NU and Blane St. Croix

NU
       It’s just possible that a great professor of MCA, Kevin Mitchell, has just opened a gallery this February First! The gallery NU, features current contemporary artists and is located on 2577 Broad Ave, Memphis. The opening on the first was a great success holding a one-night show,  Co LAB -­A Collaborative Experiment.  Feel free to check it out or go to the website; www.nugallery.net 

                         

         Blane De St. Croix visited MCA last Thursday taking time to visit both the afternoon IPC class and also lecture at seven-­‐thirty that same night in the auditorium. As an artist he works both in sculpture and two dimensions, creating massive and impressive landscapes that focus primarily on the conflict between ecology, politics, and the human race. St. Croix has found that creating sculptures is a way for him to enter and surround himself with his work in a real and tangible way. His sculptures are located all over the world including Mexico, Afghanistan and South Korea. I was very blessed to hear him both in class as a teacher and at the lecture as a professional artist. His wise words to the students and myself that afternoon impacted me in a strong way. He advised students to always always be conscious of the environment around them as they are influenced by it, to do creative research in places where students are rarely seen anymore, such as libraries, and to never show blood in artwork. One simply can compete with Hollywood. His website is: http://blanedestcroixwork53.blogspot.com 

   
                                                                 

Digital Imaging II

"Feeling restless and so I go for a walk. Its' abnormally windy outside and my boot are too big so I complain. A hobo starts up a conversation with me about something that he saw earlier. His name is Willie and he sleeps under benches in the park and say he used to be a painter. He's got a big, black, wiry beard and crooked teeth. I sit next to him and he lets me share his handheld radio radio that he listened to soft jazz on." (student)

Photoshop! I don't know why you and I don't get along as well as we could. This relationship is slowly getting better, but I still don't know why I don't die and go to heaven when I have to sit and gaze at you for five hours a day.

We were given a assignment in digital imaging class to recreate other students dreams/stories. This is 2/5 that have been partially completed. I spent two and a half hours in class last monday scribbling crayon on newspaper and then scanning portions to create backdrops.Some days I get so tired of just looking at a screen and clicking away. And this genius idea of crayon and newspaper, solved my distress on Monday.  The trees are from Overton park, the star playing these characters is ... yours truly!

"Two little boys who pretend to be in the army are playing in the woods. they have water guns and re-fill them with a bottle of rubbing alcohol they found in the cabinet because it burns when it touches their scrapes. Chasing each other, one begins climbing up a tree and the other follows. They climb high enough that the tree sways, but to the they are in an imaginary battle. the tree isn't a tree. They are in the sky flying in jets. The first boy knows that he is safe because he has a parachute on. He 

jumps out the jet; of of the tree" (student)

Ya, I bought a can of light.

Today was long. The moment I got up I was running around trying to do my final shoot for class. From shopping at Lowe's for clearance plants, to sitting in a  little dim laundry room for hours tying to be the boss and meter like I should, to printing at the school with Suzie (that was fun).

Well at first it looked like everything was just blahs and bloopers... I had thought that light would reflect nicely if I simply sprayed the plants with water. It worked in my mind when I was running around Walmart trying to find a darn spray bottle. But in my one window dryer studio, it looked like I was failing. What the heck!

 So I took out the gold spray paint. And like magic I saw light! I didn't really know that I was humorously cheating till Suzie commented this evening as we were looking at my prints. "Oh it looks like the paint is a light reflection!" I stopped what I was saying and started laughing. I remember my last post on this blog. I think with out really knowing it, I held light today. And my rays came in a four dollar can.

I wish I could hold light.

This assignment is just the opposite of the previous one in Studio Lighting. We are now required to take the light of our nearest star and use it as one would use clay. We have to model daylight. . . 

So today was rainy! And tomorrow is a working critic! And I had done nothing till this afternoon to prepare  for class tomorrow!  So we're back to paper dolls for now. There's a few familiar faces here. I have no real intention of using these photos for my final on Tuesday. Today was simply trying to meter light. I'm hoping to create something fantastical soon (All new cast included). 

Gathering Materials

I went out this evening to start gathering material for Digital Imaging and I stopped to take a few shots through this cute little thing! I'm happily gaining confidence in manually shooting. There is really no desire to tweak on the computer. Take it how you want it and be DONE! 

I was so excited to see how well wall paint took to color xerox prints! I can't believe how addicted I am to transfers... I just want to slopping paint and photos on walls. :) 

Io Palmer, Color Photography, and Downtown Grad Center

It's been a wild two weeks getting back in the swing of things here at school. From new professors to new expectations. Some evenings after coming home, I will have the sorest jaw and realize that I have been biting down hard all day without knowing it. I really love these classes though. There's so much confidence gained in struggling through.

This is the beginning of our first project in Photo 4. Learning how to push and pull color film (under expose and over expose film in the camera by changing the ISO settings). Thank God this is a group project class!

Instructions on how to do this assignment. It took five glorious hours to get er done. And I have new brain cells to prove it. :)

                     
   MPI : One of the few great shops left that develops slide film.

   

    Here is a photo of the slide film. It was so cool to see positive images in film strips. They looked like little gems.

                                        

                                     

                                                       Grad Center downtown Memphis

                               This work is done by Io Palmer. She came to Rust Hall to give a lecture Thursday evening of her life as an succeeding artist.  http://www.iopalmer.com/Bio.html Check out da link and get to know ha.

Grad Gallery

            Trolley Night Downtown (This is where students get a chance to come out and be cool... and look cool).

                                                               

                                     I stopped on my way home last night to start snap a few shots on Covington Pike road in Bartlett. I want to start doing transfers with color photographs, and I thought car lot shots at night might be an interesting combination with paint.

                                   

It's always good to try again.

I decided that I wasn't happy with my first attempt photographing Nick. So I implored a couple friends for help (Joni Miller, and D'Angelo Williams) and took the same lights, wrapped in white plastics bags, and tried again. This time I wanted him stationed in public places. And it worked better then I thought!
The light works better in a few of the last ones, but overall, I'm pretty darn ok with what I got this time round.


The best moment of this evening was when D'Angelo commented, "I feel like we're making a movie! I feel like we're in a movie!" He was so excited. I could't stop laughing when I saw this picture.

                                                              Lets not get too carried away here.