Viva la Revolucion!

I went to the Museum of Contemporary Art in Downtown San Diego, near the Gaslamp district.  I was already stoked because it was free, but I was pleasantly surprised by the exhibition.  I'll be honest.  Before taking this class, I kind of thought that art, specifically modern art, would be either boring or just have little to no impact on me.  This was probably because the extent of my experience with modern art was the idea that anyone can make something " great" as long as they call it "art".  But the exhibit this time shattered my stereotypical preconception of art.  "Viva La Revolucion" was an intense display of the agony of social and political injustices all over the world.  The main areas focused on were the Latin American countries.  There was one in particular that ensnared my attention.  It was by a man named Stephan Doitschinoff (aka "Calma").  He was the son of a preacher in Brazil.  He grew to rebel against all the cultural, political, but mainly the religious influences of his area.  There was heavy evangelical pressure where he lived.  He rejected all of this and embraced the punk and street art culture.  This particular piece was an interactive installation.  It looked like the inside of a church.  You could walk right up to the altar, and right in front of it is that cushion that you kneel on when you pray (hassock?).  Surrounding you on all sides are Bibles, open to pages with what looked like Latin writing on them, and marked with a red ribbon.  There was also similar writing on the front and back walls, where there were exquisitely detailed, yet almost depressing images painted with acrylic and spray paint.  Behind you, if you face the altar, there is a naked woman standing on a snake with a scroll in it's mouth.  One of her bony ankles has a cross painted on it, whereas the other has a hangman's noose and structure.  On her knees there are cartographer's compasses, and on her left forearm you see factories.  Her right bicep shows a cross atop a globe or perhaps an atom, and the cross is being blown off by what looks like lightning. Her other bicep features a grim reaper's scythe piercing through the head of a person kneeling with a Bible in hand.  There is a large Bible painted across her chest with a ram lying on top of it.   Her heart is in her throat, and there are red tears streaming from her eyes.  I am not quite worldly, or wise enough to recognize and interpret many of the symbolic pictorial references, but I did see a black swan on her exposed intestines.  If I understood that right, what I remember from a World History class is that in the 16th century, the English believed that swans could only be white, given that only white one's were native to the areas they had explored.  But when they explored Australia, they came across black swans, an impossibility to them.  Since this revelation, the "Black Swan Theory" has been used to explain singular events of extreme rarity that have an enormous cultural or religious impact, and can revolutionize the mindset of the whole world.  A Black Swan can change everything, from the understanding of historical events to aspects of our own personal lives. On the woman's womb there appears to be a church painted, which, along with the snake,  I believe symbolizes the focus of the piece.  I think this is a protest of the church.  I believe that Calma has witnessed horrible things about the Church that you would not believe for a second... because it's the Church!  I think Calma wants us to look into the dealings of the Church objectively, without the expectation that they are all only doing good.  If what we find shatters our expectations, it would indeed change everything about how we think and how we view history.  Viva La Revolucion!

San Diego Museum of Contemporary Art

Pedro Alonzo, David Ellis and Roberto Lange talk about Ellis and Lange’s new, contained Kinetic Trash Sculpture

I was drawn to this piece because of the music that it makes. It blends is so well with your surroundings that at first you don't really know that something is making music. It took me a while to realize what exactly is making the music. The trash can is filled with actual trash  and is tucked away in a corner so at first glance you think its a real trash can. The music is symbolic for the "rhythm of the streets". The natural sounds of the everyday life and the rhythm of the streets.  To me its made for the urban youth walking down the street listening to music or enjoying the natural rhythm of the streets.Below are other photos from the exhibit that i really liked.

The Museum of Man Visit…

The Museum of Man Visit was quite a learning adventure. I have lived in San Diego my whole life and I have to admit that I had not visited any of the museums in Balboa Park since my fieldtrips form elementary school.

Aside from the gorilla displays I was really drawn to the Paleolithic art pieces. I remembered that on the first day of class I had commented on Venus of Willendorf because that was one of the art pieces that I remembered from elementary school. I was very young when I was first exposed to this piece of art to understand the true meaning and appreciate the creativity of this specific piece.

Venus of Willendorf, c. 24,000- 22,000 BCE, measuring 4 3/8 inches, and it is made of limestone. This mini statue depicts a women with exaggerated parts of her body. "The genital area would appear to have been deliberately emphasized with the labia of the vulva carefully detailed and made clearly visible, perhaps unnaturally... combined with her large breast and the roundness of her stomach, suggests the subject of the sculpture is female procreativity and nurture." Venus of Willendorf has been known for centuries to be some sort of fertility idol.

I found Venus of Willendorf different and interesting because for us it is considered art but centuries ago it served like a talisman for women who wanted to conceive (or so it is believed by many). Overall, my visit to the museum and the whole class in general (Art 151) opened my eyes to a whole new dimension of art appreciation. I am really grateful and happy for all that I have learned in this short period of time. Best of luck to all.

Preschool Art Gallery!

I hope you guys enjoy my silly face! :-)

I work at a preschool. I didn't think it would be appropriate to name the school that I work at so it will remain nameless. (I made sure to tell Lara where I found this piece though.) :-) For the past six months, the school held an art gallery displaying the children's work. The school is designed to be an art gallery. The halls are tiwce the size of other halls and we have wires coming down form the top to hold the canvases. Later on this school year, lights will be installed so that people can enjoy the art gallery at night. I'm so exicted to see the project move forward!

The pience that I chose for thie particular assignment was by a boy named Colin. He's four years old. He called this piece "Ladybug". The reason why I was drawn to this pience because at first glance, I thought it was a submarine in water. When I looked closer, I saw that he had labeled it a ladybug. The colors he used sare so different than what an actual ladybug has. It reminds me of works done during the Fauvist era. The colors that are used are so vibrant and different than the norm.

Children's art is so interesting because children do not care about pleasing the audience. They just want to create. Children are very creative and tend to not abide by the "rules." Above all, their works seems to be unintentional but speaks so mucha bout the artist. COlin knows the colors of a ladybug, but he still chose to use different shades to blue to represent his ladybug. By him creating this piences, it's a reminder that art is and should not be held down by rules. Artists are encouraged to think outside the box!

The art pieces that were used for this art show were created by the chidlren and up for auction to the public. Anyone was allowed to view and purchase the canvases. However, in this particular case, the parents were the ones who purchased it. When they saw it, they were so impressed and wanted to keep the canvas for memory. Since children get such satisfaction by pleasing adults, I believe that Colin created this art for his teachers to be impressed.

M.C.A.S.D

For my museum visit I chose to go to the Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego Downtown. The name of the exhibition during my visit was Viva la Revolucion: A Dialogue with the Urban Landscape. The artwork I was drawn to was Untitled, by Dr. Lakra, and is India ink on wall. The initial reason I was drawn to it was because of its size, as it occupies a very large portion of one of the walls in the main gallery. There’s a lot going on in this piece and found myself in front of it examining for about three times as long as any other of the works. When looking at it closer you begin to notice all the symbols and different scenes, and you begin to wonder if they are somehow related or connected. The images seem to vary greatly, some being very violent in nature, while others express more of a soft or gentle feeling. Some of the images remind me of a lot of Kara Walker’s work; white background with black figures. It’s kind of hard to tell what the image professes to say since it a surreal piece but I do notice that the eyes seem to draw attention and it does contain a lot of different women, so I think it’s made for women and that could be a reason I don’t know the message it’s trying to get across. I think it was made just for this exhibition and because of the images in it, I would say it was intended for an older audience. All in all I really liked it, as well as the rest of the show, it was waaaay better than their previous exhibition but i still look forward to my next visit. I didn't receive a ticket since i went with my class but i included a picture of the museum’s sticker they give you while you’re there.

Cristal Ochoa: Gallery Visit

Cristal Ochoa: Gallery Visit: "I visited the CJ Gallery located on 343 4th Ave. San Diego, CA 92101. The artist I chose is Mirang Wonne. The title of her artwo..."

Kevin's Museum visit went like this...

This is me standing next to a painting which i thought was pretty awesome.




Quince, Cabbage, Melon, and Cucumber
by Juan Sanchez Cotan



I went to visit the local San Diego Art Museum and I was attracted to the painting Quince, Cabbage, Melon, and Cucumber by Juan Sanchez Cotan. What really catches my attention from this piece must be the dark background in contrast to the actual objects. Also, I love the way the colors are set to give a three-dimensional feel and how I can tell how the light hits each vegetable. Something interesting I wondered about was the fact that the artist, Juan Sanchez Cotan, had intentionally painted some vegetables hanging from a mere string. It’s not very realistic in the sense of the event, yet the items in the image are very realistic

I developed interest in the still-life canvas painting known as Quince, Cabbage, Melon, and Cucumber by Juan Sanchez Cotan because I loved the way it appeared simple, yet it had a greater meaning to it. I found this painting in a religious section of the museum and I wondered why it belonged there. I learned that this painting came from Spain (Toledo and Granada), around 1602, where still-life painting was almost nonexistent in European art before the 1590s. The artist Sanchez Cotan was one of the first great practitioners of the art style. This work was universally known as his masterpiece because it was brilliantly executed as natural and simplistic. It holds a mysterious peacefulness in which the objects are positioned in a perfect curve and are placed in front of a plain black background. On the other hand, the meaning of the image is believed to be a pure painting exercise that is a straightforward depiction of vegetables in a cold cellar. Furthermore, some people actually believe that the picture holds religious meaning and it should be noticed as a celebration of God’s most modest creations. To support this claim, Sanchez Cotan gave up his possessions and joined a Carthusian monastery sometime after painting the canvas.

Contemporary Art Museum Visit

Visiting the Contemporary Art Museum in downtown San Diego, street art was one of the main exhibition. Particularly Akay, a Swedish street artist, had his work influenced by graffitti. One of his work called "Robo-Rainbow" was partially complex piece of work. This work consists of a machine that can paint a perfect rainbow arc on any given surface. What's interesting is that the machine is remote-controlled and that the spray cans are released simultanelously. This piece of artwork was constructed entirely from strach and utilizes the modern function of an electric motor for it to work. This particular work was also one of the prominent pieces displayed, since it was based on graffitti.

Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego - Downtown

For the museum trip, I decided to go to The Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego in downtown. The exhibit displayed the pieces of some well known "street artists" such as Banksy, Shepard Fairey, and Vhils.

The art piece that I found especially interesting was Scratching the Surface (2010) by Portuguese artist, Alexandre Farto aka Vhils.

Vhils is relatively a young artist. He gained prominence when his work of a face carved into a wall appeared alongside a picture by street artist Banksy at the Cans Festival in London in 2008. A photograph of him creating the work appeared on the front page of The Times. He was later given space to show his work by Banksy's agent, Steve Lazarides. Several of his works were featured in Outsiders, a collection of street art published by Century, 2008.

Scratching the Surface is a stenciled relief that is sculpted into a brick wall with plaster and white paint. This is a fine example of the type of work that Vhils is known for, stencil graffiti.

Stencil graffiti makes use of a paper, cardboard, or other media to create an image or text that is easily reproducible. The desired design is cut out of the selected medium and then the image is transferred to a surface through the use of spray paint or roll-on paint. The process of stenciling involves applying paint across a stencil to form an image on a surface below. Sometimes multiple layers of stencils are used on the same image to add colors or create the illusion of depth.

Vhils takes this art style to another level by taking the stencil and carving it directly into the surface of the wall. This makes the process take a little longer but adds a whole new aesthetics to graffiti art.

I chose this piece because of the craftsmanship of the actual piece. It astonishes me how much detail that Vhils can create just my varying the different thicknesses of the plaster. Ultimately Vhils creates the shadows and highlights of the face through a minimum of three visible layers: the white paint, the gray plaster, and the red brick.

I applaud Vhils and all of the other artists of this exhibit.

Museum visit by Juan Jose Atilano

I went to the Timken Museum at Balboa Park for my gallery visit. They have good exhibitions and the best of all is that is free. The painting that really got my attention was titled, "Torment of St. Anthony" (Oil on panel), at first instance reminded me of Hieronymus Bosch. This painting was made by an Italian named Giovanni Girolamo Savoldo; he used very good contrast in each side of the piece. Painting a peaceful landscape on the left side with a blue cloudy sky, green hills giving a sense of tranquility; on the other side, a very dark and reddish panorama. The ground of hell burning and making the sky so red with all those little creatures chasing St. Anthony, crossing from one side to the other is what I find the most interesting in this painting. It is said that St. Anthony gave his wealth to the poor and lived his life as a hermit.

Those little demons and the dark landscape are the points that make similar the paintings from this artist and the one from Bosch. Also both paintings have like three separations. Bosch divided his painting into three pieces, that is why is called a triptic; on the other hand, we can see the divisions in Savoldo's painting with the green landscape, the stone in the middle, and the hell scene on the right side.

Over all I found this piece the most interesting of the gallery. I really like the flowing of the picture from one side to the other. The contrast of colors, the contrast of size on the characters, and also on the architecture in each landscape. I really enjoyed the visit to the museum; I am going to do this more often.

Timken Museum

I visited the Timken Museum in Balboa Park and the piece I was drawn to is called An American Ship in Distress, painted by Thoams Birch in 1941. I was mainly drawn to this piece due to the realism and texture of the entire painting. The ocean and wave look so real you can feel like collision as it batters this ship. I believe the image professes to show the struggle of a ship and the measures it must take in order to recover and hold down the stability of its vessel. This viewpoint is shown to show Americas struggles and our overcoming of them, especially at sea and in the early wars. I do not believe the painting was commissioned but instead created to portray a message from the artist. Everyone can be drawn to this painting due to its broad charateristic and relativity. I admire the struggles of our country and the respect artists pay to our nature, the beauty and dynamic characteristic it brings to the art world.

My visit to the Timken Museum!

For my museum visit I decided to visit the Timken Museum. It was my first time visiting and I was really pleased with everything I got to see today. The painting I chose was Lovers in the Park by Francois Boucher. I was especially drawn to this piece because I automatically recognized the Rococo style of the painting which I really liked. To have the opportunity to experience seeing a Rococo painting in person really brings to life everything that we learned in class such as the soft brushstrokes and colors that are involved in the Rococo style. I decided to test my skills and try to get a meaning out of the painting on my own. From my first few glances I took in that the couple on the right had wealthy looking clothing so they much have been aristocrats. To the right, there is another woman walking by and it seems the man is smirking in a flirtatious way to her while his girlfriends stares into space. I also noticed that there were two statues above them of babies and they seemed to be aware of what was going on in the picture as they looked down at the couple. I felt the statues were a symbol of innocence since they were babies and there is also a dog with the couple which I thought was a symbol of loyalty. I figured the image professed to say that men at that time were powerful and wealthy, and could get away with having more than one woman as their wives or girlfriends absentmindedly looked away, although you can tell the girlfriend in the painting seems a bit uneasy with the situation. I figured it was for the male gaze since the women attire was provocatively buttoned down and showed off their bust. Later, I decided to spend 3 dollars on one of those listening gadgets which supply you with more information on the painting. It turns out that the painting is Boucher's way of commenting on the endless game of love. "It invites the viewer to dream awhile" it continued to say and it successfully did that for me. I felt like I had stepped in a dreamy Rococo world. My imagination was running wild with thoughts of what happened next. Did the girlfriend say something to him? Did the milkmaid (the woman to the right) keep walking or stop to chat? I mean this guy's girlfriend weaved him a wreath of flowers after all, how is he going to blatantly flirt with the milk maid?! Right?! haha.

Anyways, I came to the conclusion that the image professes to say that love is an innocent game. It seemed to portray the daydream on an aristocratic male and I believe the audience is surely for the wealthy to view, primarily males, because it was made to decorate the Salon. I'm not exactly sure who it was commissioned for but with further information from that handy gadget I did find out that he was Madame de Pompadour's favorite artist, Louis XV's mistress, and he was appointed in 1765 to be the First Painter to the King. Lovers in the Park was made in 1758.

CICATRICES DE LA FE: Museum Visit to EL CUBO

For the Museum Visit I chose El Cubo, part of CECUT (http://www.cecut.gob.mx/) or Tijuana Cultural Center. Normally the cost for the whole museum goes from 3 to 5 dollars (or even less), but it is completely free if you go on Sunday; so if you guys have the opportunity to go on Sunday take the time to ask at the reception desk about the free passes.

The main exhibition, taking part in the first and second halls, was “Scars of Faith: The Art of the Northern Missions of New Spain, 1600-1821”.

I was particularly drawn to this piece because, just at the end of the exhibition, visitors were shown a video about the restoration of the top part of “Retablo pintado de la Virgen de Guadalupe y sus apariciones” (Painted Retable of the Guadalupe Virgin and her apparitions). According to the team working on the restorations —people from el Antiguo Colegio de San Idelfonso and other participating individual conservators— it is easy to identify the period of the painting just by knowing the color of the base: pure white during the 16 century; red during seventeenth and eighteenth century; and white, along with other variations, is found during the nineteenth century.

The artist appears as Anonymous Novo-Hispanic, and the retable is dated circa 1760. During that time period, portable altarpieces were in high-demand, and most of them were commissioned by Franciscan or Jesuits orders to artist workshops from central New Spain.

The image by itself is presented as an account of the Virgin of Guadalupe’s miraculous apparitions to San Juan Diego: the whole retable is a testimony of faith for both missionaries and converses. This point of view is claimed easier thanks to the life-size of the pictures depicted; which served the purpose of the missionaries (often Franciscans or Jesuits) that traveled the New Spain. Very often this paintings and sculptures were considered miraculous, since they were supposed to protect Christians, and also because they sustained the missions and helped to convert the Amerindians, whom integrated this images into their own worldviews since they included the feminine and masculine forces that governed life, and the use of sacred images was not so foreign to the indigenous population of the northern part of New Spain.

These retables were also meant to bring temporal and spiritual relief to the collective due to the trauma of colonization lived by the northern states of what now is know as Mexico (Chihuahua, Chihuahua in the case of this piece).

I hope that someone decides to pay this exhibition a visit, specially due to its strong religious and historical context.

Good luck on your finals,

Miriam Puente.

Museum visit Downtown SD. by David Reyes

For my museum visit I went to the museum of contemporary art in Downtown San Diego for the Viva la Revolucion: A Dialogue with the Urban Landscape exhibition. I am a huge contemporary street/urban art enthusiast so to find out that some of the biggest names in the game were having a show in San Diego, not to mention the fact that they did pieces all around downtown was incredibly exiting news to hear. As soon as I walked in I saw a 2010 untitled piece by Os Gemeos (the twins) Gustavio and Otavio Pandolfo two Brazilian street artists from that do pieces that make you feel as if you’re in a dream. Yellow skin, oval eyes, Brazilian folklore and faces hidden all through the painting are some of the main characteristics they bring in all their work. In this piece as in most of their museum work they utilize more of a sculptural aspect to their work making it more interactive with the audience, for instance this piece had two small doors that you could open (when the guard wasn’t looking). I saw this piece more as a family portrait with the mother as the lighthouse watching over you and lighting your way and the father being on top of you making sure you do not overdo it. The woman in reception didn’t know if it was commissioned so I couldn’t find that out but as to the audience, because of their carnival-like style, the audience is anyone (young and old, rich and poor). Which is one of the many reason why I am such a huge fan of these two brilliant artists. Overall my visit to the museum was amazing, I’ve always wanted to go to one of the “big shows” that I see only in pictures on my monitor.

Museum visit

For the museum visit, I went to the San Diego museum of art. A painting that really intrigued me was Francis Luis Mora's painting "Morning News" 1912 oil on panel. I really liked this piece a lot because of the way the how simple the coloring is and the whole early 1920's/Victorian style is just something I really adore.(Bowler hats, aww yeah!)
I also love how the colors of both light and dark are played with (Mostly the blue,greens,reds and oranges) are really well played in this piece. The details of how the oils were played in this painting is really amazing!
The painting was inspired by Mora's visit to New York and venturing in the subway one morning. How people would just lean over and get a glimpse of the newspaper when someone else is reading it.The painting wasn't commissioned but was more of a personal piece for Mora.
There were tons of other paintings around the museum that were really beautiful, but this small painting really caught my eye the moment I saw it.

Oh here's my ticket too. I couldn't take a picture of myself since my camera ran out of battery.>:(

Museum Visit

For the museum visit I visited the San Diego Museum of art. The painting that I studied was of the painting by Diego Rivera, The Hands of Dr. Moore. (Oil on canvas, 1940. Bequest of Mrs. E. Clarence Moore, 1970.) the reason I was drawn to this piece was well first of all it is Diego Rivera and like always his painting are strange yet captivating. Unfortunately there was no one there to provide information but from what I could gather was that the painting is a surrealist-inspired work in which the surgeon holds a sponge and scalpel, preparing to slice into a stylized anatomical image of veins, recast as a “tree of life.”...should be seen in the context of Rivera’s long interest in medical practice and especially surgery, which he related to his own “practice". He seems to be creating a painting that tries to captivate the importance and admiration of what doctors can do for individuals as well as society. Many believe that the tree in the painting represents society and the hand of the doctor represents the people and how society must purify itself to keep on living. Over all I thought this was the most interesting if not most eye catching painting I found.

also here is the receipt of my online ticket purchase to attend the museum sorry its long but this was the only way I could upload it.

Nov 28, 2010 13:24:43 PST Transaction ID: 8BC66582LW387205V Hello Erik Romero, You sent a payment of $10.00 USD to Secure Access Colo Inc (btorders@bitsoup.org) It may take a few moments for this transaction to appear in your account. Merchant Secure Access Colo Inc btorders@bitsoup.org Instructions to merchant You haven't entered any instructions. Description Unit price Qty Amount San Diego Museum of Art $8.00 USD 1 $8.00 USD Subtotal $8.00 USD Total $8.00 USD Payment $8.00 USD Charge will appear on your credit card statement as "PAYPAL *SECURECOLO" Payment sent to btorders@bitsoup.org Issues with this transaction? You have 45 days from the date of the transaction to open a dispute in the Resolution Center. Questions? Go to the Help Center at: www.paypal.com/help. Get verified – Pay from your bank account and you're 100% protected against unauthorized payments sent from your PayPal account. Log in and click the Unverified link below your name. FOR INTERNATIONAL PAYMENTS ONLY Commissions and Fees incurred by sender: $0.00 Rate of Exchange: The above exchange rate includes a 2.5% spread above the wholesale exchange rate at which PayPal obtains foreign currency, and the spread is retained by PayPal. If and when the Recipient chooses to withdraw these funds from the PayPal System, and if the withdrawal involves a currency conversion, the Recipient will convert the funds at the applicable currency exchange rate at the time of the withdrawal, and the Recipient may incur a withdrawal fee. RIGHT TO REFUND You, the customer, are entitled to a refund of the money to be transmitted as a result of this agreement if PayPal does not forward the money received from you within 10 days of the date of its receipt, or does not give instructions committing an equivalent amount of money to the person designated by you within 10 days of the date of the receipt of the funds from you unless otherwise instructed by you. If your instructions as to when the money shall be forwarded or transmitted are not complied with, and the money has not yet been forwarded or transmitted, you have a right to a refund of your money. If you want a refund, you must mail or deliver your written request to PayPal at P.O. Box 45950, Omaha, NE 68145-0950. If you do not receive your refund, you may be entitled to your money back plus a penalty of up to $1,000.00 USD and attorney's fees pursuant to Section 1810.5 of the California Financial Code. Important Note: The Right to Refund claim process applies only to payments that have not been successfully transmitted to the recipient. With PayPal, almost all payments are transmitted to the recipient immediately, except for eCheck payments, and payments to non-PayPal members. Please do not file a Right to Refund claim if your payment has already been completed. If you have problems with a completed payment or need assistance settling a dispute with a seller, log in to your account and clickResolution Center at the top of the page. You can also click Help at the top right of any PayPal page for more information about the Resolution Center and filing complaints. MA residents only: PayPal holds a Foreign Transmittal Agency license in the State of Massachusetts - License Number FT3345. Please do not reply to this email. This mailbox is not monitored and you will not receive a response. For assistance, log in to your PayPal account and click Help in the top right corner of any PayPal page. To receive email notifications in plain text instead of HTML, log in to your PayPal account and go to your Profile to update your settings. PayPal Email ID PP120