The Beatnik Generation

Well this class was definitely one for the books.  I have to say I was most excited to learn about the 1960s relating to art and culture, but wasn't prepared for the extreme intensity and rule-breaking passion that was behind these artists.  It is unfortunate how drug induced the beatnik culture was.  Although these mind-altering substances could be said to have played a big part in the creation of artwork that was created by geniuses like Andy Warhol and Yves Klein, it was also what killed most of these brilliant artists and caused them to hurt themselves in ways they wouldn't have otherwise.

I find it truly fascinating the way Andy Warhol made his artwork and the recurring theme that can be find throughout them.  His vision of pop culture, media, advertising, and pure consumerism was truly brilliant for that time period.  He took these negative societal trends and embraced them to make his art relatable and ground breaking.

Yves Klein's fire paintings were truly magnificent as well.  The way he would use the creation of these pieces as performance art was definitely a first for that time period.  He displayed the human body in a new and beautiful way, one which had never been done before.

Gilbert and George were extremely comical.  I am still a little confused by their perception of art and how it was perceived back then, but I found them to be very innovative and funny.

As for the brief moment we touched on the Vienna Aktionists... I had nightmares.  The Otmar Bauer vomit film was disgusting and the idea of a man cutting his penis and bleeding to death on a stage for art baffles my mind.  That is way over the edge and breaks a few too many boundaries in my book.

Bauhaus

Thank goodness for the Bauhaus era!  Honestly without it we would be in such a different place in art, architecture, and design.  The whole evolution of typography really interests me as well.  I can't imagine a world without different fonts and use of space other than linear to write letters.  The photo of the chair I uploaded above is an example of the Bauhaus furniture, and believe it or not my father has that chair!  He also has several other related pieces that I can definitely see coming from this time period.  Being an artist, everything he owns exudes art in every way so this doesn't surprise me.

As for the film we watched at the end of class.  HOLY CRAP!  I definitely had nightmares after that.  It was extremely disturbing, but also had a huge impact on viewers of the terrible effects of drugs and self-mutilation.  I feel like I really need to watch the rest of that to get a grip on what we were seeing.

William Burroughs was also extremely influential.  His ides of the "Cut-Ups" is truly brilliant.  He clearly saw all the flaws in society and had no problem expressing them through his words.  Everything he did seems to be politically and societally-related in some way.  He had no fear and changed the world, one word at a time.

Grid Assignment

This is my grid assignment.  I used the netting sac you buy oranges in as my grid, and took a picture of it on top of an orange folder as a background so you can see the image of the face better.  I used sharpies and paint to create the image of a female face on the netting.  She has full, slightly opened lips, eyebrows, eyes with blue irises, and freckles on her cheeks.  I found the most difficult part of this assignment to be the initial task of finding an actual grid to work with.  I also tried to be extremely precise when creating the face on the grid.  I used rulers and even counted the spaces on the netting to be more exact when drawing each feature.  I think it came out OK, but I now wish I had created an actual background for the piece myself to better enhance it and make it easier to see the image.

Pong and PacMan and Tank, Oh My!

Before the creation of these fabulous games that I still, to this day, would chose to play over any modern day game, was the invention of the computer.  The census was what initially sparked the need for a device that would be able to compute mass amounts of numbers with flawless mathematic equations.  This resulted in the creation of the first, most primitive of computers, known as the Tabulating Machine.  Next, World War II sparked the next generation in computers.  This was created in order to break German Nazi code through radio airwaves.  Next came ENIAC and then UNIVAC.  Although this is the dumbed-down version of the evolution of the computer, it is what later led to the invention of interactive video games.

Pong was one of the very first of these primitive video games.  Initially it was played using a plastic monitor consisting of a grid that was taped onto the screen to simulate a playing field.  This later led to the integration of this playing field being programmed directly into the game,  gradually becoming what it is today.  This led to more modern and updated video games that we see and use now.

The creation of a virtual enemy first began in Space Invaders and sparked the platform for the majority of games now used.  Because of the massive popularization of these games, people, especially kids, became utterly obsessed.  Society and even the government began to get worried and attempted to control the situation by setting curfews and local laws. Just another situation that the government saw fit to monitor and attempt to take total control of.