graffiato
Friday, September 7, 2007
I think that graffiti can be a beautiful thing. To me, it epitomizes the underground, the underbelly, the alternative, the anti-establishment. It's true that some of it is ugly--I still remember going to play at the neighborhood playground to find it covered with spraypainted swastikas--but as an art form, its got meaning and grit and flair. I like how it can be employed as a playful and insightful upraised middle finger to everything too uptight and narrowminded about authority (see banksy). I love seeing colors and shapes bloom on a decaying urban wall. It's a pleasant surprise. It shouldn't be there. But it is, evidence of humanity's drive to create things, to share ideas, to express itself, regardless of rules or location or abundance of artistic materials. It's ingenious and clever. It's about making something extraordinary out of something ordinary, creating a diversion from and a commentary about the mundane.
I just finished reading the wikipedia article about it. Here are some highlights:
"The eruption of Vesuvius preserved graffiti in Pompeii... One inscription shows a phallus accompanied by the text, mansueta tene: "Handle with care"."
"Disappointed love also found its way onto walls in antiquity:
- Whoever loves, go to hell. I want to break Venus's ribs
- with a club and deform her hips.
- If she can break my tender heart
- why can't I hit her over the head?"
"With the popularity and legitimization of graffiti has come a level of commercialization. In 2001, computer giant IBM launched an advertising campaign which involved people in various states spray painting on sidewalks a peace symbol, a heart, and a penguin (Linux mascot), to represent "Peace, Love, and Linux." However due to illegalities some of the "street artists" were arrested and charged with vandalism"
"Modern graffiti art often incorporates additional arts and technologies. For example, Graffiti Research Lab has encouraged the use of projected images and magnetic Light-emitting diodes as new mediums for graffiti writers. The Italian artist Kaso is pursuing regenerative graffi through experimentation with abstract shapes and deliberate modification of previous Graffiti artworks."
See the Graffiti Research Lab for yourself. The "light graffiti" it advocates is not only aesthetically awesome, but leaves behind no paint or scratches...so it technically isn't vandalism
With Hektor, graffiti gets digital. Hektor's a "portable spray paint output device for laptop computers". props to Hektor's creators! what a cool machine.
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I tried my hand at cardboard stenciling and spraypaint, a la banksy, last quarter. It was hard. There's a lot of advance planning involved--with complex pictures, you have to figure out what to cut out first and how, and how to lay the paint down (which was difficult in itself! aerosol paintcans are temperamental) so you get the right colors down.
I managed to snag some free spray paint (five colors, including turquoise, silver, and royal purple) from an outgoing product design student right before I left school for the summer. Hopefully I'll have time to experiment with them. artistically and legally, of course.
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And of course, some facebook Graffiti that I'm particularly proud of. It came out during finals week and became the bane of my spring quarter GPA. I became a Graffiti junkie. Mostly I just made bad stick figure drawings, but some of them turned out well.
from top to bottom:
1. Moon Woman, or Best Use of Time Spent Procrastinating an IHUM Paper
2. Karen's Birthday Unicorn
3. Man and Burro Traversing Sideways Cliff in Front of Burnt Sienna Sky (done completely with my laptop mouse)
People I owe Graffiti to:
- Ben
- Jessica
- Amy
- Alex O
- Kontien
Posted bySHELLY! at 5:45 PM 0 comments
Labels: graffiti
all warfare is deception
Tuesday, September 4, 2007
Currently watching: Planet Earth. It's gorgeous, brilliant, entrancing, plus a million other superlatives. Nature shows are my anti-drug.
Currently reading: Sketch for a Historical Picture of the Progress of the Human Mind (a history of human civilization written during the Enlightenment by Marquis de Condorcet), and The Art of War by Sun-Tzu. Pretentious much?
[to the left: detail shot; to the right: full image]
I redid her face so it no longer looks as freaky, however, I'm off-put by how perfect she looks. It's hard to draw normal looking people. Imperfections. Disproportions. Although I enjoy looking at beautiful digital illustration, a lot of the "pretty woman/man/or androgynous figure in intricate clothing in lovely environment" paintings always strike me as empty. I want to create something that's more meaningful and more moving than that. I have plenty of 'deeper' or more interesting ideas in my head, but I've never actually composed or executed them.
I have an excuse with this painting: it's a present for a friend (shoutout to Rhea!) and practice for a lot of different techniques (figure drawing, rendering water, composing a piece that seamlessly integrates the foreground with the background, choosing a more uniform color palette), but after this, I'm going to devote myself more to substance than style.
My occasional existential crises about my major/life plan continue to strike. I know I should study what my love--the problem is, I love so many different things! I have so many divergent academic interests! My dream major would be mostly product design (heavy on needfinding and design, easy on engineering and math), anthropology/human biology (People are fascinating!), some neuroscience (Brain & Behavior was a great class, and I liked Psych 1 a lot too), and of course, a good dose of studio art.
For next quarter, I'm debating between the following classes to round out my schedule (with E14, CS106A, Design I, and a 10 hr/week campus job is already looking to be pretty hectic)
- Intro to Theatrical Design: I wanted to help out with set design for The Wild Party, but I had no time or experience. Will this class change things? (requirements filled: none)
- Intro to Art History: I LOVE art museums. I read about art history on wikipedia for fun. but I've always wanted to take a formal art history class. (requirements filled: none)
- Drawing I: I've never taken a formal art class past 8th grade. I need to work on my live figure drawing skills. (fills another product design requirement)
- Human Behavioral Ecology: Biology! Psychology! History! Anthropology! (requirements filled: none. exploration into anthropological science: yes.)
-Environmental Change and Emerging Infectious Diseases: How the way humans treat the environment is resulting in the spread of diseases. Case studies of malaria, HIV, the plague, etc. For the part of me that relished reading every single page of The Hot Zone. (requirements filled: none. exploration into epidemiology/anthropological science: yes.)
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Design for the Other 90% rocks my socks.
That is what I want to do with my life. The big question is: how do I get involved with it?
Posted bySHELLY! at 1:30 PM 0 comments
Labels: design, existential crises, work in progress