Fashion Blogs

Not sure why, but I am kind of into the "outfit a day" fashion blogs right now. I like the idea of checking them daily and seeing what outfits these women have put together. I do like shopping, clothes, and accessories a lot! I would hope that this somehow filters into my art and that I am getting inspiration through this. Otherwise, I feel like it might be a waste of time to look at them...a guilty pleasure I guess :-) I find inspiration from patterns and fabrics. Recently, I purchased shirts and fabric from a thrift store and hope to make something out of them (books maybe?).

I do love (vintage) patterns.

I actually love design.

Here are a few of my guilty pleasures and since I am not very patient, these bloggers post almost everyday-

http://finelittleday.blogspot.com/
http://whatiwore.tumblr.com/
http://kendieveryday.blogspot.com/ tie for my #1 fav
http://lostmyhead.org/
http://pacingthepanicroom.blogspot.com/ tie for my #1 fav

Let me know what you think about them!

Stuck in a rut!

That is how I have felt for the past two weeks! I'm not sure how, but I seemed to have gotten myself out of that rut, which is a good thing. All I wanted to do was sit around the house and do nothing. I still always like to do that, but not in the same mind set that I was in the past two weeks.

I am back at it and making some books. The pressure from school and professors did help me out of that rut. My final is in about 4 short weeks and I don't think I can beat my midterm installation. Unfortunately, there was only 1 professor there to see my midterm, so most of my professors didn't see my installation. For this reason, I am thinking about setting it up again for finals, which is not typically done. I mean, my thesis committee DOES need to see my work, geez! It's hard because our program is not on the main campus, so we have a separation and are not in the same location as the art department or the professors. The professors rarely, almost never, venture the 10 minutes away to our studio space to see what we are up to. Then they march in for the midterm and the final and bitch about how you have not been productive enough and need to have more work...um hello? You have no idea what I have been doing so don't judge me!

Enough of my ranting. I'll make the best of it.

I worked on the pages of my book last night and here's what I've got (iphone pics)-

I will be adding more pages, but this is what I have for now. I am also trying to figure out if I want to add words or not. 

Nothing is Original

What I'm into right now- Artist Books

I'm not sure why, but I am really into artist books right now. The crazier the better. I love how in the art world just about anything can be considered an "artist book". As wikipedia states, "Artists' books are works of art realized in the form of a book. They are often published in small editions, though sometimes they are produced as one-of-a-kind objects referred to as 'uniques'." I am also very much interested in mini books, probably because they are cute. I am always drawn to things that are miniature or huge. I do kind of feel like they can get a little crafty sometimes, so I must keep "fine art" on the mind. Basically anything that has a sequence, narrative, pages, or text could be considered a book in my opinion.

I really love flip-books too. I used to make them when I was younger. In fact, I used to make a lot of books when I was younger, but flip-books and "touch and feel" books were my favorite. I remember specifically making a Jetson's flip-book, I loved that show! If only I still had all of this great art from my childhood. What happened to it? Did I throw it away (doubtful) or did my mom?

We had a great artist who visited and talked with us a month or so ago at school. She started as a bookmaker and most currently does public art pieces. She has been working on a piece for our very own UCF Engineering building.  Check her out: http://www.janetzweig.com/

I will leave you with a great flip-book of hers-

Professor Obsessive and his Two Compulsions from Janet Zweig on Vimeo.

Hey check it out, I can add tabs to my blog now!

I have added my CV above for your viewing pleasure!

Success!

First, thank you to everyone who participated in my survey for my installation. My midterm critique went really really well and there were even a few people who said this piece was my best ever. I guess it really does work when you look inside yourself and make a piece that comes from you. As I had said previously, this is not something that I tend to do, but am trying to do that this year. This all stemmed from my professors looking for a deeper meaning in my work and I think wanting to see a little bit more of "me" in my work.
Honesty always works. How can you criticize someone's work when they are being honest and putting it all out there? You may not like it, that's your opinion, but I don't care if people like my art or not. Do they find it interesting? Do they want to look at it? Do they question it? Do they hate it? Do they love it? If there is a yes to at least one of these, then I am satisfied.
I have some pictures of my installation, courtesy of a fellow classmate NooNa Shuqair. It is really hard to tell what is going on, but I ended up having 2 videos- one of myself looking at the computer screen and one of the secrets scrolling. I had the videos facing each other on 2 walls going through glass, this caused a lot of reflections. The secrets reflected on my face and my face reflected on the secrets. To me the glass represented literally and figuratively, the barrier that is between me and the information I am getting. We do have access to a lot of information about other people from various social networking sites, but there is a barrier between us and the people. The computer is like a window into the lives of others, you can see through it, but cannot get in. This is what the glass represents. This "barrier" is transparent, we can see through it and see so clearly. The area you go in to view the installation is on the inside of the glass, where the video of my face is. The sound of my voice whispering, "just tell me, I won't tell anyone" and typing on a computer can be heard in the space. This area represents me, you are looking through the glass at the video of the secrets as I would see them (kind of like you are in my head).

*The location was the best it could be for having to show this in our studio space. The cords, computers, and projectors would ideally be hidden and the space would be completely dark (which was not possible bc of the windows).

I feel like I am always asking myself, "why didn't I think of that"?

Well, I think what this young artist is doing is really great and something I have never seen before-

I love that it is a painting, photograph, performance, and installation all in one. I try to use multiple forms of media in my installations or environments so I totally appreciate what she is doing...and how great is it that she doesn't have to worry about drawing or getting proportions right in her "paintings" - my kind of painting!