Juan Castillo

My project hasn’t changed much since I began working on it,
but some things have unexpectedly changed direction. For example, my idea for
the Christmas commentary piece has completely shifted from commenting on the
commercialization of that holiday, to a piece that questions our idea of
originality. That particular piece has turned into a very graphic work,
consisting of only two calculus expressions on a flat, white background. The
Christmas roots of the piece have not been lost, however. In an art history
class that I’m taking, we’re discussing Walter Benjamin’s concept of an artwork’s
aura. Part of what constitutes a work
of art’s aura, is its history. I
figure, if I choose Christmas colors (green and red) to allude to the original idea,
that will add to the story behind the piece and ultimately add to its aura.
The miscellaneous part of my project, about using the
painting as a way to capture things, has been used to capture the music of Bill
Evans. I enjoy listening to music while working, but I tend to gravitate toward
instrumental work. Hence, I end up listening to a bunch of jazz piano, and Bill
Evans is usually who I prefer. Lately, I’ve found comfort in his music, not
just as a way help pass time, but as a place, a familiar place, to comfort me
in an uncertain part of my life. Having temporarily found peace of mind through
his music on multiple occasions, I wanted to capture, not only his music, but
how I feel when listening to him play the piano. I’ve done some charcoal
drawings of Evans himself, and a couple of paintings on Masonite. In the
paintings, I tried to capture his music by holding acrylic tubes in each hand
and responding to one of his songs.

Inspiration And Names

Versace spring ad
"The ever changing face of beauty" Video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MiWdG1lSA8Q
Jean Paul Gaultier @ DMA
Anthropologie

alexander mcqueen dress

Matt Youngblood Project Update

I will have a minimum of three pieces. Piece 1 has been shown in class and is on newsprint. I doubt I will alter this piece anymore and am considering it complete. Piece 2 is on Reeves BFK and has not been shown in class. It consists of some drawing in pastel and some form of printmaking/painting. Piece 3 is a collage of all the prints I showed during Critique 2 for group 2. I am now making it a point to work with larger plates in my printmaking practice, reflecting on the three pieces above and the large size they are. I was talked out of doing the largest plate that I could, but am still doing a plate that is the largest I’ve done before. This is the next project. I may make this next piece into a collage to better fit with the overall quality of my pieces. I think I have exhausted myself on trying to explore Noah's idea of incorporating painting and printmaking, or make printmaking more like painting, at least to any complex degree. I am staying more closely to printmaking now.

Piece 2 was made by taking small rectangular strips of copper plate and coating them with ink and putting them through the press many times with multiple copper strips laid down. The surface of the paper was first painted. The final touches were done with pastel.

I think what I am doing here is essentially trying to find an alternative form of printmaking, or not settling for the standard practices I see in the SMU printmaking courses. That is why I am now reluctant to just have the prints themselves, and instead want to make them into collages. I also will not be going back to small plates, which was actually the norm for me before this class.  

For the collages, I am using the Reeves BFK paper we use in printmaking, and simply organizing the pieces however I want. I am trying to make the pieces rectangular in form, and am trying not to do the whole collage all at once. One thing I have now added to my art practice is that I will rotate the piece to different views, and not work on it from one single axis or view. I do see potential that I could take the idea of the collage further, but don’t think I will take it further than what it is now.

I estimate I will have one to two more pieces by the time of the exhibition. So, I will have four to five pieces total. I don't have any titles for the pieces, but think I should probably include them, along with a little card with cataloging information. We discussed alternative ways of arranging the pieces in the show in class, but don't know if I am going to do this.

Kate Egan Update

My objective of creating the four elements of the earth in clothing, furniture, 
photos, frames, and video is coming along nicely.  I knew that this was an ambitious 
undertaking but so far everything is progressing. The furniture ideas are still 
the same as they were originally. I am conceptualizing the element and transforming what 

was or is a chair. The end result is an interesting “sculptural” piece that translates the 
ideas that I feel towards each element. The clothing as a whole is near 
completion. Final touches are being made and since completing the original 
ideas, I have come up with new interpretive ways to create a garment based on 
something, for example, that is usually in a liquid state. With the completion of 
these garment pieces, I have set up photo-shoot dates and finalized the model list. I have 
lookbook type portfolios set up for each shoot and have scouted the location for 
the photos. The video is also coming along. With my recent trip to Florida I was 
able to get some interesting footage for each section of the video. I have a 
concept and thoughts about angles and movement that I wanted to video during the 
shoot. The problem that I always run into when creating a video is having all 
the video clips that I need during the editing and manipulating process. I 
always wish I had more shots or had done something differently. So thinking of 
all possible ideas before the shoot is crucial for me. As well as I always second guess 
the style of video that was first created and want to restart.


As to the set up of the show I want to have one of the larger walls in the 
Doolin and hang the four pictures but have space in the middle for a projection 
of the video. The furniture will sit under the appropriate photo (corresponding element). Then

the 
clothing I want to suspend from the the tracks in the middle of the Doolin using invisible wire. To fill out the bodies of the clothing I think I might buy 
inflatable or plastic torsos.

Nicholas Clark - Project Update

On the technical side of my project, I’ve gathered the tools required to create a sound triggered motion sensor and will begin assembling it soon. The included parts are an Arduino, three Parallax PIR sensors, LEDs and the proper wiring. The next step is to use Pure Data software to properly program the sensor. This will undoubtedly be a trial and error process.

On the visual side, the work has changed in two ways. Firstly, the project is entering the biographical realm. In building upon my original idea of organizing the work into columns, it will now be chronologically ordered. I feel a column system implies a linear progression therefore the work will be arranged in a linear manner. My hope is to display Gil Scott Heron at three points in his career. These three snapshots (that span years) should reveal a change in something about Heron. Quotes from Gil Scott Heron will also be included as contextual support for my images. Secondly, I’ve reassessed the art’s style. My original sketches were aiming to be realistic. They were intended to illustrate my interpretation of Heron’s lyrics, but ultimately the sketches were boring and did not meld with Gil Scott Heron’s artistic approach. In response, I’ve adjusted my technique to a graphic style, a style reminiscent of Emory Douglass. Gil Scott Heron’s spoken word is honest and bold. My goal is to reflect these qualities visually. When I thought about the way Douglass’s work mirrors the passion of the Black Panthers, I realized I was trying to achieve something similar with Heron’s work.

The culmination of my project will be a series centered on Gil Scott Heron’s career. The project will be composed of three columns (with three works per column). Heron’s spoken word will accompany the visuals via a speaker triggered by one of three PIR motion sensors. Although the work is primarily focused on one man, it may also touch on historical movements such as Civil Rights, given Heron’s connection to such things.

Jordan Greenbaum Proposal

I have always been interested in the world of fashion and design, and how it relates to the world of fine arts. Through personal investigations and various courses I have become increasingly intrigued by the idea of creating art though fashion. While this idea isn’t immediately easy for me to explain – I can give a short description of what I plan to do.

I want to create interesting garments through both textiles (with use of paints, screen-printing, and various sewing techniques) and non-traditional materials (for example, recycled materials or latex.) I also want the pieces to be no only be interesting on their own, but part of the mannequin as well. I have always loved the idea of not just using the mannequin for display, but making it part of the garment itself – essentially the garments I intend to make are never meant to leave the mannequin. For the mannequins themselves I want to make plaster casts of a miniature dress form (hopefully create and successfully design 3-4) and then create two full size mannequins using plaster casts of women in more dynamic poses (hopefully creating 2)

In the final gallery showing I hope to display these clothed mannequins with the original illustrations (and any additional illustrations relating) as well as drawings and prints done from observation of the completed garment and mannequin.

My main original inspiration for this was the theatrical runway shows put on by Alexander McQueen. In particular, in his 1999 runway show in which two robots sprayed paint onto a white gown on the runway. I want to create pieces of clothing that function outside of the fashion world – each being independent works of art.

Updated Proposal

This semester I am planning on creating a show inspired by the four elements of the earth: Water, Fire, Earth and Air. It will incorporate the components of photography, video, embellished furniture pieces and sculptural clothing. There will be up to two photos per element. This could mean possibly incorporating a homemade light box, but each photo will be framed. The framed photos will be digital and may be transparent for the light box. The furniture might have cyano photographs imbedded, actual elements, or a representation of it. The clothing will be handmade and be used in the production of the video and photographs. The clothing will be created as a sculptural piece, to eventually stand alone in the exhibition. The video will hold the entire story while the photos become almost still shots of the video, but video of singular elements will also be incorporated . The musical piece, Cavalia from Cirque de Soleil's, Cavallia, is what has inspired the entire work to become cohesive. The overall idea and story will be meticulously thought through when creating each piece of the collection to embody the particular element. The use of professional models and possibly dancers will be used in the video and photos. People that inspire me to create this look are Elsa Schiaparelli, Annie Leibovitz, Richard Avedon.

GSH

Here is an example of Gil Scott-Heron's work. "The Revolution Will Not Be Televised" sums up Scott-Heron's mindset and is essential to my project.

DiVonte Gorham Proposal

As a digital artist, my work focuses on creating assets for use in entertainment media, which is primarily categorized as, but not limited to, interactive experiences such as video games. Assets range in meaning, but include Software used for creating 2D works are Adobe  Photoshop, Adobe Illustrator, and Alchemy, while 3D works are created using 3D Studio Max and other Autodesk programs. Exhibitions of these works are then meant to be viewed as ‘light-images’, as opposed to works rendered with pigments, to emphasize the ethereal and intangible nature of the medium itself. A secondary motif behind this is chaos used to create order, displayed with controlled forms/silhouettes, though letting a range of values create disorder within the works to remove the perfect uncanny valley feel from computer graphics.

While the final works will be digital, some concept work and studies used to reach the final point will make use of pencil. As a quick means of creating rapid, though less defined, compositions and works, these steps are still ever important and will be presented close to their final works when possible.

The scale of works is limited primarily by equipment and image resolution, which will be kept at around 300DPI for the sake of good-practice, rather than the physical limitations of materials. In subject, the works will focus on the organic figure, though occasionally exploring the environment as a means to create meaning within the images; more precisely, there will be a heavy focus on design and the meaning behind design choices within ranges of color, form, silhouette, readability, plausible animations, and utility. Some video will be used as a means to shed light on the process, considering the lack of Individual artists acting as primary influences on my artwork include Feng Zhu, David Dociu, and Andrew ‘Android’ Jones. Inspiring teams of artists include Massive Black, Steambot Studios, Team Ico, and Blizzard.

Julie Smith Proposal

A Timeline of Conceptual Portability

Art is not created merely for visual appeal it is created to promote the spread of ideas. Art is the circulation of ingenuity and innovation. Portability, being the lead aspect of technological expansion today, helps allow for a fast and efficient way to propagate such ideas. Along with the theme of portability in my work I plan placing a focus on timelines. These timelines will deal with the expansion of structures or a person’s struggles and achievements throughout time. A timeline is never set and a person can constantly modify their future. In my work I plan on allowing viewer interaction. I feel that a person should not be just observing a piece they should be incorporating their own opinions into the work, so it doesn’t just contain one person’s perspective. I plan creating pieces that are portable, interactive, and have an underlying theme of expansion and the modification of time and space. These attributes work together in order to further express the emphasis on time, change, and originality. Change over time is not based on one person’s commitment; it is a combination of people’s efforts and ideas.

Scale: small, medium and large-scale pieces

Materials: photography, pen & ink, word-work, paint, canvas, photoshop, print, and other found objects

Artistic Influences:

            Andrea Bianconi

            Paul Fleming

            Christian Eckart

            Anthony Thompson Shumate

            Neva Mikulicz

            Tony Smith

            Robert Morris

            Joseph Kosuth

            Sol Le Witt

            Angelbert Metoyer

            On Kawara

Matt Youngblood's Proposal

My aim is to both re-express and explore further the abstract expressionist works of myself in the past, which are of the form of painting and printmaking, as well as those works of an artist whom I recently began to admire, Jasper Johns. I seek only to generate ideas conceptually from Jasper Johns, though, as a source of inspiration. I will do this in my preferred style, printmaking (as this is my focus here at Meadows), but, also, may choose to utilize drawing and painting to assist in whichever way that may so happen. I hope to fledge out a more in-depth understanding or appreciation of my own work and that of Jasper Johns in the process. I have also been influenced by other associate artists during my art education that has lead me to this desire to make work of this sort, but I think that making this type of art comes out of a very real personal desire and will of my own. I will only be mildly motivated by works of others, relying mostly on my own experience. I mention Jasper Johns mainly because I readily identify with his work, more so than other artists I’ve seen, but it is not so much that I aspire to do work like his. I began this line of work a short while ago when given freedom to explore myself as an artist as a part of a class, and have further refined these tendencies through my focus as an artist, which is printmaking, for now at least. So, this is all very new to me. I would also describe my work as impulsive and the reasoning behind it to not be ideally conveyed through the use of words. The art really speaks for itself, and what ideas it represents can be elusive to me, as the artist, and probably far more so to the audience, but nonetheless, here I believe my work to hold meaning to others, but what that might be I cannot rightly say. It has the capacity to be profound, I might add. I think my work here could be described innocent in nature in that it is free from conscious thought and more in line with the emotional and subconscious underpinnings of the human condition. If there is any conscious thought that I impart on my work, it is not done intentionally. Sure, the exact actions that create the effects within the piece involve my own human psychological traits, but these exist at a much deeper space in my own psyche that does not operate on the same level as conscious thought processes do, thus, I cannot adequately explain my actions in words.

Savannah Niles-- Proposal.

I want to pursue two bodies of work in parallel: one inside the computer and inside language, and the other outside the computer and largely outside language. In my practice currently I experience difficulty bridging these two interests and ways of working; I hope that by intentionally exploring each side of this coin separately, I can find a point at which both relate. These ideas are so far inchoate, but interests that come to mind as related to the investigations I intend to conduct are:

1.) Translation and language: I’d like to continue pursuing my interests in 3D scanning and printing, processes I think of as translations, and which I’m interested in connecting to language. I am also interested in the inconsistencies and difficulties of switching between systems of symbols, such as languages, or code and speakable language. I will consider writing and programming as investigations in these interests.

2.) Honesty: Often, biases, assumptions, and subjective judgments challenge a thinker’s honesty—it’s nearly impossible to arrive at objective conclusions, or unbiased data. Computers are capable of doing this, but not their operators. This to me is an important difference between the kind of work and methods of working that can be accomplished in a digital world versus non-digital media. This is a difference I’d like to explore. I also see language as a frequent barrier to honest ways of working, since language can justify, rationalize, and obscure decisions. My interest in honesty thus likewise relates to my interest in language.

All this is to say that I want to question the honesty of my work all the time.

3.) Memory: Personal memory is the anti-data, I think: it’s not quantized, it’s not honest or objective, and it’s not universal. But, like a computer system relies on heaps of numerals and calculations to execute decisions, we too depend on and carry with us personal memory as a kind of emotional dataset. So much language is devoted to the expression of this “data”—this is all interesting to me as an artist and a programmer, and a human.

Ultimately I want to make work that reflects an interest in what it means to be a human, particularly in a technological age.

I want to end this proposal with a poem by Wallace Stevens that is central to my thinking and practice, called “the Idea of Order at Key West”:

She sang beyond the genius of the sea.

The water never formed to mind or voice,

Like a body wholly body, fluttering

Its empty sleeves; and yet its mimic motion

Made constant cry, caused constantly a cry,

That was not ours although we understood,

Inhuman, of the veritable ocean.

The sea was not a mask. No more was she.

The song and water were not medleyed sound

Even if what she sang was what she heard,

Since what she sang was uttered word by word.

It may be that in all her phrases stirred

The grinding water and the gasping wind;

But it was she and not the sea we heard.

For she was the maker of the song she sang.

The ever-hooded, tragic-gestured sea

Was merely a place by which she walked to sing.

Whose spirit is this? we said, because we knew

It was the spirit that we sought and knew

That we should ask this often as she sang.

If it was only the dark voice of the sea

That rose, or even colored by many waves;

If it was only the outer voice of sky

And cloud, of the sunken coral water-walled,

However clear, it would have been deep air,

The heaving speech of air, a summer sound

Repeated in a summer without end

And sound alone. But it was more than that,

More even than her voice, and ours, among

The meaningless plungings of water and the wind,

Theatrical distances, bronze shadows heaped

On high horizons, mountainous atmospheres

Of sky and sea.

It was her voice that made

The sky acutest at its vanishing.

She measured to the hour its solitude.

She was the single artificer of the world

In which she sang. And when she sang, the sea,

Whatever self it had, became the self

That was her song, for she was the maker. Then we,

As we beheld her striding there alone,

Knew that there never was a world for her

Except the one she sang and, singing, made.

Ramon Fernandez, tell me, if you know,

Why, when the singing ended and we turned

Toward the town, tell why the glassy lights,

The lights in the fishing boats at anchor there,

As the night descended, tilting in the air,

Mastered the night and portioned out the sea,

Fixing emblazoned zones and fiery poles,

Arranging, deepening, enchanting night.

Oh! Blessed rage for order, pale Ramon,

The maker's rage to order words of the sea,

Words of the fragrant portals, dimly-starred,

And of ourselves and of our origins,

In ghostlier demarcations, keener sounds.

Juan Castillo Proposal

Juan Castillo
Junior Tutorial Proposal for SP 2012

I’ve been very scattered with my artwork up until this point. In a college environment (or maybe just at SMU), the simple joy I feel when making a very technically motivated piece feels very out-of-style. Where I come from, when one makes a painting of, say, a bird, or a face, no one asks what it means. In class, I find myself having to justify my reasons for painting such things, as if I could have only painted these things having first been intellectually inspired to do so. I explain this context simply to contrast a different sort of inspiration I’ve been feeling lately. It may be that watching all of the Republican candidate debates has finally made me a little more politically aware, or perhaps everyone complaining about the same thing on Facebook has made me give things a second look, or just maybe, my “higher education” is finally kicking in; but whatever the reason, I find myself actually thinking about something intellectually, and then wanting to set out and create a work of art that responds to it. In other words, my work is going to actually be trying to say something.

Specifically, I plan on making work centered around two ideas: social & political commentary, and the frame as a container. The latter is sort of my miscellaneous category, but I’ll mostly be drawing from personal experiences for it. However, I should first explain what I mean by the “the frame as a container”. When I write that, I’m writing about the idea of a drawing, painting, print, (or anything with a border, really) and its capacity to not only imitate something, (the way an observational drawing does), but also, to capture something too. When conceiving of the painting as a way to capture something, I find myself wanting, not to replicate a scene (and focus on realism), but rather, capture the feeling of a particular moment. When thinking about the idea and its implications for size, I think it’ll be fairly unlimited, because containers come in all sizes. Anything from wallet-size, to house-size, because after all, they’re all containers, aren’t they?

Alright, down to business, I want to work mostly with paint, at fairly large sizes (depending on its costliness). I already have two commentary pieces in mind about world hunger and Christmas (motivated by street artist like Banksy), and I also have another piece in mind for my “container” idea. The “container” idea I have in mind is a piece composed of multiple frames, depicting a past experience. Although the media will mostly be paint, I will have to make sculptures and drawings (as models) for some, in order to prepare for the final piece. I’m very much looking forward to it.

Kate Esbenshade Proposal Update

            My incentive this semester is to develop a body of work that reflects my interest in narrative as well as the figure. Contemporary artists Alice Neel, Willem De Kooning. Alex Katz, Joan Mitchell, Joan Brown, Richard Diebenkorn, inspire me with their mastery of form, color, and perspective. I will be working in both oil and acrylic paint. I want to take risks with composition, surfaces, and color as it coincides with my subject matter. I will use these different elements of inspiration and creative thought process to present a modern take on portraiture and storytelling. The evolution of my project has gone from a more traditional idea of the figure to using my passion for collage to create the narratives. I am transferring pieces from the collages directly on canvas to create an interesting juxtaposition between the surface and the process of layering other materials on top. What is painting really but a collage? We layer paint over paint, shape over shape, color over color, and I am using this thought process to hopefully provoke the viewer into dialogue with the painting. The struggles in my process have been using small collages to create larger work, which can cause one to get too wrapped up in the plan and less on the final product. Also, I have been using materials such as, wood, aluminum, glue/sealer, paper, acrylic, and oil, together which can be difficult to achieve the right textures without mistakes. Size of the work has also been something to consider. I have two larger works 48x60 currently in progress, but am planning to scale down so that I can create more work in a shorter period of time. 

Nicholas Clark Proposal

Nicholas Clark

Gil Scott-Heron Proposal

My goal is to construct a body of work that starts a conversation involving the artist, the art and the viewer. The conversation will concern the life and work of Gil Scott-Heron. Scott-Heron was a jazz poet and musician among other things. His lyrical content is concerned with social and political issues in the United States. The recently deceased poet will serve as a potent subject due to his untimely death and the relevance of his work.

The art will be separated into columns. Each column will form a single idea based on some aspect of Scott-Heron’s work. They will be accompanied by motion-activated sound that will play segments of the poet’s lyrics. Each column will have a sensor and the columns will activate depending on where the viewers stand. In a sense the viewer is in control of the project’s auditory aspects. Alternatively, a button will trigger the sound if the motion aspect does not pan out.

The visual portion of this work will be done digitally and influenced by pieces of Scott-Heron’s music. As I have not defined a specific scale for the images, working digitally will be beneficial; however the minimum size will be 13”x19” per image. The final scale will depend upon how the printed work turns out.

A secondary goal in this project is to make it an interactive piece, hence triggering the sounds with a motion sensor. Creating an interactive piece is not a particularly original idea, but it is one that further involves the viewer and that is nearly always a positive consequence in art. The decision to incorporate an interactive feature stems from a longstanding appreciation of Scott Snibbe’s work. For example, Snibbe’s, Boundary Functions, is a project that critiques the idea of personal space. The piece does not fully become art until at least two people enter the space. This is the level of viewer interaction that has guided me to the Gil Scott Heron project.

Kate Egan Proposal

Kate Egan 

Junior tutorial 

Proposal.

This semester I am planning on creating a show that incorporates the components of photographs, ink drawings, print making, video, furniture or sculptural clothing. There will be up to ten photos possibly incorporating a homemade light box, or enlarging the photos to poster size. The photos could be transparent for the lights box, gelatin silver prints, cyano types, or digital. The ink drawings and prints will be abstract doodles and ideas that venture from the entire theme. The furniture will have cyano photographs imbedded in the fabric. The clothing will be handmade and used in the production of the video and photographs. The clothing will be created as a sculptural piece, to eventually stand alone in the exhibition. The video will hold the entire story while the photos become almost still shots of the video. The music is what inspires the entire work to become a whole. The overall idea and story will be meticulously thought about when creating each piece of the collection. The use of professional models and possibly dancers will be used in the video and photos. People that inspire me to create this look are Kevin Llewellyn, Elsa Schiaparelli, Annie Leibovitz, Richard Avedon. I am considering a few concepts at the moment, one is based on the four elements of the earth, another is a nature based ethereal dreamscape, and finally a retro spy theme.

Hey guys: 500 X is having their annual show at the end of the month. The deadline in January 31st. http://www.500x.org/?p=940

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