Response to Alex's article

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/14/arts/design/14earth.html?_r=1&scp=5&sq=art%20in%20review&st=cse

1.  How important is the process of destroying something ( personal object/ mental image/photograph)  to create a piece of work that is abstract?  I think that the point of abstracting is to find something new and worth highlighting in the original that was not able to be seen, I don't think it has to do with destroying but more so with looking through a new lens. 

2.  In your own work, how do you feel that the medium that you choose best expresses your meaning, message & own truth? The medium is chosen based on content not emotion for me. 

3.  In your opinion, why do you think that the Gerald Peters Gallery mainly selected Fair's photos for their abstract impact? (not showing the photographs of the smokestacks & factories).  Do you believe that these particular abstract photos were selected because of an "over-all" sense of platonic beauty? Do you believe that the GP Gallery wanted to appeal to the "masses" in order to  make a better sale? I think that the gallery is not as interested in vocal work and they focus more on work that can insure a not-interested-in-art viewer sale. 

4.  What are the similarities between art & documentation? Documentation can be used as a way of approaching what you are making, documentation can become art, but that happens on the conceptual not aesthetic side. 

5.  In my own work, do you feel that i convey a sense of environment & mood? The aerial view painting does this, the others convey that paint is pretty. 

6.  Do you feel that the process & materials that i use, best expresses my message in my paintings?  If not, then please explain what materials would work  best for the execution & final outcome of my work. I am still not sure what the message in your painting is. I am not sure that there is a message that comes across more than what painting materials are capable of. 

7.  How important is the use of scale in your own work? And do you believe that i use an appropriate size & scale for my paintings? I think that in your smaller pieces that you do some really interesting things with your materials that gets lost in the larger work. It seems as though there is a time allotment that you are working in and your larger work needs more time. They don't seem as finished. 

8.  What do you think of my color palette for my paintings?  What colors do you think I should use in my next painting. I don't. 

Response to Shellie's Article

http://books.google.com/books?id=pn2BMESshtAC&pg=PA91&lpg=PA91&dq=over+intellectualized+art&source=bl&ots=Wlfs9z9jSd&sig=H2ROJfP4a-PgGGLVgLFTopUf8z8&hl=en&ei=bwF5TfSrK4Xp0gG1kZ3sAw&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=5&ved=0CDYQ6AEwBA#v=onepage&q&f=false

The like above will take you to the entire book. I am asking that you read chapter 6. That is page 89-100 its pretty short and entertaining. Hope you all enjoy. Here are the questions. let me know if you have any questions or have trouble with the link 

Chapter 6 From the Book “Woody Allen and philosophy”

Woody on Aesthetic Appreciation p. 89-100

Questions:

1. After reading this article analyzing Woody’s work do you feel like his movies mock how contemporary art classes approach talking about art? Why? I think that he is mocking the way that people add content to work when it is not there, they are reading into work as though there everything needs interpretation and everything is a symbol. 

2. Do you ever feel surrounded by people that you need to impress/fake being overly excited or emotional about your work? If you do ever fake these emotions, why? The excitement in my work is more vivid when I am talking about it with colleagues, but that is the extent of it. My excitement level has more to do with me than with the viewer. 

3. Would you say you art leans more towards needing emotional or intellectual appreciation? Does this relate to the aesthetics? I would say more to the intellectual side, this directly relates to my process. I am not looking for an emotional reaction in the majority of my work. 

4. Do you care about how your work looks while your creating it? Do you ever step back and move something around just because it looks bad? Does the work become less intellectual if this happens? Explain. The aesthetics play more into the final editing stages of my work, and are there to reinforce/highlight the functionality of the art object. 

5. When you view my art do you have any intellectual response? If not does this mean my work has no aesthetic value based on what the chapter requires for a meaningful aesthetic response. I have an intellectual response but it is more to do with the subtle details that arise within the work. 

6. Where is your fulcrum between intellect and emotion when creating your work on a scale of 1-10. 1 leaning more towards intellect and 10 being more towards emotion. Where is mine? I would say you are a 7 and I am a 3. 

7. Why do you think I tend to reject intellectualizing art? I think that you have an emotional response initially and that is why you tend not to try and read something that is not present in the work. 

8. I would consider my work to be relaxing to the viewer. Do you agree/why? I agree, your images come from a relaxing environment and this is carried over in your practice and development of your work. The delicate and rhythmic nature of working in the print studio is parallel with paddling. 

Jen's Reading

The Article can be found here: 

http://www.huffingtonpost.com Why aren't more poets political? 

 What are your political concerns? Is there anything happening in the world beyond your self, that still effects you directly? Does this come into your work? I have personal political concerns, but would rather not publish them. However, they do indirectly influence my work. 

  What insights should artists provide? Do you agree that poets(artists) are "uniquely suited" to "speak publicly and morally about human aspirations"? I think they are uniquely suited but in the same way that a baker or construction worker is uniquely suited, artists just have another language to discuss them in. 

 What does it mean to be politically active?politically- Of, relating to, or dealing with the structure or affairs of government, politics, or the state. action- something done (usually as opposed to something said)

I do consider something said leading to something done to be politically active. 

 Are you able to relate to the work that I've made this year? What work? Do you relate it to any other artists or movements? I relate to your thought process in what you are making, especially with your new york times drawings and your chalk board piece, but although I see the poetry in the final piece I do not tend to relate to the final piece. I think you are interested in some of the same things that those indulged with automatic writing and see your work in similar ways that I see Christopher Wool's work. 

 What do you think would make my work better? I think that you would benefit from trying very ambitious projects and from self evaluation, especially in regards to what it is that you are ultimately concerned with. 

7. Do you think some of my work can be political, even if I don't say it is, or take a specific position? Is this an effective way of discussing work? Yes, there are political threads in your work, it is something that as a viewer you can see without needing explanation from you the artist. 

8. Does my work provide any insight? Technically, yes, especially in the way you arrange your work. But it is conceptually on the fence, I do not get strong convictions from your work, but don't know that I would want to. 

Kris' article responces

Questions.

1.  What is meant by a poor image?

The article says that this is a poor image > The poor image is a copy in motion. Its quality is bad, its resolution substandard. As it accelerates, it deteriorates. It is a ghost of an image, a preview, a thumbnail, an errant idea, an itinerant image distributed for free, squeezed through slow digital connections, compressed, reproduced, ripped, remixed, as well as copied and pasted into other channels of distribution.

The poor image is a rag or a rip; an AVI or a JPEG, a lumpen proletarian in the class society of appearances, ranked and valued according to its resolution. The poor image has been uploaded, downloaded, shared, reformatted, and reedited. It transforms quality into accessibility, exhibition value into cult value, films into clips, contemplation into distraction. The image is liberated from the vaults of cinemas and archives and thrust into digital uncertainty, at the expense of its own substance. The poor image tends towards abstraction: it is a visual idea in its very becoming.

The poor image is an illicit fifth-generation bastard of an original image. Its genealogy is dubious. Its filenames are deliberately misspelled. It often defies patrimony, national culture, or indeed copyright. It is passed on as a lure, a decoy, an index, or as a reminder of its former visual self. It mocks the promises of digital technology. Not only is it often degraded to the point of being just a hurried blur, one even doubts whether it could be called an image at all. Only digital technology could produce such a dilapidated image in the first place.

Poor images are the contemporary Wretched of the Screen, the debris of audiovisual production, the trash that washes up on the digital economies’ shores. They testify to the violent dislocation, transferrals, and displacement of images—their acceleration and circulation within the vicious cycles of audiovisual capitalism. Poor images are dragged around the globe as commodities or their effigies, as gifts or as bounty. They spread pleasure or death threats, conspiracy theories or bootlegs, resistance or stultification. Poor images show the rare, the obvious, and the unbelievable—that is, if we can still manage to decipher it.

I think that the poor image is one that is  not considered within its context. 

2.  What is meant by the contemporary hierarchy of images?

That certain images hold a higher value than others. When an image is technically proficient that it is held in a higher value, and vice versa. 

3. What qualifies a work as experimental?

I think that it is hard to define work as experimental until after it is followed by its successor. 

4. Do you agree that poor images are poor because they are not assigned any vale from the clas society of images?

No, I think that an image is poor when every aspect of its installation is not been a result of a specific decision. 

5. What relevance does this have to painting?

Especially because much of today's art is seen on a screen, at some point, everything made becomes an image. Paintings go from being about what has been discussed with paint to adjacent colored pixels. 

6. How do we measure the quality of image?

Carefully. 

7.  Do you consider these qualities when constructing work?

I consider this when editing work. 

8.  What role does the human condition or the "everyday" have in your work?

It seeps in slowly and often times I don't give its due diligence until post-production.