In depth: Final Project

For this final In depth project I wanted to try a technique I learned several months ago in my drawing II/ mark making class using shaving cream and acrylic paints. With this piece I wanted to experiment more with psychic automatism, technique of the subconscious drawing which the artist allows their unconscious mind to take control. Automatic painting is a style of painting in which paint is applied directly to the canvas without any planning or preconceived ideas. 

When creating this piece I used my left hand to be less in control of the gestural movements and marks that were being applied to the paper. For the first layer I applied the technique with the shaving cream and acrylic paints. The second layer was when began to apply 

psychic automatism to my artwork, using my left hand instead of my dominant hand (right) to paint with white gesso, black India ink, and apply bleach and salt using various objects to assist my gestural movements and marks making process.  In addition, for my final layer I went over the gestural marks with the same technique I used in my first layer. After I applied drippings of bleach and dashes of salt on the painting.  

Creating this painting was tedious with the process of mixing the colors, drying time, and layering the paint, overall I really enjoyed making the piece because it allowed me to relax and have more freedom, spontaneity in gestural movements and marks that I was applying to the paper. During the whole process of making this painting I was nervous about how it was going look once I completed the last layer, with each layer I saw the piece becoming what I had pictured in my mind. 

Art Basel 2017

I visited three different events or exhibitions for Art Basel 2017: Casa Lin, Rubell  Family Collection and Fair.

The exhibition that had the most impact on me was Fair at Brickell City Centre by Spinello projects. The exhibition was called “ We Are Here”. The exhibition displayed artworks that encouraged participation and/or an immediate exchange of ideas between artists and viewers, a platform for multigenerational group of women artists.

Fair seeks to address gender inequality in the art world and beyond by providing space for radical women artists to transmit messages in contemporary art by women from around the world.

Fair addresses this contemporary market by creating an alternative marketplace for the exchange of ideas and messages, where women and trans artists can occupy, activate, take over dialogue, so their messages can take the place of the oppressive and hegemonic messaging. Fair discusses the way that women are disproportionately represented in the contemporary art world, and the enormous pay gap that still affects women across all industries especially in the art world.

In addition, Fair hopes to communicates ideas and experiences from diverse female perspectives that have been suppressed or oppressed by cis-hetero norms. Fair utilizes their voices of their community to create new patterns and generate new language for the transmission of ideas. Fair aims for the fair exchange of ideas, fair wage for women, fair market that reflects a diverse community, fair play and equal playing field.

This exhibition was very impactful to me because it communicates issues that are important to me a woman and an artist, discusses issues that I want to later explore within my artwork. Not only did I find this exhibition extremely empowering, beautifully displayed within the preconstruction/unfinished phase of an interior space with no painted walls and exposed air system in comparison to a gallery setting or convention exhibition.

Fair artwork: 

The first artwork that strongly affected me in a neutral way was the Guerrilla Girls hot pink T-shirts "The advantages of being a woman artist". This art piece communicates and exposes the sexual and racial discrimination in the art world. The thirteen points listed are ironic in tone and include: ‘working without pressure of success’, ‘having the opportunity to choose between career and motherhood’, ‘being included in revised versions of art history’ and finally ‘getting your picture in the art magazines wearing a gorilla suit’.

The second art work that strongly affected me positively was “Wish Tree for Peace”, encourages the audience to interact with the creative practice and Buddhist tradition of leaving their wishes tied to the branches of a tree in a public space. The tree acts as becoming part of the creation of artwork as both a performance gesture and later to be a document in Ono’s “Imagine Peace tower”.

This piece affected me positivity because as a viewer I was able to participate in the creation of the artwork and it conveys a lovely message to about what you would wish for, it also leaves you with the sense of mystery because you are intrigued to look at other wishes on the tree to view what other people wished for. I have never participated in creating an artwork before so I truly enjoyed this and reminded of me of the times I make wishes, this experience was very welcoming and peaceful.

  

Engaging with Miami Art Week made me think about how I want to continue to pursue art, explore working with metals, computer art, three dimensional printers and laser cutter, sewing and weaving techniques. It made me think about why I chose to study art and the goals I’ve set for myself, and the things I have accomplished as an artist thus far.

In addition, Miami Art Week made me think about setting goals as an artist (gallery show, grant application/resume, art internships. I had a new revelation about how the art world treats women, unfair pay and unequal opportunities.

Fair: Brickell City Centre

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Rubell Family Collection: 

 Casa Lin:

Narrative: Zine

For this project we were to create our own narrative on 8 pages, including a package for the zine to fit in as well as three small sculptures to go along to convey the story behind the zine.

First, we brought in our original artworks that were going to be on the zine. As a class we laid out our original artworks, book mock-up showing pagination and structure/orientation. From there, the next time we would meet we were required to bring 5 printouts for the zine, 3 hand-held sculptures, and the container/structure package and demonstrate how it all goes together.

I chose to create the narrative of my zine about ecological issues within the ocean. I took photographs of the artworks (close-ups, focused/out of focus), used information about the environmental issues to help convey my message to the reader.

Evaluation:

As a class we were given each one a Self-evaluation zine package handout, and another to critique a peer's zine package. The images below depict my self-evaluation zine package about my sculptures, zine and package, the other is of my peer whom I gave feedback to about their artwork, and the other self evaluation is of a fellow classmate who evaluated my zine package. 

I created my zine package out of  recycled plastic water bottles to discuss the issue of pollution. Plastic is a non- biodegradable material that is discarded in the ocean that ends up in one of the 5 gyres (located in five different oceans). This material causes an impact on marine life, leading to death by entanglement, suffocation, and digestion (food). 

My three sculptures depict a mangrove tree (conservation/preservation of the mangrove trees) using chicken wire and grass material, fish entangled in a bottom trawling net wrapped in fishing line and plastic wrap (pollution) using aluminum foil, netting material, fishinglin  and a coccolithophore (carbon absorbing algae/carbon cycle) created with plastilina clay. 

My zine was integrated with the package, illustrates materials using ecological issues within the ocean and the text explains what the effects on the environment are. Each zine edition has different facts about how the material affects the environment, and images (close-ups, focused/out of focus) of the original artwork used to create the zine.  I bounded the zine together using fishing line which is a material that causes many issues with marine life deaths because of entanglement and suffocation due to harmful fish practices and technique's.