SAIC Tour

Last Thursday, Teen Lab visited SAIC for a tour. I found the tour very interesting an my eyes certainly "glazed over" many of the materials and facilities available for students to use. We first visited the Ceramics department. I was interested that chemistry was involved in mixing glazes for ceramic students to use. Things like volcanic ashes could be experimented with.

We also visited the Photography department next. There were dark rooms for developing photos, the traditional analog way. There were also high tech machines for digital as well as negatives too. I enjoyed the fact that we saw what a studio for painting students looked like. There were electric lights as well as a open window, so students could contrast how their artwork looked in artificial light versus natural light. We ended our tour with a visit to a student gallery.

John Molini in ART PACKING

Today at Teen Lab we went 'behind the scenes' to the art packing section of the Art Institute. John Molini was the manager of that section of the Art Institute. His specialties include making the crates for art packing as well as framing the art for the finished version shown in the galleries upstairs. It was interesting learning about the state-of-the-art materials involved in the packing, including memory foam that is very strong and retains its shape. He said it was like "packaging eggs", the closer and tighter you fit it, the less likely it is to break. This goes for fragile things like eggs, or priceless works of art.

Mr. Molini said he was "lucky" to be able to do a job he enjoys and is able to think in 3D, if he is asked about a painting in the galleries, he knows how big the crate should be. He said he still had a blueprint of the primitive crates used several years ago. Today, the crates are made of special materials that make the crate waterproof and sturdy. He said he was very lucky to get the job at the Art Institute after years of being a traveling musician on the road. He said is happy that he went from working in a temporary architecture job at the Art Institute in the 1980s, to getting a job in the Art Packing section after a member left their job. He had only planned to stay a few months to pay his debt and pay off a guitar custom made for him, but he ended up staying.

I found a link to the band he was in: BB Spin.

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As a side note, I'm finished with my digital collage today! Its not quite long in length, but it tells a story. :)

Physical Collage Artist Statement Draft

 We are working on artist statements for our physical collages for our Teen Lab exhibition, and here is my current draft, it's a work in progress!
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When I started my collage, I picked out artwork that was mostly from the older galleries. I found that floral patterns were pleasing and were present in the majority of art pieces I chose. The pieces draw inspiration from nature. Thistles, lilies, and abstract flowers were present in the decorative arts, as well as backgrounds in paintings. The second part of my collage consisted of entrances and exits. I felt excited when I incorporated the flight of stairs to the second floor because that was the floor that contained the decorative arts. I chose to put the yellow beaded curtain, because it was also an entrance. It makes one think what lays behind the curtain, or up the stairs.

Project Progress

My theme for the Digital Collage project is Childhood Nostalgia.
Right now I'm split with two different storylines.

One is based on the painting 'Song of the Lark." It shows a girl in a rural setting. Since she had to work in the fields often, she didn't have time for play. I would like to put the song "I Have Had Singing" to the paintings that line the wall along with 'The Song of the Lark." All of them depict rural scenes.

The second part has to do with seagulls and waves and seascapes, like in "Two Sisters", siblings at a beach, along with "The Child's Bath," Summer memories and domestic scenes are very nostalgic.

I've collected beach sounds, including waves and seagulls, as well as ambient farm sounds. Ive collected lark songs as well.

I have to figure out how to combine these two stories. Meredith has suggested that perhaps the girl in the field is recalling her past childhood.

The theme of my digital collage is mostly taking comfort in the past after all . . .

College Fair

I went to the college fair on Tuesday. I was able to talk to all 5 colleges I was planning to apply to. It was very informative and I managed to get a lot of pamphlets. I liked that a large amount of information was all in one place. I found the student financial aid table was very helpful, I even got a bookmark that listed what to watch out for in scam/illegitimate scholarships. "We do everything for you!" / " You are a finalist in a contest... that you never entered." were some of the things listed. With the new and old information I learned, I need to finish up my college applications.

Guest Speaker

There was a guest speaker (Curator Lisa Dorin) today at the Art Institute for the Sharon Hayes exhibit. Her presenting the theme of "Speech" made the exhibit much easier to understand. The first time I went to the exhibit at the opening I really didn't know what to expect. The second time I went with the them of Speech in mind, I found that the album covers and how they were juxtaposed made me be more aware of the exhibit. When I got to the almost silent room with the clicking projectors, I found the sound unfamiliar. I hadn't grown up in the time of projectors and it was definitely not the same as a Powerpoints'.

Later when we went back to the Ryan Education Center we discussed things with our guest speaker. She spoke at length about the artist's work and back ground. Sharon Hayes was a journalism major before she took on art more than a decade ago. It is evident activism shows in her work. Most of the exhibit had presidential speeches from the 60s, a turbulent time in American history. The pictures clicking on the projectors were of protestors with protest signs, however, they were placed in a different time period than they were intended to be. There were interesting reactions from people.

Sharon Hayes Spoken Words DJ Nov 10

 Today the Sharon Hayes exhibit opened today at the Art Institute. She was a spoken words DJ and here is a bit of her performance.

Her performance was very interesting. At Teen Lab , we discussed that the lack of visuals made people focus on the audio. She mixed presidential speeches, interviews and news-clips from the 1960s. It was a turbulent time in American history, I heard JFK's fimilar voice in speeches, several news anchors on the Vietnam War and a really devastated voice announcing that Martin Luther King passed away from a gunshot wound in the neck.

A piece of audio I really noted was when she mixed news of an airplane crash caused by a fog/miscommunication, after audio news of Cuba and the Bay of Pigs.


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Yesterday we learned to use Garage Band and record sounds using cameras. I was in the create sounds group using pencils, paper, hands, whatever we could find. The other groups were ambient sounds and vocal sounds. We will use these non-copyrighted sounds for our digital collages.

Digital Sketchbook Entry

Today we brainstormed themes and voted on them. "Colors" won, but it was too broad, so we narrowed it to "blue."
The first thing that came to me was City by Ed Ruscha.

We wandered as a group over to it on the second floor for contemporary art.We thought it reminded us of the ocean, since we associate blue with the ocean. We also thought it was 'calm' and 'clear' and the fact that Chicago as a city is next to Lake Michigan is a possible reason for why it was titled 'City'.
We also took blue candy from a colorful pile and went to the very very blue Chagall Window. We were working on a physical collage all the while. Many notes were written on post-its.
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We viewed examples of previous student Digital Collages, and my favorite one was the 'Rouge' one. It incorporated live interviews and many images, and text. The music was lovely too. I guess I'll have to learn iMovie and Garageband.
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So far my going theme is Memory, which I associate with childhood memories, which has nostalgia, as well as looking into memories in the past as an escape. Certain memories are also tied to objects. Certain memories remind us of experiences.

Personal Museum Tour recap!

 Today at Teen Lab, I went with LaShay and toured the museum with museum staff Becky and Shahrazod. We went to our favorite pieces. most of my theme dealt with floral motifs and patterns. The European decorative arts was my favorite section of the museum. There is a casket there that was gilded and had these beautiful lions in the back and bird hooks at the front. The decorations were certainly 'excessive' and opulent.

We got to climb up the stairs I had in my collage, as well as see the two separate paintings of the couple I cut and pasted together.

My favorite part of the experience was the fact it was a group experience. I loved the collective group comments on the pieces and I loved the way it drove some interesting pieces of conversation. :)

Personal museum Map - digital sketchbook update

I visited the decorative arts section on the first floor as part of my Museum mapping project!I found the design of this furniture piece attractive. I really like the rounded corner of the desk, chair and the semi-circle side bins. According to the label the plywood piece was designed by Frank Lloyd Wright.

In my additional online research that I found here, I learned:

1. The Desk and Chair was made for the S.C. Johnson and Son Administration Building.
2. America was rapidly industrializing and the chairs design reflects the streamlined and shiny lamented surfaces.
3. The chairs were designed in 1936/39, before the start of WWII.

Personal Museum Map

At Teen Lab, we were asked to visit 4 different sections of the Art Institute Museum. We had to take 4 sketches or images of the works for each section. We also had to pay attention to text and the signs and cards that are next to the art pieces. We were also asked to trace our path on a map.

I found my way to the second floor, where there was a yellow bead curtain. A pile of candy was at the corner, and was told the pieces were edible. When you read the text explaining the piece though, the artist made it to represent his wife dying of AIDS. The candy pile was the same weight as she was. People taking candy represents her dying and losing lots of weight. I regret taking a piece after realizing.

I don't get these pieces at all. Its just countries flags, or stripes of color. anyone can do it. Maybe I'm missing some hidden meaning here, but its so ..simple. It confuses me.

I made my way to the first floor, where I went to the ancient Egyptian, Greek and Roman arts section. I found these hand crafted weapons to look very lethal.

I saw this Egyptian tablet with hieroglyphs in it. There appears to be a seated person and some sort of flying bird.

I'll have Thursday tomorrow to finish up!

Roger Brown Collection House Museum Visit

We visited the Roger Brown Collection yesterday on October 19. We took the Brown line to Armitage and walked a few blocks to the museum. After putting our coats and bags away we went on a tour of the house. Roger Brown had many different collections and he had interesting ways of displaying them. He had this shelf with what I think was his childhood ephemera. He had a Green Hornet lunch box and old toy buses and toy cars. He also like Jesus and Batman a lot. He had a batman pinata and lots of Jesus statues. They were like his heroes.

Text and Image Glimpses~!

Today we did a "Text Glimpse" and "Image Glimpse" exercise. I interviewed a security guard for the text portion. Interestingly, she said children were more well behaved than the adults when it came to no touching art! I also tried to eavesdrop on groups of people as part of the assignment. I was terrible at being discrete about it but I overheard an interesting comment on the Modern Wing Building itself: "All this glass makes me nervous."

For the image portion, we used viewfinders, it was black card-stock with a square cut in the middle. It gives a close up and helps focus on details.  Some familiar paintings look unrecognizable close up. I took many pictures with a camera, but here are a couple.

A close up of one of Georgia O' Keefe's close ups.

Part of a tablecloth? A scarf ? A dress?

Beatrice was with me too~

Exquisite Poem

This is a poem done by me and Vanessa. It is based on the "Exquisite Corpse" Surrealist game, except for writing instead of drawing. It was a fun collab! :) 

She was looking through her window on
morning,
does not reach the window, the sun does not
melt the glass. The glass was dripping with white
paint
on the the frames paint on the columns leave the
mirror. She glanced at it again and saw a white
bird.
is trapped and is spooked by its own reflection, it
gets injured, the floor under shattered, pieces
of mirror falling everywhere, no sound was
heard.
it? No one heard it. The noise was trapped in
there.

Here is my annotated album ~~~ C:

Website I visit a lot

yahoo!

Spanish Dancer by a Russian artist

I love the ivory and gold. I love how her hands are posed and the floral patterns on the folds of the cloth.

what inspires me.

Alphonse Mucha~