Art is Subjective

What one person likes another very well may hate. Even defining art can be subjective. I’ve noticed that this can cause a problem in the academic world.

Theoretically, a professor can grade a student’s artwork on areas such as if the student met the assignment criteria and on the student’s technical ability. That said, it is really easy to also judge art based on whether one actually likes the piece or not.

In discussions with science majors I’ve admitted that they frequently seem to spend more time studying for their classes than a lot of the students in the arts and humanities spend on their projects, papers, etc. but I also point out that at least once they’ve memorized a formula, learned the names of all the nerves in the lower leg, and can explain the process of mitosis they know they are right. A studio artist very well may take an oil painting that she has poured her heart out into only to have the professor decide that she doesn’t like it an give it a poor grade.

Some of the worst grades I ever received on projects were one I had spent a lot of time on and some of the best grades I’ve received were for projects I rushed through. This wasn’t always true by any stretch of the imagination, but each situation occurred more than once.

Photography Class

Sophomore year of college I took a photography course using an old SLR. The class was difficult for me for three reasons. One, I had very little experience with taking photos before the class, two I procrastinated entirely too much on projects, and three the light meter in the camera I was using was broken. In order to overcome the third problem, I had to take each picture at about 6 different settings and hope that one of them worked. Sometimes they did, sometimes they didn’t.

I’d like to say I learned a lot from that class and afterwards I was able to take much better photos, but the truth of the matter is I still don’t have a clue what I’m doing.

One part of the class that I did manage to learn was how to develop film. To me that was the fun part. I don’t know why enjoyed it, but what I liked best about the development process was taking the film out of the canister and preparing it for the chemical process which set the film.

A lot of times on tv shows and movies and the such one sees darkrooms where the lights are dim, but one can still see. This was true for part of the development process, but when we removed the film from the canister, we were working in a room so dark you couldn’t see your hand an inch away from your face.

As a result, many of the students seemed to struggle to figure out what they were doing merely by feel and memory. The dark never bothered me. I would lay everything out in the exact order I wanted it, flick the light off and go to work. That part of the process would only take me a minute or so but I enjoyed it. It was like going into a test knowing that I knew all the answers before I even picked it up.

Now if only I could learn to consistently take photos worth developing ...

Sometimes I get bored...

"Echoes"

Echoes
Forgotten words.
Laughter never heard.
Stillness where motion used to be.
Too much peace and harmony.
Unnoticed, dust gathers.
On an empty chair.
Memories in tatters.
Splatter your mind.
Life one big tear.
Lost in time.
An open door.
A broken window.
Echoes.
Of war.
Fought – lost.
You didn’t notice the cost.
I danced in the corner.
As I became a foreigner.
Wind blew up the ashes.
Of all that is past us.
And my soul sang.
Screamed out for attention.
As it cracked under the tension
And I wondered.

Will you notice when I’m gone?


"Bang"

Bang. Splat.
That’s all it takes
to leave your smear on the world
but you know what?
You still don’t mean squat.
In a generation
no one is going to remember the kid
who chose the company of a bullet
late one Friday night
because you were tired
of being alone.
Your best revenge
on all those people who ignored you
is to make them wish
they had paid attention
so they could day they were friends
with the guy who cured ...
girl who became ...
woman who ...
man who ...


"Wasted"

Girl peeing between the cars
in an almost empty parking lot
because she can’t wait
one hundred yards to the dorm

Hunched over figure
puking up
all he drank
on the side walk

Loud people
weaving back and forth
because they can’t decide
what side of the road to walk on

We buy it
by the bottle, the case, the keg
but are we
having fun yet?

“Art is Not Created In A Vacuum”

I had a professor who used to repeat over and over "art is not created in a vacuum." Of course if your name is Duchamp art might be a vacuum, but that is another matter altogether. What my professor was getting at was that art is influenced and influences the world around it.

It is impossible to separate art from the world. The inspiration for art comes from one’s experiences in the world. Those materials one uses to create art, be they paints, computers, pens, musical instruments, or old rusty vacuums come from the world. What the audience experiences as a result of the artwork is influenced by the audience’s past experiences within the world.

One can even argue that because art is part of the world that even if one is using art to help escape from the world that one fails as the artist’s attempts to escape the world merely create more of the world.

Art, be it good art or bad art, is never as simple as it seems.

Arts Magazine

I recently created an arts magazine which displayed work from students and a few professors. It was about 80 pages long and featured two short stories, a handful of poems, photographs, paintings, and other artwork done in both traditional forms and digitally. I had originally wanted to also do reviews of a few plays, musicals and concerts but sadly events beyond my control prevented these last few additions. The whole project was one big learning experience. One thing I couldn’t get over was how much disrespect people had for their own work.

I’ll begin with the written pieces. When it comes to spelling and grammar, I am quite aware that I frequently mess up which is part of the reason I love spell check so much. I couldn’t get over how many of the submitted pieces had spelling errors, etc. which I was able to catch simply by skimming the page. I know it is easy to become so close to your piece that you miss the mistakes, but there are some mistakes that are so glaringly obvious that I fail to see how one can miss them in a piece one wants the public to read.

Nobody had to submit written work for the magazine. They choose to do so which means they weren’t just submitting any old piece to fulfill their commitment. These were the pieces they wanted to represent their work. I’d hate to see some of the junk pieces.

I also couldn’t get over how many artists and designers messed up their image files. I had graphic design majors submitting work at 72 dpi (dots per inch) and only a couple inches large. While the optimal setting for each type of printer can vary, generally one wants somewhere around 300 - 360 dpi for print. 72 dpi looks fine on screen, but comes out awful in print – especially if the image then has to be enlarged.

I can kind of understand some of the artists and photographers making this mistake if they haven’t had much of a digital background, but if they wish to submit work online in the future they need to figure this one out really fast. I do know some of the photos were submitted because a professor made his class do so, but I also am sure he explained the difference between screen quality and print quality.

If you want others to respect your work, you first have to respect it yourself.

Learning Through Experience

In a few short weeks I’ll be graduating from college and entering the dreaded "real world." I feel like I have a lot left to learn. I’m okay with that though because that seems to be one of the most interesting things in life: learning. Hopefully I’ll never stop.

One lesson life has already taught me is that an awful lot of learning is done best through experience. I’ve learned more that way than I’ve learned in any classroom. Unfortunately that which one learns through experience rather than the classroom tends not to show up in résumés.

I know a number of students who do better than I academically but who can’t figure out how to plunge a clogged toilet. Obviously I’m biased, but I’d rather work with someone who can plunge a toilet than someone who wastes an hour panicking because the toilet clogged and they don’t have a clue what to do. I also find the fact that so many of my classmates literally don’t know how to plunge a toilet to be a sad testament to the helplessness of my generation.

I’ve decided that if I ever am in a position to be hiring people for a job I’m going to first make them pass a basic life skills test where they have to deal with day to day problems successfully. I’d take someone who could do this and shows an ability to learn how to do the job over someone who academically appears better but who can’t to figure out why water that has passed through an old floor is going to have changed colors.