Art Basel Miami 2010

Finals are over and I made it through! Now I have time to reflect on the artwork I saw in Miami last weekend. Of course, Miami, lack of sleep, and stress has taken it's toll on my body and now I am sick! I got to see a couple of pieces from one of my favorite artists Guerra de la Paz. I'm not sure if I have mentioned them before, but they are an artist duo based in Miami. I found this great video of their booth at Scope that I saw last weekend. Its nice to see the set up for the show and hear about the work from the artists themselves. I was surprised to see art from Jen Stark, who I recently stumbled upon when browsing the internet. I liked her so much that I bookmarked her page! So it was great to see her work in person too! I really enjoyed a lot of the work and noticed that I saw a lot of work from the same artists that I saw last year. The fairs I attended were Scope/Art Asia, Nada, Pulse, Art Miami, Aqua, Ink, and Fountain.

Well, hello "day before finals" day

So, I am just coming off of a weekend filled with art at Art Basel Miami, which was a whirlwind of fun. Now I am back to reality and faced with the fact that I have my final critique tomorrow. Actually, I signed up to be the first one, what was I thinking? It doesn't really matter either way because I have to have everything set up tomorrow morning, but if I would have picked the afternoon, maybe everyone would have been too tired to pick on me. As you know from my previous entries, I have been in somewhat of a rut this second half of the semester. I have had ideas and projects in the works, but nothing I am really that crazy about. I need to wrap everything up today and set up for tomorrow. I hope that I can get my thoughts straight over the winter break and churn out the first draft of my thesis. Then this will give me all of next semester to edit and format in preparation for the deadline/thesis defense.

This is my latest installation/sculpture/deconstructed book work in progress, or whatever you want to call it. I have torn up my Post Secret book and dipped the paper in milky resin. I will hang the pages on clotheslines like you see and will most likely use this stand in my installation as well. I am still dealing with other peoples lives, secrets, and the home. Hanging packaged up porcelain houses will also be a part of this (I will repost pics when everything is set up). I love working at my dad's shop because he has stands like this and all the tools and materials I need. It's kind of funny because my dad's shop is the place where I first started creating things as a child. 



Very strange, but in a good way

So, I stumbled upon this artist today in the Arts section of the Huffington Post- Jody Zellen. As her bio states, "Jody Zellen is an artist living in Los Angeles, California. She works in many media simultaneously making photographs, installations, net art, public art, as well as artists' books that explore the subject of the urban environment". Her animations are so strange and so different. I really like the simplicity of them. She obviously has more knowledge of coding than I do, but she is still keeping it simple. I am assuming that in her "code art" that the drawings were created using just code. This is kind of over my head, but we did take a processing class last year, so I am a little more familiar than I would have been. You will also notice that when you hold your mouse over some of the animations that the hand pointer shows up, which means you can click on it and the animation becomes interactive. I was able to find one of her animations on youtube (youtube version not interactive):


I do like her use of installation, photography, video, and books. She is like a variety pack! This is right up my alley, minus the coding! I am always drawn to an artist's process and use of medium. That is always more important to me than their concept or meaning. She seems like someone who is worth researching a bit more.

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.