Lets put down the guns and pick up the tweets

Ok I admit, the title is a little misleading, but I was going for shock and awe. But I recently saw Salmon Rushdie speak at Miami University, in Oxfod Ohio. The speech was well composed, full of cracks of conservative cracks and some godless comment, which definatly increased the tension in the room.

He talked about how we measure the cost of safety. Briefly put, the fear of getting hit by a truck shouldnt keep us from crossing the street. Talking about issues ranging from domestic to india, kashmir and pakistan. A few points came to light, the first, the worst of the west is at war with the worst of the east. This is key to understanding in order to moving forward with the “war” on terrorism. Rushdie pointed out that recruits for terrorism are people that feel like their life is hopeless, and they have no voice. When I feel I have no voice, which happens from time to time I look at my twitter stream and ineveibtably find something funny, exciting, engaging. If people in this situation twittered would they become terrorist recruits?

Answer: Maybe, Maybe not. When someone is able to see an influence on the world around them, or in the case of these social networks the world surrounding them, it makes them feel better (at least me). It allows people to interact in a way they would normally with people, just not with the normal people they would meet.

***Disclaimer I just thought the photo would add a little meme and levity to the post***

So the bugs follow a ball and the strokeweight and length react to sound.

Why is it if I draw like this...

After a conversation, about the benefits of drawing, with a previous professor at the local coffee shop. I started to think about the current pedagogy of teaching the practice of creating fine art.

If drawing is the basis of art, as I am told, then why don’t you need to be able to draw to be an artist these days. Now some people might disagree with me, but please finish reading until you post a comment.

I think that there are very good lesson learned from drawing such as; understanding the difference between what you see and what you think you see, understanding how/why you make the marks that you make, and refining ideas. In my undergrad experience I had to take six drawing classes and only two of those classes actually taught me the lessons above. The reason is because before drawing 3/4 we did small task based assignments (contour line, inner contour line, perspective). I don’t disagree with learning these things, but I do disagree with the way they were taught. Because they were treated as isolated assignments I just wanted to get them done and over with.

I can conceptualize things like this

That was drawing 1/2 and then I ended up in drawing 3/4 the atmosphere changed. The class wasn’t treated as a “class” but more of a workshop. We came in and drew vigorously from life for two hours and then reflected on the drawings, learning and thinking after every step.
I think that it is the process of making – reflecting – acting – making, in which became the invaluable lesson of drawing.

I think that after you realize this process in drawing you can apply it to any other form of art without sitting down and drawing. For me it is most appropriate for an idea to spring into my head – then sit on it – then do some samples – then make it. Because I don’t sit down and do a detailed sketch of exactly what it will look like give me the flexibility to evolve alongside the piece.

At some point “drawing” becomes more of a technical problem instead of a learning dialogue. I think it is time to acknowledge this. By doing so we can substitute what we can learn from most processes what we learn from drawing, therefore turning drawing into a mere technical problem.

How silly is this? C’mon, as far as I’m concerned these are things that happened not things people own. Corporations are getting greedier and greedier. Especially in the domain of genetic engineering. Monsanto, an prolific perpetrator of patenting living life forms because of what they altered. I just wonder when the day will come when you can claim rights to another human being.

Another thing is the simple fact that nobody plays by the rules ne more. Its always changing the rules for the benefit of the individual. Its like we are a nation of 5 year olds playing in the back yard. For me, when I step into a situation I understand that there are guidlines set for how to act, respond , and generally conduct myself. I know when I don’t live up to those expectations I shouldn’t deserve better than what I get. In many of my classes in college, there are many times where a teacher will back down from giving out an assignment when the class whines about it, instead of stepping up to the challenge and tackling it head on.  If this decision say nothing else it day that as long as you complain enough you will get your way, because apparently this country has lost what it means to play by the rules.

This is also true in art. Today too many people get away with shitty art claiming that its “conceptual”. Well even if its conceptual it still needs to be made well and relate to an audience. CGI and Conceptual art do the same thing; they allow the audience’s mind to stay in the movie theatre/gallery. Instead we should be making amazing things with our hands leaving people thinking “How did they do that”, otherwise we are just fakes.

Don’t get me wrong craft isn’t what the piece has to be about, but the piece should be made well enough that there isn’t any question about whether or not the artist just chose the easy route. We aren’t in this to find the easiest way to convey a message. We are in this field to make things with our hands, and become something greater, and to find the best way to share our ideas and ourselves with the world.

Concept isn’t everything, it is only a piece of what an artwork is about. Along with movies CGI/Concept should never be paramount in a piece because then focus is lost and the discovery is in the process.