Jonah Kagan - Final Project - Walking Machine

Allison Barker - Final Project

I decided to test my skills/explore watercolors for my final project. Sorry, it's posted so late...

15-Elsa Obus-Final Project Experience

Sooo what is art? I don't know exactly, but I believe that any art form involves the release of energy and emotion. For my final project I got really huge paper and a lot of tempera paint from the RISD store and invited a bunch of people to come paint and make art with me (no paint brushes allowed). I don't know if what we made is art but I think it is really aesthetically pleasing and interesting to look at. But more importantly than that this was really an art making experience. This is something I will always remember about the last few weeks of my freshman year at Brown and I'll always look back on it fondly. When I see these pieces (which will be hanging in my grad center suite) I will always feel the emotion coming off of them and I think that will make me happy :)

14-Elsa Obus-Color and Light

For my color and light project I decided to paint on light bulbs. I think it is interesting how whatever you paint looks completely different when the light is turned on. For example, this light bulb I didn't like so much and I thought I overworked it. But when I plugged it in it got much more abstract again and more appealing. I actually would consider doing this more. I found the painting really cool and relaxing, although I would have to find something other than acrylic paint (which starts to smoke and burn when the light gets plugged in!) to use.

Lucy S's final project

For my final project, I painted a series of portraits. I limited myself to a few color paints and tried to focus on capturing the lighting on the face. I made the background a list of genetic code because I wanted this project to represent the unique form and function of the human body (I'm really interested in medicine and human bio).

Michael Yanagisawa - final project

http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?pid=3813377&id=505494550#!/photo.php?pid=3813377&id=505494550&fbid=395620664550

my final project, a portrait of my two late grandparents from hong kong.

in addition, i did a spraypaint stencil of a urinal, perfect for that friday night when you don't know what part of the building to urinate on. So if you see a spray painted urinal around ....

Also, there was a great article in the sunday new york times magazine ... may 9, 2010. it's entitled "just priceless," and describes a piece of "art" -- a black box, in fact -- that, once purchased, resells itself (so a complex black box). Is this art? I think so. I'd say, that in the modern day and age, art is subjective, and art is whatever you want it to be. To some, a piece is art; to some, it is garbage. My standards for art, no doubt, differ from a lot of people's; I do not think that a urinal is art in the traditional sense, but I can see how people would this such. I think this correlates perfectly with the fact that art is an "emotional experience" -- if you feel some sort of emotion, elicit some reaction, then the piece of work is art, to you. But art is like religion -- you believe it, or don't. Art is an opinion, something noone can take away. Subjectiveness, beauty, emotions, opinion -- that, to me, is art.

~Mike Y.

Olivia Fagon (1/3 of final project)

This is my second headdress, and it was inspired by the Color and Light prompt. I chose to incorporate the idea of ceremony and ritual in this piece through my use of light and shadow created by the cardboard cutouts and transparencies. This eliminates the static quality of a 3d piece and makes it an experience that is both visual and interactive.

Leah Cogan - Final Project - The Dress

Inspired to make my own wedding dress after visiting the bridal shop where cupcake dresses abound, I decided a nice 50's style dress would be just the thing. Simple, different, classic. Throughout the process what became of primary importance was making something that represented both Chris and I, something that was not just 'my princess-for-a-day' dress but a symbol of us coming together. To do this, I made use of his used guitar strings to decorate the dress along with pieces from broken bracelets given to me from grandma. The material is mostly from Recycling for Rhode Island Education and my fabric basket. The background of the pictures: Chris' half packed room!

Art is something that communicates. I stand by that. It communicates a story or it communicates a history or a memory. Art can be nostalgic, like making a little figuring the way you used to do when you were 5. Art can be innovative. Art can be every day objects. Art communicates for us when we get bored with words.

Lucy Final

I did a series of assignments inspired by Miranda July's "Learning to Love You More". I started off straightforward with my projects, not sure of a broader linking theme (sewing scarves, doing something ala andy goldsworthy) and ended up getting fascinated by noticing, capturing and trying to share all of these little things at Brown. the trash, the magazines, the notes, the seed pods, the sounds, trying to see them in a new way and getting really excited about what there was to see if you stopped and looked. I would love to continue this project in my life in general and more projects like it. i didn't expect going in that it would give me a new perspective on "what is art?", but it kinda has. i have never before been as passionate about the role of noticing, that maybe the artist is someone who notices what another overlooks and helps us see ourselves or our world of the magazine in our trash in a new way.

I find her work really fabulous: here are some links
http://www.learningtoloveyoumore.com/hello/index.php
http://mirandajuly.com/
and a cool interview about it: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_UBtwWYY4uw

Thanks so much for a fabulous semester. Good luck on finals. and fabulous work everyone!!!

13. Kat Yang - Final Project/Color and Light

My final project was an homage to my mother - very well timed for Mother's Day. I made a painting of her from an old photograph. In addition, I decided to cook a traditional dish she used to make - scallion pancakes. Half of them were with the typical scallions, while the other half was based on a recipe my mother adjusted so that it included both scallions and pork sung (sweet, dried pork). I served these with a soy sauce and garlic dipping sauce.

For my color and light projects, I decided to emulate the courtyard of Gaudi's Casa Batlo. The "tiles" near the top of the courtyard are closer to the natural sunlight and darker in hue than the tiles near the bottom of the building. Therefore, because of the brighter light near the top, there should be an effect of uniform tone for all the tiles.

The second part of my color and light project was this bed sheet. For this, my boyfriend and I painted each other's entire bodies and then interacted on the "canvas". I wanted to do this because it was exploration of the interaction of bodies intersected with the interaction of colors. The areas that are green represent the interaction of us. Also, this was very reminiscent of action painting where the process of creation is the art form, and not necessarily the final result.

12. Daniel Ton - Final Project

I drew a portrait of my house mate, Sam, using graphite, Sharpie, and charcoal. At the bottom it reads, "Death leaves cans of shaving cream half-used," from Haruki Murakami's novel - Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World. In part, the drawing is a response to artificial public personas (think, "Smile for the camera!").

Viewing art should be an emotional experience. Since this portrait freaks me out, I think it qualifies as art.

13. Rachel Borders: Final Project

ZOMBIE BRIDE!

Here are some picture I shot of Natalie (my model). I shot mostly in film, but these are the digital ones I liked. I won't have the film until I go home.

The Transformation:

Being a Bride:

Anger:

Close up:

12. Megan Estes. Lighting Project.

This past week, I co-lighting designed the Attitude Dance Concert with my friend Leandro. It was definitely an experience - I've never worked with dance lighting before, though I have learned some about it theoretically. I was able to get some photographs from the photographer who came in, Mike Nyman.

Sidelight is one of the most prominent lighting types because it "sculpts the body." Colored light from each side, especially from a mid-to-low position, throws a lot of light beneath an outstretched arm or a turned head to add definition to the dancers.

Backlight, like sidelight, is also very popular. It definitely has a different feeling than side lighting, but it is known to add dimension and depth to performers, dancing or otherwise, onstage.

Leandro and I also used a fair amount of lighting on the backdrop (or cyc) to add color, atmosphere and place to the pieces.

I had a ton of fun working on this show. It was kind of a moment-to-moment design process, done and teched and performed all in a week, but it was awesome working with a new group of people and learning more about lighting design at the same time.

11. Megan Estes. Material Alchemy.

I forgot to post this from forever ago. For my material alchemy project, I decided that instead of being inspired necessarily by a particular material, I'd be inspired by the properties of certain materials. So I decided to make a table that had materials related to light as its central components. I also wanted to challenge the idea of the table as I know it, because the light-related table I created is not as useable necessarily as a regular table, and yet could certainly function as a table in its own way.

12. Rachel Borders: Light Project

For this project I decided to focus on photography. It is something that I have been studying for awhile and I really love it. I believe that lighting can make or break a photograph. So I decided to experiment with lighting. The most interesting stuff happened when I took pictures on a train. Here is my favorite shot:

13-Elsa Obus-Material Alchemy

For this material alchemy project I went to the Rhode Island recycling center with Kat and Dan. The first thing I found that really caught my interest was this ribbon that said "Bumpus Middle School Honor Roll". I just thought it was really ridiculous. And then I started reading all these other awards that were equally ridiculous. I ended up making clothing out of these ribbons which made something useful out of these discarded ribbons. Although I can't imagine why anyone would discard their Gridley Gators International Swim Meet Eighth place ribbon! Or nearly 50 purple ribbons from the Vermont Summer Festival haha!

Katie Sola Final Project

My final project is going to be quite personal. I'm going to do it about my friend Avi, who we lost about 2 months ago. It'll be kind of a meditation on the nature of memory and art's relationship to it, and will take the form of a series of drawings. Some of them will be of him, from photographs, I'm really hoping to do a successful portrait, but we'll see how that goes. I'm also going to draw the tangible things that are left behind. I'll do his hookah, a shirt of his which is now mine, and some in his room. I may also draw places and things around campus that I associate with him.

I don't really have a set plan, I think I'll just start drawing and see where it takes me.

Katie Sola Material Alchemy

So, I decided to make jewellery out of rubbish. I thought this would be interesting because we tend to think of jewellery as being made of precious stones and metals, and I wanted to create adornments out of visually unappealing matter.
My favourite is the cardboard and white foam necklace construction. I made some matching earrings for it. The planes are made out of the boarding pass I flew in on from London, and the other necklace out of different papers - receipts, gum wrappers etc. Finally I made some rough looking rings. At first glance they might be decayed silver or something like that. They're duct tape.

Candice Low Jello

For the material alchemy project, I wanted to explore the source of a material, as opposed to recycling it. Material alchemy makes me think of cooking, and what better example of material alchemy than jello? It turns from powder into a wobbly something, which somehow we've come to accept as normal, and tasty. By putting the jello box into the jello, I wanted to create something absurd and remind us of the very mysterious alchemy behind jello. Moreover, Dan devouring it with only a knife shows how absurd alchemy has become an acceptable form of creating food which is apparently irresistible.