Event #3

Event #3

Staring in the Age of Destruction

S.A.D.

On this Thursday, June 3, 2016, a day after a tragic event on the UCLA campus, I went to an event in the event center called Staring in the Age of Destruction or S.A.D. This event meant a lot after yesterdays tragedy. Walking into the exhibit there was so much going on my friend and I felt pretty long. There was no flow of projects but they all had an aspect of darkness to them which were all kind of creepy. Some actually were not as creepy as others and because of that they stuck out and seemed to no fit. 

Me starting to play the game

One work that caught my attention the most was [Project Iron]. It is described as "An interactive exploration of the spaces and images evoked by sketches drawn by the artist over the course of several months. It got its name from the attempt to combine a passionate interest in gameplay-driven interactivity with a desire to create a richly detailed and expressive environment."

 

(Some gameplay screenshots)

This part of the exhibit caught my attention because it looked like a video game and I am a gamer. Since I was a kid, If I saw a controller sitting there, and the words "press start" then by all means i am going to press start and give the game a try. It started out kind of messed up because the artist said that there was supposed to be a tutorial that popped up and walked you through the game. Since it didn't work he tried to restart it and try a different version. This different version ended up being worse because it had major glitches that made you restart. So he put back on the better version with no tutorial. I started to figure out how the game works. You are this little robot thing and you can switch between these two worlds kind of and get through what seems like a maze to find these red dots.

After I gave up, I had a conversation with the artist. I asked him what was the real purpose of the game. He described the game as an industrial science fiction game. I asked him if the game was beatable like is there an end goal. He responded that the real objective of the game is to get to the other side of the bridge that you start on. He said that the red dots that you try to get give you power ups and allow you to run faster and jump higher. He believe this piece is fun and very approachable which it really is.

My teammate, Jacob, the artist, Tobias Heinemann, and Me

Event #2

Event #2

"Leap Before You Look"

Friday May 13, 2016

For my second event, a group of my teammates and I went to an exhibition at the hammer museum. This event was the called Leap Before You Look: Black Mountain College 1933-1957. This was the first exhibit on this college in the United States. Black Mountain College was an experimental school that had a major effect on the way art was taught and practiced. When we first entered the gallery where the the exhibit was being held, we were very lost and confused. We seemed to be out of place because it seemed like everybody else knew where to go and what exactly to look at. Every piece of art seemed to be random because we could not recognize any flow or rarely any similarity. After doing some background research it somewhat made sense to me since every piece was done by different artist and they all had their own artistic style/perspective. Even all pieces had some interesting features, a few stuck out more than others. 

These pieces to the right suspended from the roof in the middle of one of the rooms it caught my attention. When I looked closer, I was able to see the unique convoluted design woven into these two parts. The artistic style is done in a fine threading fashion for this weaving. These would make for some fashionable curtains to say the least.

This piece to the right looked to be the funnest part of the exhibit. It is some type of clay-mation of people and a town. Not all art is pretty or defined perfectly to every degree but all art should make you say something or at least give you your own explanation to what you think it is and this piece is that. I do not think it was the most beautiful pieces in this collection by any means but it made me feel the most comfortable because it seems the most genuine and human. It's not perfect but it's art.

This last piece is the one I decided to take a picture with because its randomness. This piece is called Study for Pyramid by Mary Callery done in 1949. From far away it looked like a stack of sticks or branches or even a sculpture of a Mandarin figure. When you get closer and really look at it, it is a stack of people looking figures (one male with a female on top of him)  that are assembled in a pyramid. The artist is very clever for the name once I figured out what the piece was. 

For this being my very first trip to the hammer museum, I believe it was a success. I never knew art exhibits could be so interesting. It opened my eyes on how intricate every artist is with their very one style on every detail of their pieces.