Art and the audience

vb46.017Los angeles, 2001 Vanessa Beecroft

Vanessa Beecroft organises these large groups of naked female models who perform within the gallery space for up to three hours. This work in particular the women are standing as if they are posing for a high fashion photoshoot, wearing nothing but stiletto heals. This image of the nude women isnt really that shocking because there is a barrier that has been created between the audience and performance. However, this work is almost animated by the presence of the audience within this room of nude bodies that are not interactive, therefore this work becomes this dramatic spectacle when there are people in the room to witness it, to feel perhaps awkward or uncomfortable in the room with these models. To me it also almost seems like the artist is making some sort of comment about the portrayal of models coming off production lines and how these women are presented as objects almost as opposed to human beings. i think this work really needs to be witnessed to have the dramatic effect that the artist has intended upon.

Art and politics

Tribute in light, 2001 by Julian Laverdiere and Paul Myoda

Digital concept rendering

Tribute in light was a public memorial shown for thirty-two days in memory of 9/11. The temporary installation was showed at the original site of the world trade centres that captured the sorrow an yearning of the new yorkers after the attack. The shafts of light were ctreated by eighty eight searchlights that rose in the night sky, ghost like figures of the towers. The work is beautiful and sad but also a symbol of hope.

Art and institutions

Your supermarket, 2002 by Guillaume Bijl (couldnt find a good image)

guillaume bijl has basically utilised this space to make a common supermarket, there is no real difference between the one you would go to buy your groceries from and this artwork. He uses real food, drinks and houshold products; the only difference between this work and an actual supermarket is here you cant buy anything. i guess this artwork relates to both institutions and globalisation because of our constant exposure to advertisment and our addiction to consumerism whilst also creating this twisted shopping environment where your not allowed to purchase anything. in terms of art and its institutions, to me this is a powerful work commenting on how commercial these institutions or galleries may have become- like a shopping centre where your going to buy your household basics.

Art and globalisation

Who am we?, 2000 by DO-HO SUH

Four-colour offset print on paper, each sheet 24x36 inches

Consist of thousands of tiny faces from the artists high school year book, in rows on large sheets of wallpaper. When the work is viewed from a distance the tiny faces because a blurred mass suggesting the disappearance of the indivdual into a large mass. Many of his works involve this idea of 'masses of people' which strongly relate to this idea of globalisation and becoming so strongly innterconnected that this loss in individuality and perhaps 'voice' may occur.

Art and Architecture- Rachel Whiteread

Holocaust monument 2000

Place village 2009

untitled monument 2001

Embankment 2004

House 1993

Rachel Whiteread is a was born on April 20 1963 in the country town of Essex, England. Her mother was an artist and the death of her had a profound effect on whitereads work. Whiteread firsty trained in painting at the facutly of arts and architecture, Brighton Polytechnic, breifly at cyprus college of art and then finally studied scultptue at London's Slade school of Art. She first began to exhibit in 1987.

Whiteread's work is much to do with Space, objects, materials and presence and absense. She uses domestic object of the every day and casts the negative space; solidifying the void of the objects. Whiteread generally uses plaster, concrete and rubber however she utilises these materials on everday found objects. One of her work titled 'place village' is an entire collection of old dollhouses which she has organised to create a small community.

Whiteread is famously known for her 1993 work 'house'. This work was a concrete cast of the inside of an entire victorian terraced home that had been scehduled for demolition. The work was publicly exhibited at its original location, 193 Grove Road East London. The production of the work caused great controversy amongst the public and the locals did not like the immediate groups of people coming to see the work. It generated extreme mixed responses. For example: Whiteread's work 'House' won her both The Turner prize for best young british artists in 1993 and also the K Foundation art award for worst british aritst. 'House' was demolished on the 11th of janurary 1994 by London council, which in itself caused more publicity and controversy.

In 2004 whiteread was offered a commission to produce a piece for Tate Modern's Turbine Hall which she delayed acceptance for six months to ensure she could actually conceive a piece that could occupy the massive hall space. Titled 'Embankment' the work consists of approximately fourteen thousand white polyethylene boxes stacked in different ways. The various stacks enable any veiwers to walk around the room and around the different stacks to be overwhelmed by not only the size of the hall but the space her occupies. They represent the greif of when her mother died and the period of packing boxes of her things and moving them. Whiteread also cites the end scenes of 'The raiders of the lost arc' and 'citizens cane'.

In 2001 Whiteread became the third artist to provide a sculpture for the empty forth plinth at trafalgar square in london. She made an eleven tonne resin cast of the plinth itself which stands upsidedown making a transperant mirror image of the marble plinth 'Untitled monument'. The piece took eight attempts to make as a result of the resin cracking. The entire project cost over one hundred thousand pounds to produce and unusually for public work, Whiteread rasied the funs herself by selling small models of the piece. Whiteread descirbes this work as 'as pause...a quiet moment'. The piece conjures heaviness and lightness and as Ned Denny from new statesman explains 'She sees it not as a space to be filled, but as an absence to be acknowledged'.

For Whiteread's work, 'place village' unlike her other works, she has collected handmade english dollhouse and has configured them into a minature community. The work was presented in Forster gallery, Boston in a small dimly lit room behind a black curtin. Inside the small homes she has placed a light that reveals the emptiness of the houses and their lack of funishings. The entire room is only lit by these subtle lights inside the houses which draws the viewer in to inspect whats inside. The entire work almost has a certain sadness to it as this visually thriving little town has no sense of life or anything-once again Whiteread is approaching the idea of absence and memory.

Whiteread was commissioned 'Holocaust monument' in 2000 and it was Austria's first memorial to the sixty five thousand Jewish Austrians that were killed during the holocaust. The work essentially is a concrete cast of rows of books that have been turned so the spines are hidden and the pages are facing outwards. They are placed in the shape of a room with at the front two negatively cast doors with no handles or hinges. The piece is symbolic of the large number of victims and their untold stories of their lives.

Bibliography:

Townsend, chris. 'The Art of Rachel Whiteread'. Thames and Huson, London, 2004.

Mullins, Charlotte. 'Rachel Whiteread/ Charlotte Mullins'. Tate, London. 2004.

Art and architecture

for my presentation on wednesday i'll be talking about Rachel Whiteread and her work :)

wolfgang laib: returning to what is

Darren jorgensen's interview with german artist wolfgang laib provides insight into laibs life, personal beliefs and artistic practise. Laib discusses with jorgensen the long process of his works, his philosophical approach to art making, originality and what laib believes is truthful art. Laib expresses great passion for overall artistic practise and demonstates his belief that art can be powerful enough to 'change the world'.

During the interview, its very clear that laib has a very strong connection with art and his works. Although his works are very simple and use minimal material, during the course of the interview laib explains the time consuming and laborious process that he undertakes to create his beautiful works (in particular the collection of the bee pollen). It is obvious that this process has become laibs everyday and his life "my life is my work, i have nothing else".

While Laibs materials reflect the natural environment in which he has grown up in, laib mentions various misunderstood interpretations of the concepts are based upon nature for the obvious choice of materials. Laib explains that he is interested in all materials that he did not create and taking them out of context.

jorgensen further mentions the obvious spirtual interpretations that can be taken from laibs work, while laib acknowledges this he also adds that his practise of his works is beyond the spirtual. He further explains that the process changes the idea of what a day is and ultimately what your life is about. Jorgensen also states in the abstract that some would consider minimalism to be the movement that enabled Laibs success. However, laib dettaches himself from the mainstream, and discusses originality and the importance of pushing different ideas to stand out amongst trends.

Overall, the interview is very informal which allows the reader personal insight into Laibs life, practise and to a small extent his mind and way of thinking.

Art and Spirituality- Andres Serrano

Andres Serrano
piss christ, 1987

Piss christ is a photograph of a crucifix immersed in the artists urine. The work was seen as a mockery of christianity and become the centre in a political controversy over government funding in the arts as Serrano was issued a $15000 grant for the work, part of which was tax-payer funded. The work also caused an outrage in the public and religious extremists; the artist receieved hate mail, death threats and lost future grants as a result of the controversy. The work was also vandalised at the national gallery of victoria, Australia. Supporters argued the controversy over piss christ was an issue of artistic freedom and freedom of speech.

Art and identity- Yasumasa Morimura

Futago,1988- colour photograph

Morimura appropriates Edouard Manet's 'Olympia' and places himself as both the nude olympia and the black maid, assuming new personas whilst crossing racial and gender lines. There are subtle changes in his photograph such as the addition of the japenese fabrics on the courtesans bed and the replacement of manet's feline with a black ceramic cat, in which japenese businesses used to welcome visitors.

Morimuras has used manet's famous respresentation of wetsern culteral traditon and appropriated the image in relation to his own culteral identity and growing up in post war japan-influenced by the images and products of american popular culture.

Art and the body-Mike parr

Parr's early works were designed to get a reaction from the audience one of Parr's earlier works, he sits in front of his audience and begins talking to them. Most of the people in the audience have no idea that he has one prosthetic arm. Suddenly he gets out an axe and begins hacking into his prosthetic arm which he has filled with minced meat and fake blood. quite shocking.