Month: April 2022

Title of Event: Samek Student Art Exhibit
Date & Time of Event: Sunday, April 24th, 4 pm
Location of Event: Samek Art Gallery
Type of event: Self Guided Tour

After watching 60 minutes’ worth of Art21 videos, I walked away with a few gained insights and ideas. This time around, I focused on watching videos of artists who used 3D sculpture as their form of expression and excluded performative pieces. One very intriguing concept I appreciated learning about was the idea that the past is only remembered through the 5 senses that we used to experience it and that to accurately represent it we must accurately represent these 5 senses. I also really appreciated the desire to produce pieces that do not scream a specific interpretation right away but rather slow down the interpretation response and allow anyone to take away important topics from the work. Finally, I want to touch on a more physical technique that was brought to my attention that I would like to incorporate into my work technique which is the act of splitting workpieces systematically into simple geometric shapes and focusing on these regions one at a time.

I intend to borrow the use of holes and sheltering to express vulnerability within my work.

For the final project, I wanted to focus on the paradox of how as we become more comfortable in various situations we become more vulnerable at the same time. I chose this topic mainly due to the fact that it is something I am faced a lot throughout my life. I feel like almost all the aspects of my life are met with this same paradox, and I am often left on the side of putting walls up to avoid this vulnerability or being ignorant to this vulnerability until eventually I am left wounded. 

This problem is often caused by people becoming too relaxed after they have had the same outcome over and over again. When they continually receive the same outcome over and over again they begin to forget what dangerous outcomes are also possible, they begin to believe that their familiar outcome is the only outcome. This false sense of security then leads people to put their guards down and start taking far fewer precautions than they did at the beginning, making them more susceptible to the unlikely but harsh outcomes.

Ten tangible people/places/things that are associated with this are:

1.) Free Soloing

2.) Not putting in protection

3.) Not studying hard for exams

4.) Not wearing a seat belt

5.) Not wearing safety glasses

6.) Swimming alone

7.) Drinking and driving

8.) Driving fast

9.) falling in love

10.) Growing Close to people

Consider and Clarify your topic: An issue I find compelling are the unknowns of both deep space and the deep ocean. We have spent decades working tirelessly to discover the mysteries that lie beyond the stars and despite this, there is still so much that we still do not understand. In contrast, the Oceans which reside much closer to home are equally as unknown to us. I find this to be fascinating how at times it seems like there is nothing left for us to discover, but in reality we are completely ignorant to many of these mysteries left unsolved. As an avid physics fan, and someone who loves to read about what lies millions of miles from earth, I am intrigued by this vast unknown space. There are massive gaps in the theories used to describe the world around us, despite some of humanities brightest minds devoting their lives to unlocking these mysteries. While the Ocean may feel like a familiar place, roughly 80% of earths oceans are unexplored and therefore-unknown. These may seem like two entirely different entities: Space and the Oceans, but they seem to be similar in many ways to me. Vast, dark environments with objects and perhaps species entirely undiscovered. I would love to create a piece that is able to encapsulate the idea of the unknown within both of these contexts. I think by combining many of the well known aspects of both of these, viewers will understand the parallels between the two. Ive created a list of some things that embody this: 1) Astronaut, they’re the people walking into space themselves. 2) Stars, one of the few things everyone on earth has equal opportunity to look upon every night. 3) Darkness, an inherent quality to both the ocean and space that enhance the feeling of mystery. 4) The solar system, our closest neighboring objects. 5) Fish, populate earths oceans. 6) Seaweed, very common aquatic plant. 7) A door, walking through a door represents moving from one place to another. 8) Water, the substance composing earths oceans. 9) Question mark, standard symbol for unknown. 10) Beach, The boundary between our world and the ocean.