Line Writing
Michael De Certeau’s “Walking in the City” verbalizes an overhead view of the city, concentrating on the relationship maintained between itself and the movement of its pedestrians, which he illustrates in his line drawings. These drawings are ultimately his attempts to make legible the actions in this system. De Certeau explores the “coincidence that reinforces the parallelism between linguistic and pedestrian enunciation.” (De Certeau, The Practice of Everyday Life). He makes visible a metaphor between movement (walking in this case) within a system (a city) and language, essentially, but not exclusively, arguing that the people make up the city. This comparison and visualization inspired my initial sketches in which I also tried tracing pedestrian movements. I focused specifically on aspects like the walking-speed of natives vs. tourists or the frequency of lone travelers vs. lovers or friend groups. However, after further contemplation of De Certeau’s way of “transform[ing] action in legibility,” I decided it would be of more interest to me to explore something perhaps more personal (De Certeau, The Practice of Everyday Life). I decided to attempt to trace verbal and non-verbal communication. De Certeau argues “[Pedestrian’s] swarming mass is an innumerable collection of singularities. Their intertwined paths give their shape to spaces. They weave places together. In that respect, pedestrian movements form one of these ‘real systems whose existence in fact makes up the city’ (De Certeau The Practice of Everyday Life). This prompted my exploration of the way that communication weaves a web that creates a “real system” of relationship both to others and one’s own self. Afterall, I found that the line drawings are nothing more or less than a powerful visual observation of things otherwise unseen or un noted. Key= me - black arrow, other people - Pink arrow
WWW
The Library of Babel by Jorge Luis Borges explores the concept of order and eternity as it relates to the death and the universe. It is understood that the narrator has grown old and is preparing for death. When he dies, he will be thrown over a railing and will continue to fall indefinitely through this eternal library. Not much is known about the meanings of the books in the library and the characters in this story kill to find out. Surprisingly, this fictional tale draws similar lines from ideas noted in the non-fictional World-Wide Web by Tim Burners-Lee, which is a technical guide to the then brand-new concept of the internet. It’s purpose is declared at the start of the passage with the authors opening statement, “The World-Wide Web was developed to be a pool of human knowledge.” The author goes on to explain what W3 (world-wide web) defines, which is “the idea of a boundless information world in which all items have a reference by which they can be retrieved,” very similar to the concept of a library, specifically The Library of Babel as it too is boundless. I mainly noted a string of similarities in the ideas of W3 and the library. They can both be thought of as a boundless “universe.” Within the boundlessness of this universe, there is a need to create and sustain order and structure.
The Last Newspaper
The artists in the podcast spoke about how the use of photography in newspapers could shift the viewer’s perspective on a reported issue or event. This idea of forming perspective intrigued me. I decided to look at how headlines paired with other texts/images on the page could shift our perspectives. I specifically searched for extreme juxtaposition and decided to collect horrific front-page headlines and the advertisements that sat below them. It shed light on the weird way our brain functions, partially due to the media we're exposed to. In one instance we’re taking in the shock of a terrifying crime and in the same instance we are being enticed to buy a product. In many of the newspaper projects, the artists were observing, in one way or another, the oddities of human nature. My project points out yet another one of these oddities which is just how instantly we move from emotion to emotion.
Shapes
The shapes that I chose are of the three objects that first arrived in my mind upon reading the prompt ( only when taking the abstraction of the shape of the outline into consideration ). Their forms post-manipulation don't really have a concrete meaning if not purely for the aesthetic. What did effect their meaning however was the tessellation. For me, the repetition stimulated a sort of loop which I go through everyday with the use of the items. It symbolizes their incessant prescence in my routine.
NY Art Book Fair
The 2019 New York Art Book Fair was a vast amalgam of some very unique styles of work. The event was split into three main buildings and further divided into classrooms and tables. Through the various rooms, I found myself gravitating towards sexual/provocative work. What drew me to these works were not so much the subject but the exaggeration of their poses and the emphasis on color as a way to distort the subject. I felt that this related to my work as I often use color as a way of distortion. The other thing that drew me toward this type of work was the tampering with reality. Overall, I loved the experience of vieweing all of this art.
Color
Paul LaFarge receives black as darkness and conceives of it as a void. In my photo the black backdrop appears to uphold this perception. The viewer can see the presence of light within the shine of the subject’s dark hair, the highlights in her skin, and the twinkle in her eyes. Yet, the black does not allow for any light to penetrate it or reveal any part of its texture. It is suffocatingly mysterious as it can prompt the viewer to want to see more even knowing that there is no more to see. Due to this absence of light and color in the background, the foreground is immensely highlighted. Every color in the image appears more saturated than it would be otherwise. The slight blue tint of the girl’s hair, the various shades of tan skin, the bold pink lip and most of all, the vibrant red dress.
