Thursday Posting: Artist's for Panel Review

For the panel review I am meeting with Page Bond, Julie Sanders, and Robert Hobbs.  Page Bond is the owner of Page Bond Gallery. The history of the gallery is found on the website, stating:  

"The Page Bond Gallery, first established in 1999 as the New Gallery in Nantucket, Massachusetts, relocated to Richmond, Virginia in 2001.  Featuring contemporary art in a wide variety of media and disciplines including painting, printmaking, photography, sculpture, and ceramics, the gallery acts as a showcase for the work of emerging as well as established artists with local, national, and international reputations. "

The second person I am meeting with is Julie Sanders from the Martin Agency, who is the senior art producer.  The Martin Agency is is a renowned advertising firm, ranking #3 in the U.S, and represents companies such as Geico, Hanes, Walmart, and Seiko, to name a few. 

The third person I will be meeting with is Robert Hobbs, a professor at VCU who holds the Rhoda Thalhimer Endowed Chair.  His website states:

Recognized as both an academic and a museum curator, Hobbs specializes in both late modern and post-modern art. His work joins social history with literary criticism, aesthetics, and feminist and postcolonial theory. He has published widely and has curated dozens of exhibitions, many of which have been shown at important institutions in the U.S. and abroad. His specific research areas span the twentieth- and twentieth-first centuries, and his publications include monographs on Milton Avery, Alice Aycock, Edward Hopper, Lee Krasner, Mark Lombardi, Robert Smithson, and Kara Walker. In addition to working on mainstream modern and post-modern artists, his published research includes in-depth studies of regional, self-taught, and Native American artists as well as investigations of contemporary and traditional craft media. Hobbs is a member of the Editorial Board of the Grove Encyclopedia of American Art, published by Oxford University Press. I am looking forward to getting feedback from these people, and I think their diverse backgrounds will give me a wide variety of advice and criticism.

Anderson Gallery Student Show

I entered two photographs, this is the one that got in:

Monday Entry: Matt Nighswander

Nighswander is an American-born artist working in Chicago.  He is best known for his photographs that “build stories from the streets of Chicago, transforming caught moments and characters with dream-like metaphors of modern life” (New Photographers 2007).  Born in New Hampshire, Nighswander attended university in New York, although he received no formal training in photography.  In his biography Nighswander states that his inspiration came from the great “street” photographers such as Robert Frank, Gary Winogrand, and Helen Levitt. After Nighswander became interested in photography, he worked for the Associated Press doing photo editing.  He was then accepted into the MFA program at Columbia College Chicago.  Currently Nighswander resides in New York.

Artist website:

http://www.mattnighswander.com/

Artist interview:

http://www.heyhotshot.com/blog/2007/01/07/an-interview-with-summer-hs-matthew-nighswander/

Thursday Posting: Building Architectural Models

Scale

"True architectural model making is mainly confined to 3 areas. Planning models, test and development models, sales models and occasionally exhibition models."

-Model Makers Resource

"Architectural Model Making." Model Makers Resource.

http://themodelmakersresource.co.uk/articles/article020.html

While the article talks about the three different forms of model making, the fully finished model is the one I'm interested in.  This model shows color and building details, along with "landscaping, window finishes, parking spaces, underground car parks, street lights, and all the street furniture we come to expect in our busy environments."  According to the article, this model is usually used not so much for planning but for scale development, and as exhibition center pieces.  This type of model is built out of a variety of materials, and the bases are typically wooden, while the actual buildings are laser cut from styrene.  Details such as balconies and landscapes can also be built from varying materials.  The article states: "Plants, trees, bushes and grass effects are created from many different materials depending on the scale and type of vegetation. Most items tend to be off the shelf, pre-made trees bushes and flowers."

Reading this article was interesting to look at scale-models from the maker's perspective.  The reason I have been doing this research is to more fully understand scale models, since some of my images are beginning to look like miniature versions of buildings.  Understanding the process that goes into making these models helps me in viewing my own images in these terms. So far, I have come to conclude that every little detail must be planned, and nothing left to chance.  This seems to reflect the attitude I take when creating my work.  

Monday Entry: Popel Coumou

Coumou is a photographer from the Netherlands who specializes in miniature interior environments.  According to New Photographers 2007, Coumou “constructs and captures two-dimensional interior environments in miniature.” Light, color, and space all play important roles in her work.  I really identify with her work because of the clean lines she maintains and her careful and controlled use of color.  However, her work is also quite different than mine in the way she uses light, which tends to add dimension and texture in her imagery. Coumou has had numerous exhibitions won many awards, so far all of which are European.  She attended the Gerrit Rietveld Academy in Amsterdam in 2004 for photography.  Not a lot of information was available on her, mostly articles in Dutch.  On the website Platform 21 they discuss Coumou’s process of creating images: “In the spaces Popel photographs, people are almost always absent. Her images are thus not narrative ones: only the division of the room, colour and the play of light create the hushed atmosphere.  She later builds 3D models of the rooms, using stark effects of light and shadow, and photographes them again. Sometimes she builds imagined or ‘virtualised’ miniature rooms of clay, paper and textile. She then photographs these as if the buildings can actually be entered.”

Artist website:

 http://www.popelcoumou.nl/work.php

Thursday Posting: Architectural Models

Miniature

“Scale Models are a basic mechanism used to understand, explore and conceptualize architecture.”

            -Albert C. Smith

Smith, Albert.  Architectural Model as Machine. http://books.google.com/books?id=2-9uqRbXk9IC&pg=PA112&lpg=PA112&dq=perfection,+architectural+model&source=bl&ots=JKsvgk5bIn&sig=peKEvoUT03e15NUia00MQHbctlM&hl=en&ei=zwDUScSzONLVlQeL5JnVDA&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=5#PPP6,M1

 

In his book Smith discusses the importance of architectural models and miniatures in general as an important part of the design process.  Smith’s book breaks down the architectural model into 5 parts: Define/Divine/Design, The changing mechanism of the scale model, Scale model as machine, Machine as scale model machine, Pandora and the modern scale model machine.  In his chapter about the model machine, Smith states: The model machine extends humanity’s modest ability to measure the perceived chaos of the unknown.  However, as Louis Kahn’s example reveals, without the perceived proportions offered by a trusted analogy to mediate, humans may find only a frightening loss of control over their understanding of the world.”

Reading excerpts from Smith’s book was very informative, as I have recently begin to look at my work as being miniature models of communities.  Smith’s essays on the functionality of models in the architectural design process gave me helpful information that will help me in developing a stronger thesis for my series. 

Monday Entry: Martin Wolf Wagner

Wagner is a German based artist who has been working as a freelance photographer since 2000.  He is well known for his landscape photography that combines light and color to create mysterious imagery. The Morning News in discussing Wagner’s nightscapes states: “With an eye for the solitude that comes with open landscapes, German photographer Martin Wolf Wagner shares a gallery of luminescent, moving images where nighttime doesn’t necessarily mean darkness.” Crown Dozen reviews his photos as “huge in scope, soothing in their quietness, and very, very solitary.”  In 2007 Wagner was named by Getty Images as one to watch.  Wagner currently resides in the countryside between Stuttgart and the Black Forest.  Not a lot of information was available as to the schooling of Wagner, but I was immediately drawn to his minimalist compositions and use of color.  I really enjoy how he as taken the nightscape and used color in such a way that has given the category new life and a less stereotypical meaning.

Gallery representing artist:

http://www.london-photographic-awards.com/site/lightbox2.php?type_f=3&user_id=6793&fid=0,8,250

Artist website:

http://martinwolfwagner.com/index.php?lng_ID=1&c=1,0,0,0,0&gcat=1

No artist interview available.

Thursday Posting: Defense Architecture: Bunkers

Fortifications

“Approximately 1,500 bunkers were built during World War II along the French shores to forestall an Allied landing—“the Atlantic Wall.” Decommissioned after the Allied invasion of Normandy, this elaborate defense system now lies abandoned.”

-Rosecrans Baldwin

Virilio, Paul.  Bunker Archeology.  “The Frightening Beauty of Bunkers.”  Princeton Architectural Press, 1975.

In this article Virilio discusses his youth and how you grew to find bunkers appealing, and even comforting.Virilio states:“I see it clearly now as a case of intuition and also as a convergence between the reality of the structure and the fact of its implantation alongside the ocean: a convergence between my awareness of spatial phenomena.”  After Virilio’s first encounter with a bunker, he began to hunt for them, driven by a purely archeological purposes.  Upon viewing different bunkers, he found himself asking the questions: “why would these extraordinary constructions, compared to the seaside villas, not be perceived or even recognized? Why this analogy between the funeral archetype and military architecture? Why this insane situation looking out over the ocean?”  Virilio points out that in previous eras, fortifications and bunkers were oriented towards a specific passageway, valley or port.  The bunkers from the WWII era are placed “at the summit of dunes, cliffs, and across beaches.”  The essay then goes on to describe the delight and intrigue Virilio had in finding bunkers.  He states: “My activities often led me into teeming ports, and what most surprised and intrigued me there was finding once again in the middle of courtyards and gardens my concrete shelters; their blind, low mass and rounded profile were out of tune with the urban environment. These objects had been left behind, and were colorless; their gray cement relief was silent witness to a warlike climate.”

This article interested me in its topic of abandonment, which is a major theme in my current series.  While Virilio only discusses the abandonment of bunkers, he does a good job analyzing them against their surroundings, and brings up important points about their placement and original use.  

Monday Entry: Alan Kupchick

I couldn’t find a lot of information on Alan Kupchick, but I was immediately drawn to his colorful, crisp images of sparse buildings set beneath bright blue skies.  In THE Magazine they state that on Kupchick’s road trips across America, he “has taken a fresh look at our urban and natural landscapes.  Filtered through his unique insight and wry humor, these images are presented in bold chromatic statements.  In a statement from Kupchick, he explains his work by saying: “I create photographs that make the world look like a well organized, good-looking, well structured place, which of course it isn’t.  But it makes me feel better to portray it that way.” His use of clean lines and shapes makes urban environments look pristine and organized, and almost believable. 

Gallery representing artist:

http://www.photoeye.com/gallery/forms2/index.cfm?image=4&id=187266&imagePosition=1&Door=2&Portfolio=Portfolio1&Gallery=2

Thursday Posting: Fall out shelters

Paranoia/preparedness

“Trust Me!  You can survive a nuclear or dirty bomb attack.  It will not be the end of the world.  But, you must be prepared!”

            -undergroundbombshelter,com

Civil Defense: The Family Fallout Shelter.  Nebraskastudies.org. 

http://www.nebraskastudies.org/0900/frameset_reset.html?http://www.nebraskastudies.or g/0900/stories/0901_0132.html

This article explores the logistics of family fallout shelters, and the various ways one can go about building one.  It also explains the history of bomb shelters, and the reasoning and events that for many made a fall out shelter a necessity.  Fall out shelters were very popular in the 50s and 60s during the height of the cold war.  According to the article, “A fallout shelter built in the corner of a basement was the least expensive type, and it supposedly offered "substantial protection." In many plans, concrete blocks provided the walls. An open doorway and vents near the floor provided ventilation. The shelter's entrance was constructed with a sharp turn to reduce radiation intensity.”  This was one plan for fall out shelter.  Other plans consisted of constructing a separate fall out shelter several feet underground.  Just by placing the shelter four or five feet underground significantly reduces the level of gamma radiation that would reach the family.  According to the article, “one plan suggested that the roof of the shelter can be used as an attractive patio.”  The article also explains the protocol for what to do if such a nuclear disaster were to strike.  Families were recommended to stay in their fall out shelters for at least two weeks after the nuclear blast.

Reading this article was interesting to understand the psychology and mindset that occupied people living through the cold war.  Certainly there are people today that still have bomb shelters, as the threat of nuclear war is ever present.  I was especially intrigued by the camouflaging of the shelters as a patio or another kind of functional object, and I think this could bring an interesting aspect to my work.  

Monday Post: Willie Doherty

Doherty was born in 1959 in Derry, Ireland.  He studied sculpture at Ulster Polytechnic in Belfast.  When he was a child he witnessed Bloody Sunday, which greatly influences themes and subject matter in his work.  According to Wikipedia, “Doherty has again suggested that this interest may stem from his witnessing of Bloody Sunday and subsequent knowledge that many photos of the incident did not tell the whole truth.”  Doherty makes both photographs and video installations, with the latter being said to contain aspects of film noir.  He rose to acclaim in the 1980s with his series of photographic works with text overlay.  According to Arts Council of Northern Ireland, these photographs “explore the complexities of living in a divided community, especially in his native Northern Ireland. Much of his work refers to an undercurrent of fear, oppression and uncertainty that for many was a daily experience of life in Northern Ireland during the Troubles.”  Doherty currently lives and works in Derry, Ireland.

Gallery representing artist:

http://www.alexanderandbonin.com/artists/doherty/doherty.html

Artist Interview:

http://www.jca-online.com/doherty.html

Security Testing of Corporate Buildings

Sheltered

“In recent years, corporate building owners have become increasingly blast conscious. They are now aware that specialized materials, such as safety glass films, can help mitigate damage caused by attack or natural disaster.”

-Carol Borow, President of CHB Industries

Larkin, Jay.  “The Science of Safety.” Security Magazine.  1 July 2004. 

http://www.securitymagazine.com/Articles/Feature_Article/395086fa164d8010VgnVCM100000f932a8c0____

 

Larkin is a contributing writer for Security Magazine.  His article explores different tests and experiments that corporate buildings are undergoing to determine how secure their buildings are in the face of natural or man-made disaster.  One of the first things Larkin points out is that the catalyst for this testing was not 9/11, as many would think, but was the 1995 bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah Building in Oklahoma City.  Larkin goes rather in-depth discussing the security enhancing safety films that are placed on windows to reduce deadly shrapnel that occurs when windows explode.  He also discusses the various blast-assessment tests are done to find out the building’s customized risk-reduction solution.  The part of the article that I found most interesting was when Larkin discussed perimeter security, which “is typically deployed to protect structures from external attacks, such as car bombs, or short-range strikes like the recent attack on the Sheraton Baghdad.”  Larkin then goes on to say that traditional blockades like the Jersey barriers and steel pylons are no longer popular because of the negative aesthetic value they  produced, and their negative impact on employee productivity.  Apparently employees did not like being aware of the risk they faced on a daily basis just by coming in to work.  So, as Larkin explains, buildings are improving and updating perimeter security by installing “more natural exterior barriers” that don’t alarm employees.  According to Larkin, “Many commercial complexes have positioned large concrete planters along the border of the building and some have even placed hefty rocks in front of high risk areas. These techniques provide the same basic function as would a Jersey barrier, but do so more discretely, without disrupting the delicate balance between security and comfort levels.” 

Reading this article was helpful to give me a better understanding of how corporate buildings evaluate their security.  While new information was presented, the majority of the article reaffirmed what I already knew about the ever-tightening security of the corporate world.

 

 

Lecture # 4: Amy Stein

During Stein’s lecture she explained two of her most prominent series, Domesticated and Stranded.  While showing these series she explained her background and how it influenced her in creating these series.  As a photographer, Stein had almost no formal training, but her background in politics becomes evident in her photos which show American families and communities coping in hard economic times.  However, this is not the overwhelming factor in her imagery.  Her series Domesticated consists of staged images based on real stories about encounters that locals of Matamoras, PA, have had.  These staged scenes always involve taxidermied animals of some sort, and sometimes involve interactions between people and animals.  Stein stated that the purpose of this series is to examine the boundary between the built environment and the natural world, as well as the tension between humans and animals.  Given her intent, I think her series accomplishes its mission, because upon viewing the images I immediately feel a tension between the domesticated and the wild, even though I know the images are staged.  Her other series, Stranded is almost the opposite of Domesticated, in the sense that it is not staged, and doesn’t involve props of stuffed dead animals.  When working on this series Stein realized that she wanted to take portraits of stranded motorists, and that by doing this all over the country she would also be documenting the political and economic temperature of the time.  This series began right after Hurricane Katrina, and ended around the same time as the Bush Administration, and certainly shows people in a certain light that no doubt were affected by the times.  Over all I really enjoyed viewing Steins images, and the way in which she works.  Though both Domesticated and Stranded are two very different series, they both revolve around a central structured element – and it is partly this structure that makes them so successful.  

Monday Post: Doris Salcedo

Salcedo is a sculptor who was born in 1958 in Colombia.  After obtaining her bachelors in Colombia, she traveled to New York where she obtained her MFA at NYU.  Her sculpture and installations are based on her experiences from living in Colombia, and usually are based around everyday items of furniture.  According to Wikepedia, “Doris Salcedo addresses the question of forgetting and memory in her installation artwork. In pieces such as Unland: The Orhan’s Tunic from 1997and the La Casa Viuda series from the early 1990’s, Salcedo takes ordinary household items, such as a chair and table, and transforms them into memorials for victims of the Civil War in Columbia.”  Andreas Huyssen, a writer and professor at Columbia University writes about Salcedo’s exhibition Unland: The Orphan’s Tunic, stating a seemingly mundane table, when looked at closely, “captures the viewer’s imagination in its unexpected, haunting visual and material presence.”

Gallery representing artist:

http://www.whitecube.com/artists/salcedo/

Interview with Artist:

http://www.tate.org.uk/tateshots/episode.jsp?item=12198

Thursday Posting: Fortress-Style Houses

Impenetrable

“Architects and builders say the house of the next decade will reflect end-of-the-century anxieties about privacy and security.”

-June Fletcher, “Home Front,” Wall Street Journal

Lewis, Roger. “The Neo-Fortress Home: Can the Concept Be Defended?”  The Washington

            Post.  5 September 1998, Saturday, Final ed.. 

In Lewis’s article he discusses a recent article in the Wall Street Journal by June Fletcher, who is reporting on current architectural trends, and what’s in and out when it comes to homes.  Fletcher’s article delves into the new wave of architecture that is to come (was to come, since the article was written over 10 years ago), citing an increase in anxiety about security as the propeller for the Neo-Fortress Movement.  Lewis scoffs at the idea that Fletcher would claim specific architectural elements such as “Greek columns” as being outdated, stating that fortress-style houses are only something millionaires could afford.  To clarify, a Neo-Fortress style house is defined by having “towers and turrets; walled yards; locked gates; and tall, narrow windows.”  Lewis has many issues with the Neo-Fortress house, but one of his main problems with the idea is that it is not always practical, nor affordable.  He states: “these design elements and strategies for shaping a house should be employed when they fit the circumstances and context pertaining to the house, its location and site, its occupants and its occupants' budget.”  However, Lewis has an even greater concern than that: he believes that the Neo-Fortress houses show how Americans are increasingly more concerned with segregation and isolation, and that his preoccupation extends to the creation of more gated communities, as well as gated homes.

This article helped solidify my belief that current architecture’s main priority is now security.  While style will always have some importance in the design of buildings, architects are now focusing mainly on terror-proofing, resulting in more fortress-style buildings, both in the corporate and residential worlds.  While this article doesn’t particularly fit into my idea of an abandoned utopia, I think I can get something out of the message that it delivers.  As society progresses, our interest in protection and security increases exponentially, resulting in buildings and homes that seemingly are more cut off from society and the real world, and more interested in living in their own individual bubble. 

 

Monday Post: Paolo Soleri

Soleri was born in 1919 in Turin, Italy.  In 1946 he obtained a degree in architecture from the Politecnico di Torino.  He then went to the United States where he spent a year and a half doing a fellowship with Frank Lloyd Wright in Taliesin West, Arizona and Taliesin Spring Green, Wisconsin.  Shortly after Soleri received international recognition for a bridge design that was on display at the MoMA.  After returning to Italy in the 1950’s to design a ceramics factory, he became familiar with several ceramic processes, which “led to his award-winning designs of ceramic and bronze windbells and siltcast architectural structures” (Wikipedia).  By 1956 Soleri had returned to the United States, settling in Scottsdale, Arizona, with his wife.  There the two “made a life-long commitment to research and experimentation in urban planning, and established the Cosanti Foundation” (Wikipedia).  The foundation’s most famous project is Arcosanti, a planned community that Soleri designed for 5,000 people, and which has been under construction since the 1970s.  Arcosanti is located about 70 miles outside of Phoenix, and according to Wikipedia it is based on Soleri’s concept of ‘Arcology’ : architecture that is coherent with ecology.  Wikipedia states: “An arcology is a hyperdense city designed to maximize human interaction; maximize access to shared, cost-effective infrastructural services like water and sewage; minimize the use of energy, raw materials and land; reduce waste and environmental pollution; and allow interaction with the surrounding natural environment. Arcosanti is the prototype of the desert arcology.”  Arcosanti is still an ongoing project, and as of 2005 it remains on 3% complete. 

Artist website:

http://www.arcosanti.org/

Artist interview:

http://www.pbs.org/wnet/egg/308/soleri/interview_content_1.html

Thursday Posting: Corporate Architecture

Productivity

"Silicon Valley's landscape of leased, glass curtain-wall or tilt-up concrete slab construction R&D 'parks' constitutes the extreme example [of corporate architecture]. In that archetypal IT-driven landscape, the buildings are differentiated only by their corporate signage.”

-       Peter MacKeith, Associate Dean of Architecture at Washington University in St. Louis.

Otten, Liam.  “Contemporary corporate architecture’s impact on communities examined.”  Washington University in St. Louis News & Information.  5 Oct. 2005.  Accessed 18 Feb. 2009. http://news-info.wustl.edu/tips/page/normal/5893.html

In his article Otten discusses the impact that corporate institutions, as well as churches, universities, and government buildings have had on the urban environment, since they stand for pillars that embody the values and culture of their societies.  Otten stresses the fact that now more than ever, corporations are deciding to locate on the outskirts of town, “distancing themselves from the means of production” while also contributing to urban sprawl.  According to Peter MacKeith, who Otten quotes, “The contemporary city of corporate architecture is constructed of standardized elements, homogeneous in their glass-enclosures, planned for maximum flexibility and insured for limited time periods.”  MacKeith also mentions that within these corporate headquarters, cafés, gyms, banks and day care centers are now provided for the employees, so that “daily contact with the external life of the city is no longer necessary.”  Otten then goes on to discuss the effectiveness of open-planned working environments, and whether or not they increase productivity or contribute to high employee turnover.  MacKetih notes that at Silicon Valley, the average length of employment is just eight months.  The rest of the article then goes on to mention sustainable development within the corporate world, and the key challenges that face architects today.  According to MacKeith, architects need to design buildings that create “a means of living and working, grounded in an ethical sensibility and in the natural world.”

The most interesting part of this article to me was when MacKeith mentioned that more corporate buildings are expanding to include cafés, gyms, banks, and daycare centers for their employees, all with the notion of increasing productivity.  Because of this the employees have less reasons to leave the building, and therefore less interaction with the real world.  It almost seems to me that corporations are creating their own tightly knit, private utopias.  While there is certainly nothing utopic about work, the fact that one building that serves various functions necessary to daily life, and the fact that it is exclusive to only employees speaks to the outermost ideas of a utopia.  

 

Monday Post: Peter Funch

Artist Peter Funch was born 1974 in Denmark.  He attended the Danish school of journalism where he graduated with a degree in photo journalism in 2000.  He has had many solo and group exhibitions around the world, and he is currently living and working in New York. Funch also does commercial work for ad companies, and according to Photographie website, “His work combines perceptive social commentary with a cinematic visual language.” While Funch has many prominent and distinguished series, I am really dran to his Déjà vu and Las Vegas series, for the way they employ architecture, color, and use clean lines.  Funch’s Déjà vu series is mostly wide-angle shots, collaged together to create one big horizon line.  The colors of the sky and ground play off each other, and the placing of the horizon line in the top or bottom of the frame really draws the viewer in.  In his Las Vegas series, Funch concentrates a lot on the architecture and environment of the settings, and really emphasizes the grandeur and bright colors of Vegas.  Although Funch’s work is very different from mine, I think we share some of the same aesthetic qualities.

Gallery representing artist:

http://www.v1gallery.com/artist/show/3

 

Artist website:

http://www.peterfunch.com/