Walking

"I think that I cannot preserve my health and spirits, unless I spend four hours a day at least--and it is commonly more than that--sauntering through the woods and over the hills and fields, absolutely free from all worldly engagements."

- Henry David Thoreau, from Walking (June 1862)

"When you're walking you notice things otherwise unseen--like mice in the fields--and you have to experience every step."

-Werner Herzog, from his discussion at UPenn (2007)

I have a confession to make--recently I've become addicted to walking. This habit was born from a gimmick I devised to get myself to exercise more: I decided that whenever I spoke on my cell phone I would go for a walk. I actually didn't realize how much time I spent on the phone until I realized how much I found myself walking.

It wasn't long after that that I became acutely aware of how anchored I felt by my stomach after meals. My newly named "digestive walks" cured this heaviness. Soon, after I accomplished anything--a reading, a writing, and/or an artwork--I thought, "I need to go for a walk to relax and clear my mind."

Sometimes, I got to jogging and felt this strange thing I'd only heard of before: "runner's high." A concept like this was alien to a person who had dreaded every stride of football practice in his adolescence. But here I was, racing along and feeling more connected to my human essence than through almost any other activity (we'll leave the champion of this hierarchy to the imagination). I thought, "Feral rabbits beware! I may be out for your blood so my tribe will have food tonight." Okay...so maybe I'm not Survivor Man just yet but I feel a little less wired and more inspired.

I've already had my share of run-ins with the police because of my new addiction. Recently I was actually pulled over for walking! A police officer stopped me and inquired about my name, my residence etc. and said that someone had ran out of the local diner the other night without paying and that my appearance fit the description! I thought I'd walked out of my house and into a Law and Order episode.

Pretty soon you may see me on Intervention (a TV show in which families intervene to save loved ones from drugs) with my sister saying, "Matt, walking isn't just hurting you it's hurting everyone you love. You need to come back to us! The neighbors don't like you pacing the streets at night."

Maybe I'll be like Chris McCandless or Forrest Gump and just keep going one day! See you all at Uarts later...or will I? (dramatic music please).

Pentimenti Preview/Early Review

Image taken from:

http://localephemera.blogspot.com/2007/07/real-bling-was-on-street.html

The new show at the Pentimenti Gallery doesn't officially open until next Friday but I've taken a peak and here's what I saw: David Ambrose's daedal works are less than engaging from a distance, but look a little closer and you'll find a porous, wavy web of colors. Ambrose pierces relatively thick paper in precise or wandering lines to create a braille-like texture (one of the works is titled "Braillescape" or something similar) before releasing watercolors upon the bumpy terrain, creating a nice balance between "control and chance." Art historically, the work immediately brings to mind Lucio Fontana's holey canvases:

Lucio Fontana Concetto Spaziale, La Fine di Dio

Oil on canvas, 1964. The Rachofsky Collection.
Image used with the courtesy of http://www.panachemag.com/Spring_07/TheBuzz/TheCollector/The_Collector.asp

Fontana's work, however, has more of a modernist "shock of the new" feel about it whereas Ambrose acknowledges and encourages a connection with the inherently "feminine and anonymous" history of knitting and lace-work rather than the "heroic and autographic" tendencies of painting and building (paraphrasing his own words). This aspect of his work makes it more inviting and warm than ambitious and exclusive (I'm aware that this argument can be made to support the mediocre over the great but that is not the case here--Ambrose's art is both average in appearance and superior in process and philosophy). Ambrose's work successfully commingles the trendy non-monumental world, the Yayoi Kusama school of repetition, and the increasingly prevalent "fine artist" fascination with craftwork.

On a Side Note: The works at Pentimenti are more painterly and less like classical patterns than the image above which is taken from a previous show.

Also showing at the Pentimenti Gallery is Matthew Kucynski's work:

Green Receptionist, Mixed Media, 36" x 36"

Used with the courtesy of http://www.poolartfair.com/pool_miami_05/exhibitors.html

Kucynski's particular blend of blatant sexuality and surrealistic strangeness isn't particularly intriguing and the "pop-up book" theme seems gimmicky. Most relief-styled, protruding, or distinctly shaped paintings have this problem because the three-dimensional accentuation exhibits a lack of faith in painting. However, his Technicolor Wizard of Oz tonality is charming and the obvious fun he had while envisioning these id-driven characterizations comes through the work.

Finally, head out to the Sam Quinn gallery (around 4500 Spruce...past UPenn) to see SUMFA alumnus Melinda Steffy's show if you haven't already.

Thanks for reading!
Matthew Parrish

First Friday at Vox Populi

Picture used with the courtesy of the Vox Populi Gallery

http://www.voxpopuligallery.org/

Magnetic Movie, by artists who call themselves "Semiconductor," is a squeaky, spastic, scientific digital animation (projected on a screen in a secluded dark room) of what magnetic fields and particle movements hypothetically look like (a video still can be seen in the picture above at the bottom right). The work could be viewed as "just" a glorified diagram of the potentiality of physics but it's an enthralling one. Part of what makes the video so enjoyable is that the graphic animations are contained in real environments. One watches neon magnetic fields expand and particles buzz, pop, and fire through what seems to be experimental laboratories. A highlight is when the "real space" seems to get caught in a matter 'quake, blurring the lines between the graphically altered and the actual.

I'm not one who usually likes to bring up the question "What category does it fit into?" but in this case, I can't deny the inquiry. Is it science or is it art (or both)? This dilemma reminds me of Eadweard Muybridge's stop-motion photographs from the late 1800's (which I learned about from Digital Currents: Art in the Electronic Age by Margot Lovejoy). Muybridge's photos are considered scientific but not science because it was revealed that he "freely edited" his photographic sequences for the sake of continuity.

Eadweard Muybridge The Horse In Motion. 1878
Used with the courtesy of http://www.math.yorku.ca/SCS/Gallery/images/muybridge_galloping_horse.jpg

Whereas the results from Jules-Étienne Marey's "phot-graphic gun" are considered hard science because they are precisely captured multiples without any post-production alterations. So, the distinction between what is and what is not science, according to this example, is a matter of whether or not the photographer's hand distorted the results. In the case of Magnetic Movie, the animations are based off of science but the results are creative interpretations. The artists took the blueprints for what particle movement and magnetic fields could look or sound like and pushed them into artistic territory.

There are two other video works at Vox but neither have the jolt of Magnetic Movie (not that I necessarily judged them comparitively, for they were all of different genres and it would be unfair...I'm just noting what I liked and didn't like). Nadia Hironaka and Matthew Suib's Black Hole is, simply put, disappointing (top right in the picture above). The room that Black Hole is in is more impressive than that of Magnetic Movie because it's larger and darker. The film seems to engulf the viewer which made the video, in part, live up to its name. However, the content is confused and the progression is suspect (images enter and reappear without registering).

I appreciate the chiaroscuro and some of the light play (they mesh with my video art aesthetic) but there was an attempt at a narrative that fails. I left thinking, "What was that?" After I exited the room, I found a gallery statement that discussed isolation (a favorite topic of mine), political metaphors, film noir, and cinematic conventions (so, there was an attempt at conveying meaning-- it wasn't meant to be a display of the destruction of information) but I didn't get any of that from the work (two people I watched the video with remarked on the division between the art and the statement as well).

Lauren Kelly's Big Gurl is shown on a tv screen hung on the wall in normal lighting (bottom left in the above picture). It's a stop-motion video with Barbie-like dolls that is difficult to sit through due to its inherent awkwardness but that is not the reason it's unsuccessful. It fails because its too "messagey." I don't discourage feminist messages, the truth is quite the contrary, but all the characters in this narrative are simply representations of sexist issues instead of being complex characters that we could connect with. All the men are over-the-top sleezeballs or morons trying to pick up attractive women. I'll admit that I didn't make it through the entire piece but I watched three "skits" and all three fall under this description (you could watch it for one minute and "get it"). In other words, take away the "I'm going to beat you over the head with my message" element and we're left with cleverly arranged backgrounds.

This blog is getting too long so, I'll wrap it up (I focused on video art because it's my medium but there are other works as well...Carl Baratta's paintings are fun--the middle right image in the top photo). In the end, Magnetic Movie is deeply affecting and certainly worth the trip.

Thanks for reading!

Maybe it was an April Fool's joke...?

Maybe, but maybe not. Fans of the hive mind (you know who you are...) will be delighted to read Mark A. Wilson's article at insidehighered.com, imaginatively titled Professors Should Embrace Wikipedia.

As a teacher who supports student research projects, I have some thoughts on it, but I would rather just get it out there for y'all to think about. Have fun.

More on critcism - at the movies

There was another little tidbit on the place of criticism in contemporary life in the New York Times on April 1 (Now on the endangered species list: Movie critics in print by David Carr).

Carr makes many interesting observations in the piece, but the one I most interested in about how journalistic criticism (as opposed to mob-criticism on the web) benefits products that the market is prone to overlook. Carr usefully reminds us that the cream doesn't always rise; it's often prevented from doing so by the enormous marketing of blockbusters that fills our collective field of vision. Journalistic criticism can direct attention to overlooked works with an authority that new media criticism has yet to obtain.

The article introduces other interesting topics to thrash out this summer in seminar, too. If, as it is commonly claimed, everyone's opinion of a work of art is of equal value (the "everyone's a critic" maxim), how should media outlets select regular critics for their publications? More to follow, but I wanted to put this out there for y'all.