Rainbows!

http://www.hawaiipictures.com/pictures/wallpapers/rainbows1-1.jpg

Or, because that doesn't work:

http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://www.hawaiipictures.com/pictures/kauai/rainbows1-1.jpg&imgrefurl=http://thebarefootlibrarian.blogspot.com/2008/03/many-colors-of-greater-phx-digital.html&usg=__1IzlYGalLtMNJKG-J0VsM3z9ihM=&h=1149&w=1600&sz=335&hl=en&start=2&um=1&tbnid=Of9XJbB7NV3q_M:&tbnh=108&tbnw=150&prev=/images%3Fq%3Drainbows%26ndsp%3D18%26um%3D1%26hl%3Den%26client%3Dfirefox-a%26rls%3Dorg.mozilla:en-US:official%26sa%3DN

Back when I used to actually draw things (around the age of 5), my favorite subject was rainbows. I was weird and critical about them having the colors be in the right order (my kindergarten buddies got an earful if they ever drew purple next to yellow). I was thrilled when I found out that there was actually a scientific explanation for why rainbow colors were always in the same order. They’re spread out according to the lengths of the wavelengths. Red has the longest wavelength, purple has the shortest (The five-year-old in my is saying “I told you so”). Also, I mean, come on, that order is totally the prettiest.
Anyways, I’ve always had a weakness for rainbow pictures, and this one is particularly awesome. That’s definitely a double rainbow in the top left of the picture. (I know, right? Rare!) The picture even depicts the conditions that make rainbows possible. You can see the receding rainclouds, and almost feel the sun finally beginning to come out. Yes, there’s got to be tons of tiny little water drops refracting the white light and splitting it up into a beautiful depiction of its constituent parts.
Also, the mountains and beach have this perfect mix of calming beauty and hinted adventure. (Anyone want to try to scale those steep cliffs? Let’s go! If we fall, whatever, they look velvety soft. It’s cool, nobody dies in rainbow beach land). There are even footprints in the sand that give this feeling of impending journey that might lead beneath the rainbow, or into the mountains, or just down the beach forever. Despite the hint that we might actually walk under the rainbow, in real life the rainbow would just keep receding into the distance, or maybe disappear. Rainbows in general are this fleeting beauty that we can only ever view from a distance. The photographs make the rainbow more tangible, and the footprints add this hope of attaining the unattainable
I couldn’t find the name of the photographer, but this is actually a wall paper for your computer (Yea, I downloaded it). It’s probably supposed to promote tourism to Hawaii. Which is working. I’d be down for visiting that landscape. So, to summarize, this picture called to me in particular because it’s got this exotic draw, and it features a particularly good image of rainbow. And the little girl in my is kind of jumping up and down right now for a vacation to Hawaii and singing to theme song to “Rainbow Bright.”

ok, i dont know why, maybe because i am in anatomy class and we're touching cadavers...or maybe its because im doing my paper on art in anatomy, either way, its safe to say that dead bodies have been a part of my life recently and ive developed a little bit of an interest in them.

the photos of this guy, joel peter witkin are not for the faint of heart, the squeemish. that part of me was totally killed off a few months ago. the photos, for me, touch on a part of childhood actually -those boyhood fantasies, conjuring up the most greusome or gory image i could think of. did anyone else go through that period...around 3 or 4th grade?

well anyways, thats what i see come to life, so to speak, with these photos. i want to include a link of them on youtube, but im worried some people might freak out (like some of the asian girls in the computer room at ihouse did when they saw what i was looking at) if it pops up.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TA9b1Uuohl0&feature=PlayList&p=2806D065D860BF8C&index=0

So back to the childhood thing...yea. I read a little about him, and i found one quote which was nice, something about being able to find beauty in everything. I would extend that further, by implication, by wondering if beauty necessarily has elements of pleasure in it - meaning if it pleases us, then its beautiful. Can something be beautiful without being pleasing. Even further, can something be beautiful and repulsive at the same time? I dont mean that it is repulsively beautiful, but can we accept that it is repulsive, and then forget it in place of accepting it as purely beautiful.

The Future Hotel Room by LAVA is a research collaboration that explores the future of relationships between humans and space. Integration of emergent technologies include specific user control of lights and climate.

I found this project interesting because it is one of the more successful attempts at creating a new formal environment through digital design mediums that is able to serve the function of bedroom. While it may be still at the level of a schematic proposal, spaces like these are being increasingly developed and realized. The implications of spaces with continuous surfaces offers both advantages and disadvantages, but gives a glimpse into how we might inhabit space several years from now.

Doll Face

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zl6hNj1uOkY



This short animated clip is "Doll Face", where a robot with a doll's face is shown a series of idealized human faces on a television, which the robot tries to imitate. I have the impression this is a rather well-known clip, so it's likely lots of the class already knows about it. It is a statement about the unrealistic ideals society instills upon people, especially those of the images of women, who are often unrealistically beautiful.

As an possible example of art, there is aesthetic value in the high-quality animation that can be seen in the clip. However, I would classify it as more of a Duchamp-type work, in that the meaning of it is more important than what it actually appears as.

Mitch Clem is my favorite webcomic artist/writer. I don't know if webcomics are typically considered Art, but most webcomic artists generally experiment with other art forms, digital and traditional. A webcomic almost documents the entire development of an artist's style, sometimes for over 10 years of drawing comics. I love Mitch Clem's style, the thick black outlines, the character's expressions, etc, but it's also his writing that makes his comics great, with his character development and sense of humor.

The Afghan Girl

http://www.nationalgeographic.com/ngm/100best/storyA_story.html

I searched National Geographic website for this picture because I saw this picture in a magazine a while ago and I was really drawn to it. Something about the girl's piercing green eyes really seemed to illustrate the common saying that eyes are the windows to a person's soul. Her eyes, which are bright, almost unnaturally green, are not only beautiful, but seem to tell some sort of a story. Along with the pair of emerald eyes, her facial expression, grimy face and vividly colored yet tattered rust-orange garment suggest some sort of a struggle. Although she is clearly a young girl, she looks too tired and aged because this photograph tells us that she has suffered through so much already in her life. It turns out that she is an Afghan refugee. There is no caption needed; the picture alone is more than enough to tell us her story. There is nothing fancy or extraordinary about the picture (after all, it's just a shot of a young girl's face), but there is something so beautiful and haunting about her that it makes me feel drawn in.

Theo Jansen's "Beach Beasts"

This picture is of one of Theo Jansen's "Beach Beasts", but this sculpture not only looks really interesting with its jungle of connecting tubes, it actually walks on its own, using only the wind. Watching these creatures slowly walk along the beach is like watching a skeleton of some never before seen creature come to life again. This is exactly what Theo Jansen is going for. Through his kinetic sculptures, he is seeking to create a new kind of nature. He uses ideas based on evolution to improve his creatures and eventually wants to put herds of them onto the beach to let them live their own lives. But when asked whether what he is doing is art or science he replies that they are all the same, he sees no difference (Jansen studied physics at school, but also became a painter).

What I find most interesting about Jansen's art is the way it seems to create life, in a sense. Many artworks can be thought of as "creating life" in a sense because they might create new worlds and emotions on a canvas that don't exist in the real world, or at least not at the moment. But I think Jansen takes this concept even further, his creatures not only move but are self-propelled using only energy from nature, just like real lifeforms do. Jansen's art not only makes us question the line between art and science, but also between art and nature.