Book assignment

I decided to use a combination of some of my favorite quotes and some of my favorite photographs for my book. My boyfriend took the pictures of me, but I edited them in photoshop to try and make them mine. I did take the thunder cloud and forest shots though and edited those as well. I feel like this selection of words and images sums me up particularly well.

Lab assignment: Table of contents

Obviously this needs some work; I didn't realize my text boxes could be seen outside of the program.....guess I'd better figure this one out quick eh?

Things that make me happy installment 4: California Redwoods

The California Redwoods are one of my touchstones; they always make me feel so small. Nothing can be so big that it matters in the redwood forest, or so I believe. With finals looming and the sun shining I am feeling pretty antsy these days and what better way to relieve antsiness than a mini vacation (as if camping last week wasn’t enough). We headed down to Sonoma this weekend for my cousin’s wedding and instead of taking I-5 we took the 101 to 299 to 5. Our trip back was about twice as long, but I got to go from my family and wine country, to redwoods, to ocean, to my hometown and In-N-Out, to a thunder storm on Siskiyou pass….and I wasn’t even driving. I will admit that I love being driven, if I feel comfortable with the driver, and when Nolan drives I am totally “chillaxed.” I took these pictures on our little trip. The first is of the redwoods, obviously, but I feel like this image does a good job conveying their hugeness; usually a comparison image is required. The second is kind of a comparison image; I’m inside a hollowed out Redwood (obviously I didn’t take this one). The third picture I took from the safety of the truck cab; the sun was going down as the storm was gathering strength. Snapping a photo of the lightening would have been cool, but that would have required me stopping, having the right equipment and knowing what the heck I’m doing….plus some luck I’d think. These clouds still look pretty sinister to me. The fourth picture is a fence and a pretty flower field. The composition isn’t exactly original in the sense that there are probably a million photographs taken similar to it, but I thought it looked kind of pretty. The sun was shining in just that spot, like it was winking at us or something.

photo sketch

For my photo sketch I used a picture taken on the California Coast in Legget. I'm not much of an artist, but I was suprised at how much easier the technique was than I expected. By sketching over the photo I have to pick the really important parts because detail is hard to "sketch." This seemed similar to the poster assignment in that both of them were about minimizing content but maximizing the use of what was there.

Things that make me happy installment 3: Andy Goldsworthy

Keeping with the theme of nature oriented artists I wanted to introduce Andy Goldsworthy to anyone not familiar with his work. My dad actually introduced him to me a year or so back, my dad also incidentally introduced me to Thoreau and Whitman as well. A photographer/artist/sculptor, Goldsworthy works in rural and urban settings with organic objects. His sculptures are made from leaves, rocks, snow...anything he finds in nature and his tools are his hands, teeth and "found" tools. No glue, only mud is utilized as well. However, for some of Goldsworthy's more ambitious pieces he used machine tools for safety. One example would be a piece he made entitled "Roof" in which he enlisted the help of professional dry wallers to make sure the piece was structurally sound.

Goldsworthy is known as a rock balancing artist, which means that he combines/balances rocks and stones in an arrangment that exceeds the power of nature. Goldsworthy's work is also classified as "land art" which was an art movement that emerged from the confusion of the sixties and seventies. Linked closely with the art, the landscape is the catalyst for the creation by providing content and materials. "Land art" is made outside and is altered/decayed by natural processes like wind, rain and frost.

Deterioration is part of the artistic process for Goldsworthy and he classifies his work as transient. He creates a piece and then photographs his "land art" making the statement: "My sculpture can last for days or a few seconds-- what is important to me is the experience of making. I leave all my work outside and often return to watch it decay."

This work touches me in an inexplicable way. I struggle with the idea that life is in constant flux and no matter how much scheduling I do, I will never be completely prepared. In a sense all humans are "land art"because we are shaped by our environment and are slowly deteriorated by natural processes. There is art in what the world already has to offer, we don't need to make it or freeze time. Art will always regenerate itself, we just have to know where to look.


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Ansel Adams photos monologue

Henry David Thoreau, Emily Dickinson and Walt Whitman were good friends of mine growing up, their voices whispering about nature and beauty in simplicity, about the emptiness of existence and the fulfillment found in loneliness. Paradoxically i also grew up loving Barbie and playing dress up with costume jewelry and make up pilfered from my mom. Keep in mind that I played with Barbies up until I was 12, albeit behind closed doors. By that point I was familiar with Thoreau, Whitman and Dickinson, even though we weren't as close as we are now. The point is that I feel a tug between the Thoreau-esque part of me that wants to sell everything and live in a yurt and the part of me that wants to spend $80 on a purse (I'm a college student, i don't even try to pretend like i could justify the purchase of an accesoy above the very generous limit of $100).

Ansel Adams is a photographer that I have always connected with. Taken in black and white, Adams' photographs illicit traces of feelings we didn't know we had and draw the viewer in through the use of shadows, symmetry, persepctive and generally mind blowing landscapes. One of my personal favorites has always been "Rose and Driftwood" but I posted two others to compare and contrast instead; much the same way I have been comparing and contrasting myself. One is a photograph of tree roots, the other an arial view of freeway passes in L.A. The two "objects" photographed reflect eachother in designand both serve "neccesary" purposes in life. Roots provide nutrients and stability as though they are the freeways of the natural world. Freeways make trade, travel and consumption that much easier, the human construction of a root base.

For me these two pictures bring up questions about my own conspicuous consumptiom and whether I am really doing my part or merely imparting a slightly smaller amount of damage to my enviornment than a handful of others. I can see the beauty of freeway passes, L.A. and New York and Portland. Imagine all night Chinese takeout, Broadway shows, fashuon week, art museums and jazz clubs blue with smoke and beatnik incense. I can see how flashing neon lights and towering buildings can seem magical, mystical and sear itself onto the eyeball. But I aslo know the earthy scent of the redwoods and the heady drunkeness that accompanies the scent. I know hoe the tops of little red mushrooms sometimes look like faries peeking out at dusk and how a pristine beach free of litter can feel both alien and like coming home. Empty woods make me feel like the first person to walk across hallowed ground and rainbows feel like personal presents.

If I had to make a choice I think i would choose the roots over the freeways; the redwoods over the billboards. I think the flashing lights would make my head hurst enventually, and a sky scraper could give me a nose bleed. I love chinese food, but too much MSG and my brain might melt, you never know. The redwoods soothe my soul and titillate my imagination. a clean beach stretching farther than my limited eyes can see makes me feel rejuvenated, like I could accomplish anything. If I had to choose the purse or the yurt I'd take the yurt. I can still keep the shoes though....right? Haha.

Ansel Adams Photos

Thins that make me happy: Installment 2

I woke up in a pool of sunshine at eight this morning; the sky was tensely waiting for the heat. All I could think about was being outside; my body is running on a serious vitamin D deficiency. The boat came out of storage last week with a decent amount of money put into it. With the current economy scare spending 2,000 dollars on a wakeboarding tower seemed exorbitant, so the boys installed a wake fin and bought a pole held on by a tension suspension system for a couple hundred instead. I had yet to see the extra lift in action and lucky for me my boys didn’t disappoint. We even headed out to the wake for life event put on by SOU in support of breast cancer research. We didn’t stay to watch our buddy compete, but we did give him a warm up round! I had a hard time capturing the real action shots; a camera is hard to hold still on a joggling boat, but I still took some neat shots. The first one I like because I feel like the fore ground, middle ground and background are defined. The pole divides the center of the photo, but my buddy’s watch also lens itself to the frame. This picture almost feels like a wakeboard ad to me; something about time being irrelevant. The second one is a photo of the sumo tube…every time some poor sucker puts the thing on and waddles to the edge of the boat I come close to losing bladder control. Then the wakes come and they swallow their first face full of water and I really lose it. I chose this one because as funny as the sumo tube is to watch in action, the photographs don’t really do the thing justice. I did however, like the weird trick with my boyfriend’s face through the windshield of the boat; it’s a two headed water monster that just ate a whole boat! Oh no, it’s just Nolan. I do seem to love to divide my scenes in half; the third photograph as the rope from the pole running right through the middle. This picture cracks me up because J-Will looks like he is chewing his nails…the wake is that scary! This is yet another thing that makes me happy; spending time on the boat with friends. (I also brought my well loved copy of Valley of the Horses and drank a couple beers.) I think just being outside refreshes my soul.

Poster 3

I think I like this one better; the primary colors were too loud in the first attempt.

I'm not sure whatthe white line is, the word standing alone just made me feel lopsided.

Poster Two

This is still a work in progress. I'm trying to say One Love; universal love, peace, love and unity. The tree used to be a lot more; actually initially I started out with a black and white photograph of a tree. The sketch seemed to lend the poster a more fluid feeling.....I don't know what I'm doing!! Haha.

I Cento Passi

Studying history has always made me feel grateful; grateful I didn’t live in Fascist occupied Italy or under Castro in Cuba or in Cambodia under Soviet siege. I see clips of home movies or specials done for television covering the mayhem of the 1960’s; despite their grainy, washed out quality the images stand for something. Riots and truth under the dirt of deceit, the ever expanding recesses of the mind and heart, the richness of life and the depth of destruction are all revealed in still shots of picketers, army men ducking under fire, the long hair that smelled like sunshine and hay weed. I always thought that by now I’d have my something; something that felt so important. I don’t think its religion, or a person or a place…or a time period or a war. I think that the something I see in images of the 1960s is inside the individuals; they didn’t find something to be passionate about, they were finding themselves. Maybe; I wasn’t there. Maybe everyone really was just too high, or maybe those who knew themselves the least were the ones lost most often in the conflict of right, wrong, love, peace, war and the infinite struggle for power.
Giuseppe Impastato was a young man who believed in himself and his cause; battling the “Mafioso’s” control in Cinisi, Italy. Born to the life of the mob, Peppino, as Impastato was known, watched the fate of his family twist in the corrupt hands of the Cosa Nostra. At fifteen, Peppinno lost his uncle, the mob boss Cesare Manzella, to an exploding car and he watched his father kiss up to the man who killed Cesare for his position. Peppino spent the rest of his short life battling the mafia through newsletter, a radio station, a wicked sense of humor and an attempted political carreer to the detriment of familial relationships and the all important concepts of honor both within the mafia and Italy as a whole. In 1978, at the age of thirty, Peppino was taken from his car, very probably beaten, wrapped in TNT and blown apart on the railroad tracks running through Cinisi.
I recently watched the Italian made film, I Cento Passi (One Hundred Steps) by director Marco Tullio Giorana, which covers the life and death of Peppino Impastato. Interestingly enough though made in 2000, the film is extremely difficult to find and the U.S. does not have permission to market or make the film; perhaps because the topic deals heavily with mafia and modern Italy’s silence. Initially Peppino’s death was considered a terrorist act gone awry and then a suicide. In 1980, after grueling efforts put forth by his mother, brother and peers in the activist community, Giuseppe Impastato was added to a list of murders committed by the mafia. In 1996 the case was reopened and on April 11, 2002 Gaetano Badalamenti, the man who killed Peppino and Casere, was issued a life sentence.
When this film was made in 2000 the case was still unresolved; this movie represented the need in the hearts of many Italians for that resolution. An Americanized soundtrack of the rock rebellion of the late sixties and seventies bolstered the many evidences of the penetrating influence of the mafia, which I understand still exists today. This film felt important to me and I wanted to share; even just the story is interesting. The truth is always prettier, always more gruesome, always more fantastical than anything we can dream up.

Poster one

I'm really struggling with this one...not that this is anything new.

Things that make me happy: Installment one

I am at a transitioning period in my life when home really is where the heart is; where the people I care about are. I have many homes in that sense because people I care about are spread far apart. I guess then home is about the people you are with; I am never far from home for that reason. Whether I am in California or Oregon I am always home; albeit I am also never completely home for this same reason. I don’t remember the last time I was completely home.

I am lucky enough however, to have not only people that make me feel loved and home, but places that draw up similar feelings of security. I went down to California this weekend and spenty some time in my other home with my parents. I also visited another one of my favorite places, the Sundial Bridge. I took a couple shots that I thought turned out well. I was trying to use the negative space and the shapes within the bridge more than trying to capture the whole image; I have tons of those. I would like to go back and take some more shots at night as well.
The first image was a shot taken on the bridge itself as I was waliing across. I was really intruiged by the shadows the suspension system made across the arm; this bridge is speacial in that she is a suspension foot bridge. This image would have worked well for alphabet soup; instead this is the firsdt installment in my "Things that make me happy" series. The second image was taken fromunderneath the bridge looking up through the base of the arm. I feel like the image sucks the viewer up through it to the other side; to something truly bizarre. The third image was also taken underneath the bridge, but rather than looking up through the bridge itself I took the image through a bronze statue in the courtyard. A heart; how appropriate.

Nostalgia

I love my brother, Brian, very much but as kids we weren’t very close. With a five year age gap, my brother at ten didn’t know what to do with a tattle-tale, tag-along fiver year old little sister. I do have some really good memories with my brother as a kid though, just when no one was around. He read extensively to me from his Spawn comics and collection of Calvin and Hobbes, he knew how to make a fried egg sandwich almost as good as Dad’s, and he always made the coolest forts. I’ve had an inkling of a memory, but I couldn’t discern whether I was actually remembering or if I had imagined something. There was a ticklish recollection of Scooby-Doo and the rest of the gang teaming up with Batman and Robin; somehow Cher was there floating around too. I kept meaning to ask my brother, but I’d usually think of the thing at a really inconvenient time to call. Is there ever a convenient time to ask someone if you remember something or are just crazy?
A few weeks back my parents came up to visit and they brought my bike from storage and a couple of boxes of old VHS titles. My roommate and I didn’t really want cable; we have a T.V. and DVD player she scored for free in the font room and I have my little color TV VHS combo in my room. Buried under my favorite Disney titles, The Indian in the Cupboard, and Matilda, I discovered a battered copy of The New Scooby Doo Movies. Five minutes and a google later the case of my hazy memory was solved. The New Scooby-Doo Movies ran from 1972-1973 in two seasons comprising of a total of 24 episodes. Each week a special cartoon guest star would lend their personality and sleuthing skills to the mystery gang. Stars like Sonny and Cher, Phyllis Diller and Dan Knots lent their own voices to their ink counterparts; Batman and Robin made their appearance on September 16, 1972 in the second episode of the first season. I vaguely remember other episodes, like the one with the Boston Globe Trotters, but I think I remembered Batman and Robin more clearly because we obviously had the tape at home.
Why is any of this important? Well frankly its not; unless you’re me, Regardless, I also went and saw Wolverine: Origins with some friends over the weekend. I don’t remember my brother really being into X-men; he was more of a Thunder Cats kind of guy, and I knew little to nothing about the Wolverine comics put out by DC. I could however, compare the newer super hero to the thirty plus year old heroes my roommate and I watched later in the week. We cracked open a couple beers, curled up with the cats and laughed until my stomach seized up and my face was dripping.
Unfortunately, most of us have seen the highlights of the new Wolverine flick just by watching the preview, but Ryan Reynolds with a bald head, his mouth sewn shut, and a larger than average superhero stature shows up and shoots lasers out of his eyes, Wolverine’s blades slide out of his skin seamlessly; CGI brings creatures to life. Deaths are more brutal, colors are sharp and almost exaggerated; reality is exaggerated. Compare this to hokey music, simple backgrounds consisting mostly of flat color with one or two props thrown in. Even compared to the cartoons today, let alone a human acted role, makes the 1970’s version look like something my best friend’s three year old would make at day care.
The cartoons represent so much hard diligent work; grunt work. Computer enhancement is work as well; I took a web programming course last quarter and I have an unbelievable amount of respect for anyone who can get past JavaScript. But the work is different; heroes have become less about drawing and more about science and math. Entertainment as an industry is changing as well; people don’t want to work for their escapism anymore. Re-creating realism sells tickets; although I mean “realism” in the sense that people want the unreal and unattainable to look real. What I want to know is: where’s the fun in that? Did I enjoy the Wolverine flick? Yes, but mostly I enjoyed doing something with people I care about. I’d rather take a walk or read a book or watch The New Scooby-Doo Movies because they are hilarious. I miss when TV was just cool because of the novelty of it; I miss when the story was more important than the graphics and when I had to work a little bit to fill in the gaps. Designing g Women and Golden Girls for example crack me up and their sets were so simple. I know I’m mixing and matching my movies and television series and cartoons, but I feel like the change in the fundamentals of entertainment may be illustrated by examining them all.

Pig Pod to the Rescue!

Blustery days love scarves, almost as much as hats. Both blow away so prettily, and come in such myriads of colors, patterns and sizes. I wore my softest, pink scarf today and blew around town running errands before returning chilled, damp and decidedly hungry. A warm meal later we are curled up under the fuzzy Guinness Blanket, I was reading The Hobbit, when Nolan’s G-phone buzzed. I had been just thinking what a gray day I was having; I felt little to no motivation to get my butt back out in the wind and up to campus to work before class. Nolan’s uncle was kind enough to forward us an e-mail of Aunt Margie’s latest and greatest. An engineer, Nolan’s aunt is extremely intelligent, a very warm person with a wacky sense of humor. Her video was something I felt I had to share and I was so inspired that I have been in the computer lab for two hours now! Here is the link….please check out “Pig Pod to the Rescue”! A guaranteed smile.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WIs6i40Yw

Collage Two

I only used pieces of photographs that I have taken around town in the last couple of weeks. My intention was an abstract ocean/ montainous coastline at sunset carrying a weary boat under the watchful eyes of the sun or some benevolent, golden creature.

The back ground layer was an upclose shot of an old tire on some abandoned machinary I found by Bear Creek.

The Ocean was a photograph of pieces of blue bottles and rocks arranged like a garden in someone's yard. That same yard has a fence covered in combination locks and I pasted the locks in the ocean like fish.

The boat was a photograph of a fort in someone's back yard on Walker Street.

The clouds were taken from a sunset shot above North Mountain Park.

The face was part of a phoitograph of my buddy's Bob Marley tapestry and the smoke behind him was a combination of blurred photographs of white blossoming trees and my own doodling.

The coastline was from a photograph I took at Immigrant Lake on that really hot sunday a few weeks back.

More picturing the other

This one is my favorite. Who doesn't want to chase bubbles on your second birthday?

This guy thought he was being sneaky, but I spotted him!

I can't decide if I like this one or not. I think the lighting is cool, but that it would have been more effective closer up. I just have a really big personal bubble myself and I've never liked taking or being in the in your face pictures. Yeah, yeah, excuses, excuses. I wouldn't say that I have my portrait that I love yet. I am still taking pictures.

visual writer's block

Sometimes I forget that I am supposed to be in college to expand my mind; I get caught up in the mundane, day to day B.S. of grades and politics and money……..Instead of asking myself what I could learn toady I am often thinking about what work I can get out of the way.……man am I having a major case of visual writer’s block!! I see stuff all of the time, but I still don’t know what to write about. I think this is going to be all about rethinking my approach. I’ve always been a words person, but that doesn’t exclude me from the possibility of becoming a visual person. I think I am over thinking this whole “analyze something visual” thing to the point of paralyzing myself. I feel this enormous pressure to analyze “something interesting” and to do so “well.” I’m actually making myself sort of sick about it. What did I see today? Actually quite a bit considering I have been in the computer lab for almost four hours now. At Nolan’s the clown fish were particularly cheerful today, their antics made me smile before I had my coffee which is no easy feat (unfortunately). The dog was so happy to have the plastic cone off his neck that he skidded across the wood floor smack into the door; he’s allergic to grass and keeps scratching his face until his eyes bleed. Mango and Pharaoh were tearing around the living room of the condo my roommate and I share; Mango is getting tricky and discovered my hiding place for the catnip. My roommate looked like she had drunk the entire bar last night and it sounded as though she may as well have. Breakfast at the Oak was also a visual panorama—my friends were almost face down in the traditional post drunk fry up and I was the only one even close to resembling human (I was still recovering from my boyfriend’s birthday on Wednesday and didn’t go out with them, plus I’m an old lady who would rather do homework than spend half the night and next morning breathing in, moaning out and generally making out with the toilet.) From the window of the computer lab I saw a little boy and his father. The toddler grasped a “Vote for So-and-so” sign from the lawn in his chubby fist was determinedly charging towards the newer ceremonial rock circle installation on the lawn below the C.S. lab. I love the diaper-under-overalls look; a complete classic. I saw a million other things this morning, but I couldn’t name them all. Maybe that is what I should do tomorrow….write down 200 things I see? That may be a good exercise to get me thinking visually and not through text as well as open me up to seeing more than the bigger events. I need to see the smaller events that make up the big ones—usually those are the important ones anyhow.

first attempt at collage

This is what I came up with in lab. I don't know yet if I am going to keep tweaking it or start something new. 

Picturing the other: the Sunday Times

Sometimes I feel like I’m living to work instead of working to live. My world is a blur as I constantly brace myself for the next and the next. I am always hurrying to wait. Knowing that I frequently allow myself to become a giant, spiky ball of stress, I have decided that Sunday is my day. Fridays are usually weighted with homework and Saturday carries more homework along with odds and ends that seem to eat time like 99 cent cheeseburgers. I don’t always spend the entirety of Sunday in indulgence; just the morning.
Rave music from the neighbors’ vibrated the walls at five am this morning; oddly comforting in the half awake morning. I woke up much later and lay on my bed in the sun with my kitty. I made my bf’s fabulous spicy cream cheese eggs and waffles, settled with my cup of coffee, and read the New York Times. I didn’t read the thing cover to cover mind you, but I did my best. The Sunday Times is one of my favorite indulgences, along with $2.50 beers at ‘Mars Night and those ham and cheese croissants at Apple Cellar. I love the way the paper and ink mix together to make an almost earthy scent, and the satisfying crispness of the folds makes me crazy giddy. I know; I’m special.
Regardless, while I soaked the sausage from my eggs in the syrup from my waffle, a headline on the front page caught my eye: A Family Divided by 2 Words, Legal and Illegal.
Immigration is a topic in my Italian Culture class this spring so I began to skim the article. The basic gist is that immigrant families are now mixed, meaning that at least one child from a family of illegal aliens living in America has residency. This article followed a family of immigrants from Ecuador: a father, his wife and their son and daughter. The parents have split since their move to the U.S. and the younger son, still a junior in high school, is a U.S. citizen. Their daughter, 22, has a college degree afforded by the law in New York stating that an illegal resident may pay a resident’s fee to attend a University, but cannot find the kind of accounting work her advanced, well educated brain is qualified for because she has no social security number. The mother also feels trapped, having given up a computer analyst position to baby-sit for children in cramped apartments and broken down homes in Queens, unable to obtain a driver’s license or a better position for herself. Tensions are caused by the mother encouraging her daughter to marry an American husband, by the son wishing to return to Ecuador and by the pressure felt by all four of them to succeed; to obtain the American dream.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/26/nyregion/26immig.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1&sq=immigrants&st=cse&scp=3

If the above link doesn't work go to nytimes.com and search for "immigrants." The article should be the third down or so.

For the last two weeks I have been struggling to capture moments on film for my Picturing the Other project. I am struggling; my pictures are missing a dynamic energy. I could describe the same photographs with words and be more effective. This story moved me; in so many ways I am living the American Dream and I do catch myself taking my life for granted from time to time. Not only did the story move me, but the pictures drew me deeper into their world; I achieved a different level of understanding by seeing them.
My favorite picture is of the daughter in her attic room; her hunched frame heavy in the center, bathed by the rickety window frame’s light. Her poverty is evident in the matted carpeting, narrow bed and hodgepodge of furniture. Her hope sleeps there too though, in the girlish knickknacks displayed on her bureau and the way she is poised to launch herself out the window, come flight or fall. The practicality of an illegal immigrant’s daily thoughts are in the pockets of her sturdy rain coat and serviceable hat; far from the plaid Burberry coat and smart matching cap that chase the asphalt between puddles in New York on a daily basis. I feel life in this photograph, despite that my first sight was of a smudgy news print copy that I accidentally spilt coffee on.
The family had only agreed to be followed and photographed if they could maintain their anonymity. As such, all of the photographs are of shoulders and the top of a head vanishing into a crowd, a blurred profile or a back lit, faceless shot. What caught my attention about this photo was the way the triangle at the top of the frame lined up with the square and the circle so well. The eye was carried up off the page; maybe that is why her hope seemed so strong to me here. I also appreciate the irony of the female archetype here, the damsel in distress. Too bad her hair isn’t long enough for some handsome American prince to climb up to rescue her. The light coming from the center of the page also seemed like a conscious choice on the part of the photographer. This is a faceless portrait that tells more than story; it tells a life.
I don’t know much about photography; I am learning though. I do know that this story and these pictures moved me. Here is an example of Picturing The Other on a daily basis. Here is a story, diametrically opposite of my own, presented with grace and dignity. Not only that, but here are people who really are working to live. Maybe only having one morning a week to myself isn’t so hard after all, or maybe I should remember to just be grateful every day that I wake up, go to school and be surrounded by people I love. Maybe by picturing the other I am really re-picturing myself.

Items in Picture: lung, tree, ruler, fingers, table top.









http://www.scoop.co.nz/multimedia/tv/world/20763.html

As a female I find myself checking for growths and oddities in my body on a regular basis; cancer runs in my family and is one of those back burner pressures in my life. The thought of actually finding something makes me sweaty and uncomfortable, like waiting at the dentist’s office or doing my taxes. I’m not sure which would horrify me more, having my body invaded by a tumor, or believing I had a tumor and later discovering my body had become a private arboretum. On Wednesday of last week a man in Russia, who believed he was suffering from a cancerous tumor in his lung, discovered a five centimeter fir tree growing inside his chest instead.

My big brother once told me that an apple tree was growing out of my stomach. At the time I believed him, but my mom assured me later that stomach acid would kill any seeds that made it to my internal nether regions. Inhaling a seed never occurred to us as a possibility. I still feel a little creeped out by this; am I going to have to wear one of those doctor’s masks outside from now on? There is enough to worry about between cancer and terrorism and midterms and the economy……now I have to think about the fertility levels of my lung tissues?

Start of Picturing the other

I think this photo could have been more effectively cropped in the taking process, but the scene was soon disrupted by two unruly dogs. There is something cute and vulnerable about her face, and not seeing his makes hers more effective I think. 
I really like the light in this one, but I feel like a close up of her face may have been good as well. I like that her eyes take us away from the scene, as well as the shadows on her face and hand. 

I like the closeup of the face because the shadow and the little bit of negative space at the bottom right work well together and I feel like the frame is used well. The second one is split in half by the negative space between the hand and the face as well as by the light source.

Alphabet soup: I

Fan-friggin-fabulousness in photoshop
This is my I; the fence post in the middle is the letter. I stumbled across this fence taking the dog out to Four Corners last week; I'm pretty sure it's new since last year. I think focusing more on the foreground would have been better when taking the picture I think. 

Alphabet soup: C

I cropped the photograph and increased the hue saturation here.
This is my C; the edge of the road and the drop off form the letter. I like how the road goes out of the frame and comes back in, as well as the way the cut off edge and the tree truck frame the letter. I think some tricks with light may be good here.

Alphabet soup: L

This is my L; the top of the tree and the smaller tree branch form the letter. I do not feel like this is necessarily the most technically advanced photograph. I feel the tree more isolated could be more effective, but I chose to keep the foreground for interest. The shadows on those hills never cease to dazzle me in late afternoon, but somehow a picture doesn't capture all of the interest for me.  Maybe focusing on just the tree and the smaller town would have been less busy but again, I needed the picture to remain interesting. I have heard less is more however....

Alphabet Soup: O

This is my letter O; the side mirror is in focus the reflection is clearly a circle....right? I guess the O is a little squishy, but I liked the idea of a reflection of a reflection.

Alphabet soup: T

This is my letter T; The statue and the fence rung meet at the upper portion of the middle to form the letter. I really like the light on the ball though.

consumer awareness

I ride my bike around town as much as possible—by the end of summer my calves will be bigger than Arnold Schwarzenegger in his prime. I also try to buy my produce at the farmer’s market and to support local businesses as much as I can. I buy modal cotton and other more sustainable textiles like hemp; I recycle and have a compost heap. With that said, however virtuously I attempt to live, I am still a big time consumer. I have heard the word “consumer” bantered around quite a bit lately, with fingers being pointed at the oil consumers and overzealous expensive shoe addict consumers and Mr. Biggest-house-on-the-block consumers, and the label has become an ugly, heavily connotative one. My belief is that no matter how much or little we consume and no matter where we point the finger, all living beings are consumers. To take away the negative connotation on this state of life imposed by birth humans must simply become aware consumers.

With the context of my rant set I would like to explain that I have been trying to observe my own reactions to advertising, specifically television commercials. I wouldn’t say that I watch an exorbitant amount of television myself, I would much rather read a book, but a good portion of my day is set to the soundtrack of Sports Center. (Once you know me even a little bit this should be funny in the heavily ironic sort of way). There have been a few commercials within the last month or so that have stuck with me—one of which I don’t even remember the product to (insurance or a travel agency or something?)! I just think it’s cute the way the little girl loves her daddy in the commercial. Another one was the Hulu.com commercial with Alec Baldwin—I was sideswiped by 30 Rock and have been on an Alec Baldwin kick ever since. The commercial I want to focus on however is a Verizon Hub commercial.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=geHh9y28drg is a link to the specific commercial, but you could probably find it right from youtube easily as well. I just did a basic google search and found it that way too. The first time I saw this commercial I said, “Awww, how cute! That hub thing is really cool!” My friends cracked up. See, I already have Verizon, but I’m unhappy with their service. That product, in conjunction with the “super cute” commercial, almost convinced me to stay with Verizon. It got me, so to speak. I don’t need to spend money on a new phone and I have no need for any type of fancy high tech gadget, however…….

Why did this commercial make me feel good? The kitchen setting is light and airy with expensive, stainless steel appliances. Light colors in combination with what is a dream kitchen for many, implies security and safety. There’s a French press partially full of coffee and dishes on the counter which implies that despite the wealth, the character on the screen is still relatable. He still loads his dishwasher from the front and shaves his face in front of the mirror every day. I think that the intimacy implied by the character “sending his wife a new route” while he drank orange juice from their carton was the part that got me, along with the cheesy background music. The commercial is set to the apparently new pop classic, “I am yours” by Jason Mraz. I didn’t know that until I looked it up, but the song still made me a little gushy. I drive myself crazy—why do I have to go and be a girl all the time?

I also like things to be ordered; as much as I want to be a hostel hopping, rinse-her-underwear-in-Woolite-every-few day’s kind of gal, I just can’t. I like to plan ahead and see where I am at all times. Yes, I do know that this is impractical, especially for an aspiring travel journalist….or really for a human being for that matter. I am working on it, although I doubt I will ever be anything other than a buy-a-new-pack-if-there’s-no-washer kind of girl. Having a schedule with a route and a house full of nice stuff and someone to forget to pack your umbrella….that is what U.S. American culture has raised me to think of as the state of fulfillment. I am aware of this, I am also aware that I don’t really need all of that stuff to feel secure. I have been comfortable and safe my entire life and I am still an insecure basket case. Security is something only I can provide for myself. As such I will continue to enjoy the soppiness of the commercial, but I will not let myself be sucked into their fantasy world that they are peddling. By being aware of how the commercial makes me feel, I can do my part to really ascertain whether I need a product, or if I am just being a girl. Most things, whether I understand how the commercial makes me feel or not, I don’t need.

I found this fence on the way out to Four Corners and I was compelled to take a couple snaps. Not only does the fence lend itself well to my alphabet soup assignment, but I keep coming back to the contrast of metal and wood also. The animals I copied and pasted in from other P.S. documents and I did a slew of other things that I may not be able to repeat readily.....but this is why I pride myself on my note taking abilities. 

Escher

Personal perspective: I have always been a dreamer, more satisfied in an imagined reality. My parents used to have to tell me not to bring a book with me when we went out to dinner. In one sense this has been neat because I have a highly developed imagination. In another sense this is sad—as Ferris Bueller said, “Life moves pretty fast, if you don’t stop and look around once in a while you might miss it,” or something to that effect. I have realized that this world of ours is beautiful and mysterious, vast and microscopic. I am grateful to be here, but fantasy still has a special time and place for me. Regardless of my acknowledgment that I need to have a firmer foothold in the real world, I have always loved the alternate reality this Escher piece proposes; knights, ladies, fairies and a floating castle in which there is no up or down. One of my close girl friends in high school had this poster on her wall and in the summers we would fling both doors open and sprawl across her faded chenile bedspread, the swamp cooler sputtering coolish air on our faces. This was the perfect vantage point to gaze up at Escher's world and talk or not, or read or just be. This image is a piece of home to me.

List of objects: castles (2), towers (9?), bridges, stair cases (2), Mountains, river, trees, cobblestone floor, clouds, grass, vines, windows….

Molly Bang’s Principle’s: This is a very dynamic piece that defies gravity in a sense and unsettles the viewer. The bottom half of the sketch is dynamic because the castle is made of vertical rectangles and triangles for the most part and imparts a sense of moving upwards. This section is heavier than the top half however and appears weighted down. According to Bang the bottom half of the page has this effect on images. The castle atop the castle will also lend itself to the squishing, diminutive effect of the lower half of the image.

The top half of the image is made up of similar lines and triangles except everything is at an angle. This is the most dynamic type of imagery according to Bang because angles imply instability and uncertainty which may create tension or anxiety in the viewer.

The center of this piece, which according to Bang’s principles is the most important, is where the two castles or realities merge. In a way this center could represent my attempt to combine my fantasy world and the one I am supposed to be in. This is the greatest place of attraction for the viewer, but it is the place where the image makes the least sense. Viewing the top or bottom halves separately is okay, but trying to combine them is where the energy of the piece really lies. This demonstrates that the image was meant to create a sense of altered or unsettled reality.

Bang ruminates that lighter backgrounds feel safer than dark because humans cannot see in the dark or night time. The background of Escher's image is light but is in a transition either from light to dark or dark to light. This is noticeable in the luminescent quality of the clouds. This also creates tension because the world is poised on the brink of change, just as the two castles are poised on the brink of transitioning into one another. The light background in this case does not offer the sense of safety to the viewer that it would if the transition of time was not implied. Also, the towers themselves do not continue off the top of the page, but the clouds do. Also, the bottom of towers on the base castle and the top of towers on the upper castle both continue onto the left and right sides of the page. This creates a sense of spreading, like there is more known to the right and left, but only the unknown sky above. Escher used the edges of the page to create a sense of a larger picture we cannot understand, just as Bang’s principles dictate.