I felt artistic and sad today, so it was a good day for painting. I bought three 8×10 canvasas and some acrylic paint at Michael’s and settled in for the evening. I created two quality (at least in my opinion) works and one mess that I threw in the trash. I still feel sad, but at least something came out of it.
6/12: made horrendous art June 19, 2009
There is an art gallery on the first floor of my building. From what my eyes have been assaulted with, it appears that any jerk off the street can roll some clay into a ball and call it a sculpture or spray paint metal and scrape it off. For the completely reasonable price of $2700 you could have the metal fiasco to hang on your own personal wallspace. Maybe I don’t understand art at all.
My friend Kim and I decided that we would make some art of our own since anyone who wants to can apparently have a show in this gallery. We are thinking it will involve white zin, Cheez Its, and absolutely no class. Our supplies were: model magic, black paper that you scrape off to reveal colors, glitter, paint, and posterboard. Throw in some Mexican food, chips, and a number of baby Coronas and you have quite an evening.
Sadly, we didn’t come up with a reasonable theme so we don’t have a show yet. We will try again soon and I will definitely post pictures.
7 ounces of fun!
PS: If you live in MA, you should check this place out (Museum of Bad Art) http://www.museumofbadart.org/
NOTE: I did not paint these. I am just laughing my head off at them and wanted to share. They are from the Museum of Bad Art.
8-2: New Game: Masterpiece or not? September 24, 2008
We went to the Prado Museum today, which is cool. The Garden of Earthly Delights is incredible. (I need to learn more adjectives.) We walked around the entire place, but we were both a little bored so Brian created a new game called Masterpiece or Not. Every room we went into, I had to guess which were masterpieces as designated in the program. I didn’t guess very well, but at the end of the game, we were both like, “What makes a masterpiece anyway?” We have no idea.
8-1: took an amazing picture out of a plane window September 24, 2008
Sea and sky on the way to Madrid.
This is sunset in Madrid:
4/13: Peabody Essex Museum April 13, 2008
Cost: $15.00
TIme: as long as you would like
The Peabody Essex Museum is in Salem, which is my favorite town in the entire world. I went up there this morning and strolled around, then went to the museum. The exhibits that I specifically wanted to see were: Body Politics, Maori Tattoo Today and Origami Now! I did wander around the museum a bit after I checked these out, but I didn’t stay too long.
Origami Now! is really cool. I had no idea that paper was so much fun. There were faces, horses, knights, a slinky, garden vegetables, and flowers all made of paper. I was stunned. The descriptions told how the artists did each piece (not directions, but how much paper was used, how long it took, etc.) There was also a table where you could (try to) create your own. A group was there trying to help people make flowers, but the line was long so I didn’t bother to try it out. Maybe for one of my art projects though!
Body Politics, Maori Tattoo Today was incredible. This exhibit was the reason I went to the museum in the first place. (Note: all of the following information is from the exhibit itself, though I am paraphrasing.) Maori tattoos were outlawed (in 1907, I believe) and then the law was dismissed in the 1960s. After this, gangsters started using this form of tattooing and many were done in jail. Maori people didn’t want the tattoos to be associated with gangsters, so the tattoos started coming back on regular folks. To get moko (tattoo), it has to be approved by the elders of the tribe, and the family of the person has to agree on the design and placement. The designs can mean anything from the tribe the person is from to absolutely nothing at all except that the design is attractive. One photograph showed a man whose entire face was tattooed (most moko are on the face, but they don’t necessarily cover the whole face) and he was wearing a business suit. The photograph was startling, but really beautiful. The designs were amazing, with swirls, curves, and sometimes words, and the artist (Hans Neleman) had the subjects talk a bit about why they had the tattoos. Next to each photograph was a listing of the person’s name and why they chose the design in their own words (though some chose Bible quotes.) One that stood out to me was a man in his 70s who said something like (not a direct quote), “My tattoos are my history and they will make my descendants remember who they are.”
