The End to the Dec Review Drama

So how was it? Umm... interesting. "Interesting" is what my father says when my mother cooks something he doesn't care for. Reviews are something necessary and valuable, but no one says "wow, when can we do that again- that was great."

The set up that Hannah and I created was the best possible in order for me to feel as comfortable as I can be in these situations and I'm really grateful that it was an option. For me to not give in to my urge to bail which would have been bad for everyone, I really needed the understanding and support which i received :)

I was really worried about timing because in both practices I had stopped to ask questions during it and had no idea if my timing would be off. It turned out just fine- I ended at 20 min 11 sec.

I have mixed feelings about the comments. Some seemed helpful and it was interesting to see what was taken away by people that aren't me. However, I felt some comments were unrealistic and if I followed them I'd be sacrificing quality strictly for conceptual reasons, which I am not willing to do... ever.

The first comment I received referred to the tattoo lamp and referenced how in the holocaust they killed jews in a specific way so that they could be skinned and their skin used for lamps since their skin was tattooed. There was an awkward silence as they waited for my reaction. I am politically and historically retarded, so I'm not surprised that I had no knowledge of this. I think it's an important thing to be aware of but I feel that the artistic choices I made made it obvious that I was not making a statement about that and I think that's ok. I did search for other tattoo lamps while I was making mine and I'm not the first person to make a lamp like this since the Nazi's. If my audience thinks I'm a Nazi I suppose I'll have to deal with that but I have no desire to make a statement about the holocaust. I believe that the majority of people would not think of the holocaust when viewing my work.

A comment was made questioning my photo choices that I used in my slides. I had good reasons for my choices and since the comment only referred to my work previous to the start of the term, I am trying to forget it was said. I made my choices in order to have clarity and use time wisely so that I could get to the more important issue- my IP project. Let's stay productive shall we? You need to when you only have 20 minutes to explain a college career that started in 2003!

I continually heard things like "you're playing it too safe" or "you're not taking any risks" or "you're not letting yourself be vulnerable." I've found that if a work is too personal, you get asked to verbally explain it more but the more personal you make your work, the more uncomfortable yo are with answering any questions. If I could ship my work to a gallery and have it viewed with no explanation, I'd gladly make work that disturbs and confuses you all. However, that's not going to happen in this setting of academia because silence is not an option. Right now I'm straddling that line of making work that is meaningful to me and my existence but doesn't dig too deep. I guess it's a choice I have to think about.

I was asked why I'm making work about myself and yet I'm not the one in the photographs. The answer: I considered that and found it to be impossible. I cannot be a model and a photographer. I have no desire to do self portraits, and I loathe trying to direct someone else to capture my vision- I'm too picky and I want the visual control besides the fact that if I don't take the photos I don't feel like it's even my own work. With tattooing in particular- I do not have money to spend getting tattooed at this point in time. My camera takes 2 hands to operate and when you're getting tattooed you're too focused on trying breathe and trying not to move so that you don't have messed up artwork on you for the rest of your life. I'm not going to accidentally move while being tattooed because I was trying to take a picture. Not happening people.

I was extremely happy to hear Lisa's suggestions as far as materials other than that this particular film is hard to find and expensive...

I'm curious to read the written comments in order to see the whole picture instead of the few things that were shared in the moment.

So that's my longer version of "it was fine" with an expression of horror on my face.

WEEK 12

WHAT I DID: I finished my first lamp. yay finally. I got lots of feedback including two small group crits. I heard a lot of good feedback about things to incorporate in my second try. I feel good about it because I thought it was a good first attempt, but I definitely wasn't happy with it. I felt changes needed to be made that I couldn't pin-point. Things that I thought were problems other people confirmed these intuitions for me. I am excited to try again but frustrated that I don't have a clear idea of what I want to include in my new design. I keep looking at lamps online but haven't seen any that include elements I would want to have in the lamp i'm currently working on. Here's some lamps I like:






WHAT I DISCOVERED: That I have things about this lamp that I'm willing to change and things that I'm not. Some of the suggestions I got I really didn't like and thought they ruined my original concept. I'm going to stick to my guns and I'm ok with that- there are still a lot of things that i agree need to be changed. I have a very limited experience constructing 3D objects and everytime I do I learn a little bit more about what mistakes I made and what tools I should use/what's available. For one thing, the shade wobbles because I drilled the hole for the lamp nipple too large. Oops- won't make that mistake again. As far as the shade and the painting- I chose paint because I feel comfortable working with it and I chose canvas because I knew I could paint on it. Those were not the right choices for the effect I originally wanted. I guess you don't kow these things until you try it though.

WHAT'S NEXT: Since I don't have a clear idea of how I want to redo the lamp (which is super annoying because I'm running out of time.... aaahhhhhhhh!) I've started brainstorming different shapes which either sit on a table or hang on a wall and use wood, metal, and shade. What I really need to do next is a material test. I need different fabrics and I need to experiment on them with things like ink instead of paint and see how each one looks when illuminated. I have no money at the moment so I may have to wait until I can buy some materials to do this. However, this would be a good thing to do while I'm deciding on the shape. I've included some sketches of different shapes and I'm sure there will be more- there's just too many options. Here's a few sketches:


ERICA: I looked for you in the studios 3 times yesterday and couldn't find you- I should've just talked to you right away- i'm a dummy. Anyways I hear you're into fabrics so if you have fabric suggestions for shades let me know. I'm looking for something that will hold paint or ink, has a higher thread count, and has some give to it so it can be stretched over a frame without perfect sewing. Any suggestions of things to try?

Here's my lamp- try #1: The first pic is without any diffusion material which made the painting look horrible :(

week 11

Funky lamps that inspire me: uploading the pics isn't working for some reason. it shows up as html and an error message. i
ll keep trying.

What i did: this week i shared my new project idea with peers who brought up some good questions and feedback. I found myself doing a lot of things I had done for the other project as far as searching inspirational pictures and thinking about what topics i really want to include in the finished product. I've been working on making the first lamp but it's been going much slower than i originally anticipated. I always think things are simple and don't include time for things going wrong or forget about things like glue having to set overnight but not being able to figure out the next part until the current step is finished. These things always happen when you havent done something before, but somehow i always forget. I have parts of the base done- covered, painted, but they aren't assembled together yet. I've made the frame for the shade in the woodshop which took a few hours. I've stretched canvas over it so I can paint on it. That was a big trial and error mountain to climb. Since the frame is a weird shape and i don't sew, and canvas isn't stretchy... i had a hard time. I debated having my mom help me put darts in it which wasn't how i wanted it to look. I finally figured out how to cut it the right shape so it would work but it took like 8 hours just to figure that one thing out and its far from perfect.

what i discovered: that i'm a dumbass and i always am able to get done less than i had hoped and then i'm disappointed in myself. This week confirmed for me something that happened last year when i made lamps- that each lamp may have to be made more than once. Last year my first tries were horrible failures that didnt look good and didnt function well. However, my second attempts were so much better than it was worth it to do everything twice. I suspect this is the case for IP. After each lamp is produced I need to get feedback and then assess whether to leave it, modify it, or try again. I'm ok with this because I enjoy this kind of work and am really passionate about what i'm doing.

what's next: i need to finish this lamp to the best of my ability so people can tell me how to fix it or redo it. I'm not really sure what's after that.

WEEK 10

WHAT I DID: Last Fri I did a photo shoot and got what I wanted to capture. I'll be adding it to my portfolio. These photos are posted above. I couldn't muster up the courage to go back into the Harley dealership with a camera. I met with a biker from the HOG charter and talked to him about himself and the project.

WHAT I DISCOVERED: I hate this. It totally sucks. Biker Dave was a really nice guy. I learned a lot about him and the biker world. But, I was uncomfortable and wishing it was over the whole time. As for photographing him- in order to get him doing his hobbies in a timely manner it was unavoidable that I would have to go out of town to a house in the middle of nowhere to be alone with a guy who is 3 times my size and owns guns and my conscious told me that was not a good idea. I emailed the class to see if anyone would go with me and no one volunteered. I'm not blaming them- I know how busy everyone is and I would've felt uncomfortable even if I had someone with me. I know not every situation would be this dramatic, but it got me thinking about how a huge portion of this project is spent thinking about who to get, finding people, getting people to meet me which is around their schedule, getting them to talk to me, setting up a shoot on their schedule, and only spending an hour or two per person actually making images. This is not how I want to spend my time. I've been dreading this thing called my IP project and that's not how I want to feel about it. It was too much all about other people and not fun for me at all. If this project should be one thing it should be fun- at least sometimes :)

WHAT'S NEXT: I've changed my project. I picked something that was about me, that I would enjoy every second working on it and is for the most part not dependent on other people. And how do I feel you ask? Relieved. Excited. Nervous. Nervous because I feel like every project idea I had in the beginning wasn't good enough because it didn't have some world purpose or deep meaning that I could ramble on about. I am one of few words and no project that I enjoy making will come with that ability. That's not what art is about to me. I get inspired by visual elements and it's these visual elements that are the main motivation for my art making. So for my project I'm going to do a series of 5-10 (I haven't decided yet) photo sets. Each one will be about a different thing that is personally important to me or inspires me visually. I will also be making a lamp to go along with each photo set inspired by that topic or the photos themselves. One of the photo shoots I had set up for my last project is still relevant to the new project so that's still happening. This week I'll be working on the first lamp, the new project statement and thinking about how to progress- either making sketches for another lamp or setting up a photo shoot.

Website

Here's the website I've been working on. I'm still not sure about the project statement and participation paragraph. If anyone has suggested wording or suggestions about other things having to do with the site please let me know. Thanks a bunch

http://www.wix.com/laurenno/photo

WEEK 9

WHAT I DID: I had the flu :( but am feeling better and feeling ready to work. I finished the website but would like to revise the writing of the project statement before I start spreading it around. I think I have too many photos on it also and may reduce the number of galleries/try to have only the photos i'm the most proud of on it. I had a meeting yesterday with a girl in IP about participating in my project. I wasn't sure I wanted to use people in IP, but it has been suggested that I talk to her multiple times, so why not? I really enjoyed our conversation and I'm looking forward to photographing her. The girl I've been trying to photograph agreed to shoot the first photograph this afternoon and luckily it's sunny so I'm in good shape. I totally thought I wasn't going to get a response from the biker charter, but yesterday I finally did. I received an email with a name and a phone number of an interested member. I mustered my guts together and called him last night. He seemed really nice and excited and agreed to meet me for lunch on Tuesday to talk about the project. He said he is going to become the president of the charter in January and would probably be riding his harley to our meeting, so I'll come with a camera and hopefully get a few good shots right off the bat. I was kind of disappointed that he doesn't have a day job, but maybe I'll find something else non-harley related about him without too much trouble.

WHAT I DISCOVERED: That this project isn't a bad idea (which i have wondered about from time to time) but that it may turn out to be different than I originally imagined. I know that that happens a lot with art projects, but it's kind of hard to deal with internally. There's an element of feeling out of control which goes against my personality a little bit. At this moment in time I'm thinking it's unlikely I'll use crazy set ups of artificial colored lights and what not, but I still may use traditional studio set ups sometimes. I need to get familiar with what equipment is available to me. Right now the calendar is my friend- I'm trying to schedule things and have ideas of how to do productive things associated with my project in between. I've felt really busy these past few weeks, but not enough of it was IP related it seems to me so I'm trying to move forward and be better about time management. Time feels like it's moving so fast right now. I'm happy to finally move along with a first connection- it makes me feel like I haven't failed.

WHAT'S NEXT: Taking some goddamn pictures finally! I'll always be looking for new people/ new ways to make connections, but I know I need to be taking pictures too so hopefully the project keeps progressing where both happen simultaneously. After I make a few changes to the website I'll post the link here.

week 8

wow yeah so i got wrapped up in halloween festivities with my family and posting a blog totally slipped my mind... oops.

WHAT I DID: I spent like 8 hours or more working on getting a website up. i've had conversations with both peers, professors, and family and everyone felt that walking up to someone and asking them to participate in my project is very awkward and ineffective. i knew it is a high stress thing for me and i don't do well in those situations. so long story short, i'm working on getting up a website which includes my photography portfolio, a short bio, a project statement, clarity on what participating involves, contact info, etc. so that not only can i connect to people electronically, but if i meet someone in person i'm interested in i can refer them to the website where they can learn about me, see my work, think about participation, etc. i think this will establish somewhat of a comfort level which is important. i suck at websites and i don't have any money, so i looked for a site that hosts for free and has easy building tools. slightly after that, my old computer which has my photo archive i.e. my entire portfolio died. i spent the next few days with the IT people trying to see if it can be fixed/recovering my files. it is now six feet under, but thankfully i did get my old photos back and had gotten a new computer last year which makes it possible for my life to go on.

WHAT I DISCOVERED/DIDNT DO: people are not reliable. they get sick, blow you off, don't answer your messages. i was super naive to think the first 2 people i asked, even after one said "she was committed" would work out in a timely fashion. therefore, we have a crit on thurs and i do not yet have any photos. i'm sure my website will be done by then and i could get feedback on that possibly- i'm not sure if that's ok. i've set up meetings this week with 2 people whom i hope will participate, but i'm a little down, so i don't expect anything. maybe i will change this whole thing to self portraits... kidding- or am i?

WHAT'S NEXT: that timeline i made before is totally worthless. it was a good idea to make one, but in my situation it doesn't seem practical. i'm really hoping i get to do a photo shoot of someone this week. i definitely will finish the website, start posting the link in different places, emailing large groups the link etc. and reach a lot more people very quickly so that i can get serious responses instead of someone saying ok becausee i'm standing there asking with puppy dog eyes. ugh.