Blurb

I made a book of my 30 best photographs from the past 10 weeks, check it out!
http://www.blurb.com/books/1739355

Final Project

For the last assignment in my photography class I wanted to try to connect my photography to what I have been learning in my Literary Inquiry class on the pastoral. The project I just completed in that class was on the environmental artists Andy Goldsworthy and Robert Adams. These photos are sort of a spin on the work of Robert Adams showing a small park near the University of Denver that is a great example of the country overlapping with the city. In each photo I tried to capture a human element and a natural element; I did not intend for this to be a work on urban decay, but the amount of litter and graffiti encountered in the park made it impossible for my photos to not show that issue at all.

Julius Caesar!

            Before today I had never seen or read Shakespeare’s “Julius Caesar”, but like most people I knew the storyline: Caesar’s friends betray him and kill him. I did not come to the play with high expectations, not because I did not have faith in the actors or the rest of the theater department of the University of Denver, but because I did not really feel I would connect to the highly political Roman tragedy.

            There were such parts where I did not feel a strong interest in what was happening onstage, but I blame this on tired actors. This was after all, the final performance of Julius Caesar and just the day before they had put on a double show.  Indeed, there were several actors who seemed to just be going through the motions: saying their lines, moving to their mark, but without any real passion or energy behind it. Others slipped in and out of energy throughout the play, but the actors playing Cassius and Brutus were consistently passionate and energetic through the entire play. Cassius especially was full of energy, every line was delivered loudly and her screams and laughs conveyed a certain mental instability in her character. Brutus’s best parts were the lines he delivered while making direct eye contact make eye contact with members of the audience.

            When the first part of the play ended with Caesar dead I found myself slightly confused. I had no idea that the play actually extended past the plot to kill Caesar. This was a pleasant surprise and the fight scenes that occurred in the second part of the play were amazing. The use of lighting, music, chanting, and slow motion made the play feel like an epic movie playing outright on stage.

            The use of fake blood was also a pleasant surprise. Without the blood, the murder of Caesar wouldn’t have been the same. It was so disturbing to see the actors rubbing the blood of Caesar all over their arms and hands, and then to watch them walk around for the rest of the scene with the blood dripping onto the stage. It helped me feel the passion and madness motivating the characters to kill Caesar. On the other hand, I kept feeling distracted by the puddle of blood in the middle of the stage and kept worrying the actors were going to slip in it.
         Overall, it was an enjoyable play, and I look forward to my next chance to see one of the theater department's productions.

Friday Night Art Walk on Santa Fe

          

       For Denver Arts Week, I wanted to participate in at least one of the many events going on around Denver. I chose to go to the First Friday Art Walk; although I have been to a couple Art Walks in the past, I had higher hopes for this one. After all, it was Denver Arts Week, and the Art Walk was occurring in 7 different art districts. I chose to go to the one on Santa Fe, hoping that with all the other places open, this one would be less crowded than normal. 
      Perhaps this would have held true if I had made it to the art walk when it opened at 6, but I was only able to attend it for 8-9 hour. By the time I arrived, the galleries and streets were packed. I like being around people, and a giant party focused on art is fun in theory, but instead of feeling excited by the energy of the people, I found myself annoyed. Socialization was clearly the main event, people cluttered around each other, blocking hallways, doorways, art, the sidewalk. I felt like I couldn’t even enjoy the art, or visit all the galleries because I got sick of having to navigate through the endless stream of people and feeling increasingly claustrophobic. It also doesn’t help that many of the people were drunk off of the free gallery wine, making them even more oblivious to the people like me who were actually trying to view the art.

            However, despite this I still enjoyed going to the art walk. It is exciting to see so many people out on a cold Friday night in November trying to look at art. The Sizzle & Bang Gallery was the first place I visited and it was my favorite. As always, the art there was bold, contemporary, and colorful. While my boyfriend and I were discussing the works of one artist, the artist himself came up to us, introduced himself and told us to grab a card because he was always selling prints. This was pretty awesome and reminded me why I like First Friday in the first place.

Around Campus Again

Went for another walk around campus to de-stress, this time I took photographs to try and find beauty in the banal, sort of a pre-exercise for my final photography assignment.

Cindy Sherman

 

The documentary "Guest of Cindy Sherman" was not exactly what I had anticipated.  I expected it to be another documentary that was largely composed of the artist talking about their work and life, but instead Cindy Sherman was not interviewed at all for this documentary (unless you count the interviews Paul H-O did with her for his show Gallery Beat). This documentary chronicled the lives of Cindy Sherman and her former boyfriend Paul H-O almost equally. I found it interesting to see what is was like to date a famous artist, instead of just what is was like to be one. It showed that it can be hard to maintain a strong sense of identity when your fame is not as great as your significant other's.

I was surprised by the amount of famous non-artist people Cindy associated with. I always assumed that famous artists either kept to themselves or associated with other famous people within the art world. Also, Cindy Sherman herself was not at all how I imagined her to be. She seems so cute and timid on camera, not at all like the strong characters she takes on in her photos. At the very least I expected her to be strongly opinionated, but if she is this documentary did not show it.

Looking at Myself

Honestly, when I first heard that my next photography assignment was going to be self-portraits I was not thrilled. When I take photos of myself, they're usually the typical Facebook photo, or family photos. I've always associated my identity mainly with my face. So, after much thought and frustration I decided to focus on the two parts of my body equally apart of my identity as my face, but often overlooked: my hands and my feet. I've often half-joked that I have "sausage fingers" and "box feet" so it was nice to make my less-than favorite parts the focus of my photographs. I tried to make this series of images represent a journey for self-discovery, since I am still very much unsure of who I am and where I fit into life.