Tuesday, March 30, 2010

Graffiti / Final

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lP36NHO6ScY

At the beginning of the course, I have decided that I would focus my projects on the theme: the artist working in the public sphere and the artist working with other artists and non-artist alike. In the beginning I wished to explore this theme form my own experience. I wanted to share the experience I have while going out every Sunday with other artists in a gathering known as ‘Toronto Subway Sketching``. I was particularly interested in the teaching / learning environment that Subway Sketching provided for anyone that was interested. I felt that Subway Sketching was a good representation of a studio away from home or school where artists could be surrounded by their subject. This also allows you to receive feedback on your work from those around you, which in turn helps you become a better artist while at the same time providing art for those interesting in watching what you are working on. In the first assignment I wanted to provide a visual feel to what the `studio` environment looks like and so I took a few pictures that showed some of the participating artist at work. In the second project I wanted to focus more specifically on the idea behind subway sketching, so I filmed one of the creators, who hopefully was able to provide some insight. In my opinion I fell that Thierry was able to provide a good overview of the mission behind Subway Sketching and its importance for all young artist and non-artists that wish to explore art outside the comfort of their homes. Deciding that I covered enough of the Subway Sketching phenomenon and it`s application to my theme, I changed direction to a much more public setting than the subway car: the streets themselves. I have always been a fan of graffiti, both as an art form and as a form of expression by which the people living within an urban environment could be heard. Graffiti is practice by practicing artists and those who do not consider themselves artists, therefore I tough it would be a great subject to explore for my performance piece in which I gathered a group of people and persuaded them to work with me on a freestyle graffiti project which I have filmed for class. At the great success of the first graffiti filming, I have decided to give it another shot, except this time I was focused much more on creating a predesigned piece for which myself proclaimed `non- artist` friend helped add to the piece. I choose to spray my graffiti nickname which is COG. This name is a shorter form of my full name but also has a meaning attached to it: A subordinate that performs a routine but important function. I feel that in a way artists in general are all cogs because they are a functional part of the bigger machine that is the art world. After finishing the initial piece that I had in mind, we completely went over it and changed it to the point where what was underneath was gone. The reason for doing this is because I wanted to have the feeling of temporariness that is tied to graffiti. In doing graffiti one should always keep in mind that someone else will come and paint over your work, in turn creating something new.

Tuesday, March 9, 2010

Centennial Bombing - Graffiti Project

The video is a documentation of the Graffiti project I undertook with a few friends in a public space (Centennial Park). The goal was to introduce people to the art form of graffiti writing by working together as a team in the creation of an artwork. The performance aspect of the project was in creating the artwork within a public space, which fits in with my orginal theme form the beggining of the year : The Artist workin in the community / public space, because Graffiti is an artform that is produced within the public sphere.