Final Project

As I said in my previous post, I had no idea what I wanted to do for this narrative.  I had golf in mind because it’s something that I’ve played for awhile but besides that, nothing.  I pretty much decided to just play a couple rounds and have my pictures taken and see what happens.

On the course I tried to get as many pictures as possible to increase my chances of finding some good ones.  I had most of them taken while I was teeing off and I did this because they are typically the most interesting and they would affect me the least while playing.  There were quite a few that I liked.  I not only found some interesting pictures but also was able to pinpoint things that I have been doing wrong in my swing.  At this point, I still had no clue what I was doing.

I started to sort through the pictures once I got home and found maybe ten that I thought were promising for the project.   I started looking for pictures of famous golfers online just for a starting point.  I finally decided to use pictures of John Daly, Tiger Woods, and Happy Gilmore.  I superimposed John Daly’s head onto a picture of me right before impact.  I staged the image like how he ended up getting suspended from the PGA.  He teed off of a Coors Light can on national television…my hero!  I Put Tiger’s head on a candid shot of me after I hit a bad shot and thought that the pictures had stopped.  Tiger’s picture was from when he was upset of the ordeal with his mistresses and his ex-wife Elin.  I thought that it worked very well with how my body was posed on the shot.  Finally, I put my head onto Happy’s just because I wanted to be attacked by Bob Barker.  I really don’t have a better reason than that.

After the fact, I noticed that every picture had something in common.  I did not intentionally choose a “bad” situation from each player’s life, it just happened.  Thinking about it, it’s probably because they are the most memorable.  John Daly was never a really respectable player but he was still a semi-decent golfer.  If you asked anyone about John Daly’s most memorable moment in golf, they would probably say when teed off of that beer can.  The same could be said about Tiger.  He was/is one the best golfers around but even though it happened awhile ago, most people still have his cheating scandal in memory.  It may not be a closely connected, but most people would probably think of the Bob Barker fight in Happy Gilmore and not something like the final shot he made to win the tournament.

I guess that the whole point of this was that we often latch on to bad memories.  When looking back, it’s often easier to remember how something didn’t work out for you than something that did.  I could have used a picture of Tiger Winning the Masters but I was drawn to one of him in anguish.  That may be a comment on me but I don’t think I’m the only one that does it.  If I learned anything it’s that I should see the flaws in my swing and try to improve them, not see them as my whole game.  We all make mistakes but we should learn from them and play the next hole.

75% Critique

I had been having some trouble coming up with a narrative until a few days ago.  It really has just been trying do not repeat something that I had already done before.  I decided that I I want to do something involving golf since it has been a part of my life for a very long time.  I haven't always practiced and played as much as I've wanted to because of various reasons, so the quality of my game changes often.  I'm always reminded of something that my step-dad told me when I said to him that I wished I was as good as Tiger Woods.  He said, "No you don't because if you did, you'd be out hitting balls until you're hands bleed," and that's the truth.  That said, I still get upset when I do poorly.

I've found that the main message of this class, "slow down," also happens to be exactly what I need to do to be successful on the course.  It always surprises me how emotional I can get over a stupid ball but it's that emotion that keeps me playing.  It's the balance between the two, slowing down and emotion, that define what it means to be a good golfer or even a good anything.

I'm still not exactly sure what I want to do with this project, but here are a few of the photos that I liked best when I played on Monday.  And yes, I skipped class to play golf but I promise it was solely to get some pictures to work with :)

     

MP6

The words that I was given were “roll” and “knot.”  I had decided from early on that I wanted to use roll because it seemed that I would be able to do more with it.  With that said, I still had no idea what to do until I looked up roll in the dictionary and saw “to steamroll.”  From there, it seemed to be in my best interest to not literally steamroll someone and instead use Play-doh.

Unfortunately what I was trying to do didn’t work out.  I downloaded an app called “Fast Burst Camera Lite” and wanted to string the photos together like stop motion animation.  When I looked at all of pictures I had taken, only the first third were there.  Because of this, I had to use pictures before and after but not mid-crushing L.

I’m pretty happy with how the Play-doh turned out after the rolling.  I choose to do a before and after to show what the person was looked like beforehand.   I wanted to put some text in but couldn’t think of anything clever but a rolling pin is close to bowling pin.  I wanted to use one of the animations that are played at a bowling alley and luckily, I found “Spare me.”  The other two pictures were me just wanting to roll someone else over who witnessed the murder.  There’s just a head and no body because I ran out of Play-doh.

MP5

Most of the time I really don’t do a lot of brainstorming, I pretty much stare blankly at my computer screen and something just comes to me.  Dramatic chipmunk is pretty random.  I was just screwing around on You Tube and it was in the suggested/related video section.  I originally was going to give myself powers like the ones in Dragon Ball Z but then decided upon getting turned into a dog.  It’s not very fantastic, but dogs do have abilities and the permission to do things that we can’t.  Running with that idea, I had a friend just snap a bunch of picture of me making faces that I imagined a dog would make.  I then took my dog on a walk and took a bunch of pictures of her as well.

Most of the time when people imagine super powers, they think of being able to fly or being incredibly strong, etc.  I decided that I would like the power to just do whatever the hell I want and have people look at me and say, “Aw, he’s so cute.”  There are people around where I live that curse at me for driving fast because they have kids but then do the same thing when they’re driving all four of them around in their SUV.  As super pooch, I’ve made them wreck and I look like I know I did something wrong but not really.   I also thought it would be cool to know when people were where you are now and obviously I would be at a fire hydrant.  Finally, the friend who took the pictures had gotten fined for public indecency so I thought it would be funny to shit in a similar area but no one would care.

I wish I could have made it look more cartoony, but I also didn’t want to load it up with effects and have it look bad.  This is more apparent when looking at my face than the other parts.  I had to dial stuff back because I just looked really bad.  All in all, I am pretty happy with how it turned out and agree with you saving this one until closer to the end.                      

Blog 9

Carver

I’d probably have a similar reaction if my wife told me that her blind friend was coming over.  Like carver, it’s not that I have any problem with the blind it can just be awkward.  The best analogy for me to make is that it’s like someone passing by you in a wheelchair.  You don’t want to stare and make them feel uncomfortable but you don’t want to completely divert your eyes either.  There’s a lot to learn from people who are in some way physically compromised.  I don’t know anyone now who is blind, but there was a guy where I used to work that was.  He was outside smoking almost every time that I would go out to do the same.  I never thought about him being able to see the smoke or know when he was finished.  Anyway, he always seemed like he was happy.  I guess it’s because he probably views life differently, literally.  There’d be so many things you couldn’t do but you’d never have to deal with worrying about how you look others’ expressions, etc.  I always thought it would be an incredible burden, and it would be, but I guess I never thought about the benefits before now until now.

Blog 8

Wallace

I would suggest listening to Schwarzenegger’s Life’s Six Rules on YouTube if you haven’t heard it, as it is probably my favorite speeches.  Wallace does kind of remind me of myself though.  I’m cynical as hell but I try my best not to go on that default setting, otherwise I would just be really pissed off all of the time.  It can be awfully difficult to pay attention to what’s right in front of you instead of what’s going on inside your head.  I can’t count the number of times that I have based something that someone has done to annoy me upon an internal attribution rather than on an external one…and that seems to be the default.  Everyone can remember a time when they’ve been cut off while driving or in any line and thought something around the lines of, “That stupid P.O.S.”  As I’ve gotten older it’s been easier for me to stay calm and assume that there’s a reason for a person acting this way rather than him/her being mentally deficient.  Since I rarely flip the bird anymore, unless I’m really upset, I shall assume that college is working and continue to attend.  

MP4

I decided to use Hagerty Hall because there’s a courtyard in the center that is outside and inside at the same time…it’s pretty sweet.  I had a lot of classes there my freshman and sophomore years, so I consider it my place on campus.

I was originally going to just put cars and lifts around the courtyard but I thought that would be a little boring.   I thought about what has stuck with me the most since I took classes there and it was learning about the Berlin Wall.  It’s something that isn’t talked about much anymore but I was reminded of it since my car was made in West Germany.

  

I tried to make the three pictures seem as if you are looking at just one, with a focal point of the tree in the center.   The left is supposed to be West Germany, the right is East, and above is the United States.  The factory is on the left to show that West Germany did pretty well after WWII and there are people there just hanging out, enjoying themselves.  The U.S. has a ton of money after the war and dumped it into the non-communist European countries to rebuild but also keep them from going communist.  I decided to represent the U.S. as the Coca-Cola Company because of a movie that I saw about the wall being torn down.  This woman in East Germany was in a hospital in a coma and woke up to a Coke sign outside of her window.  She pretty much freaked out because life had completely changed in her sleep.  I chose a black and white Coke sign too because the U.S. used to be a powerful country but is now on the decline.  It also says “Pure As Sunlight” and a lot of people in Europe would laugh at that.  The right has the Berlin Wall being guarded by soldiers (wall is blocking entrance/exit to the courtyard) but besides that, there isn’t anything else over there.  I thought it was pretty fitting to not have anything besides that since they were deprived of almost everything that Western Europe had.

In terms of materials, I used glass, steel, concrete, and people.  Without an explanation, I’m assuming that most people that see this will say, “huh?”  That’s pretty much what I’m going for.  I never really want people to understand something that I’ve made, this class or otherwise, I’d rather them come up with their own ideas.  All I know is that if I had seen this on my way to German class, I’d probably walk right out of the building. 

Blog 7

Kaprow

This reading was far too short for me to get much out of it although he does make a good point about why I’m not always too keen on modern art.  There have been a number of times that I have seen an average, ordinary object placed in a different context, an art gallery per se, and have watched people gaze in awe at it.  I will sometimes even feel like an idiot because rather than being in awe, I’m standing there with a dumb look that says, “I don’t get it.”

I also liked that he brought up the automaticity of life.  It bothers me how many things we do without even consciously thinking about our actions.  It doesn’t frighten me like driving and realizing you’re home and you don’t remember how you got there, but just the fact that so many things go unnoticed.  It’s similar to when he’s brushing his teeth and notices the small nuances of the action.  I know it’s not exactly what he’s getting at, but he just got me thinking again about how much I miss because I’m on autopilot.  

MP3

Net of Being print - This isn't a picture of the actual print but I grabbed it online because it's higher resolution. The original is done by the artist Alex Grey, who does all of the album art for the band Tool.  They are one of my favorite bands and this is a visual representation of the collective unconscious. - Mind Blown

Randall Amplifier - A friend's dad was going to throw this 1970's Randall bass amp away because it had water damage.  I picked it up a few years back and had intended to restore it for awhile but didn't until late last year.  I fixed the wood, wrapped it in "snake skin," replaced the speaker, and a couple other things.  It was a lot of work but was well worth it because no one has something that sound's or looks exactly like it.  In a perfect world I would save it if my house were on fire, but I would probably die because it weighs a ton. - Phat Bass

My Car - There's nothing that I've devoted more time to than my baby.  She's an absolute joy to drive but I would not wish the maintenance upon anyone.  I used to be an out of control driver and speed excessively but do not as much as I used to.  It was an outlet for me when I was younger but i guess everyone grows up...maybe. - Anger Incarnate

Bass - This is my five string bass that I've had for awhile.  I got an Ibanez because my favorite bassist at the time was Fieldy from Korn.  I was in a band in high school and like most, we broke up because of "creative differences."  I go through phases of playing and not playing but i will never give it up completely. - Memories

Golf Clubs - These are my golf clubs.  I've played since I was eight but trust me, I'm no Tiger Woods.  I've been on and off with golf just like playing the bass.  Most people tell me that they don't have the patience to play or it's boring.  Playing is one of the only things I do that can completely clear my mind. - Serenity

Anyone that knows me well knows that I am a big fan of Alex Grey's work as well as Tool's.  I love having my music turned up and wanted it to look like the amp was producing the picture through sound waves.  As I'm driving towards the source of the sound, the shear power is destroying my car.  I left my clubs in the back just in case I want to play when and if I get to wherever I'm going.  The image is more distorted the further you get from the amp to show the power diminishing.  Finally, my bass is in the upper-left hand corner plugged into the amp (there's a cord but it's hard to see).  I put little sparkles of light around it to imply that some ethereal being is playing it.  

I'm not sure what that says about my identity...maybe that I should take my ADD meds again.  I would say that music trumps all else in my life in terms of importance.  It's gotten me through hard times but is also great for the good and everything in between.  The picture doesn't say anything about my love of computers.  I mess with them a lot but I didn't feel that a computer fit anywhere. 

Blog 6

Feet in Smoke

After reading Feet in Smoke I’m still wondering how unlucky you’d have to be to experience “death by microphone.”  The narrative was really entertaining.  The only times I think about getting electrocuted are when working on my car or if there’s a thunderstorm and I’m on a golf course.  I guess I never imagine surviving a situation that bad to consider the irony in resuscitation by means of death.  The story also brought up something else I’ve found interesting every since a good friend of mine was diagnosed with Bipolar II Disorder, the fact that one can “trip” without any external stimulus.  Both Julien and Worth seem kind of similar.   My friend thought that World of War Craft was made by the French to recruit Al-Quida members to destroy U.S.  but not in the conventional sense…he meant take down the government and create a hippie utopia.  He said the French admins of WOW told him to recruit soldiers to the cause.  Long story short, he got arrested and sent to the psych ward at OSU after screaming at a Middle Eastern shop owner for not admitting that he was in Al-Quida too.  Julien hasn’t remembered either of the manic episodes he’s had and so I had to fill him in.  Like Sullivan, I can laugh about it now but Julien doesn’t like to talk about it to this day. 

MP2

MP2

My journey to class each day involves quite a bit of driving.  I live right by the zoo so depending on what time I leave, I’m either cruising down the highway or sitting in traffic.  I drive an Audi 100 that was built in Oct of ‘88 so I feel I share this bond with it because my birthday is in December of ‘88.  Every day I crank it over it coughs a few times, I smell unburnt gasoline while it works itself out, and then is ready to go.  It sounds like the cars my dad would fix when I was little, so every morning carries some nostalgia.   I always have a coffee with me in the morning so I have my two favorite tastes/smells, coffee and gasoline.  It sits in the aftermarket cup holder I had to install.  I’ve always found it funny that every German car from the 80s has eight ashtrays and zero cup holders…it was great when I smoked.  I finally turn my stereo up until it’s at the point of distorting, wrap my hands around my AutoZone covered steering wheel (original is tattered and torn) and I’m off.

I normally take sawmill down to 270 and then to 315S but I will take back roads when there is a lot of traffic.  The picture that I made shows the route that I normally take on the map, but the smaller pictures within it are of the back roads.  I also let the Google Maps part of it obscure the pictures because I’m often more concerned about where I’m going than the in-between.  I do prefer the back roads because they are faster if there is traffic but there is also a lot more to see.  I transition from city, to rural, to city over and over again which is kind of interesting.  I always have the window opened a crack, even if it’s freezing, and the smells change in relation to the landscape as well.  I don’t pay attention to what speed I’m going until I hit Upper Arlington because they will pull you over in a second. It’s ironic because they do nothing if your car is broken into a block away from the police station...Once I make it through the construction that plagues campus, I’m in the lot outside the shoe.  I’m almost always early and I was the first day too.  I pretty much just saw a person that looked like they were my age and followed her into the building.  It’s taken me until this past week to not get lost inside the art department.  I’ve pretty much just wandered around until I’ve found where I need to be but it’s good to now know.      

Blog 5

Wexner Review

The current exhibit at the Wexner Center is Cubes and Anarchy by David Smith.  This was the second time that I had been to an exhibition there and the first was for Andy Warhol.  I wasn’t really impressed to be perfectly honest.  I read on one of the walls that he was trying to combine art and industry and I get that…I’m just not fond of the sculptures.  I’m sure that if I had spent more time with the art and had someone explain each piece to me, Smith’s “cubes” would had a greater impact on me.  Most of his pieces looked like a random arrangement of metal that was welded together but some did appear like there was something more to them.  One that I did like was smaller than the rest and seemed to have more detail.  I can’t remember the title of it but I do remember that he produced it in the 50’s.  That’s another thing!  At least two of his pieces were titled “Untitled.”  So he couldn’t think of a name for at least two pieces that he probably spent a lot of time on unless that was the point he was trying to make about industry.  Probably just answered my question but he still could have given them names.  That said, I’m probably not the person to ask about contemporary art because I will tell you that people have just gotten lazy.     

MP 1

Asymmetrical

Symmetrical

Radial

Person and Surrounding Space

Person Up Close

Ant's View

Bird's View

Stable

Unstable

Name on Campus

In both scenarios I was looking to take the best pictures possible and the best one's are those that are not planned.  I got more photos that I liked this time around but I also went to some places more better suited to taking good pictures.  I liked both experiences, probably the second more because I just took a bunch of pictures and tried to figure out the symmetrical, etc. stuff later.  Had I tried to stage all of the shots, I probably would not have liked it very much.  The first two pictures and the ant's view are my favorite in this set and the eggs in the last set.  I might have a sick sense of humor but after finding duck eggs I thought it would be funny to take a shot of me cooking store bought eggs. I guess I'm not the only one because everyone liked those too even tough they startle you at first until you realize that I didn't steal eggs from a nest and eat them.  Of the three I mentioned liking this time, the picture of the May Apple (ant's view) is my favorite.  I asked a park ranger what it was because I had never seen it and there were a ton of them.  They're supposed to be here in May, hence the name "May Apple," but are here a month early.  I guess I like it so much because of the way that the sun made it glow.

I also had no idea how to find my name on campus without using Photoshop or taking a picture of a tree and saying, "Hey, you can see Tony in the tree right?!"  I probably missed the point of the exercise but I'm assuming that you will explain it tomorrow or it hits me when I see other's photos.  For now, pretend you don't see the "o" and the "r" in Orton and shorten my name a letter... 

Blog 4

Hornby

For not being a professional writer, Hornby’s article was well written and entertaining.  It was fascinating to see how his feelings towards “Nipple Jesus” changed based upon external forces that pulled him in one direction or the other.  At first, Hornby was awe-struck until he got closer and saw that the piece was blasphemous because Jesus was made out of nipples and breasts.  This reaction was not surprising since most would be offended by a picture of their god made out of what people in this country fear most, the body.  More interesting was how his views became the polar opposite because of Martha’s informational influence.  He believed that she had some profound reason for making this artwork and by not knowing, it elevated her artwork from disgusting to novel.  His preferences came full-circle when the Jesus was destroyed and Martha revealed that this was her intention all along.  She stated that art should be about “provocation” and but he thought there was a deeper motivation.  The best part about this story is that is reveals that our preferences aren’t stable.  We think we know what we like but we really don’t and Hornby exemplified this through his several preference reversals.       

My only problem with this story is with Hornby. I was happy to see that he changed his mind about “Nipple Jesus” but was upset that he was so quick to judge Martha when he discovered her true intentions.

    

Blog 3

Walker

I liked that Walker’s article was from the perspective of guiding an instructor rather than it being written for students.  The main theme was concerned with choosing a “big idea” to guide one’s artwork.  This is really important because in the past, I have found that you can get bogged down in the details and that stunts creativity.  It is best to choose a “big idea” and see where it takes you.

This may sound contradictory, but I don’t think a “big idea” is always needed.  I took art class almost every semester in high school and most of what I made did not have some larger theme tied to it.  One could argue that I prove Walker correct and am only “problem solving” when I was mindlessly making art.  I did get stuck at times, but sometimes it’s nice to just be making something and not be thinking about its meaning.

Barrett

Barrett’s article brought up a major theme of a comparative studies class that I just took.  In semiotics, there is a signifier and signified that together form a sign.  He uses a couple different examples in his writing but an easy one for me to understand had to do with diamonds.  A diamond is the signifier and the signified can be many things, but an example could be love.  This is incredibly important with advertising because everyone knows this connection.  It’s implied that if you buy someone a diamond that you “love” them and that love is “forever,” even if it’s not stated.  It goes both ways as well since “forever” can be a signifier for diamond.  It’s a concept that is very valuable when interpreting anything present in popular culture.

I think Barrett could have done a better idea of explaining what I did above.  He gave several different examples and broke them down, but he could have gone into a more general definition of what semiotics was and then into the examples.  It could also be that I was given different terminology and “denotate” and “connotate” are synonymous with “signifier” and “signified.” 

Blog 2

Kidd

In Cheese Monkeys, Kidd talks about how artists can play with one’s perception even when only working in a two dimensional space.  I found it rather interesting because I took a psychology class on perception.  We use monoptic and dichoptic visual cues when viewing objects in space.  Painters, drawers, etc., rely upon the same cues to alter how we perceive these objects.  A good example is optical illusions.

I agreed with “Big and Small” as a way to signify figure/background and importance, but I do not necessarily agree with the order in which we view art.  It could be that I that I have never noticed myself looking at the top-left portion of an image and then working my way over and down, but I am not convinced.

Hickey

This article did not do as much for me as the previous one but then again, I’m not an avid sports fan.  I did like that “the liberating rule that civilized us yesterday will, almost inevitably, seek to govern us tomorrow.”  He compared it to Pollock and how he was told to paint to show “soul.”  I feel that idea can be superimposed over a lot of things, especially in a college setting.

As I said, I’m not a huge sports fan so the basketball analogy made it a little difficult for me to relate.  This is not to say that I am completely ignorant to the rules of the game, I just don’t find it to be too terribly interesting.

Wescler

I found this article to be the most interesting of all.  I do not game as much as I used to, but he Wescler brought up a point that I hadn’t thought of.  I assumed that when replaying a game that the graphics looked worse because I was now comparing it to a newer game that had come out.  It may be the case that since I already knew the story, the imperfections that were always present were now noticeable because I was no longer distracted.

The usage of the word “soul” doesn’t do much for me.  I understand that he and others are trying to get at the “essence” of being human but why not use that word?  Of course it is impossible to animate the immaterial or maybe I’m just jaded from the Catholic schooling…

Blog 1

My name is Elefterios Antonopoulos but I go by Tony.  I was born and raised in Columbus and have lived in pretty much every suburb of the city.  I went to St. Mary's for grade school which is located in German Village and then St. Charles for high school.  Both of these are Catholic, go figure, though I am far from being religious.  I am a "3rd" year psychology major and have no idea what I want to do post-graduation.  All I know is that I worked in the closest thing to a corporate job without a degree and hated it.  I enjoy working on  cars and playing golf in my spare time.  I would also say playing electric bass, but it has been awhile since I've picked it up.  My top five bands (not in order of importance) are Nine Inch Nails, Tool, Korn, Rammstein, and Lamb of God. I loved art class in high school, especially drawing.  I have not drawn since but like messing with computers a lot, so I'm assuming that I will find this to be quite interesting.

This is old but it's a favorite of myself and a good friend getting hit "where the sun don't shine." (I'm on the left with the shaved head at the time)