I prefer Fudgy brownies to Cakey brownies. If I wanted to eat something cakey and chocolatey, I’d just eat a chocolate cake.
MY KILOMETRE
For my kilometre, I turned to the idea of making one out of a non-physical medium, which ended up being music. How much music is in a kilometre? I worked it out to be around five and a half minutes. A CD spins at about 500rpm, with a circumference of 37.7cm. in one minute a CD will have spun the equivalent of 188.5 metres. therefore, a kilometre can be represented by 5.5 minutes of music. to show this I recorded footage of my CD player playing a kilometre of Hall and Oates.
NYT ARTICLE DISCUSSION
- Katja Heitmann’s “Motus Mori” is a collection of over a thousand unique physical mannerisms of the everyday population. A team of ten performers execute the rhythms which have been ‘donated’ to heitmann and are recorded only on a notecard. The performers stage five-hour long blocks of dance installations that are open to the public, where the performers‘ bodies act as ‘archives’ for the donated mannerisms. It is sometimes challenging for the gesture donors to act candidly when they are interviewed by Heitmann’s dancers, but the tension eventually fades with the help of an ambient setting for interviews. There is a mix of special and ordinary movements and gestures, like ‘hanging upside down on the sofa’ or ‘fingernail biting’. For donors, watching the performers recreate their gestures and tics can have different effects: some realize their gestures “looked less elegant” than they thought, and some gain a “newfound sense of ownsership” over their tics. Heitmann’s work can help us remember others, like her own late father, whose tics she has donated to her performers to recreate.
- One part of the article that resonated with me was making gestures that accompany music. Listening to music often evokes a physical response from me. Upbeat or heavy music might encourage me to air guitar or air drum. A lot of times i will tap my fingers in time with the rising and falling notes as if i was playing a piano or bob my head or tap my feet. These gestures help me enjoy my music deeper.
- My dad has a habit of rubbing the underside of his nose with just one finger, even if his nose isn’t running. It’s a quick swiping motion; sometimes he’ll squint or blink as well. One guy i know will stand with his arms crossed and have one foot perpendicular to the other, like a T-shape. One teacher i know would talk a lot with his body during class, which made him a very energetic lecturer.
Field Trip !!
I Took part in our class’s field trip to the AGO and the Power Plant and saw some great works of art. Starting with the AGO, I really enjoyed the hip-hop exhibit “The Culture;” there were a lot of great works here. One that really stood out to me was this large work (which I forget the title of). Its blending of graffiti and Japanese print styles make for an engaging composition, enhanced by the bright colours surrounding the horseman. I really enjoy this kind of ‘cultural collaging’ in art, and it reminds me of the artist Julian Adon Alexander, who combines portraits of people in everyday life with pop culture elements to create visually striking works.
The next work from “The Culture” I want to highlight is “Can a Rap Song Have the Significance of Art,” which was derived from an old news article where “rap song” originally said “photograph.” This one spoke out to me because critics have always been questioning the legitimacy of art in different mediums. Of course, today we would consider a photograph a work of art; tons of artists make a living taking and selling photos. Photographs can capture grand landscapes and deep, intimate moments of personal significance. Music can do the same thing, too. We tell stories through all genres of music, so what singles rap out as “not artistic?”
At the Power Plant we saw two exhibits. The first one, “Floating Sea Palace,” was a surreal half-hour film that told the story of the mythical Lo Ting, a half-fish half-man and his attempt to journey to the “Fragrant Harbour,” or Hong Kong. Narration, live action footage, and shadow-puppet-esque performances are all woven together to craft a mystical story that had me almost in a trance state. It was ambient and treacherous at the same time.
The second exhibit, “How Many Colours Are the Sea,” featured a small booth in the corner of the large exhibit room that had pairs of headphones hooked up to mp3 players. Out of curiosity, I sat down and put a pair on, and I was treated to a ten-minute meditative audio file from the artist, guiding me through a meditation where I was instructed to confront a loss I had faced in the past. I immersed myself in my memory of that moment in time where I came to visit my grandfather in hospice. I tried to conjure the exact senses I felt that day, and placed myself close to him. Then, I was guided to make peace with this loss and let it go. The meditation helped my ease my mind and get into my head in a calm way, and I left feeling lighter.
I had a great time seeing these works!
One Feat, Three Ways
One-Shot: https://youtu.be/vyasj5W_oxg
Sequence: https://youtu.be/jgNRsffsNkY
Loop: https://youtu.be/2MIi5rSlsa4
Our work was meant to comment on the sensationalized nature of guns when it comes to the younger generations. Firearms have been objectified and glorified in mass media but they are still real, harmful weapons. We used two colourful toy guns to represent this fact as we shot each other with deadpan expressions on our faces, our bodies still suffering the effects of being shot (figuratively). by removing our expressions you are able to focus on the harm being done by shooting each other. Our loop is an endless cycle of shooting, both of us exchanging bullet for bullet. Gun violence is a cycle that we have perpetuated for a very long time… this video serves as a metaphor for that fact.
One Minute Audio
For this project I decided to play with found audio and mash together the lyrics from Radiohead’s In Rainbows album to create a monologue/spoken poem. The sentences are a bit nonsensical, but still coherent.
A script is here, because sometimes I can’t decipher what Thom Yorke is saying:
Take my hand because I just wanna be your lover
I’m at the pearly gates, I never really got there, I’d be crazy not to
Forget about your plastic bags before you let it out
How come I’ve no idea about your house of cards
You’ll go to hell for an animal trapped in your hot car
I managed to use all ten songs off the album!
Conceptual Portrait
My Conceptual Portrait is a Self-Portrait. It’s about how Instagram and my sense of humour interact. I save a lot of posts, some make me laugh more than others, but they’re all at least a little funny to me. I screen-recorded my saved posts and scrolled through a small chunk of them to showcase what I save and what I find “Funny”. It’s embarrassing to display that kind of personal, private thing to everyone, which is exactly why I wanted to do it. Everyone who uses social media has curated their own gallery of funny posts and videos, hand-picked to suit their sense of humour. Some people may have overlapping tastes with others, but they’re all at least a little unique. On the left I recorded footage of myself looking down at my phone, emotionless. Often when I’m on Instagram I’ll fall into a loop of scrolling through posts with a blank expression on my face. Even when I see something funny, most times I just laugh in my head, but if it’s really good I’ll laugh out loud, which I think (hope) others can relate to. I wanted to show what it looks like to be sucked into your phone, wasting valuable time looking at an ocean of garbage that just might make you chuckle.
I actually had to go back and watch the “foreskin” reel because I had no idea why I saved it.
Artist Multiples: Buttons!
I had a lot of fun with this project! For mine, I made “Embarrassment Buttons,” buttons with embarrassing actions on them. Some are worse than others, and some are more or less relatable than others. I chose the blue and yellow colours because it reminded me of an award badge, which is ironic because no one would want to proudly exclaim that they did any of the things on my buttons. Here’s some pics !
