Blog 6

The article I read for this blog was mostly about sound and its use as an artistic media.  One thing I liked about this article was that Miller and Cardiff were so happy with their piece "Dark Pool" that they wouldn't sell it. I just thought that was nice to have a piece you enjoyed so much you wouldn't be able to part with it. Another thing I found that was cool was that the piece of work and the environment the piece was in started to blur for some people experiencing it.

I think something that made this article difficult for me to grasp is that I have no prior experience with sound design or sound editing at all. That isn't to say that I'm too familiar with video editing but I do at least have a vague idea. When the sound project comes up it's going to be a tough time for me I think.

Project 2

So for our journey project I decided to walk to class and pay more close attention than i usually do.  Most of the time I walk to class with music going and I don't really think about the little things around me.  The first picture is of a bench out side of someone's house that I've walked by for more than a year now and have never bothered to notice.  The next part of my journey to class takes me over a bridge at the corner of Indianola and Woodruff that I've probably walked over hundreds of times, but I don't think it ever crossed my mind that people actually park cars under there. That got me wondering who are the people who park there? Where do they live that those spots are the most convenient for them? Also, it doesn't really seem like a very safe place for a car to be in my opinion.  So then walking down Woodruff a house caught my attention because out front were probably 4 different grills.  I can't imagine having such a need to grill food that I would need 4 grills.  So then as I walk down 19th avenue I've seen the motorcycles before but I never really stopped to think why so many in one place. Was it that this was the only place on campus to park?  Finally the last thing that caught my interest on my walk to work is that right across the street from our classroom there seems to be the headquarters for the groundskeeping of OSU. This was something I've noticed from time to time but I never realized where it was actually centered around. It really makes me wonder what else I miss by being so focused on myself as opposed to the world around me.   

Jesus Tap Dancing Christ

So the reading we were assigned for today had to do with the personal story of someone tasked with guarding a controversial piece of art.  What I really enjoyed about the article was that it was the story of someone who didn't have any real background in art but became extremely emotionally invested over the course of guarding the work.   I like how he said he understood the piece better than the artist herself because he doesn't just see the work, but he sees how people react to it as well.

What I didn't really understand was how the whole thing was just made to be destroyed.  The idea that the whole point of the piece was to get wrecked and then use it as an example of people's intolerance just doesn't sit well with me. I agree with the author that the piece probably had a greater effect on people while it was still on display than as a closed circuit video that may or may not even show what happened.

What's the Big Idea?

Big Ideas and Artmaking
This article was about the concept of big overarching ideas that govern an artists entire body of work.  The thing I found to be the most interesting about this article was the that they challenged students to find their own big idea.  So instead of just creating to prove mechanical skill, they urge students to find something larger to focus their work on.
I think the most difficult thing for me is going to be trying to find a big idea to focus on.  This is mostly for the fact that I don't have a lot of mechanical skill when it comes to drawing anyway, so taking my work a step farther with a big idea might be too advanced for me. If I can get a grasp of the mechanics of digital art making I may move on to this concept, but for now I'm just going to try to produce work that's technically nice.

Barrett Visual Culture
So this article dealt with the idea of denotations and connotations in a visual piece of artwork.  The idea that everything in a piece of work is meant to be done deliberately in order to elicit some kind of response.  The response doesn't even have to be a conscious one.  It was interesting to see the students pick apart the Rolling Stones cover since I've never thought about really looking at something to the point of noticing the most minute details.
The thing about the article I found most difficult was that now I'm going to be very aware of everything I do in my work. Now I'm going to have to really think about the meaning in all the nuances of a piece of work. This is something I don't really have any experience with so it may not end well.