Comments for ARTSpeak

Comment on Comment and Read Comments Here! by adi28

adi28 — Sun, 26 May 2013 16:09:01 +0000

thanks for the infotmation

Comment on ARTSpeak Lecturer: Mira Schor by adi28

adi28 — Thu, 23 May 2013 16:16:32 +0000

nice info and good topic [kaltura-widget entryid="0_9a30tuup" size="comments" /]

Comment on ARTSpeak Lecturer: Wangechi Mutu by Ariel Herman

Ariel Herman — Mon, 04 Apr 2011 01:13:20 +0000

Art expresses itself differently for each individual artist, the artist can draw on their culture, their past experiences or even just pure abstraction as their main focus. Wangechi Mutu is one such artist that draws on her culture as well as historical events as the main focus in her art. Mutu’s work is full of vigor and devotion, creating detail oriented paintings and drawings spilling with significance. Mutu looks at sickening events in Africa to build off of as well as having a strong interest in the distortion of the female form.
Color and collage is an element of Wangechi Mutu’s work that is of great importance. The color palette in which Wagechi Mutu uses is stark and sophisticated. Wide array of colors are used as well as a curious application of these colors to create a piece of artwork that shines with vibrancy. Mutu described in her lecture how she is constantly collecting magazine photographs in which she dilligiantly puts together to make an appealing whole. These collages she constructs relate to the distorted female form in many cases, as well as relating the female to an animalistic quality in nature. The collages are just a base for the works in which she creates.
Wangetchi Mutu’s breadth of work drew from magazines as a chief component. In Mutus Pin up series, Mutu created small works of art on paper with watercolors as her medium. Josefine Baker, a french dancer was the chief inspiration for Mutus pin up series, she looked to her for a sense of fiction and fakeness, in which she created her own fake and distorted figures. This fakeness seen in Josefine Baker might be related to the fakeness of the world, therefore making everyone a displaceable aspect of it. Mutu described Josefine baker as a “gorgeous buffoon” Being a gorgeous buffoon, Josefine Baker played on using quirky, silly movements on stage making her beauty mix with a sense of stupidity. In Mutus other series based on collage, she sought to connect the figure with a face. In this series of the correlation between figure and face , Mutu drew on masks for inspiration. Mutu created eye puzzling works that made it difficult to distinguish the figure and the mask and gave a feeling of depth to the artwork. The correlation and eye trickery made the pieces bring the foreground into the background while also bringing the background to the foreground.
Mutu Baker not only draws on the people of the time but also the events that transpired in Africa as well as her new home in New York. Mutu looked at the work of Hannah Hoch, an artist of the dada movement for inspiration. Hannah Hoch used collage as a means to politicize art and culture which Mutu also sought to do. Both Mutu and Hoch share an interest in creating a “shock” factor within their artwork. Mutu talks about the protest of a group of woman in kenya, whom took their clothing off in front of an Anglo-Belgian rubber India torture building. Kenya was and still is a very conservative and restricted area, where woman taking their clothing off was seen as very powerful and obscene. Mutu created a sculpture she titles“fat legs”, in the work fat legs Mutu drew on the comforting factor of the female form in a world of troubles. Mutu describes that when she moved to new york she felt hardship in adjusting, and felt like she was living in a city that constantly displaces you. Mutu used art as a therapeutic form, as an escape from a world that doesnt need you or forgets easily. In Mutus next series, she drew on the alienation of portraiture as the base or preliminary idea behind her work. Looking at mug shots she created this series that emphasized a sense of alienation. This series draws on the idea that we are all just subjects in this city and if we take a break the city still functions without us.
Art can be expressed through many different forms of expression. Wangetchi Mutu uses primarily collage to depict her feelings about society and the hardships that occur within it. Mutu also draws inspiration from all over, ranging from female performers to the history of her african culture. We artists should all learn from Wangetchi Mutu and dive into our own experiences that shape our artwork, from their we can grow as artists as well as individuals within an ever-changing society.

Comment on Comment and Read Comments Here! by Marian Weston

Marian Weston — Fri, 01 Apr 2011 18:05:16 +0000

It was a wonderful lecture yesterday – actually another wonderful, inspiring lecture. This has been an amazing series. I’ve been fortunate enough to attend all four of the lectures in the ARTSpeak series and each one was powerful, informative, inspiring, and educational in all the best ways. I’ve learned so much about these artists, artistic process, creativity, responses to life, taking experience into art, etc. We hear first-hand about the artists’ diverse backgrounds and how they express this and more in their art – their various paths, working techniques, influences, and unique self-expression. Thank you to all those who worked on arranging these lectures, especially the entire Art Speak committee. I hope this important series will continue. Kudos!

Comment on Comment and Read Comments Here! by Lydia Zackery

Lydia Zackery — Wed, 16 Mar 2011 15:14:14 +0000

Wangechi Mutu

I found Wangechi Mutu’s lecture very interesting. I am personally not a big advocate for collage but her works are provocative and certainly full of contradiction.
On the first look they seemed commercial to me, given the nature of the inspiration of pin ups and fashion, one has to forgive me for that. After hearing her speak, and looking at her work closer, I realize how prompting, forward, dark, detailed, beautifully executed and intricate her work is. It is charged politically, sexually, philosophically and personally. I still have to say that the esthetic of her art is not something that personally moves me, however, Wangechi Mutu as a person and how she comes to create her work is something that I found really fascinating. She inspired me with all the research of anthropology and her thirst for knowledge to understand the world and it’s history as a whole. I found it incredible that she looks for connections and truth in everything and everywhere. She functions scientifically as well as artistically and I was very impressed by that. The soft yet strong way she is passionate, the way she speaks so eloquently about world affairs, war, society, her upbringing and history, reminded me that we have a higher purpose as artists and there is something quite special about us. We can be powerful and make a difference. We have the voice and the tools to document and stand witness to the signs of our times and eventually become part of our history. We can tell a story and we can tell it right. I do realize that there are different types of artists and all art does not have to be political or sociologically charged but she definitely reminded me of something I have forgotten a little bit. It is not always just about us but our history, our documentation and our participation to help create a more powerful future.

She has a reason for making her art. It is as simple as that. I also come from another continent and she definitely touched a nerve when she commented on moving somewhere and having to explain the person you are, and having to explain yourself as an artist. In many ways I think that can be challenging and painful but ultimately it can be an amazing journey and experience. I feel that when we do have to dig deep and look inside ourselves, in order to be understood by others, we also learn many new, real and probably hidden things we couldn’t even fathom.

I have had quite a bit of a journey myself and feel privileged and blessed that everyday I can express myself through my art. I am nowhere near as political as I used to be but I am hoping that through my constant painting, sculpting and photographing, I will understand my way and purpose as an artist. I am still not quite sure why I do what I do but Wangechi Mutu reminded me that it is a journey and things do not always make sense straight away. I also absolutely loved what she said about mistakes that happen whilst making art. She understands that there is a plan but sometimes we have to let it go and decide whether the mistakes are actually part of the process and are part of the piece or if the piece is just simply ruined by it. I agree with this, even though sometimes it is hard to let something just simply be or go.

I am grateful that we were able to hear her speak and see her work so up close and personal.
She reminded me that things take time and sometimes we just have to keep digging, doing and going, eventually it will all fall into place.

Comment on ARTSpeak Lecturer: Wangechi Mutu by Stephanie Morse

Stephanie Morse — Sun, 13 Mar 2011 20:45:59 +0000

I found Wangechi Mutu’s lecture to be very interesting. What I appreciate most about her work is its elegance. She comes from such a dark aspect of world history that one might expect her work to be brash, full of gore and anger. However, instead she handles such powerful topics such as race, colonization, and mutilation all with a very graceful touch. In my opinion, her outlook toward these issues is shaped heavily by her idols. With admiring such strong female figures as Nina Simone and Eartha Kitt her approach to difficulties are met like those icons with quiet tenacity.

That juxtaposition between power and the powerless, beauty and horror led me as the viewer to feel extremely uncomfortable which I think she absolutely intended. I feel compelled to call them beautiful but that does not explain them completely. When speaking of their beauty one must also include their raw grotesqueness also.

I hope to see her work in person one day. From what I can tell, there are a lot of intricacies and smaller details that were a little bit hard to tell in the handouts and the slides. She is definitely one artist I am glad I was introduced to and one that I will keep on my radar.

Comment on Comment and Read Comments Here! by Angela Hermida

Angela Hermida — Fri, 11 Mar 2011 02:31:32 +0000

Wangechi Mutu
Art is dead or rather painting is dead. Some believe that the art form has been minimalized, stretched, explored and manipulated in every conceivable way. Because of this, nothing more can really be done with painting that has not already been done before. My own artistic inclinations compel me to argue against this. I find it hard to believe that there is no one who can breathe new life into Art. After all, art is a freedom of conscience and someone can still choose to express something of consequence. Why can’t that unique voice manifest itself in a painting extraordinary enough that it can stir something within a viewer? If it does, can that piece tell us something about who its creator really is? As an aspiring artist, I find myself searching for answers to these questions whenever I can. Oddly enough, I began to find them when I attended a lecture by the artist Wangechi Mutu.
Embodying ideas regarding beauty obsession, genocide, rape, mutilation, and colonization, the contoured figures of Mutu’s compositions appear bizarre and ominous. She uses cutouts from fashion and porn magazines to collage her figures. By applying ink or watercolor to Mylar, Mutu achieves a “bubbly marbly effect” that make her creatures look as though their skin has been either burned or diseased. Some have twisted, flowing hair while others are bald. Many even have limbs comprised of motorbike or mechanical parts. As strange as they may sound, Mutu’s femine creatures still manage to be alluringly beautiful despite their spiky hair and “infected” skin. According to Mutu, those who are made to endure the atrocities of the world are left feeling despaired, dislocated and disconnected. The artist refers to persons who were once removed from their homes and put into camps or those who are arrested, tried, and tortured because they dared to speak out as examples. They struggle to make sense of themselves and their surroundings in their attempts to survive. Consequently, their identity as individuals transforms. This notion along with her ardent love of her own African heritage is what gives Mutu’s creatures their staggering nature.
Listening to Wangechi Mutu discuss her work as well as the things that motivate her was inspiring. She comes across as an old soul with an inquisitive mind. From her description of her African homeland to her admiration for the innovative Josephine Baker and Grace Jones, she seems to consider the depth and beauty in everything. For example, she attributes her forensic series to the peculiar idea that “we can study a person’s features in order to understand who a person is”. She then drops hints in regards to her figures as she curiously reflects upon various physical depictions of Aliens. Despite its chalky skin and large black eyes, an alien may possess human like qualities because it is “a thing we don’t know that’s actually us”. She is drawn to the dirty, dark and morbid as well. Mutu will use raunchiest of porn images in her art as a means to emancipate the women objectified within them. As harsh as it may be, even scientific research done on humans during the holocaust and genocide in Rwanda can still teach us something significant. It is easy to imagine how, as she has strived to attain knowledge and understanding, she began to twist and mutilate the figures she drew. Coming from an extremely conservative Kenya, she appears not to want to look away anymore. The blindfold is off. Some of her topics of discussion were brutal but it is possible she chose to talk about them as a sort of walk up call. Confines and rose colored glasses rarely make things better. More often than not, we are stifled by them.
As suggested in her work, there are many facets and layers to everything and everyone. A person’s race, color, or circumstance do not account for all of it either. Good or bad, Wangechi Mutu declares there is healing in her process. Whether we can personally relate to her subjects or not, we can still feel for those who do. By facing up to our deepest fears, like those who inspire Mutu’s work, we can all choose to learn, accept, and decide to do better. If her viewers see Mutu’s message for what it truly is then maybe something can be done. Differences can be made. With this in mind, Wangechi Mutu is a profound artist who is doing some really remarkable things with her artistry. Her painting is most definitely not dead and it does say something about who she is. Aside from looking at her work itself, this was never more evident than when she passionately said: “Art is important. It has kept me sane alive. It saves lives!”

Comment on ARTSpeak Lecturer: Wangechi Mutu by camilla

camilla — Fri, 25 Feb 2011 06:45:30 +0000

I found the inspiration for her art to be really fascinating, very morbid but fascinating. You could tell her background really had a voice in her work too.

Comment on Comment and Read Comments Here! by Ashley Maiorana

Ashley Maiorana — Fri, 25 Feb 2011 00:25:35 +0000

Collages? Something I never thought to do but a great way to express an idea without the stress of having to work at making the figures and objects look realistic.
We as artists are inspired by the world around us and try to replicate what we observe in figure painting classes or simplify the world around us in abstract painting, why not take photographs and previously produced illustrations, slap them together and create work from that. She saves time doing physical labor and get to use her mind to be creative, the best part. I think I’ll try this sometime.
I’d classify her paintings to be surreal rather than abstract since she is using parts of images from life to tell her story.

Comment on Comment and Read Comments Here! by Katherine DiBella

Katherine DiBella — Thu, 24 Feb 2011 05:02:34 +0000

My making sense of Wangechi Mutu’s speech…

Wangechi Mutu spoke in a very quiet and shy voice when she presented herself to the crowd in F.IT.’s Katie Murphy theatre. Usually, when someone openly admits that they are nervous before they start making their speech, the audience suspects a dull speaker, who reads straight off their piece of paper, but although Wangechi was soft voiced, she was not soft spoken. In fact, I think that because she was so silent with her speech, she made her points that much stronger. The way she held her poise while discussing difficult topics made her reasoning and her explanations sincere and honest. She was driven by the worst things in her life like the wars in Africa and the cruel brutalities within her heritage. All of her motives and her thoughts revolve around one common theme, which she reiterated throughout her speech, no one knows anything at all and you cannot believe what your eyes are telling you.
Wangechi and I are from two completely different places, at two different times in the world and yet I felt so in sync with her as she spoke to us. She had mentioned being inspired by sound. This is something that hit me very closely; my great grand father, Onofrio, emigrated from Sicily in the early 1900’s and in Spanish Harlem he opened, what today is not only my family’s livelihood but also my family’s pride, O. DiBella Music. The store was later moved to Bergenfield, New Jersey; closer to home and now is on its third generation of family. This made sound very apparent element in my life. Although I have tried every instrument under the sun, I have never stuck to one, I used sound and music in my own way, in my art. Just as Wangechi absorbed the sounds, good and bad, within her neighborhood in Kenya and her country Africa, I try everyday to remind myself of the sounds and the fortunate beauty that I was raised around. The passion I thrived as a young child waiting for my grandfather to play his mandolin is a sensation I hold inside of myself everyday. The way I can see my own father growing to be just like his father, drives me. My grandfather teaching my father how to fix instruments, holds so much value to me. The two loves of my life, my grandfather and my father, make me so proud about where I come from.
Culture was an obvious staple within Wangechi’s art. She distorted the bad things and tried to make sense out of unspeakable truths with her two most powerful tools, her hands. I had taken three pages of notes during her lecture and I would say that three fourths of my notes are things I had quoted her saying. Just as she had quoted people she was inspired by in her power point, her own inspiration made me quote her. She said “ Art saves lives, art keeps me sane.” This I can honesty understand, not for the same reasons she does, but for my own. Her culture dropped these life-altering situations on her and she created personal awareness. I love how for her own wellbeing she, to this day, has been trying to make sense of it all, in such a healthy and organic way.
Art does keep the sanity within me. Even though I cannot say that I lived within the battlegrounds of war, I can say I have turned to art, just say she has, for comfort and for explanation. I have played the same mind games she has, I have had to retreat to canvas, to my bedroom walls and to color for therapy. Wangechi subconsciously added the difficulties from Africa into her art and only later realizing what she had done. I too create things and then years later think back to what was happening when I had made that certain piece. I believe that Wangechi and I would agree that the act of doing and the processes of making is much for beneficial and substantial than a final product. Some artists make art for an audience for the purpose of pleasing and I think that we both decided and/or were driven towards art to make sense of this big, dense world we live in. I have always felt that art is the most dependable friend that anyone could ever confide in, it will never leave you and it can never disappoint you, nothing in art is permanent and if you truly create with a purpose, an audience, a person, even just one, will see it inside of you and relate to you. Wangechi Mutu and I have been physically worlds apart for our whole lives but when she spoke, I understood.