Sassy Doses of Imagination

Donna Con Cappello Verde

Weeping Woman with Handkerchief

  Artist Statement

For this project, I wanted to use technology to explore some of Picasso’s paintings.  I was always intrigued by the exaggerated features of his portraits and wondered what they would look like if the paint was replaced by skin textures and the faces’ features were slightly more accurate.  In each of my works, I did my best to keep the characteristics of the face. 

The painting by Picasso,  “Donna Con Cappello Verde,” was the first one used as I explored the best way to make the transformation.  I also experimented with the process of making a GIF, by slightly changing each picture until it produced a subtle movement of the face; a straight face, then a smile and straight-on stare,  back to a straight face.  At the end of the entire process I found that so much blending was needed of the face I originally made that it went back to looking like a painting, just with smoother surface and different colors.  After realizing this, I took another face from a photo and stretched it over the painting (and my blended base layer), and made it transparent enough to show only the texture.  Had I realized sooner that I would do this, a lot of time could have been saved that was instead used blending an accurate base layer.  Although I see some areas that could be improved, I am happy with the final product.  

Gramercy Park Hotel

Canard De Chaine

- oil, gesso, wood on velvet with banner, 126 x 96", 1989

Portrait of Tina Chow

- oil, plates, bond on wood, 72 x 60", 1987

Portrait of Jose Luis Ferrer

- oil, resin, enamel on canvas, 108 x 102", 1997

Barbara Bush Skipping Down The Champs Elysees

- Patinated bronze with oil paint, 12'11"X6'4"X3'10", 1989

  I do not like either videos, but I find Ed Atkin’s “Death Mask 3” more watchable than Michael Robinson’s  “The General Returns  From One Place to Another”.

The first time I saw either of these videos, I was not sure what was going on at all.  It was complete confusion.  In “The General Returns From One Place to Another,” I noticed that many of the clips were repeated, even though it was zoomed out or in or blurred in a different way, but did not understand the significance of it.  I still do not understand the significance of it.  Despite not understanding what was happening, I was still very intrigued. 

The text in the first video seems to be implying that beauty, such as nature and flowers, can be interpreted as something sinister.  I still do not understand why that segment is called “The General.”  I also noticed that each time the text appears, the screen was either blank or showed something that was not very beautiful, at least, to me.   The text eventually becomes overlapped and impossible to read, as if what the text is nonsense anyway.  The text is trying to explain beauty.  Maybe the point is that beauty cannot be explained, and thus the text is unimportant anyway.  Michael Robinson does write that he never really appreciated beauty.  Also, when he spoke of having to notice the beauty, like noticing flower in a field, the scene had a blank wall, as if a field of flowers that is not noticed might as well be someone sleeping, or be simply staring at a blank wall.

I do not understand the significance of the woman.  At first, she appears unconcerned and alone.  The second time the woman appears, she is distraught and seems scared and has a companion.  By the end of the video, the woman looks distraught and scared.  The companion does not react as harshly as she did to the sounds, but reacted nonetheless, which brings me to my next topic:  the soundtrack.

The soundtrack is interesting, and switches from something pleasant to something that is uncomfortable.  The uncomfortable parts sound like trees are crashing in a forest, just like the one the woman is in.  At the end, the video soundtrack brightens up as it blasts a loud and happy upbeat song.  The scenes that it shows are also brightened up, with clearer pictures and more sunlight.

  The second video, Ed Atkin’s “Death Mask,” has  clearer film than the first, but the message it still hazy.  The scenery becomes clearer as the video continues, but then is suddenly hazy and yellow.  I do not understand most of the scenes.  To me, the winding road in the fog represented something dangerous that brings death.  When the video flashes a scene the back of a man’s head, I had no idea what to think.  I still have no idea.  The woman on the beach represents something serene and calm, yet is hiding something negative.  It focuses so much on her, that when I child ran past the camera, I jumped.  The dogs barking in the background and the woman’s voice listing the time throughout the beach empty beach scenes made me uneasy.  I think that the change of the landscape’s colors foreshadowed a negative meaning.  The colors were mildly pleasant with sudden episodes of a harsh red that caught me off guard.  

Balloon Dog

Oil on canvas

102 x 143 inches

1995-1998

Gazing Ball (Antinous-Dionysus)

plaster and glass

2013

Puppy

486 x 486 x 256

Installations at arolsen 1992, sydney 1995-96, bilbao 1997 (permanent), new york rockefeller 2000, private collection (permanent)

1992

I think that it is absolutely ridiculous for anyone to sue anyone else over using original pieces of art or music.  In the photograph of Obama, the artist , Fairey, has clearly transformed it into a piece of art.  It is not the same photograph by any means, especially when it took two years to track down the original.  The colors are different, the composition is different, the shadows are different; almost everything is different except that it is a picture of Obama from the same angle.  If someone took a picture of Obama that happened to be at the same angle as by Garcia, should they be sued too?

Art is something that shows freedom of expression and pushes boundaries.  How are people supposed to be able to do that freely, when sharing pieces of art (like the original Obama photograph) to work with, becomes a tedious political argument?  In order for art to reach it’s full potential, I think that it should be free for anyone to use anything, with small amount of recognition and credit going to the originals.  And since I like to think about art as something of passion than money, I don’t think money should be discussed at all when it comes to crediting originals.  If someone makes a lot of money over a piece of transformed work, and the owner of the original didn’t, then too bad.  The newer version of the work must have had something more like-able to it, was released at a better time, or the artist had more connections.  Either way, the public likes it more and the original artist should just try again to spread their work.  

I feel that Gillis faces the same issue.  Like tangible art, music should not be heavily protected.  In order for more ideas to come about, the only thing that artists should have to worry about is the actual production of the art, not whether they will be sued for coming up with a great idea to use an original work in that was done by someone else, especially if the artist of the original work does not want to share.