Relavent Phrases I Found on Urban Dictionary.

Social Fruit Fly-
Like a social butterfly, lacking in charm or beauty and always around.


Materialist-
(self explanatory)


Cupcakegasm-
Obsession with and overconsumption of cupcake related things.


Fame Whore-
An individual who is willing to do anything, regardless of how humiliating or demeaning, to achieve notoriety.


Pole Bite-
Pole bruises

1000 Character statement for Reaction (for Guggenheim)

Reaction (2009) is a exploration and response to the mediated self in contemporary culture. In it, young men watch and react to performances in violent viral videos from shock-sites and post their reactions to YouTube. The videos are then appropriated by the artist and edited in Final Cut Pro. The viewers of the videos become performers themselves as a result of their awareness of the recording devices used to create the reaction video. The position of the gaze becomes blurred due to the multiple layers of interaction within a singular video: initial performer (whom we do not see), audience  then also assuming the role of  performer, and the fourth degree removal viewing audience (presumed to be the self). Whom is on display? Is this phenomenon a product of desire for celebrity, which perhaps, is the only way to truly exist in a mediated world of multiple selves? Is social matter and its behaviors influenced by the gaze which we place upon it as observers or participants?

1000 character statement for Angry Gamers (for Guggenheim)

Angry Gamers (2010) examines our culture’s fixation with social media, gaming and ultimately, our emotional interconnectivity as a populace through these mediums. Research techniques such as trend watching and content curation were utilized in combination with editing in Final Cut Pro to execute the work. The goal of Angry Gamers is to create the next page in the dialogue within the digital world regarding our concept of reality. Emotional absorption into “virtual” worlds calls into question what the meaning of “virtual” actually is. Code, binary and pixels are not real in the same way the senses are real. Our senses can offer us corporal tangibility. However, bodily reactions and immersion in the culture of social media and its content along with the relationships that are created with others who also participate in it are physically real.  Is reality and its effects on the self limited to situations of the physical world? 

Interesting

Here are some interesting facts about cameo's in relation to the concept of facebook or the facebook profile default pic.....

Early Greek and Roman carvings featured images of gods and goddesses, themes from mythology, beautiful women and biblical events or other great events.

Many cameos through history depict living heroes or rulers.

In the Hellenistic era young women used cameos as charms to express desire. A woman could wear a cameo depicting a dancing Eros as a seductive invitation to love.

Women began collecting cameos to prove cultural status during the Elizabethan period. At the same time, tourist travels to the ruins of Pompeii were on the rise and women began collecting shell and lava cameos as souvenirs to remember their travel.

During the 18th century, men purchased these carved gems to mark their prestige and culture.

Mass produced cameos are generally molded and not carved.

Victorian women considered a cameo carved in their personal likeness a prized possession.

Speaking of Facebook Default Pics....

...They reference cameos. While the term cameo refers to a method of carving, the cameo item itself consists of two contrasting colors which depict a portrait or scene, carved in a relief manner. Facebook isnt relief, but the idea remains...

The portraits often depicted royalty or rulers or royal court. These were sometimes given as gifts.

Im thinking a lot about the concept of the cameo plugged into space of the Facebook Profile Pic with a little bit of contemporary youth culture thrown in (Generation Me). I think it could be a cheeky commentary....

When combining the (in my opinion) direct reference of cameo in Facebooks default profile pics, what are we saying about ourselves and our importance? When you think about it, HAVING a facebook profile in the first place is, in some ways, elevating ourselves into a higher level of importance that we could never achieve on our own. (see Reggie Watts' Fuck Shit Stack for more on this). The thought that we are important enough that people want to keep up with our personal news and life is absolutely ludicrous.

While I believe interconnectivity is imperative to the progression of the human race, im still somewhat baffled by the idea that people exist in this world who think that other people really care what they had for breakfast (ie- the self important useless status update). But then, is THAT thought ("i dont care what you ate for breakfast") selfish in and of itself? Is that very thought of not caring what someone eats for breakfast further proof of a self important individual because, really, the breakfast status updates are actually just a matter of peripheral awareness (ie- the idea that something besides myself exists, the post navel gazing era overlapping the navel gazing era).

Question which makes no sense part 2.

Ok. So heres the real question, in clearer terms (hopefully):

we have the micro (self) and the macro (the whole). does the micro shape the macro or does the macro shape the micro?


i mean this in terms of popular culture, desire, fame, interconnectivity, perceived and projected self.

im leaning a bit towards Alicia Silverstone's coining of the term "Monet".....
When you look from far away you can see the entity of the image, but close up, its a big ole mess.

Facebook Default Profile Pics

changes the meaning of "fault"

 

Question which makes no sense.

After many years since first reading "Against Interpretation" by Susan Sontag, I keep coming back to the Oscar Wild quote at the beginning:

“It is only shallow people who do not judge by appearances. The mystery of the world is the visible, not the invisible.”

So here is the question: which is more complicated? The surface or the core? Is it that something looks simple, but is actually really complicated, OR does it look complicated, but is actually really simple? Can it be both?

I think this question is specifically applicable to my current body of work. I keep saying that im interested "not in how were all different, but how were all the same", but what does that really mean? How are we different and how are we the same?

Are we all individual beings, but were all fighting for the same thing at the core (love, food, sex, shelter)?

OR

Are we all fighting for the same on the outside (love, food, sex shelter) but were really actually more complicated in our core (with regards to motive, preference, perception, intuition, judgement, feeling)?

post structuralism, commodity fetishism, Derrida and the like....

New Work

Meat Joy by Carolee Schneeman

One of many Nan Goldin Photos

Laurie Simmons

These are all things ive taken snaphots of in real life next to the google image search of the things. Started June 2010. Ongoing.

I got a million ways to get it.

I see Dan Flavin, Kelly Richardson, Rorschach, and Damien Hirst references in Jay-Z's "On to the next one".
Some less noticeable references include Avedon's fashion photography, Mappelthorpe's X Portfolio, Batmans Joker character by DC Comics, and a mixing of the Satans from The Passion of the Christ and Constantine (check out the video for the references here).
I cant stop watching this for some reason.
Im also particularly interested in the old Holga frame thats used, as opposed to the 16:9 industry standard.

Word Exercise- Thanks to Paul Thulin

He made us do this three word thing in grad school. Everyone hated it but me. Im pretty sure of this. While I do not think my work can ever be summed up in three words, I enjoy the process of trying.

In the next 20 minutes, im going to try to come up with 50-100:

sameness
similarity
repeat
multiple
human
internet
organization
homogenize
trend
popular
many
archive
memory
proof
document
participant
insecurity
doubt
need
conditional
fear
importance
validation
love
materialism
obsession
truth
Truth
audience
performance
time
guilt
mediated image (ok thats two, but still)
grouping
clique
show
update
fast
real-time
social
self
social-self (which is different from social and self)
window
mirror
fake
real
superficial
simulacra
need
want
desire
sex
sexuality
projection
perception
extroversion
stage
screen
identification
identity
youth
gender
culture
reality
Reality
difference
perceived difference
perceived similarity
hetero-normative
class
hip hop
adoption (of personality, not of actual children)
futility
change
morph
ephemeral
awareness
choice
caring
time
maturity
willful
adaptation
unaware
follow


ok. thats 85.

i need to get this work out there more. i feel incredibly lazy.

You Remember Dada

A few months ago, I found a series of videos linked on Facebook of dogs reuniting with their owners. The owners were soldiers who were arriving home from overseas.


I was reminded of Hachiko, the Akita dog in Japan who loyally waited for the return of his owner at a train station until he died. In 1924, Hachikō was brought to Tokyo by his owner, Hidesaburō Ueno, a professor in the agriculture department at the University of Tokyo. During his owner's life Hachikō saw him out from the front door and greeted him at the end of the day at the nearby Shibuya Station. The pair continued their daily routine until May 1925, when Professor Ueno did not return on the usual train one evening. The professor had suffered from a cerebral hemorrhage at the university that day. He died and never returned to the train station where his friend was waiting. Hachikō was loyal and every day for the next nine years he waited sitting there amongst the town's folk.

I thought there was another (perhaps Greek?) proverb or story that went along with this idea as well, but it escapes me at the moment.

I made You Remember Dada because I became my interest in the archive and preservation and documentation of time continues to interest me. In addition, the idea value as a human being adds another layer. A third layer is the projection of value. 

"See how much I am loved/liked/cared for/admired/ect?"

 This manifests itself in the form of status updates on Facebook, self important blog posts, thousands of photos of people with their friends which convey a sense of popularity and importance they could never achieve on their own. I chose to make You Remember Dada because, in THIS particular piece, I wanted to show what I think to be is true love and loyalty that does not know the bounds of the conditional. What better place to go than to animals for that? Perhaps I will address (to me) superficial love as well. Who knows.

As I researched this, I found that a movie was being made about Hachiko.

This is a still of You Remember Dada and Hachiko.

Projects

Soldiers/Dogs---DONE

Father/Daughter Wedding Dance

Military Party Boys

American Idol Freak Outs

Baseball Game Wedding Proposals

Haul Bloggers

Dick Slang

"Were Not Gay" response to Dick Slang

People Saying Um, Uh, Like or Sigh

The I Dont Have Much To Say Vlog

Just Sayin Hey

Something about the First YouTube Video Ever

Weird Dates.

Youtube was born on February 15th. My dads birthday is February 16th.

The first video ever uploaded on Youtube was on April 23rd. My dad died on April 22.

Here is the first video ever uploaded to Youtube:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jNQXAC9IVRw&feature=player_embedded

Call for entries- Museum of New Art Detriot

http://www.chicagoartistsresource.org/visual-arts/node/25750

5-14-2010 (deadline)
New Media, Sex, and Culture in the 21st Century


-many of the discourses and technologies of the Internet have been preoccupied with it, even though the U.S. government and other groups have tried to make it harder for people to find sex online


-online porn became somewhat normalized






I have a few ideas for this:
phonejacker- revamped, in print form and the new phone jacker. i have to decide which of these fits best. 
new series about sexual fetishes on youtube: smoking, shoes, ect....
bootymeat- an obvious choice
naked vlog
pleasure in looking- the work about scopophelia
last years print piece about sexting messages
new print work

The Presence of Absence

The Presence of Absence
45''x45''
2010

Girls Who Pole Dance Prove It With Bruises

45x45
2010

Trying out some print work.

"Girls with Cupcake Tattoos"
45x45
2010

100 ideas for art projects

Hank Willis Thomas mentioned that he once made a list of 100 ideas he had for projects. i thought id do the same thing. we will see where this goes.

1. make a piece that is a lie, but that others think is truth.
2. make something that involves glitter.
3. make a successful photo.
4. accurately depict my love for grrr
5. tell a story in 6 words or less and/or under 10 seconds.
6. make a complete catalog of something.
7. alter an ad.
8. do something self indulgent.
9. make a piece that is the truth, but others think is a lie.
10. make something silent that speaks. (ala Benassi)
11. make something telling of the place i grew up in.
12. create a work about zinedine zidane in the world cup (head butt)
13. collage something
14. tell my fathers story
15. make an object that is mass produceable.
16. self publish a book about anything.
17. self publish an entirely appropriated book.
18. make a work of art the describes my place in the participation of popular culture.
19. create a 3 piece project about strippers in a way that no one else has.
20. using only found footage, create a narrative film.
21. make something that offends myself.
22. make an art object that no one would want.
23. figure out how to make silence loud.
24. do something with all of my bird sculptures.
25. do a time lapse conceptual piece.
26. make a work of art that is funny and only funny.
27. make something completely original.
28. use my fathers clothing to make something wonderful.
29. accurately depict confusion
30. let go of my preconceived compulsive notions of organization and perfection and allow something i make to be a mess.
31. make a series of works using only one word as the base concept.
32. create a piece of art that measures less than 6x6x6 and weighs less than .5lbs.
33. find a lie in truth.
34. find truth in a lie.
35. make over the top kitsch. not just regular kind.
36. make a photo series of photos i shot myself.
37. make a photo series of photos i did not shoot. (a compilation)
38. make two different things that look exactly the same.
39. create something monumental in size.
40. use blingee.com for a work of art.
41. make a comic (one per month for a year)
42. capture the sound of something without using sound at all (thanks benassi, now i have to do it too)
43. use glitter
44. make a commentary on long fake plastic nails
45. participate in a performance.
46. "it is, but it isnt"
47. create something without destroying something else.
48. have 1000 of something.
49. make a short film that is a portrait of my take on popular culture once a week for a month.
50. make a drawing series.
51. do a one liner.
52. challenge everything ive made before.
53. investigate the haul blog.
54. make a complete piece in one frame. not in a series, either. just one frame.
55. make a work that only uses footage from music videos.
56. address class tourism in a work of art.
57. make something trite and see where it leads me.
58. make a video that is designed to be projected tiny.
59. make work about something other than what i already make work about.
60. make a piece about the "RIP _____" profiles all over facebook.

What kinds of image posts do we make?

- posts that quietly prove to others that we have real lives.
-posts that have an explicit purpose to talk to other posters.
-personal archive/documentation posts

my videos are breaking up into the following:
- videos that are a reaction to web specific phenomenon
-videos that are a reaction to people posting data to prove they exist.
- personal portraiture that lends itself to the experiences that everyone else has had.

i need to make this clearer.

Every Place Ive Ever Lived (sketch print)

Buildings

(this one isnt a building. its a street sweeper)

Every Place Ive Ever Lived. in order. (and then some)

to my knowelege, this is the first place i lived.

 these images are the map and composites of the closest block available on streetview to my 2nd home.

 my dads house, where i visited.

 the site of one of my old houses thats been leveled.

 the apartment i lived in is on the first floor corner of the shadowed building.

 the last house i lived in while living with my mom. she still lives here today.

 a map and image of the block closest to my fathers last house before he died. streetview unavailable.

 freshman dorms. 10th floor.

another dorm. 1st floor.

undergrad house.

1st apartment in grad school. basement apartment.

2nd apartment in grad school. 3rd floor, apartment 2.

 house in grad school.

current house.

my car on streetview

this is where we went to skip school in high school.