Official spring season starts next Tuesday, but it's close to 80 degrees outside in Chicago today and here is my Spring update:
Last semester was very busy, I took four courses at SAIC where I am working on my B.F.A.W. right now.
Form/Formlessness was a cross-listed course between Writing department and Sculpture with talented artist, Stephanie Brooks. It was a very worthwhile course; it expanded my knowledge and creativity away from the written page and typical narrative.
The Cut: Through Literature, Film, Music, & Art was a Topics course dealing with Art History that was a real challenge and addition to my education. I learned about modalities throughout history, politics, and art. Reading everything from Hal Foster, Lawrence Cahoone, Kuhn, Nietzsche, Venturi, Frederick Douglas, Sartre, & Edward Said - it was definitely a multi-cultural, widely ethnic, and diverse learning environment. Identity, Race, and Hybridity are topics that I have grown very interested in, thanks to immensely interesting Professor, PhD candidate at the University of Chicago, Romi Crawford.
Art History II Modern/Antimodern/Postmodern was a dynamic survey from year 1850- Contemporary Art being made today! Got a chance to see the Soviet war propaganda posters at the Block Museum at Northwestern & Eva Hessa's work at AIC.
Painting the Dream ended up being a subconscious-minded travel into collage-making where I made several collage based on my inner thoughts and dreams (maybe nightmares).
So, I dropped my one and only real writing class because the teacher was a yoga fanatic and lectured about running from assassins while making the students chase each other around the room on the first day but it turned out really well and this semester is going great so far.
My goals: Continue to work on bringing my work to new media forms. I want to scan in my collages and upload them, work on a professional website, continue building my portfolio while I have this amazing opportunity at "the most influential art & design school in America" :-) Currently working on a drawing portfolio, writing cabinet, analysis of Literature in two courses, and will be writing my first ethnography about Language Revitalization in American Indian culture in and beyond Chicago. I am def. looking forward to future work for that project.
p.s. someone hacked my blog last semester, so if the hacker is reading this please find something better to do. Thanks!
Wednesday, March 14, 2012
Saturday, November 12, 2011
Quick Update
This semester has been a whirlwind. I am working on so much in my four courses. This is a short list of what I am composing and will be posting after the end of the semester (Dec. 12)
-A 20 page paper on "Language Death" which will inspire my UG thesis on linguistic change and evolution of language
-A portfolio deviating from Form/Formlessness that includes: instruction manual, an epic (connected with UG thesis), signage, and lots more!
-Collage work including cut ups, neat images from advertisements, and much more
-Art History compare and contrast of Dali's Atmospheric Chair and Pollock's Greyed Rainbow
I am really excited to be finishing the book version of "Survivor's Encomium" and posting more images later in the season.
-A 20 page paper on "Language Death" which will inspire my UG thesis on linguistic change and evolution of language
-A portfolio deviating from Form/Formlessness that includes: instruction manual, an epic (connected with UG thesis), signage, and lots more!
-Collage work including cut ups, neat images from advertisements, and much more
-Art History compare and contrast of Dali's Atmospheric Chair and Pollock's Greyed Rainbow
I am really excited to be finishing the book version of "Survivor's Encomium" and posting more images later in the season.
Thursday, May 12, 2011
Final Project
Cheers to the last day of class tomorrow ! In order to complete my final project, I have chosen to create 20 books expanding my "Survivor" theme and give it a much different dynamic:
- There will be a dual narrative with juxtaposed themes, but very different moods. The book will be serious/memorial and read more humorous when flipped.
- Instead of colored drawings, I am using the class suggestion of black and white line drawings.
- I am going to sew the binding to give it a scrapbook/collage look!
I am really into this project. I found some awesome materials and I am loving the hands-on nature of this course and all the fun adventures of book-making! Book-making is certainly not an easy hobby but it allows creativity to roam in all sorts of directions. I have taken a lot of photos, so I hope to upload some later this evening after the sun sets. The warm rays are pouring into my window by my desk right now as the afternoon takes care of its business. I wanted to get my post up so my classmates can peer into my ideas and get an idea of what to expect tomorrow.
Not sure if I'm going to continue to roll with the title, "Survivor's Encomium" or rename it, this is something I'm still considering.
- There will be a dual narrative with juxtaposed themes, but very different moods. The book will be serious/memorial and read more humorous when flipped.
- Instead of colored drawings, I am using the class suggestion of black and white line drawings.
- I am going to sew the binding to give it a scrapbook/collage look!
I am really into this project. I found some awesome materials and I am loving the hands-on nature of this course and all the fun adventures of book-making! Book-making is certainly not an easy hobby but it allows creativity to roam in all sorts of directions. I have taken a lot of photos, so I hope to upload some later this evening after the sun sets. The warm rays are pouring into my window by my desk right now as the afternoon takes care of its business. I wanted to get my post up so my classmates can peer into my ideas and get an idea of what to expect tomorrow.
Not sure if I'm going to continue to roll with the title, "Survivor's Encomium" or rename it, this is something I'm still considering.
Wednesday, April 27, 2011
Proposal
It's been a while since I have posted a blog so here's a little catch up:
Book #3 was finished with lulu.com and another book, "Cento" simply titled was made and distributed to Quimby's. For the final project, I am going to reproduce "A Survivor's Encomium" into a special edition and interactive book. The edition will be 20. Each book will be handmade with copies inside as well and expand the theme of survival. My research is going to be focused on the interactive quality of the pages, where there will be pockets with additional info, fun folding, and flipped pages.
The most unique feature will be the hybrid narratives of the book. One side of the book will read more serious while the other is a humorous homage. The duality will expand on the encouraging memoir quality of the small stories as well as the humor that I have developed in the other minibook and zine. I am going to design the cover(s) and the page count will be: 12. The book will also have a scrapbook-like aesthetic because I am going to use different textures, colors, and materials.
Besides classroom distribution, I am going to also send this final production from class on to my usual receivers including my mom, friends Diane & Simone, and former professors.
Book #3 was finished with lulu.com and another book, "Cento" simply titled was made and distributed to Quimby's. For the final project, I am going to reproduce "A Survivor's Encomium" into a special edition and interactive book. The edition will be 20. Each book will be handmade with copies inside as well and expand the theme of survival. My research is going to be focused on the interactive quality of the pages, where there will be pockets with additional info, fun folding, and flipped pages.
The most unique feature will be the hybrid narratives of the book. One side of the book will read more serious while the other is a humorous homage. The duality will expand on the encouraging memoir quality of the small stories as well as the humor that I have developed in the other minibook and zine. I am going to design the cover(s) and the page count will be: 12. The book will also have a scrapbook-like aesthetic because I am going to use different textures, colors, and materials.
Besides classroom distribution, I am going to also send this final production from class on to my usual receivers including my mom, friends Diane & Simone, and former professors.
Thursday, March 31, 2011
Print on Demand pt. 1
Hello ! I am just checking in on the progress of the next project, which is the Print-on-demand book. I am ordering a perfect-bound, comic book sized paperback from lulu.com of my short story, "Swept." I illustrated 15 pages, and produced a humorous, and embellished fiction romance about a man who can't settle down in one place because he gets swept away as soon as he's comfortable.
As I am looking around at the blogs today, it seems like most of the class is a little behind in this project with deadlines and the timeline our teacher gave us, which is great for me because I found Spring Break was a little too short, and it's Spring semester so with all the colds/flus/allergies going around, I was under the weather and feeling ill slowed down my progress as well.
As soon as I have the pdf link available I will post it; however, seems like there may be a problem accessing lulu.com has a page that says "Access Restricted." Hmmm... I will have to explore that later, I'm off to my next course!
link:
www.lulu.com
As I am looking around at the blogs today, it seems like most of the class is a little behind in this project with deadlines and the timeline our teacher gave us, which is great for me because I found Spring Break was a little too short, and it's Spring semester so with all the colds/flus/allergies going around, I was under the weather and feeling ill slowed down my progress as well.
As soon as I have the pdf link available I will post it; however, seems like there may be a problem accessing lulu.com has a page that says "Access Restricted." Hmmm... I will have to explore that later, I'm off to my next course!
link:
www.lulu.com
Thursday, March 10, 2011
"A Survivor's Encomium:" The Zine Edition
All my classmates know, that for the zine project I expanded my minibook, "A Survivor's Encomium" to a 11 page zine. Thanks to the suggestion from our teacher!
Making a zine turned out a lot harder than I thought. Or how it looks! I had some challenges with margins, white space, putting together completely straight text, and printing. The overall result was: Room for improvement. There ended up being a typo on one page and no back cover because of the size of the paper. I couldn't figure out how to give a classy looking backcover since all the cardstock I could find is regular size.
For putting together the zine while ill it turned out pretty good. For distrobution, I exchanged zines with my colleagues and gave one to my teacher. My family ends up with a copy and I have two left over to give out. I am mailing one to the writer S.L. Wisenberg and to my former teacher, poet Simone Muench. For the next project, I am going to do a print-on-demand work. It's a longer work, that gets professionally published by lulu.com or another similar company.
My original thought it to send out after illustrating a short story I wrote and am fond of called, "Swept." It's a comedy/romance about a man who has a hard time staying in one place.
Making a zine turned out a lot harder than I thought. Or how it looks! I had some challenges with margins, white space, putting together completely straight text, and printing. The overall result was: Room for improvement. There ended up being a typo on one page and no back cover because of the size of the paper. I couldn't figure out how to give a classy looking backcover since all the cardstock I could find is regular size.
For putting together the zine while ill it turned out pretty good. For distrobution, I exchanged zines with my colleagues and gave one to my teacher. My family ends up with a copy and I have two left over to give out. I am mailing one to the writer S.L. Wisenberg and to my former teacher, poet Simone Muench. For the next project, I am going to do a print-on-demand work. It's a longer work, that gets professionally published by lulu.com or another similar company.
My original thought it to send out after illustrating a short story I wrote and am fond of called, "Swept." It's a comedy/romance about a man who has a hard time staying in one place.
Friday, February 25, 2011
Zine pt. 1
I am so sorry I almost forgot to blog about my zine project!! This is way late. Sorry groupers.
Surabhi suggested, helpfully, that I expand my mini "A Survivor's Encomium" to a 16-page zine. The mini was a little teaser, so I decided to heed her advice and go for it.
I have planned to use the same six people, draw them in black and white line drawings, and add narratives and other images.
For example, I will start with a Table of Contents and then for Otto Frank, I will describe his life and events that made him a Holocaust survivor.
Each other person I will add details about events each survived and add some quotes, song lyrics, or stories. At the end I am going to have a "resources" page that lists support groups, networks, e.g. and a bibliography.
It will be a more detailed and expansive project inspired by the minibook. So far, I have just done the mock up and gathered information. I will start the physical creation this weekend and post another blog with pictures.
Surabhi suggested, helpfully, that I expand my mini "A Survivor's Encomium" to a 16-page zine. The mini was a little teaser, so I decided to heed her advice and go for it.
I have planned to use the same six people, draw them in black and white line drawings, and add narratives and other images.
For example, I will start with a Table of Contents and then for Otto Frank, I will describe his life and events that made him a Holocaust survivor.
Each other person I will add details about events each survived and add some quotes, song lyrics, or stories. At the end I am going to have a "resources" page that lists support groups, networks, e.g. and a bibliography.
It will be a more detailed and expansive project inspired by the minibook. So far, I have just done the mock up and gathered information. I will start the physical creation this weekend and post another blog with pictures.
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