Idea/Word of of the day: Artifact

According to the Historical Society, an artifact is an item/object that is over 100 years old. I want to work with artifact photographs and compile new works through appropriating old family photographs. I plan on using photographic means of appropriating the photos.

What else is considered an artifact?

"art" i "fact"

I have a ton of baby pictures from when I was less than a year old that had survived the flooding of the basement numerous times, however, the pictures have rainbows of water damage flying across them, blocking out faces and just looking cool. I was thinking about appropriating these into a piece. These photographs, because of what they've been through, are, in my opinion, artifacts.

My younger sister and I were at our family farm, which is itself an artifact (ca. 1830), and at the bottom of a drawer in an antique dresser in the guest room, my sister found an envelope with Victorian Era "wedding pictures" inside...she starts flipping through the pictures when all of a sudden I hear her SCREAM!! The pictures were not wedding pictures, but a Victorian porno with the images numbered in order of the "plot" which was that of honeymoon sex. Hilarious. That I am sure would be worth some money, and I was thinking about appropriating it..somehow...

Contemporary Brazilian Photography

I checked out
Novas Travessias; Contemporary Brazilian Photography, by Maria Luiza Melo Carvalho.
ISBN#1-85984-963-6

A collection of Contemporary Brazilian Photographers which began as an "open-ended research venture, with the intention of encouraging a dialogue." It is a beautiful collection of works which are each unique yet they all cohesively unite and portray an inside look into contemporary culture of Brazil through the eyes of her Photographers. Published in London:1996.


Patricia Azevedo




"Working in the darkroom, exposing sections from many different negatives (often from historical as well as her own photographs), Azevedo builds up her images over a period of many hours, sometimes days, only seeing what she has produced when the photographic paper is finally immersed in developer. This technique (imagine drawing in complete darkness) generates dreamlike images about history, memory, imagination and intuition.(http://www.juliangermain.com/projects/patricia-azevedo.php)"


Walter Firmo






Eustaquio Neves

I have been very sick with Spring Fever and my Senioritis is flaring. I shall be posting double entries to catch up for last week.
Thank You.

Idea: James Branch Cabell-Special Collections room at the VCU Library

For my Va Hist class we attended a lecture at the special collections room at the Cabell Library. They have a whole special collections of historic documents, maps, books, memoribilia, and even artifacts etc from the history of Richmond and Virginia. They even had an entire "period" room dedicated to author James Branch Cabell, a local of Richmond, and whom the VCU Library is dedicated and named after. The room is a "period" library containing the entire personal library of J. B. Cabell, which include many literary classics read by Cabell and an entire collection of Cabells books.
Cabell was known as "Richmond's Tolkien" and a wrote a series of books based upon a fictional land in medieval France known as "Poictesme (pwa-tem)" The library room also has a collection of Cabell's furniture, writing desk, smoking table, etc.
The amazing thing about this room at the library is students are able to access all of these resources, with supervision, for research. A student can look at and access the private library of James Branch Cabell. Cabell has a collection of books surrounding the occult which I am interested in looking at.
Also the prospect of getting to hold and touch the actual item/artifact is interesting.

Lecture: Sanford Biggers

http://www.sanfordbiggers.com

Sanford Biggers' work is a culmination of sculpture, video, music, performance, and graphic design. His works communicate the voice of the African American with a full range of emotions from dance to lamenting song. his work combines American popculture, hip-hop, African culture, with a slight Japanese influence as well. Biggers' uses strong symbolism and icons to communicate social realities. Biggers artworks are also a melting pot of spirituality and philosophic ideas has gathered traveling all over the world. He also likes to "recycle" previous artworks transforming them into newer pieces.

Biggers had designed a break dance floor which he filmed the dancers from above. He melted down a boombox to represent the death of hip hop. Biggers also melted down hip hop jewelry to make singing bells to commemorate the dead ancestors of hip-hop.
He is currently being commisioned

Artist: Maurizio Anzeri

Anzeri is most known for his "Human Hair" sculptures, but I am showing his embroidered photographs. Anzeri is an native of Italy who now lives and works in London. From 1996-99, Anzeri attended the London Institute-Camberwell College of Art awarded a BA(Honors) in Graphic Design and Sculpture then from 2002-2005 he attended the Slade School of Fine Art-London being awarded a MA of Fine Arts-Sculpture.

I chose to write about Anzeri's embroidered photographs because a friend, Arlie, recommended I look at these after she saw the photographs I was making of old family portraits where I purposefully was placing the reflection of my flash on the glass upon the faces in the photographs-my images reminded her of Anzeri's works.

They are hauntingly delicate and beautiful artworks. I am reminded of mysticism, psychic powers, and the aura that surrounds people. I am reminded of masks and how we as people masquerade our true identities behind "projections" of who we think we are or who we want others to perceive us to be-how we hide our true identities behind masks in order to protect ourselves. They appear at first glance to be creepy and alot of reviews online have a similar opinion, but I do not believe them to be creepy because the vivid colors and patterns suggest otherwise. Embroidery is a delicate meditative process employed by Grandma's everywhere, so how can these artworks be creepy? I think that it is because as people we psychologically look at faces in order to connect with each other or communicate and the fact that the faces are "masked" by embroidery it creeps some people out. I think Anzeri is commenting on obscure knowledge and perhaps the powers of the subconscious mind suggesting that the subjects in the antiquated portraits psychically manifested the embroidery upon their own faces and that Anzeri's hand was possessed by the souls captured within the photographic image to produce these magical designs in accord with the personality of the portrait.

Idea: Return to the "Halfway-House"

^^^^^^^^^^View from INSIDE the Halfway-House^^^^^^^^



I must to return to the Halfway-House and photograph the magic.

The Halfway-House sits upon a threshold to the spirit world.
Half-way in this realm and half-way in the other.

Directions:
Look for:
the spot in the East where the Sun will set over water in the West,
7 concrete foundered ships,
Follow a dirt road to the left and where the road bends find a deer trail.
The deer trail runs along a 25 ft cliff ledge that drops off to the sea.
Follow the obsessive Orange Tape
The Halfway-House is guarded by a thicket of Briars

The Halfway-House sits upon the 25ft sandy cliffside. Half of the house is on the cliff and the other half had fallen into the sea long ago. Sit down upon the floor of the Halfway-House and Look out upon the Sea.

It is a Magic spot-impossible to take a photograph of for the photograph will never capture the truth about the Halfway-House.
Must experience firsthand.
Yet, Ye be Warned, not to let it steal your soul for the view is so enticing a person gets the urge to leap out into the sky, but alas would plumit to their untimely death and the Halfway-House would collect another pony for the pen...