Responding to the art of Ai Wei Wei

We were looking at photos of Ai Wei Wei's artwork in class and decided to check him out and learn more about his work and what hes doing. 

Ai Wei Wei, born on August 28th 1957 in Beijing, is a Chinese temporary artist and activist.

I really enjoyed Ai Wei Wei's art work, and found it very real and moving. I think that in his work he shows a little bit of his artist side and activist side as well. His art work really tells a story and lets the audience or whoever looking at his artwork know that and it really captures my attention and i can imagine anyone else who seen his work. For example, this piece of his art work below:

I found while i was looking at his art on google.

I think this one was my favorite piece of his work, that he helped create. This one really meant a lot to me because the way i see it, is that its  myself, or anyone who has struggled with anything in their life, and how the more times you get hit it makes you stronger and stronger every time. I think this sends a strong message out to people and can really give them hope or strength.

Some of the other art works Ai created and caught my eye are here:

 

Over all, I think Ai wei wei has an amazing talent, and is a great artist and i'm very glad that Mrs Rose shared his stuff with us!

Culminating Part 2 Questions.

1. What was your most successful artwork from the semester?

I would have to say that my most successful artwork from this semester was my 3 series art assignment. I think that this one is my most successful one because I was able to experiment with blending paints together really well and neat, because of the small detail that is on my picture, and make it something different than i usually do, and it was really fun and kind of just care free doing it, which made it look nice afterwards also.
I also enjoy how it kind of looks retro in a way, and really funky, and that is the kind of artwork i like and hopefully can expand on and figure out how to express it better in the future.

2. What was your least successful artwork from the semester?

If i had to choose one of my art projects from this year that was my least successful i would have to say the Book about me project.
The reason for this is because i wasn't able to really understand what the project was about and what i was suppose to do. I had some ideas in mind and tried to think of ways to express myself and who i am through art and i just had a really hard time with it, therefore not being able to full finish it and hand it in on time.

Culminating Task Part 1. "Artists Support Other Artists"

After reading the Artists Support Other Artists, on the art blog and watched/read the linked items, I now have a more interesting and better understanding of art appropriation and appreciating art, and how artists support other artists.

There were many different ways in the videos shown, where  artists were supporting and appropriating different artists in their own way. I'm going to discuss the main points that I thought were fascinating and caught my attention the most about these art pieces, and artists.

I think that the artists express their appreciation, support an admiration, for these art pieces or other artists, in their projects by using different tools and techniques that the specific artist may use or used once, doing something that reflects a different culture or tradition, or by using a piece of their art work and combining it within their own, this is called Art Appropriation.

I believe that Art Appropriation is one of the great ways for artists to support other artists, by being able to take a piece of art that an artist connects to, and understands or even just likes and adding different visuals and creating it into their own style and their own emotions, and still having the connection they do to the original piece is really neat. For example, the artist here, Marcel Duchamp,  took the original Mona Lisa by Leonardo, and basically added a Go-Tee.
 TO 

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"Appropriation breathed important new life into art"- Unknown

I noticed that after researching the photos of art appropriation, a lot of the comments and thoughts on it is that it isn't right, or that their copying for attention, plagiarism etc. I don't believe that this is the case at all. I believe that is an example of an artist bringing life, and a bit of themselves into another artists piece of work, not to copy to get more attention for themselves,  but to draw more attention to the original piece itself and that artist because they admire it and maybe feel some type of connection.
I believe that it is important for other artists to support each other and help each other out, by gaining knowledge and techniques from other artists to expand their knowledge and have a wider variety of what they could do with a canvas.

From discussing these topics, I realized that the aspect that I value the most would be the way artists put other cultures and traditions into their art. I like this type of artwork because its not only beautiful but its different to see, and a very interesting way to show an artists appreciation for another artists work or culture. To me, this doesn't mean it has to be a famous or well known artist who does this for another,  but anyone who decides to use other peoples life and cultures into their work.

For example, from doing some research I found this art class in elementary school, who obviously are not all Native but participate in creating art that isn't their culture and showing respect to other native painters, or native peoples in general. This meant a lot to me because now a days, there is a lot of racism going on and not enough people who express the beauty and uniqueness in every single culture, and to be able to put that beauty onto a piece of paper and share it with the world is an incredible thing. Here is the link below:

https://www.teachingchannel.org/videos/exploring-culture-through-art

There are many ways in which artists support other artist, but the most common ones that stood out to me were social media supporting and studio work&galleries.
I believe that these two are the main ways today that artists are supporting other artists. On social media websites such as Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and even Snapchat, artists are supporting other artists by sharing their work, or giving them "shout outs" to let people know that this person has talent and you should check them out, because I think they're really well. Once one artists fans notice he/she enjoys another artists piece of art, that helps draw attention to that artists work and helps support them and their career. I see a lot of the time on Instagram, singers and song writers whom I follow are sharing teenagers music and Instagram pages to their fans, and telling them to check them out. I think this relates to this topic extremely because its the exact same thing, artists supporting other artists. Some of the artists on Instagram that I think are really neat:

@oleknyc
@mutustudio

A lot of the time today, a way for other artists to support another artist to share some of their work in the others gallery. This helps draw the attention of the people who are there checking out the artists gallery, and letting them decide if they like the other artists work and if they do the artist will be getting more support, and more fans all because of the main artists helping out another artist in getting their work out there and making a name for them self. On snap chat, I have a few contacts who are artists, are posting photos of their art works, or when they go into galleries and snap a photo of a painting to their story. This is also supporting the other artists because when i seen the photos I thought they were really neat and wanted to check out that artist and see more of his work.

Over all, after learning and reading about artists supporting other artists, i find it odd that I didn't actually realize that almost all the time artists are supporting other artists in a lot of the work that they do.  I think that this is a really kind and good thing for artists to do because they are not just trying to be the best and only get people to see their work, but instead they share others work and and trying to get them noticed rather then them self. This is an important factor to me because I don't really like the idea of fame changing people, or people wanting to be the best and the only one who can do something. This is also a good strategy for artists too, because by sharing others work with the world, might get them to return the favor later and help support you by doing the same.

Stop Motion

After watching some of the stop motion videos Mrs. Rose shared with our class a few days ago, i decided that i wanted to try and make one for myself because of how neat and fun they looked.

It took a couple trys for me to understand how its done and how to use the app its self. The challenging part for me was that i kept moving the camera and couldn't keep it still so the footage didn't look like it was suppose to. My favorite part of this was watching the video after. I didn't realize how cool it actually is using photos in that type of way could make something so neat and interesting to watch. 

For my theme i wasnt really sure what to use, or if i was even going to be able to do it, so i just used skittles. I started by lining them up in a line and moving them a couple cm each time i took a photo so that it made it look like they were moving around by themselves. The skittles move into a line and then form a circle where one skittle starts to go into the middle and the rest kind of follow and create a smiley face. 

I would definitely like to try this again with better materials and have a better way of setting my phone up so it doesn't move.

My Series

For my series project i decided that i wanted to draw 3 giraffes and have each one with different colors.
The first one i did was light pas-telly colors, and the second was vibrant primary colors, and the last  one black, white and grey.
I decided that i wanted to paint these giraffes because from my previous work last year i experimented with water colors and it turned out really well.
I chose to mix the colors together before they changed into a different color to give it a more real look. My favorite part of this assignment was being able to blend new colors together to create to ones, and practicing my drawing skills since i'm not very good.

The most challenging part for me on this assignment was having to do the little detail spots on the giraffe, and using the paint brush to go around every piece.
It was also difficult to paint and draw the legs because i wanted them to look realistic and have the same bones and figures as real giraffes do.
Overall, i enjoyed doing this assignment and liked the retro kind of pop art themed way of doing my series.

Climate Change

" Our Earth is warming. Earth's average temperature has risen by 1.5°F over the past century, and is projected to rise another 0.5 to 8.6°F over the next hundred years. Small changes in the average temperature of the planet can translate to large and potentially dangerous shifts in climate and weather. Over the past century, human activities have released large amounts of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. The majority of greenhouse gases come from burning fossil fuels to produce energy, although deforestation, industrial processes, and some agricultural practices also emit gases into the atmosphere. "

For this project I wanted to capture  how the parts of the earth that were once full of water and trees, are now dry and have no green.  Some of the ideas I had were to draw the ice melting in the Artic and show how the climate is changing and its important for everyone to know.

By the end of my experimenting and sketching I decided on a piece where I was going to draw a tree with half dead, and half green and full of life. This was to represent how serious this is , considering we need trees to stay alive.  I think that im going to use some type of material for the green part of the trees to show its life, and texture and than a plain color for the other side symbolizing no life to it. I also think im going to add water and a nice sky to the green side or flowers and grass, than nothing but cracked land and soil on the other side.


Some intriguing art pieces that I came across while online were these:
I believe that they have a really strong image.

Paris Artist

The piece of artwork that I chose to show you that was inspired by the Paris attack on November, 13th, 2015 is this:

 

This specific piece of artwork is by " Steve Benson ". Steven Benson is actually Steven Reed Benson (born January 2, 1954 in Sacramento, California) is a Pulitzer Prize-winning U.S. editorial cartoonist for The Arizona Republic. Benson is the grandson of former U.S. Secretary of Agriculture and former LDS Church president Ezra Taft Benson.

The reason why I chose this piece of art, was because of the meaning that I feel it has behind it.

I think that this piece of work says a lot about the world, the countries and most importantly the Paris attack.

In the photo, it shows Paris across the lake being attacked, while the statue of liberty is stepping in to help. To me, this photo has a strong message that we need to all be in this together, and have each other backs when heartbreaking things like this happen. I believe that by all the countries coming together and taking care of each other we can make a difference. I think that by people seeing this photo they will also understand the message and realize that its important to stand with eachother in these types of situations and have respect and condolences for the people that were victimized in this trageic occurrence.