Wednesday, November 19, 2008

Wednesday, November 5, 2008

Animated Binders




Appropriation

As artists, we all look for something different to say. We want to be individualistic, creative, and smart about how we communicate our views to the world. However, with so many of the same themes floating around, it is hard to be original. Borrowing ideas, or appropriation, has been commonly used throughout the generations as pointed out in Lethem’s article “The ecstasy of influence: A plagiarism”. Lethem says “…most artists are converted to art by art itself. Finding one's voice isn't just an emptying and purifying oneself of the words of others but an adopting and embracing of filiations, communities, and discourses. Inspiration could be called inhaling the memory of an act never experienced. Invention, it must be humbly admitted, does not consist in creating out of void but out of chaos. Any artist knows these truths, no matter how deeply he or she submerges that knowing.” It is unrealistic to be able to come up with inspiration and ideas with nothing. It is like building a house with just sticks and nothing to hold them together. Artists are constantly inspired by their surroundings and will use them to their advantage to portray their point. Although it is wrong to steal ideas, known as plagiarism, it is not wrong to borrow ideas, to appropriate them, however, if only the main sources were credited for their work. In the distant past, it may have passed as acceptable as the media barely existed but now that ideas are constantly thrown around with our vast technology, it is very easy to tell when an idea has been stolen and those who steal ideas are usually dismembered from society. Often times, other people’s artwork provides the inspiration needed for another’s artwork. For example, reading a book certain images are produced in your head. You are inspired to illustrate these images because the words speak so powerfully to you. On the show SNL, they are constantly using what is happening in current times to produce ideas on their skits, such as political events. However, they used their skits in an original way and is clearly for comedic purposes for entertainment. Looking back on art history, there are certain periods of time where artwork that was produced were similar, using the same artistic techniques such as impressionism, pointillism, and etc. These artists borrowed ideas from each other to create their own artwork. Two artists that use appropriation in their work are Andy Warhol and Salvador Dali. In our computers class, we constantly use appropriation to produce our artwork. We use others ideas to help us make our own so that we can convey them better. I am constantly inspired by the artwork hanging up on all of the walls around me and will be using techniques other people use to help me find my own voice.



Wednesday, October 29, 2008

Monday, October 20, 2008

Text



For this assignment, instead of using a body of text I decided to use words literally to describe features on the face. I thought it was interesting how the different shapes and colors of the letters could describe details of the face as a visual element. I wanted to use text in a different way and experimented with layering and different fonts. I also experimented with the different colors and sizes of text to see what would happen. Repetition of text such as "eyeeyeeye" occurs to define the features of the face. I wanted to make a statement with text not to have any other meaning than what it literally is.

Tuesday, October 7, 2008

Wednesday, September 24, 2008