Advanced Sculpture, 2014

Summaries of Four Art Events

Justin Masterson

Dr. Scheer

Art events

1.

I attended Shannon Rafferty’s SMP presentation during the SMP presentations this spring.  SHannon described her process as well as her influences throughout her art making during the SMP.  I was very interested to see Ms. Rafferty’s presentation because I really enjoy her artwork as a whole and I knew this from the first show fall semester. Something that surprised me initially during the talk was the fact that her works at least for the spring semester were landscapes.  They are very abstract takes with a very specific color palette which is a strength in her work.  Another interesting thing i found after learning that was observing one of her landscapes from our home county.  Being able to mentally place the scene she painted I could admire how the landscape was presented by the artist.

Shannon uses a variety of ways to apply her color which is another thing I thought was very strong about her work.  I thought it was interesting how she did blind contours of the landscape with painters tape then painted over it to make a hard edge line that reflected the white canvas underneath.  Shannons level of abstraction is an excellent quality of her work in my opinion. I have found myself getting into abstract art more and more and I really dig how aggressive some of her paintings can turn out. I also like how she can create something that is not aggressive and very aesthetically pleasing in color and abstract form.  These are two things i strive to create in my art and where i am not sure if I can call her an influence I feel that her work is sort of like what I aim to create in sculpture in an abstract way involving shape and color and contrast.

2.

The life after graduation talk was very overwhelming.  Even though I feel I have improved my work ethic I feel I have a lot more progress to make in working hard in light of the information presented at the talk.  The panel consisted of of St. Mary’s art professors experts in various mediums and diverse in their respective paths to success. Internships were stressed as they usually are. Professors presented ways you could work internships into a senior year as well as how the faculty could help attain internship opportunities.  Another topic presented was grad school, I am not very interested in grad school at this time and it was good to hear that I should not just go to grad school based on not knowing what to do.  The packet of art jobs available was also reassuring because it presented a lot of jobs that I could potentially get. Another topic I found interesting was the idea of trying to get a fellowship.  It was presented that these are very hard to get and I think that it is just all the more reason to try and produce the best work i can next year.  

I think the most beneficial part of this talk was the urgency to be proactive and active as soon as possible.  There are not many jobs out there so I feel in light of this talk you really have to want something more than everyone else and do the best you can. This is something I can believe in in myself.  As I sat there a little scared I hope to learn as much as i can from all of the staff here at St. Mary’s and make my professors proud seeing as they are experts with a lot of success in the art world it would mean the world if the work I produced exceeded their expectations.

3.

Heather Latent is a very socially conscious artist who came to our school and gave a talk.  Her art is kind of interactive in a lot of ways in which is responsive to communities of many sizes.  Her first project she presented was a memorial piece.  She plotted the cites of all the homicides from the more impoverished half of the city then flipped them on a map to the more economically privileged half of the city.  Using these coordinates she placed flower memorials on all of these sites without invading any private property laws. The response from some was alarming in that some people reacted very negatively.  The overall positive response however issued a second artwork that had the entire community create a mountain of toys to commemorate the homicides resulting in death of children.  This was a unique memorial that brought the community together in sentiment and in art.  Latent also reached out to the global community when she sent cards in clear envelopes to all nations apologizing for any harm the US had caused in the pursuit of it’s own personal gain.  While many did not write back she did get a few responses meaning her voice had an impact in at least some minor way.  More in the sense of thinking about the global community, her work in protesting drones seemed very moving.  In one similar to her memorial piece she flipped the coordinates of drone bombings onto America and took pictures at those specific places during a given day.  I found the images of a wedding party and someone grieving at a tombstone to be the two most tragic. It really put into perspective the inhumane damage drones can cause and in that way it was a very powerful piece. Latent touched on artistic issues that embodied the suffering of others and in that she found true value that went even farther than the art she produced.  Her art produces actions as a result of it’s exhibition and I find this very admirable.  I would like to be able to use some of the motifs in her work to evoke such strong feeling as she does just like any other artist would.

4.

I attended the senior SMP art show which took place in both the gallery and the annex.  This show was very diverse as far as content and mediums but it was cool to see how each senior went in a different direction.  Especially after going to all the shows and being with these seniors in class it was very interesting to see the artistic culmination of their growth.  I grew to be friends with each of them in some way so that also made me very happy.  Each final project was excellent in content and execution.

Some that stood out to me were SHannon Rafferty’s, Rachel Heis, The guy with the cartoons, Anuli’s and Paige’s.  I really respected the amount of work put into the animation and the storyline.  I also thought Gipetto was actually funny in a lot of ways and all the voices coincided with the characters.  After working with digital art in class this year i can understand that it takes a lot of work and patience. Rachel’s spans the entire wall and I was previously unaware at how good she was at portraiture.  Her portrayal was very interesting.  It was nice to see a timeline of all her sort of photograph memories. It was very personal.  Anuli’s was a performance piece that i could really comprehend and also for some reason I got a little choked up during the performance.  This was probably because I was thinking about how this was a culmination of work a lot of seniors had been doing.  Paige’s was so interesting because we had talked about it so much.  From what she and I had talked about I could have never imagined it to look anything like it did and I thought it was a great installation which Paige is really into.  Finally, Shannon’s work is so cool to me I am just in love with it.  I have always enjoyed her work and her final compositions were remarkable in my opinion.  I really enjoy her style of work and think it is so interesting.