Back to scanning

This summer, I really want to start experimenting with scanners  to create odd worlds. I love the work of this naturalist artist; Marty Klein.  He uses a flatbed scanner to compose and create photographs. Working from nature is a very intimate action for him. 

For my final, I am inspired to use this scanning technique but in conjunction with my own cutouts. 

I want these cutouts to have a Rod Sterling feel to them. 

TWILIGHT ZONE

Caleb Cole and Wall greens.

Yesterday while sitting in the wall greens pharmacy waiting room, I drew myself out of my heavy thoughts, and began to notice the people around me. Five or six were standing or sitting, hands in the pockets, eyes, on the cellphones, leaning on a crutch or talking to their kids. And all were waiting. Most did not make eye contact. No one really smiled or chatted. All seemed preoccupied with their own problems. I then imagined taking these people out of the wall greens environment and placing them in front of a simple white backdrop.

The idea of doing something like this, reminded me of some of the work of Caleb Cole, an current avid photographer. Taking old photographs he cuts out all but one of the characters, to get the idea across; isolation in a crowded environment. Or perhaps some personal struggles in his own life.

What good do people do for each other if there is so much disconnect.

Block Printing

http://www.vam.ac.uk/content/videos/b/video-block-printed-wallpaper/

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VO6IDeqvouM&noredirect=1

Here are a couple videos showing the making process. 

Something that has been interesting me for a while is the concept of block printing. I love using backdrops in my work and I'm interested in somehow incorporating fictitious textiles as backgrounds. Wall paper began to be used more as a cheep substitute for fabric textiles. It found it's way both in Eastern and Western cultures resulting in what we see now. Block printing began to rise in popularity  around the 1700's as importation began and cultures mixed.

Typical wall paper we see now in common stores cannot hold a candle to its ancestors.

Legit Block Printers take extreme amounts of time and patience to produce layer upon layer of different colored paints onto the paper. Then it is carefully hung out to dry before being once again laid out and touched up.

Working in this class has made me realize that I love to portray the feeling of theatrics. Though, block printing is far out of my reach, I still am inspired and influenced in the making process of this kind of art.

Kara Walker

I find the work of this artist to be completely fascinating to me. Kara walker was born in Stockholm California in 1969. At the young age of three she realised that she wanted to an artist just like her father.  She graduated with a BFA and an MFA with a focus on print making and collage. Her works are potent, dealing a lot with race, sexuality, power and repression. I am attracted to her flawless use of multi media. And of course her cutouts. I would really like to take the cutout idea and use it more to my advantage in photography.

A couple of her own inspirations : Vincent Van Gogh and Andy Warhol.

Mike Mills

"There’s a carefully tended fuzziness to the movie itself, like a memento mori sketched in pastel. Part of that has to do with the nature of memory, or rather those shards of Oliver’s recollections that are continually bumping up against one another as the near-past triggers remembrances of things further past, sometimes with the neatness that distinguishes a meticulously constructed screenplay rather than messy life."

I watched a documentary called "Beautiful Mess" this evening  and found myself intrigued by one of the artists interviewed; Mike Mills. 

Mike mills has directed a movie/biography of his life called, "Beginners". This quote is from the website,

 http://movies.nytimes.com/2011/06/03/movies/beginners-with-christopher-plummer-and-ewan-mcgregor-review.html

I am intrigued because of Mills honest embarrassment when he talks about the making of the film. This is a true artist! I have to question the motives of any artist unless they reach that raw point in life where there is no where else to go, but the truth. I guess that means I need to question my own. And I love the way he describes how memories can be so fictitious.  


http://video.nytimes.com/video/2011/03/16/movies/100000000728868/mike-mills.html?ref=movies

Caleb Cole

Here is a artist that uses his childhood experiences to inspire his work today. He literally loved junk as a child, due to his mothers own fascination of garage sales. And I can see this in a lot of his work.

 I am attracted to his work, simple because of the theatrical states that he puts himself in. ThoughI am annoyed also for it seems thought that some of his characters are too foreign to him as a person. I would rather see him exploring more natural circumstances. But maybe that is what he wants. Anyway, he has inspired me to move forward still in my own theatrics!

 http://www.calebcolephoto.com/biocv.html

Scanographers..

Yes it's true folks! To my delight I have the found the heroes of our time. THE SCANOGRAPHERS! So can I join their group?

This first website gives  links to many awesome artists. It's so fun to explore all of them.
http://scannography.org/artists/artists.html

My question is, what kind of scanners are they using? These look like studio shots