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Contemporary Art - Coggle Diagram

- - - - For example a somewhat controversial point (or at least controversial in my mind) is the idea that something such as cell animation or stop motion animation is not handmade purely to the fact that it is typically narrative based and requires more than one person to create.
        
        Zinman eventually clarifies this with his own definition of handmade which puts more emphasis on the importance of the manipulation that the artists hand creates rather than the mark of the manipulation itself. This definition also allows us to look at much of film as handmade as even though a machine is typically used to capture the image, the artist can still employ a huge amount of importance as they alter the film in some way.
  - - - Roberto Lugo is a contemporary American ceramicist who combines elements of history, hip hop, grafiti, politics and his own heritage into his pots
        
        What makes Lugo such an interesting Artist to look at when it comes to Art vs craft is his ability to play and manipulate form, function and design to create his pieces.
        
        For example in his piece Tupac/MLK Teapot, 2020 the viewer is confronted with a tea set where the teapot has the face of Tupac on one side and MLK on the other with a golden spout designed to look like the barrel of a gun. Along the rest of the piece sits a blue pattern on white glaze similar to 14-17th century Chinese ceramics. Finally along with this there are extra gold enamel ornamentation on the lip, lip, and handle.
        
        These pieces in an undeniable way are filled with social commentary on racism and slavery which in many ways pushes them towards art. However this commentary is placed upon the form of a tea set which brings its own connotations and meaning that also push it towards being craft. Because of this much of Lagos work sits in this middle gray zone of neither craft nor art and in many ways represents a combining of both ideas to create something greater.
    - - In The Black Craftsman's Situation Sonya Clark writes about how despite there being an apparent lack of craft created by people of color in museums much of it is il defined and is instead found in other areas that aren't considered "craft".
        
        Clark writes about how many slaves werent valued as people but instead valued for crafts and technologies as they were brought over to do things such as weave and blacksmithing
        
        Despite this many of these slaves and their amazing talents were treated as invisible and so many areas of their work are no longer treated as craft today
        
        An excellent example of this is Clarks Piece The Hair Craft Project
        
        The piece consists of 12 images of Clark's head from behind with different colored backgrounds for each image. In each image Clark is shown with a different traditional African/Afrcican American hairstyle
        
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- - - - Empire 1965
        
        The film Empire is a silent, black and white film with a runtime of 8 hours and 5 minutes and one single, slow-motion shot of a mostly unchanging Empire State Building. The film contains no narrative or characters and Warhol himself stated the purpose of the film as "to see time go by.". The film was shot during nighttime and was originally filmed at 24 frames per second however is designed to be shown at 16 frames per second which extends the runtime from 6.5 hours to the full 8 hours and 5 minutes.
        
        Empire is an amazing look into the idea of Avant Gard cinema as it sheds the notion of Narrative and story altogether, making the film instead about an idea or concept with it in this case being about the passage of time. This is exemplified by the fact that the film is even meant to be shown slowed down from the original filming and contains no real significant change overtime. This simply leaves the viewer to only be able to hold on to the time passed as the film is viewed.
    - - “Paracinema identifies an array of phenomena that are considered ‘cinematic’ but that are not embodied in the materials of film as traditionally defined...Instead, paracinema is based on a different version of essentialism, which locates cinema’s essence elsewhere.” - Jonathan Walley (18)
        
        Tony Conrad, Sukiyaki
        
        The piece Sukiyaki consists of the artist Tony Conrad preparing the dish Sukiyaki in front of an audience before literally "projecting" the dish onto a screen by throwing it.
        
        This piece is an excellent example of paracinema and how it isn't a subset of cinema but instead exists alongside it as artists redefine what cinema even is altogether and push it into new bounds.
  - - - Within the essay Kraus outlines how overtime we've drifted away from traditional styles of sculpture and have expanded the range of what we might even call sculpture. Because of this he begins to outline new terms and identify work as such with these new terms. To do this he creates a diagram that compares a piece against its relationship with architecture and landscape. For Kraus he defines sculpture as something that is neither landscape nor architecture. For the other three items he creates the terms Site constructions, Marked sites and axiomatic structures. Each term has a different relationship with architecture and landscape and this will be explored in the next spread of nodes
        
        Axiomatic Structures
        
        Sol Lewitt Floor piece no. 1 (Cube structure based on nine modules)
        
        Axiomatic structures are some of the more troubling works to look at as in many cases they can be hard to distinguish from sculpture. The key difference is axiomatic structures play with architecture by both incoporating it in the work as well as distancing themselves from it. Sol Lewit's Floor piece no. 1 (Cube structure based on nine modules) is a good example of this as it combines white painted wood into a cubic lattice structure which toes on the line of almost being like an architural model but not quite as it holds an almost strange feeling looking at it
        
        Marked Sites
        
        Michael Heizer Double negative
        
        Double Negative is considered a Marked site as it its purely represented as landscape and also marks why it is in many ways crucial to have these additional terms to describe pieces. By adding the term marked site it allows artists to play with landscape as a medium and directly alter the land in ways that without the term wouldn't really be sculpture and in some ways wouldn't even be art.
        
        Earth Works/Site Constructions
        
        Robert Smithson Partially buried Woodshed
        
        The piece consists of a wooden shed partially buried within a pile of dirt at Kent State University. Because the piece consists of architecture (the shed) and landscape (the pile of dirt) the piece is considered an earthwork or more aptly a site construction. Something to note with these sites is because they combine man made vs landscape they will change and alter over time and especially in the case of this piece where a few months after creation someone grafted the words "'MAY 4 KENT 70" in memorial of the Kent State Shootings. Then later on as well the piece was partially burned in 1975 by an arsonist and was eventually removed by the university.
- - - - Perimeters/Pavilions/Decoys 1977-1978
        
        This piece by Mary Miss consists of a 4 acre clearing of grass, surrounded by a forest on Long Island. Within the clearing there are four man made structures, 3 of which are towers made of wooden beams, metal screens and plywood. With this there sits a pit that is several feet deep and consists of an underground courtyard, also made with beams, plywood and a gravel floor. Finally along with this there are two semicircular mounds of dirt
        
        With this piece there is no instruction given to the viewer and with it sitting in a forested clearing there is a sense of isolation as the viewer chooses their own way to navigate through each part. Much of the work feels alien as its raw construction aesthetic gives it both a natural and manmade aesthetic.
        
        This use of land and raw construction is an excellent example of an Earth work/Site construction where the work is acting as both a landscape as well as an architectural piece. Because of this the viewer is forced to create their own conclusions as they grapple with their own context/perspective of landscape and architecture. This is why Perimeters/Pavilions/Decoys makes such a compelling piece to look at for minimalism as well since no one viewer will have the same perspective as another
    - - Probably one of the most prominent artists to be considered a Minimalist, Donald Judds work consists mainly of simple rectangular forms made of industrial materials such as iron or concrete and occasionally colored with flat, consistent and mostly primary colors.
        
        Pictured to the right is Donald Judds Untitled (Stack) piece from 1967. The piece consists of lacquer on galvanized iron with twelve units, each 9 x 40 x 31". Installed vertically with 9" intervals. The tops and bottoms of the boxes are left as bare metal. As an additional note depending on the height of the ceiling during installation more or less boxes would be added to maintain proper spacing.
        
        By making the installation of the piece so flexible it connotes the importance of the piece as a whole, placing emphasis on the whole piece rather than the boxes themselves.
        
        This idea of removing emphasis on the boxes themselves is also continued within Judds work as a whole as he had much of his work made in a factory to create a perfect finish. On top of this he chose to use boxes in much of his work as "he felt it was neutral and had no symbolic meaning"
        
        Much of minimalism is reliant on the idea of mechanical reproduction as to look at a minimalist piece of art is to understand that the feelings created aren't from the aura of the piece but instead the feelings created simply from the viewers own perspective. Because of this a new debate is created that transcends Art vs Craft and instead deals with Handmade vs Produced and if a work such as Donald Judds Untitled (Stack) should be considered art at all since it came from a factory.