topical fast (or feast): 2012

Monday, November 12, 2012

Bad Art, Bad Subjects

Bad Art, Bad Subjects: A Democratic Assignment
3D Design
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Objective
Make a “bad” sculpture or three-dimensional work. Bad should be defined broadly and inclusively. The work can be unsuccessful, ugly, anti-aesthetic, repulsive, offensive, contrived, controversial, cliché, untimely, derivative, poorly crafted or any mixture of the aforementioned descriptors. Abandon your ego and the formal elements of art and design to create something completely unexpected. Consider the advantages of selecting a specific media or topic to help design your project (It is easier to work with a point of departure like a media or topic).

Materials
Open. Keep this affordable or even free. There is no budget. Select materials that support your idea.

Risk & Failure
Producing successful art & design takes risk. It is the hardest skill to teach and the most difficult aspect to accept as makers. The students, by creating a project where you embrace failure and risk may end up producing some of your best work.

Evaluation
Grading will examine interpretation and innovation of the project and the students ability to explain why they did what they did. COLLABORATION BETWEEN STUDENTS WILL BE WELCOMED; COLLABORATORS WILL RECEIVE THE SAME GRADE.

Resources

Jeff Koons, Damien Hirst, Van Gogh, Jackson Pollack, Duchamp, Salon des Refuses, Deviant Art, Degenerate Art, Robert Crumb, Robert Mapplethorpe, Ed Hardy, High School Musical…

Courtney Coe

Katie Isaacs

Emily Tackett

Chelsey Benne

Michael Mitchell

Tuesday, October 16, 2012

Wax & Wane

I have been working on the design of Wax & Wane with some of my students on and off for the past 3 years. It needs some more insight and manicuring, so any feedback is welcomed. The project is meant to be implemented at any level of higher education in any class where the creative process is vital to outcomes. It is more about developing strategies for creative block, developing discipline and self-awareness for better critical and creative thinking.

wax & wane
Professor Melissa Vandenberg
Department of Art & Design
Eastern Kentucky University
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Wax & Wane explores the role of saturation and discipline in creative education. The title references the cycles of the moon but the project focuses on getting stronger or “better” (waxing) and the notion of becoming smaller or “weaker” (waning). The goal is to challenge existing skill sets, formulas and habits while discovering new skill sets, discipline and the role of purging in a creative mode. It promotes growth and spontaneity by offering the opportunity to students to expand and simultaneously edit in order to facilitate quality creative processes.

Objective
Students will literally wax and wane. Waxing entails trying or learning something new while the waning entails editing something they already do or have. Students need to try both aspects but they solely determine what they are willing to wax and wane. Students should use this challenge to try something they always wanted to try (wax) and to discover what they could do without (wane). Keep selections in proportion to the amount of time you have to offer the challenge. For example, do not expect to learn the guitar in one semester, but learning a few chords may be reasonable.

Proof
Students will share progress once, halfway through the semester, and must provide proof at the end of the semester. The type of proof provided depends on what is waxed and waned. If you learn the lyrics to 5 Bob Dylan songs (wax) followed by cutting off all your hair (wane) you may sing for your classmates and show a before and after photo for the hair. If you gave up soda and studied belly dancing you could log the experience of going without diet coke and show a recording or photos of belly dancing.

For Instructors
It is best to assign this challenge at the beginning of a semester and have students report back on progress at least once prior to submitting proof or a brief presentation at the end of a semester. Proof should be simple and easily shared with peers. This venture can be utilized at any level of higher education, and in any course where creative processes are important.

Waxing Ideas
Try a food you have never tried
Visit a new museum or gallery, maybe in a different town
Submit research to a new outlet or venue, like a juried exhibition
Go to a guitar/yoga/martial arts/cooking/underwater basket weaving class
Go to a live theater/dance/music performance.
Go on a hike in a new location
Try a new medium like film photography, oil paint or stone carving
Ask someone you admire to share their Netflix Instant Queue with you
Read a book recommended by a individual you respect
Go to the library; check out and read something you would have never chosen
Get a tattoo, dye you hair or pierce something
Try a new instrument, sport or club
Tell the truth to someone
Grow a plant from seed or even a garden, eat something you grew
Try meditating, origami, recycling, karaoke, salsa dancing or juggling
Write a comic novel, make a flip book or learn to change your oil or car tire
Volunteer somewhere
Collaborate on a project with a peer
Write a poem, song or story
Take someone interesting to dinner that you want to know better
Ask someone for a date
Write and mail a letter to someone important to you
Test drive a really great car

Waning Ideas
Give up social media for a day, week or month
Give up soda, sugar, alcohol, meat, caffeine or dairy.
Donate personal items to Goodwill, have a garage sale or it give away
Leave you cell phone at home, on purpose
Cut off all your hair
Go without talking for an hour or even a day

Skip TV for a day or week
Clean out your bag, purse, car or desk…
Stop cussing for a day, week or month
Tell a secret to someone
Cut down on your trash
Ride a bike or walk instead of driving
Go on an unplanned day trip, just drive and see what happens
Skip cosmetics for a day or week
Gift artwork to someone who would not expect it
Stop txting while walking, driving or when otherwise engaged
Gift a beloved book to someone beloved

Resources
Franz Kafka “The Hunger Artist”

HADIEH-SHAFIE: WAX AND WANE, 26"X26", INK & ACRYLIC ON PAPER
Morton Fine Art

“Don’t think. Thinking is the enemy of creativity. It’s self-conscious, and anything self-conscious is lousy. You can’t try to do things. You simply must do things”

– Ray Bradbury

“You can’t wait for inspiration, you have to go after it with a club”
– Jack London

“An essential aspect of creativity is not being afraid to fail.”

- Edwin Land

Friday, October 12, 2012

Abundant Couture: Student Work

Annually, for 3D Design I revisit this project with my students at Eastern Kentucky University. Each group goes above and beyond my expectations with this wearable sculpture challenge. Here is the abbreviated version of the project and just a sampling of outcomes. The project is highly adaptable for a wide range of ages, resources and media. Topics covered during the design and construction phases include fine art versus function, high fashion and a collision with sculpture, performance, models, documentation and responsible use and consumption of material. Mindful Matters...

Abundant Couture: A Wearable Sculpture

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Couture refers to fashion design and Abundant refers to many of something, a repeating element or plentiful amount. This project examines the mutual exchange of inspiration between the art and fashion worlds.

Objective: Students will create a wearable sculpture using an abundance of one or more materials/objects. The result must be wearable by you OR a model for presentation but does not need to be anything like traditional clothing. Your wearable sculpture may make very little visual sense and be totally non-utilitarian OR can be highly functional and straightforward. They need not be symmetrical or even hint that a human is inside.

Materials: Options include fabric, plastic tarps, paper, paper mache, real or fake flowers, garbage bags, bubble wrap, chicken wire, soap, thread, safety pins, glue, wood, cardboard, hair, foam core, hats, clothes, shoes, leaves, hay, and various found objects.

Hints:

§ Collect a large quantity of one or more materials, more than you will need.

§ Test methods on how to either glue, stitch, melt, tape, or weave items together.

§ Remember to measure your model.

§ Consider constructing your sculpture on an existing piece of clothing that you know already fits.

§ Consider what theme or focus the project could have, that may suggest what materials to use –OR-

§ Look at the materials you already have access to.

§ Look at the project as a test on construction and assembly skills, NOT SEWING SKILLS.

§ Consider and resolve the whole package, head to toe: hats, make up, jewelry, belts and shoes, prop and other accessories…

§ When you think you are done, you are not, add more. Scale and quantity count.

Vocabulary: Couture, Non-Utilitarian, Volume, Mass, Shape, Form, Composition, Hue, Line and Armature.

Recommended Resources: Nick Cave, Jana Sterbak, Clarina Bezzola, Alexander McQueen, Janine Antoni, “Ergotecture”, Louise Bourgeois, Sarah Lucas, Damien Hirst, Tim Hawkinson, Mona Hatoum, Do-Ho Suh, Cesar Martinez, Marc Quinn, Yayoi Kusuma, Jana Sterbak, Mee Ping Leung, Qin Yufen, Ernesto Neto, Antony Gormely, and Judy Chicago

Student Samples