni need to take things in stages and mature myself. Once I begin to mature my clarity will start to build, making decisions easier and the stress… well the stress may never stop fluctuating. Until then.

Assignment 4: “Persona”

Response stemming from - Why is “art especially good for those who have problems”?

Art is expression; an outlet in every sense of exhaling thoughts, feelings, and emotions. Art is beneficial to those who have trouble conveying themselves so instead, artists create. Artists, by process, render responses to specific triggered emotions, visual reactions. With no negative connotation, they [artists] may be some of the most problematic of people, sometimes getting caught and consumed in their own personal limbo. Persona, safely speaking, could be one of the most confusing movies I have ever watched, but is an exemplary product to the question stated above. Elisabet, a stage actress, and artist by all means, becomes mute. The first thought that went through my mind was how over dramatic she was and how fitting it was for the role she was playing for the movie. She no longer could act out in words, she remained silent and completely lost in her own reality. Art is a double edge sword, a talent and terror. Elizabeth proves this.

“You are inaccessible. They said you were healthy, but your sickness is of the worst kind: it makes you seem healthy. You act it so well everyone believes it, everyone except me, because I know how rotten you are inside.” Alma exclaims in regards to Elisabet. 

The concept of a double edge sword is fulfilled by how Elisabet is putting on a die hard act without trying at all. With all the roles that she has once performed she is caught up entirely on them all and remains completely emotionless and for the most part, unsympathetic. Her response, her outlet, is silence once her talent has completely consumed her. 

Thoughts/Rambles:

 Must rewatch film to connect on a deeper level and to gain a more well educated, understanding summary/plot line. 

Assignment #1: Questionnaire

What authors do you like to read? Cite some of your favorite books/authors.

In no specific order: Charles Bukowski, JD Salinger, Brett Easton Ellis, Albert Camus, David Sedaris, Ernest Hemingway, Jack Kerouac, Allen Ginsberg,William Burroughs.