Understanding Comics Chapter 9 - coming full sphere

"We all live in a state of profound isolation" and each medium serves as a bridge between one-another. In comics the bridge is from "mind to hand to paper to eye to mind" and the power of understanding is what separates all artists from their audience. Mastery of one's medium is the degree to which the percentage of what the audience can understand can be increased to where the artist's ideas can survive. Ignorance is what prevents many from understanding each other and can only be breached through communication. According to McCloud, to understand comics you first have to get rid of all preconceived ideas regarding comics and learn to separate form from content. The balancing act between what is visible what is invisible is what is at the very heart of comics. Comics are evolving just as language is evolving and like people, the evolution changes by location. McCloud says that the possibilities of comics are endless and that all that is needed is the desire to be hear, the will to learn, and the ability to see.

I really enjoyed and learned a lot from this book. My opinions towards comics are so different now from when I started this book and I'm very glad of this change.

Narrative/Sequence Ideas

Thoughts:

• I was thinking of doing a comic inspired sequence/narrative piece that would perhaps incorporate post card inspiration into it, where the dates were on them but the viewer themselves have to put the sequences in order. I was thinking something super simple, maybe even how to make a pb&j sandwich. I would use very minimal, if any color and probably make characters of some sort out of the materials needed.
• Another thought was doing a flip-book narrative, I was thinking of a car crash. Again, this would be very simple in terms of drawing, and would probably have some sort of characters involved whether people or the cars themselves. this would have no color except for maybe a few frames for emphasis.
• Another idea i had was having a narrative inspired by hop-scotch in terms of shape and performance. I like the idea of using chalk as a material but it is also difficult to use because of space and detail limitations. I also like the numbers on hop scotch as order indicators and the nastolgic qualities hop scotch has with most people.

Ellen Von Unwerth

I most definitely do not have a singular favorite artist, but one of my favorite ad/fashion/editorial photographers is Germany's Ellen Von Unwerth who does lots of fashion/beauty editorial work and erotic female photography. What I love about her work its the huge variety she has in her work and yet always makes each photography distinctly her own. She does a lot of switching between black and white/sepia and color in her editorials. Her photo's are often over exposed, grainy, or unfocused and usually scream sex appeal. Her use of color, lighting, and motion are phenomenal. I like the gothic undertones to her work, there's always homage to the past and a sense of mystery to eat photo. Here are some of my favorite editorial photographs, to see all of the pictures in each series click on the name of the featured model(s).

Maryna Linchuk for Vogue Turkey, Dec. 2010

Madonna, Vogue Paris, Oct. 1993

Joseph Gordon Levitt & Claudia Schiffer, GQ US, Apr. 2008

Natalia Vodianova for Vogue Italia, Nov. 2002

Caroline Trentini & Jeisa Chiminazzo, Vogue Nippon, Oct. 2004

Maryna Linchuk for Vogue Turkey, Dec. 2010

Keira Knightly, Vogue Italia, Jan. 2011

Caroline Trentini & Jeisa Chiminazzo, Vogue Nippon, Oct. 2004

For more Ellen see here

Some of my other favorite fashion/editorial photographers include:

Tim Walker,

Partick Hoelck

Alexi Lubomirski

free for all

I'm running low on fuel these days, this day in particular because I have 2 midterms tomorrow, so I'm going to talk about...things I collect/hoard:

• movie ticket stubs - I have since I was little, I dont have every stub but i have a lot.
• cool rubber ducks - This was not started by me actually, for my birthday one year my best friend randomly gave me like 20 rubber ducks with my present and because of that people started assuming I just loved rubber ducks so I get them randomly.
• (hoard) magazines - this is probably my worst one, until I went away to college I literally had every magazine I'd ever subscribed to...which at that point was really only Seventeen, Tennis, Nylon, and Rolling Stone at that point but when my mom discovered the two hundred odd magazines neatly organized in my closet she kind of had an intervention and said that I had to go through them and get rid of them. This started my summer of going through magazines. I have some obsessive compulsive tendencies and is was definitely one of them. I eventually got rid of all of the Seventeen's and Tennis and a some of the Rolling Stones in exchange for a 4 inch binder with category divided folders of clippings. I still have a growing pile, but it's much less now. It makes me really anxious getting rid of them...weird, I know.
• greeting cards - I collected greeting cards when I was little and now have an extremely large amount of them, and I actually use them now, what a concept.
• cards to me - yeah I have every card I've gotten from people since I was about 7.
• Postcards - I'm sensing a trend here I've never noticed...but yeah cool new ones and ones sent to me alike.
• 
  some of my postcards at home
• state quarters - like everyone, though I can't remember the last time I filled in that book thingy that they sold about ten years ago who's spots were too small for quarters so I had to tape them to it.
• 78 records - though my selection is pretty small ~20
• silk scarves - my favorite is a tennis racket print.
• sunglasses - wayfarer sunglasses to be more specific...i've got ten pair I believe
• little things from friend's and family - i've got a few boxes(small boxes) of stuff like that, whether its an oragami bird a friend made me or a note we passed with pictures or a vending machine panda watch, I keep things that have good memories attached.
• shells - and more specifically ones from fun trips, I sharpie the date and place on the back of each
• little flags - when my sister studied abroad all I asked for was flags, and flags I did get...I've added a few, more in the future.

and those are just a few... what i've realized is i may have a few too many "collections".

critique day trois

I really liked all of the presentations today, they were all so different and they all did a great job conveying their meanings. Choosing favorite's is hard. I really liked the time and symbolism that went into Edurado's stain glass piece, I was just a little in the dark on the confession as a whole. I got why he intended on trying to make it more universally appealing but I just wish he would have left it on his experience only. But besides that its was really strong. Steffi's was really well done as well, It was interesting to see the effect it still has on her. I but can understand her reluctance not to want to tell her parents. I liked that Sean's was something that he knows is wrong and he knows what can end up happening but still he continues. It's obvious he wishes he didn't have such a dependence on them but for now, he's still on the same road. Jonathan's lying confession was cool as well, being completely honest for 3 minutes is also a cool spin on it. I only feel he could have practiced it a bit more or stopped exactly when the timer went off for better effect. Andrew's "afraid of the dark confession was cool, only I missed the very beginning because I was putting my project away and the end of the discussion so I didn't quite get the full effect. Ashley's letter performance was very relateable in my opinion. I liked that it wasn't clear who it was addressed to, it made it more relatable to other people. I think the confession I best related to was Mary-Beth's it was simple but had a lot of symbolism that I can definitely relate to.

progresso

Today I presented my confession. I thought it went pretty well. People seemed to get the gist of it. I definitely feel that I lost some clarity when I had to explain it but that was my nerves getting the better of me. I liked someone's remark that was around the lines of, "I like that there's a lot of symbolism in it." I really take that as a compliment because there is actually a lot of symbolism. Well I'm going to stop talking about my project, because I feel weird doing it. I hope you and the class liked it! :)

Week 5: Personal Narratives

This week's lecture on Personal Narrative was really interesting but yet again, I left feeling very heavy. Kip has a way of doing that to me it seems, its definitely not a bad thing... just heavy. Oh jeez this isn't making any sense.

I was so flabergasted to hear about the Tinanmen Square massacre. I'm so disgusted with the fact that I have never heard of it until today, let alone about the massacre as a whole, which words really can't describe. I can't think of a stronger word than disgusted, revolted, thats a little worse in my book. It's just heartbreaking and only a little more than 20 years ago, I wish humanity was always humane. It's so sad when our fellow humans turn into the "you guys" on their own. The quote that "the people's army will never fire on the people" and the fact that that is exactly what they turned around and did solidifies my distain. The "tank man" footage truly is a beautiful example of photo journalism and bravery. He didn't care if he lived or died he just wanted to show his disgust, there was no crowd cheering him on just his own conviction of right and wrong. It's really times like this that I realize my naivety and ignorance in the scheme of things. (I apologize if this isn't very coherent, I can't always get out my feelings in a comprehensible way when I'm upset.)

review: Venice Beach Boardwalk

Over the weekend I went to my friend's house in El Segundo for the holiday, while there we made a trip to Venice Beach. I hadn't been since I was really young, and forgot about the vast amount of street art present on the boardwalk. I decided to review it this week, what struck me was how surprised my friends(who are not what one would call "art inclined") were in my decision to take pictures. Its really quite strange how many people are oblivious to the art that isn't in museums, that surrounds us everyday.

R. Cronk - he obviously is the BMOC around there

Previous 4 by R. Cronk

I loved his homage to Botticelli's The Birth of Venus, the venus is in 90's garb and has a thought bubble that says "history is myth"

Emily Winters, Endangered Species 1990

Some "Grafitti"

Muscle Beach Architecture

I loved the boardwalk, we figured it would be dead at 7 o clock on Easter sunday, nope, definitely not. In fact there was a huge uh, drum circle that was literally just a ton of people drumming and dancing.

progress

this past week I've been working on the finishing touches of my confession project as well as my brainstorming for my "random acts of kindness/beauty" project. I must admit that I am extremely nervous about presenting because I really haven't ever made a presentation like this before, presenting myself, in so many metaphors. I keep wanting to change my mind, and have in a few small ways. I am very nervous... yup. My "random acts" project is going well so far and its been helping me calm down about the confession project. D-day is tomorrow so I suppose we'll see how it goes.

McCloud Chapter's 6/7: the six steps and what's color got to do with it?

According to McCloud in chapter 7, Art is anything that doesn't grow out of our basic instincts of reproduction and survival. Art is the way we assert our individual identities and narrow the roles given to us by nature. From an evolutionary standpoint art: is a way for us to receive outside stimuli, provide an outlet for emotional imbalances, and our exploration lead to useful discoreries. In almost everything we do theres an element of art. "Pure" art is tied to the question of purpose, of the path you are choosing to take. This path has six steps which are: idea/purpose(content), form(medium), idiom(genre), structure(composition), craft(construction), surface(superficial exposure). "Why am I doing this" is the most important question an artist can ask themselves and something a lot of successful artists have not answered. According to McCloud, every creator learns to command every aspect of their work and to understand their relationship to it and it's the degree in which they do this is their personal success as an artist.

In chapter eight McCloud talks about color and its "spotty" relationship with comics which he says can be summed up with "commerce"(money) and "technology". Colors objectify their subjects and allow us to become more aware of their presence. The "four-color process" is why we think of Superman as wearing red, blue and gold and batman as black, grey, and gold, the main characters were bold while their surroundings were not. Apparently while flat colors were a necessity in American comics, they were a preference in European comics. Black and White and Color comics are now extremely different from each other, while colored comics are more direct, b&w must rely more on textures and shapes to get their points across.

Reviewing: You!!

I really liked your exhibition! I went on wednesday at like 3 in the afternoon and I was the only one there at that particular time which I was really happy about because I like it when I don't have other people's reactions when I'm experiencing art for the first time. I really liked how to the point (or jaw perhaps? bad bad attempt at a pun) it was. i thought it was cool how the focus on the individuals and the materials themselves. I liked that all the pictures were in IV. I only wish there was more information on the individuals photographed, but aside from that I really liked it. and its made me start to think about the art in other sports as well. Great job!

oh and i loved the "frame" choice, it was simple but it made me think of a coach with a clipboard.

kind and generous

I've been thinking a lot about the beauty/kindness project and I think I have figured out what I'm going to do as long as i can get enough pennies to make it look good...I'll explain. I plan on getting a lot of pennies and making something(simple, perhaps a heart or a horseshoe or a clover) out of them on a popular sidewalk on campus and having them all be heads up(aka "lucky") and write something in chalk below it (along the lines of "pay it forward" "share the wealth" or "find a penny pick it up all day long you'll have good luck"and...
see
what
happens.
My plan is to do it (really freaking early) wednesday for a few reasons, them being wednesday's "hump day" and to top it all off its midterms, and it happens to be the day that i have the least amount of class where i can actually stick around and see what happens.
i have many other ideas too but this one's probably my favorite

WHAT I ENDED UP DOING:

Ok dokey I now realize that this is not a big project and its supposed to be done ASAP so instead of my previous idea I went a lot less extravagant(not that the first idea was extravagant) and instead I did a little facebook confessing, my old friend from elementary school Scott posted one of those respond to my status and say a memory you have of me" kind of things. I normally don't respond to those things but I did this time. Scott used to have a huge crush on me in 6th grade but I was "going out" with Gavin so he was always in the friends zone but he still made me oragami animals and hearts and boxes all the time. The below is the beginning of the facebook message convo. we had. It was kind of weird messaging him after ~7 years of no talking but I'm glad I did it. I took screen pictures of the first few messages, but I didn't include our names for privacy.

Me:

Scott:

Me:

(p.s. i do hope to use my other idea at some other point in the quarter though.)

Until then...my gift to the world is this wonderful, wonderful masterpiece. enjoy :)

p.s. natalie merchant reference, can i hear a what what!!!

Reviewing: You!