5-15-06

My thesis work is on display at the ICA along with the other seniors, we're all graduated and that college jazz is a thing of the past.  Now all that's left to do is sort through the movie-of-the-week deals and wait for the money to start rolling in.  However, any sort of happiness brought on by graduation is immediately overpowered by the realization that student loans are, indeed, loans.  But that's life, I suppose.  I mean, It's not like diplomas grow on trees... they're expensive.  The way I figure it,
averaging an eight dollar tip for every table I wait on... after about seven thousand tables and I'll have my college education paid for.  Not too bad.  Of course, now that I'm finished with school the winter flu that I've somehow avoided all year has managed to catch up with me.  I'm completely immobilized and most of this week will be spent laying on my couch.  I'd complain about it, but honestly... it feels great.  Nothing to stress out over, nothing to worry about... I'm done.

5-08-06
As the year draws to a close, I'm somewhat lamenting the loss of the industrial resources that the school provides... letter-presses and fancy printers and paper cutters and all that... but I honestly never used them much for anything beyond class assignments. I was never the type of person to go overboard and 'make' things for gifts or stuff along those lines. I'm actually more of a mix-tape kind of guy. It's a transcendental experience for everyone involved. And, yeah, I still use tapes. The digital revolution has done nothing for me in that respect. Where's the thrill of realizing that your perfect mix is two minutes too long and whoever receives it will get an abruptly abridged version of When Doves Cry? CDs are too easy. Maybe I should have been a self-designed major in mix-taping. There's always grad school, I suppose. Anyway, my main point is that now that I'm losing the resources provided by the school I suddenly feel the need to use them. So I'm in craft overhaul mode right now, t-shirts and tote-bags and cute little things like that. It's kinda magical.

4-30-06
Well, I'm done with school. I mean that in the really broad sense that I'm done with classes, which seems rather trivial considering the breadth of work I still have left to finish up. After next week I'll be really done, and the week after that I'll be totally done, and I'm sure by the year 2012 I'll be completely done with school. I still have to write a few papers, give a few artist talks, and try to solidify my plans for the immediate future. I'm not sure at what point I decided moving across the country almost immediately after graduation was a good idea, but I'm stuck with it now. Between finishing up with school, packing everything I own into a million little boxes, finding a way to transport it all, finding an interim job to pay for said transport, and trying to find a job on the west coast... I've got quite a full schedule for the next couple months. Never mind the fact that I've managed to acquire a copy of the Lincoln Library Of Essential Information--some sort of grand text that exists to document absolutely everything in the world in a single handy volume--and have vowed to read the entire thing this summer. I think it's, like, 43,000 pages of randomness. I know it's going to take forever to get through the whole thing... but, c'mon, I'm about to be a college graduate, I should start reading like one.

4-24-06
This is it: my last week of college. I'm so close that I can almost taste my credentials. I had the last critique of my life on Friday, which was quite a pleasant experience. I say it was the last critique of my life because it's a well known fact that once you have that diploma proving you're a real artist your work goes from being judged to just being unconditionally accepted by the masses. But it's not as if I can rest on my laurels just yet, I do have to finish my thesis work to be handed in to the ICA by Friday. It's sort of important to get that done at some point. I wanted to present all my thesis work in terms of 'old media'... paint and pencil, just to show that I'm still in the game, y'know? Huge mistake. Paint takes forever to dry and I'm left with long periods of inactivity where I feel like a slave to my materials (which reminds me of why I jumped over to the 'new' media in the first place). Nothing is worse than sitting in a studio at five in the morning literally watching paint dry. I should have just drawn everything in MS Paint and printed it out. It would have been pretty much the same end result except with much better craft.

4-17-06

This week is Passover.  I have no idea what that means.  The extent of my knowledge on the subject pretty much equates to "yeah, Charlton Heston was great in The Ten Commandments."   I only realized that it was Passover because I received four pounds of matzo from my parents.  Seriously, four pounds.  I thought it was slightly odd because I'm not exactly Jewish.  In fact, I'm old-school Ukrainian Orthodox, so I'm don't even recognize Easter until next week let alone Passover.  See, while the rest of the world uses the more sensical Gregorian calendar, there's some sort of clause in my religious obligations that demands I use the Julian calendar, which consists of a bizarre date pattern that I couldn't even begin to understand.  I think it's the year 6719 in Julian terms, I'm not sure...
all I know is that Christmas is in January and Easter falls sometime between April and August.  It's important to note that "My family still hasn't upgraded to a modern calendar, I thought it was Saturday" isn't a viable excuse for missing classes.  Anyway, my guess is that the four pounds of matzo is my graduation present from my parents and it has nothing to do with religious celebrations.  Not that I'm complaining... do you have any idea how versatile matzo is?  You can make anything with it.  I've already had a fair amount of matzo brie, and tonight I'm planning a lasagna with matzo in place of noodles.  Tomorrow I'll attempt a delicious gingerbread house constructed from nothing but matzo and horseradish.  After that I'll most likely decide to never eat matzo again.

4-10-06

There's this class known as Critical Issues here at MECA.  It's purpose is to give students a chance to dive headfirst into the critical dialogs (issues, if you will) that surround their field before they're sent off into the world, degree in hand.  Everyone's supposed to take it some time before they graduate--I'm enrolled in it now--but I wouldn't be surprised if a few poor souls slipped through the cracks and are now lost somewhere in the forests of northern Maine, scouring for food and painting nothing
but landscapes.  The basic idea is that all the students in the class analytically break down their own majors for discussion through slide lectures.  I am, of course, the only New Media student in the class (the relatively small size of the major is most likely to blame), so, as such, I'm charged with somehow defining the entire field to my classmates.  This probably wouldn't be much of a problem if the general populace even had a vague notion of what New Media is.  Like... painting most likely involves paint, right?  New Media involves... media?  Newness?  It's complicated.  I've been studying it for four years and I'm still not really sure what it's deal is.  So, like the trooper I am, I illustrated the basic concepts
through wondrous analogies.  Soap operas, hollywood blockbusters, the latest jams at the local discotheque... that's a New Media the kids can identify with.  I also learned that when ones speaks eloquently and with confidence they can rationalize just about anything without opposition.

4-03-06

A classic plot device among genre films is that of 'lost time'... the protagonist wakes up and a certain amount of their past is missing due to one reason or another (coma, amnesia, inattentiveness) and some sort of introspective soul searching takes place.  I believe there's also a more americanized variant on this in which the main character forgoes self-discovery for gluttonous revenge on those responsible.  Imagine my surprise when I awoke this morning in such a situation:  an hour of my
life seemed to disappear and I have no idea where it went.  At the worst possible time, too... I have several large papers due this week and I could have used that hour.  Why must you toy with me, Uniform Time Act of 1966?  Why?  Daylight Saving was originally thought up during World War I
to encourage people to use less fuel for artificial lighting by throwing in an extra hour of daylight.  Considering the amount of SUVs I see driving around it's safe to say that no one really cares about conserving fuel these days.  With this in mind, I have decided to dedicate my life to the crusade against Daylight Saving Time.  I even found an online petition that I can sign, and the website has those 'click here for a free iPod' banners all over the place so you know they mean business.

3-27-06

While standing in line at my local bagel store I was stuck by a dreadful realization:  in another month or so, I'll no longer get a 10% discount on my morning coffee.  That beautiful student discount I've relied on will be gone forever (at least until I decide to go to grad school, and who knows
how many months away that is).  It's not just coffee, all sorts of crazy things... from magazine subscriptions to minor league baseball tickets to ice cream.  Enjoying soft-serve while reading Vogue at a Seadogs game will soon cost me 10% more than it does now.  Heartbreaking.  I suppose I
should take advantage of my education discounts while I still can and purchase tools that'll help me in my upcoming professional endeavors... you know, like iPods.  If I were to buy an iPod before the end of the academic year I'd save thirty dollars.  That makes it practically free!  But since I don't actually have the money for an iPod at this time I'd have to utilize some sort of line of credit... so after factoring in an annual percentage rate of 12.99% paid off over a period of about two years, I actually pay more than I would if I wait to buy the iPod for full price when I actually have the money to pay for it. It's a lose/lose situation.  That made me thankful that I actually took the time to figure all out rather than switching into student discount! buy, buy, buy! mode.  But still, it's so tempting.  Anything with the word 'discount' stamped on it is... but you'd think I would have learned my lesson after the canned corn beef incident a few years back.  I will never trust canned meat again.

3-20-06

Saint Patrick's Day is probably the scariest of all holidays.  It has nothing to do with any sort of pathological prejudice or fear of Irish culture, as I'm fairly sure that the holiday no longer has anything to do with Ireland aside from it's effect on their economy through Guinness exports... rather, it's the derived rituals that are associated with it.  To me something just seems wrong about a holiday where people are encouraged to consume as much alcohol as possible.  And by that I mean it makes me afraid to go outside.  It's as if the entire city becomes populated by that scary uncle you barely recall from your childhood, the one that was never clean shaven always smelled like mouthwash.  It's not
just Portland, but everywhere... it's like something out of a Stephen King novel, the citizens of earth all turning into ravenous creatures for just 24 hours after some meteor that's composed entirely of Blarney Stone passes too closely to the planet's atmosphere.  So, like the good student I am, I try to avoid the whole thing.  My Saint Patrick's Day was spent dissecting the Police Academy movies with my classmates, determining that they were actually sly commentaries on the roles of authority and
education in our society.  That's the difference a college education makes... for better or for worse.

3-12-06

This morning I awoke to discover something wonderful: I was not curled into the fetal position shivering under a pile of comforters, but rather I was only slightly freezing. This, of course, means spring has arrived (or sprung, depending on your definition of good writing) and it brings with
it the inevitable entry point for every conversation I'll have over the next five months: "Do you believe this weather we're having?" I'm never quite sure how to answer this question; I certainly do believe it as I am experiencing it in the flesh, not to mention that there's a huge time and temperature sign on one of the tallest buildings in the city that seems to add some scientific backing to the belief. I'm fairly sure the primary purpose of this sign is to aid people at the bus stop adjacent to it in
saying "Cold enough for ya'?" when it reads in the negatives or "Wicked hot out, eh?" when it's above fifty degrees. It also acts as a public service announcement for important to remember events... how else would I know that Dr. Phil was on at 5PM unless it was advertised on a gigantic scrolling marquee that illuminates the entire city? Although the first time I saw Phil@5 flash after the temperature I thought that the woman who worked the sign was just telling her husband what time to pick her up from work. Anyway, my point is that it's nice out. Spring break has also come to a close, which means I must abandon my carefree world of lying on the couch eating ramen and reading Doctor Zhivago and return to my studies. At least I have now had my taste of summer weather to keep me going over the
next few weeks. It's at this point that I ponder what life would be like if I were to have gone to school for ecology, because then I could be doing my homework outside... or at least I assume so, as I'm not actually sure what studying ecology entails.

3-06-06

Midterms have come and gone like a flicker of lightning--lightning that will strike you down the minute you dare to sleep (lightning can sense weakness)--but it's over.  I suppose I should start studying for finals (Only seven more weeks?  How is that possible?), but I just can't bring myself to do so.  I think this particular midterm was slightly more intensive just due to the fact that my thesis paper was due.  I tend to go a bit overboard with those sorts of things.  I realized this as I was trying to whittle down the over 300 pages of notes I've accumulated this semester to a comprehendible analysis of my work.  In the process of doing so, I think I've set a new personal best for 'most time spent awake in one week.'  I'm not even sure what my thesis is actually about anymore.  I think it's genetics.  The subject of my thesis that is, not the reason why I can't remember it.  Thankfully my mind can rest for a short while, as spring break has arrived and I'll be kicking up my feet on a beach in Cancun for the next seven days.  And by beach I mean couch.  And by Cancun I mean living room.  And by feet I mean... actually, that one's still good.

2-27-06

This week marked my first process crit of the semester, which is a good thing as midterms seem to be quickly approaching.  A process crit is just like a regular critique only it's designed to weed out potential issues before you invest 180 hours into a project.  The New Media department has
been playing with a few ideas as to how to make critiques much more beneficial just through a simple change of format.  I think we've struck gold:  five minutes to present your work, then the rest of the major fills out a questionnaire with three questions selected by the presenter.  This is a great way to avoid those tangent discussions that no one really benefits from ("Why are you critiquing my color choices?  I'm colorblind.  Are you just trying to make me cry?") and focus on the real issues.  All
of my questions were about pie charts because, honestly, who doesn't like pie charts?  I'm pretty sure any piece of artwork takes on a new facet of professionalism when there's an appendix of pie charts accompanying it. Think of it as really thorough process documentation.

2-21-06

In the past few years there's been a shift away from the traditional portfolio towards digital representation.  Slides are now obsolete... in fact, I think the powers that be stopped manufacturing slide projectors almost a decade ago.  These days, it's all about having a bitchin' website.  It's not just art school, I'm sure whatever your profession you're going to need online representation (the fact that I pay my rent  via PayPal has convinced me of that).  It's a little scary in the sense that if, say, SkyNet were to take over and there were a war between humans and computers all documentation of my work would no longer exist... but taking a digital photo is so much cheaper than developing slides so I'm
game.  I now find myself in the position a senior trying to convince the world that his unique brand of art is worth consideration and, in turn, trying to work out an online presentation of his work and get it just right.  There's a certain sense of poetry to choosing a domain name, which is where I'm at now.  Even the most mundane phrases sound beautiful when you add 'dot com' to the end.  Like... today I slept through my alarm clock.  Dot com.  That's money.  Considering there are thousands of domain
names registered every second, I'd be lucky to get something as memorable as that.  And then I'll probably end up in a bidding war with some guy living in his parents basement who wants to turn the same domain into a fansite for his his favorite TV show, so it'll cost me hundreds of dollars to secure the site.  All so I can show a couple photos of my drawings and host my resume.  The future is here and it's wonderful.

2-13-06

There are a lot of great aspects to living in Portland, like having a five minute walk to the ocean or getting paid for a graphic design job in lobster.  Although there's a fair bit of snow in the winter, the speed of the snow removal service is pretty amazing.  If you go to sleep with twenty-five feet of snow on the ground, chances are it'll all be plowed by the next morning.  That part's both good and bad.  It's good because you don't really have to concern yourself with the hazards of winter.  It's bad because that means you'll never, ever get a snow-day.  In all my years living here, I think I've gotten one day off from school due to snow.  Not that I really want to miss school since I'm paying for it and all.  But every time I see a bit of snow coming down I'm consumed by giddiness... thoughts of building snowmen, sledding down highway turnoffs, the whole snow-day routine.  In the end that dream is crushed by my own tax dollars.  Right now there's some sort of blizzard situation going on and it'll
probably not exist in the morning.  I'm not even sure what constitutes a blizzard... there's only a few inches of snow on the ground, so I suppose it comes down to whether or not it's a slow news week.  Actually, the fact that I just spent a paragraph talking about the local snow removal service pretty much guarantees that it's a slow news week.  So tune in next week and see if I survived the ferocious BLIZZARD OF '06.

2-6-06
One of those life-changing moments that I've been dreading has finally arrived:  fabricating a resumé to prepare myself for the real world.  It's a requirement for the BFA thesis exhibition during graduation, but it's also a generally good idea if you, y'know, plan on doing something with your life.  This juncture also means choosing a side... either as a gallery artist or a production artist.  Should I make a resumé, or a CV (which is like a resumé only even more boring, as it's got all sorts of stuff about gallery exhibitions in it)?  Which brings up another point: where does this gallery history come from?  Was I supposed to be submitting my work to juried exhibitions all throughout college and I just
never realized it?  I thought that was a bullet point in my Why Art School? pamphlet, 'preparation for showing work in a gallery setting,' not the actual act.  Like the majority of people who put themselves through school, the bulk of my work history relates to memorizing food orders or price-checking laundry detergent.  I really dislike the idea of doing bed and breakfast brochures for the rest of my life as a production artist, but at the same time I'm intrigued by the thought that I may be able to pay off my student loans before I die.  I suppose I'll just mix and match elements from a resumé and a CV and hope for the best.  And if I could combine 'resumé`' and 'CV' into some sort of clever portmanteau...  well, that'd definitely be an accomplishment that I could put on my resumé.

1-29-06
Art is expensive.  Not just the materials, but just about anything that can be lumped into the art category seems to carry an extraordinary price tag.  Art monographs are a classic example of this.  While browsing for visual arts books on Amazon, I noticed that most of the cool looking ones were just  a bit out of my price range.  I always wonder if these books are all printed on paper made from some type of rare tree using ink taken from extinct prehistoric squid.  Magazines aren't much better.  I always get a little jealous whenever I see Popular Mechanics (which I suppose would be popular reading among mechanics) on the newsstand with a price of about three bucks.  Compare that to the fancy-smancy art magazines that clock in at up to $25 and it makes me wonder if I'm in the wrong field.  Or maybe you can judge the importance of a profession by the price of it's periodicals... I like to imagine that Rocket Science Monthly costs a thousand dollars an issue.  I also like to imagine that my intricate rationalizations are a charming quirk and not a sign of deep rooted insecurity about my own work.

1-23-06

A little bit of advice:  keep track of your credits.  I thought I had it all down and mapped out perfectly, but my degree audit told me that I was very wrong about that.  I still need nine credits to graduate in May.  This is, of course, completely my fault, as just glancing at my credit control sheet has sufficed over the past three and a half years and I never took the time to sit down and do some simple math.  Ideally, credits would be these actual tangible little things that you collected upon the completion of a class.  You could then trade them with your friends, like... 'Hey, I've got three foundation drawing credits that I don't need anymore, got any Western Philosophy that you're looking to unload?'  After
acquiring 130 credits you can either go and trade them in for a piece of paper that validates all your hard work or sell them on eBay.  The so-called professional student that never wants to graduate could even try and collect the whole set.  I imagine this would gradually evolve into some sort of gauntlet, where students competed for elusive credits against bodybuilders with names like Laser, Nitro and Ice.  But until then summer school at the community college will do just fine.

12-12-05

The semester is done.  At least for me it is; I imagine that some students have late finals or other such issues preventing them from celebrating.  It was an intensive semester but that's pretty much implied by the 'senior' title I wear oh-so proudly.  My escape was quick; classes ended Friday and Sunday morning I made the drive back to Pennsylvania to visit my family (side note:  there are no gardens in the state of New Jersey, but every time I hit the parkway I get this hopeful notion that something may have changed).  In two weeks I'll be flying out to Arizona to look into employment prospects because the umpteen thousand dollars of student loans attached to my name tells me that that's something I should make a priority.  Then before I know it the spring semester will have started and I'll be facing the monster  known as thesis.  I'm trying not to think about it.  Have a safe and happy Funmas.

12-05-05

I'm fairly sure that the fall semester is inherently more difficult than the spring semester just due to the fact that it's closely followed by the season of giving.  So, while the biggest non-school related concern in the spring is probably finding a summer job or deciding what you're going to do with your life if you're a senior (nothing too pressing, really) the end of the fall semester has you worrying about securing gifts for everyone you've ever met.  That is, if you celebrate whatever politically-correct name the religious holidays of December go by these days (I'm a fan of Funmas myself).  Of course, Joe Artist would never buy a gift for someone, it has to be handmade.  Hand crafting dozens of gifts
is difficult during the final push of a semester... isn't it okay to cheat a bit sometimes?  Really, who would know?  Just take some off-the-shelf items, customize them a bit (smidgen of glitter, cartoon snowmen, and a mason jar is probably involved in some way), and you get to maintain some
small fraction of creative dignity.  Maybe not, but c'mon... I have four papers due this week and there's only 20 more days till Funmas.

11-28-05

Holidays can be separated into two different categories:  the sentimental days of remembrance (D-Day, Pearl Harbor Day, Wookie Life Day) and the commercialized, packaged holidays (Valentine's Day, Christmas, Wookie Life Day).  I'm not really sure which one Thanksgiving should be classified under.  The anti-corporate folk who object to the fake greeting card holidays (re: the average art student) normally love Thanksgiving, but that may be just because there's a hot meal involved.  At the same time, while shopping for my Thanksgiving Day dinner I realized that it was as packaged as it gets... mainly aluminum, although the biscuit mix was in plastic.  I'm thankful that I live in a country where an entire feast can be purchased through bottom shelf brands for less than fifteen dollars.
Bonus fun fact:  according to my very Ukrainian grandmother, the proper name for Thanksgiving is actually St. 'Sgivings Day.

11-21-05

There exists a concept that every college student grows quite familiar with over time, not just the ones of the art variety:  the all-nighter.  It doesn't matter how hard you work or how ahead of the game you think you are... when crunch time approaches no one is safe.  All-nighters aren't due to slacking off until the day before something's due; rather, it's because every assignment you've ever had seems to be due on the same day.  It could just be me and my crippling fear of mediocrity, but I normally
pull a series of consecutive all-nighters around Thanksgiving break just to make sure that every paper, painting, and whatever other product is absolutely perfect before finals.  Of course, this never happens as being awake for such a long time impairs my ability to judge the quality of my own work.  But, really, it's all about the effort.  And the rush you get when the morning sun creeps into your workspace... and, in turn, the rush of terror upon realizing that the sunrise means only a few hours left to finish your work.  I'm very lucky that the convenience store down the street had a two for one deal on cans of Maxwell House Bold Blend last week.  It was actually a twelve for six deal for me personally, so I think I'm going to be extra prepared (if a little on edge) when finals roll around.

11-14-05

This past Friday was Veteran's Day, which falls into a class of rather ambiguous holidays that are difficult to pinpoint without a calendar (along with Secretary's Day, Freedom of Information Day, and National Mustard Day).  Even though the date is fairly easy to remember (the eleventh day of the eleventh month) it always sneaks up on me.  Classes are still in session but the school might as well close... how is anyone supposed to work when there are girl-scouts and soldiers marching through
the streets?  This year's parade featured a new focus:  go-carts.  I am completely serious.  It's not even like they had veteran theme... just a bunch of go-carts chugging along, drivers waving at the crowds.  Who came up with that idea?  Did the veterans have a meeting?  I suppose it's
entirely possible that soldiers stormed the beaches of Normandy in amphibious mobile units powered by recycled lawnmower motors, but I'm pretty sure I would have heard about that by now.  I can't wait for next year's parade... really, where can they go from here?  Robots, that's where.  It always comes back to robots.

11-08-05

Many people complain about Maine winters; they ramble on about excessive cold and snow and caribou. Truthfully it's not that bad, especially if you enjoy the seasonal traditions (snow-angels,  snow-men, snow-mitzvahs and the like), not to mention that I have never in my life seen a caribou in
the wild.  My real beef is with how early it gets dark up here in the winter.  This really isn't a problem with the state itself, but rather the archaic Daylight Saving Time standard that went into effect last week.  Besides the fact that it leads to me inadvertently missing classes almost without fail ('spring back/fall ahead' just sounds right in my mind for some reason), the whole concept confuses me.  The British have 'summer time' which seems to work really well... why does North America have to be
different?  And where does this saved daylight go?  Shouldn't we be saving it for the winter when people miss the sun the most?  Why not have more daylight all year round?  Why doesn't Arizona have to save daylight but the east coast does?  Are we rationing daylight because of the war in
Iraq?  It boggles the mind.

10-31-05

The internet is full of lies. After writing countless research papers I've come to consider this a fact. While looking up information on Alger Hiss for an essay, I was informed by Bob's Fact-o-rama Intersite that Hiss 'may or may not be a communist spy.' Keep in mind he died about ten years ago. But that's just an example of a poorly informed website... there are far worse things out there. The indispensable Wikipedia is a fountain of half-truths thanks to it's user maintained database. In theory this would be a wonderful method of keeping encyclopedia articles up to date, but it's not as effective when the average user thinks it's funny to label Picasso as a type of jigsaw puzzle (seriously, it was like that for a good month). But if you cite a source that says Bootsy Collins is a woman, you can't really be blamed if said source is completely inaccurate, can you? Honestly, how is a lowly art student supposed to do research these days? The library is only open from 8:00AM to 8:00PM, and, in all seriousness, what student keeps those types of hours? This was supposed to be the future of information, an effortless stream of intersliced illumination. I think I'm just bitter that I have a paper due tomorrow morning and I still have no idea who Alger Hiss really was.

10-24-05

Thanks to the miracle of laptop technology, I'm able to get a good deal of work done from the comforts of my own home. The problem with this lies in the number of potential distractions surrounding me... television, periodicals, minesweeper, novelty-sized inflatable hammers, etcetera. Through some unexplainable train of thought, I've decided that in order to keep myself constantly working I need to be convinced that someone is monitoring or supervising my activities. While hiring a motivational coach isn't really an option, I've found that plastering pictures of owls above my couch is a fit substitute (mainly because owls are downright creepy). This is just phase one; phase two will be owl pictures with those eyes that follow you around the room, while phase three will see my apartment being fully converted into an atrium. Although I'm getting my art history papers done in record time, I'm scared to fall asleep at night. I suppose it's a fair trade for a 900% increase in productivity.

10-17-05

Maury Povich. In an ideal world this name wouldn't even be part of my vocabulary, but it's something that I've become attached to as part of my lunch break. A lunch break isn't so much about lunch as it is the break in the middle of 16 hour work days. The last thing I want to do is eat lunch and read, I need a mental distraction as well... so I watch a little television to let my brain relax (or rot, as the case may be here). The art student budget normally allows for recycled rabbit-ears and a roll of aluminum foil, enabling a stream of information from four and a half over-the-air networks (three of which seem to only show infomercials or religious cartoons). So I have the choice of enjoying my grilled cheese and tomato soup with either Maury Povich or the cast of General Hospital. Seeing how General Hospital has been serialized for the past thirty years, I really don't want to exert the effort required to get caught up on all the riveting drama. I'm not really sure what Maury Povich is trying to do with his natural exposure (every day I ask myself "Wasn't this same episode on yesterday?"), but he's the perfect companion for my daily mental break. Somehow that art school instinct always seems to triumph in the end, though. "Hmm, the footage in the pre-paternity test interview doesn't sync up with the narration... I wonder if that's an homage to David Lynch?"

10-10-05

Everybody loves robots. There is no denying that. Robotic vacuum cleaners? Awesome. My apartment is about four square feet and I dream of someday owning one. I want one of those bomb squad robot things for no other reason than the fact that it's a robot. That's probably why I'm a New Media major... the fusion of art and technology gives me shivers and wide-eyed thoughts of huge Transformers making paintings for me. Yesterday the New Media department hosted a workshop designed to teach basic electronics. Which, of course, sent me off on daydreams of constructing building-sized sentient robots and having them fight giant squids. And those robots had tons of blinking LEDs, as that was pretty much the only electrical components used in the workshop demonstrations. Here's a little secret: the average art student doesn't exactly excel in scientific areas. At the end of the day, the extent of my electrical knowledge remained emailing MIT students and begging them for readymade robots.

10-03-05

This week my major went on a field trip to Boston. As I'm currently in 'september limbo' (the period between summer jobs and receiving the refund check from my student loans), I decided not to go just to save money. This, of course, ensures that it was the most amazing field trip in the history of field trips. It's an age-old question: if a tree falls in the forest and no one is around, do the other trees hire a DJ and throw a really great party just because you're not there? The answer is yes. If you go on a field trip, it will rain the entire time and all the places you planned on visiting will be closed. If you decide not to go, however, it will end up being a life-changing experience for everyone involved. When I ask about, say, a trip to the aquarium, I've come to expect responses such as "Oh man, the dolphins started talking! They evolved right in front of us!" or "The sea lions summoned the ghost of Richard Wagner by barking all of The Flying Dutchman! You should have been there!" I've included an artist's rendition of what I'm imagining the Boston trip was like without me.

09-26-05

There's a gradual shift over the course of four years of college, from the rigorous assignments that are established in the foundation program to the self-directed, large scale projects leading up to thesis. These projects exist as preparation for the real world, where artists write proposals for grants and gallery shows and whatever else real artists do. Writing the proposals themselves is no problem, but figuring out what to actually propose is quite difficult. Saying something like "I propose to document my work on a website this semester because I really need to document my work on a website" probably won't fly; a senior in college is expected to be more articulate than that. My plan is to load each proposal with superfluous tangents and hope people think my work is so incredibly layered that it demands extensive attention in order to grasp the true meaning. For instance: "I propose a systematic structure for categorizing the visual vocabulary presented by my work, a method of streamlining ideas and determining their modes of artifice before the process is actualized. Through this system I'll be able to prove that the Andalusian Dog was actually a very large cat." By the time everyone figures out that it doesn't describe a website at all, I'll be in Vegas trying to cash in my degree for slot machine tokens. It's a win/win situation.

09-19-05

The first few weeks of a semester are normally spent going over syllabuses, buying books, and gathering materials. By the time you hit your fourth year, any hesitations you've had about digging through other people's trash to find supplies are gone; the thought of saving 37 cents on cardboard is too much to resist. I myself am dedicated to saving everything that got left behind after what's become an annual technological rapture. When graduating seniors clean out their studios at the end of the school year, there's always some relic that's just not worth saving. These things always end up piled in a corner somewhere, scared of what the future holds for them. This year it was a blazing fast five-year-old iMac. My apartment is loaded with archaic computers like this; I'm hanging on to the hope that they'll all combine one night when I'm sleeping and transform into some kind of super-computer (in my geek fantasies it's powerful enough to defend the Earth against the Decepticons). Until then, they make wonderful web-browsing kiosks, which would be fantastic if I actually had an internet connection in my apartment.

09-12-05

The start of a new school year brings with it certain initiation rituals, a series of hurdles that one must pass before being admitted into the lowest possible tax bracket for yet another twelve months.  This obstacle course is known as 'Final Registration.'  As this is my fourth final registration, I'm beginning to question the finality of it.  Most of the events are trivial, updating contact info and the like.  However, the suggested check-in sequence seems a bit flawed; getting your picture taken for student IDs is directly after a meeting with the Financial Aid office.  Because of this, you can break the entire student body down into two groups:  those who are enthusiastic about the start of the new school year (this group normally makes use of some creative device for that extra pinch of hilarity) and those who just signed over their next thousand or so paychecks in the form of a promissory note (who greatly resemble a deer in headlights on their IDs).  For the first time in four years, I am glad to belong to the former.  In terms of classes, Artemis has been kind to me this year (for those who never studied Greek mythology, Artemis was the virgin goddess of art school scheduling, often depicted with a bow and quiver of inspirational clip-art).  I am going to graduate on time, which I had always thought was impossible.  It turns out it's just a simple matter of taking classes that are required rather than choosing them at random.  Crazy, huh?

04-24-05

This week is, by definition, the hardest seven days of the year. It's the final countdown (the band Europe wrote a song about art school back in the '80s... look it up), or the week when everything is due and you have no idea how you're going to get it all done in time. Right now I have to finish three huge final projects, wrap up two internships, write four papers, and finalize roughly a dozen client pieces as well as find numerous summer jobs to pay the rent--all by this Friday. So, I'm in pretty good shape and don't have nearly as much work as I normally do this time of year. I liken crunch time to a metaphorical Godzilla stumbling across your Tokyo playground of a game plan... no matter how well organized and conservative you are, something's going to come along with atomic breath and make things a little more complicated. This is a great opportunity to post a picture of my "wall of empties" for the week. I think it's a little different than the empties you would find at other colleges, but just as depressing from an economic standpoint (unfortunately, coffee beans don't grow on trees).

04-15-05

It never fails: every year, no matter how much orange juice I drink and how little sugared cereal I eat, I will get the flu. This year I was so close… it’s 65 degrees outside, the snow has long since melted, I thought I was in the clear. Then it hits me out of nowhere and I’m stuck in bed nursing myself back to health on a diet of Ricola cough drops and noodle soup. But it could be worse… what if, instead of chicken noodle soup being a natural cure-all it was some extravagant dish that a college student couldn’t afford? Like, say you went to the doctor… “Well, you’ve got the flu. But no worries, plenty of rest and a healthy amount of fresh imported foie gras will clear that right up!” Thankfully my miracle tonic costs 53 cents a can. There is a good side to this, though… sitting in bed all day allowed me to get ahead on my client work, including a wonderful illustration series of a Cheers-era Ted Danson. And no, I have no idea why either.

04-08-05

In most parts of the country, you can tell it’s spring by blooming flowers, crisp air, that sort of thing. In Maine, however, it’s a little different… you can tell it’s spring if you can count the number of layers you’re wearing on one hand. Also, spring brings about the strange concept called ‘spring cleaning.’ People throw out all their old furniture for some reason. Being a person with a good deal of student loans, I can’t really relate to throwing out perfectly good couches just because they’re a little old. This brings about hundreds of college students prowling the city late at night looking for half decent end tables. With a little bit of dedication, you can get so many apartment furnishings that you’ll have to invent new uses for them all. Take, for example, my new concertina table pictured above. Its sole purpose is to act as a resting place for my concertina.

04-08-05

New Media major‘s studio is usually a pairing of casual discussion and sleepy-eyed critiques (the class is, after all, before noon). Recently, though, a lot of our guest professors have been focusing on experiences outside the classroom; either that or they’re concerned we don’t get enough exercise and we should be walking more, I’m not sure. Today Adriane had us walk down to Porteous without explanation. I was expecting some sort of workshop or critique, but upon entering the building we were greeted by… a luau. Seriously, a luau. We all got leis and grape juice with paper umbrellas, there was dancing and mingling and other luau themed activities. I was even gifted with a very charming coconut brassiere from a gentleman named Charlie. It was basically “Hi New Media, we’re every other major at the school, it’s nice to see you away from the computers.” Quite an excellent experience, and certainly a bit jarring considering most of us had just rolled out of bed not ten minutes before. The luau was immediately followed by an awesome rapid-fire slide lecture on combating common misconceptions in and the general elite nature of the conceptual art world. I’ll let you put the pieces together.

04-01-05

Maybe it was growing as one of eight brothers, but I’ve always been a little wary of April Fool’s Day. That, combined with the incredibly long hours spent at school working (which means little exposure to current events and the general state of the world) leads to a day when I simply won’t believe a damn thing you tell me. Today someone mentioned that the Pope was sick and I responded with “Hah, can’t you come up with a better April Fool’s Day prank?” We argued back and forth for about twenty minutes. Then I went online and felt really bad. Having said all that, I’ve decided that this year I would make feel-good April Fool’s Day cards. Actually, they’re just leftover Valentine’s Day cards. But I did get an occasional “That’s pretty clever!” from the recipients (I think they were just being nice).

03-25-05

And somehow, my critique worked out. My professors have always been very tolerant of data issues (like I said, it comes with the territory), but it’s never a get-out-of-jail-free card or anything like that. Realizing that there was no way I could ever redo all my work in a single week, I instead took the opportunity of a major crit and turned it into a lively discussion on the nature of outside perspectives in critiques. I prepared a list of somewhat generalized, overly critical remarks and had volunteers from the crit address them to my (non-existent) work and I. It was mostly about breaking down the way an audience responds to work and the process of a dialog during critique. The most interesting part was seeing everyone get really engaged, talking about this piece of artwork that didn’t even exist. It brought about the realization that a lot of discussions that come up during a crit can be applied to any form of artwork, and therefore you should address those concerns before you could even consider calling a body of work finished. Fun times were had by all (mostly due to the ragtime music I had playing in the background).

03-18-05

Any branch of fine art has it’s fair share of perils--photographers have to deal with all sorts of wacky chemicals I can’t even pronounce, ceramicists have to work around a six billion degree kiln, and performance artists are commonly mistaken for being just really weird. With New Media, the risk is data failure. Sure, it’s not as dangerous as, say, accidentally drinking developer, but it hurts just as much. Like today, for instance, when my beverage decided it didn’t enjoy spending so much time in it’s container and instead spent some quality time with the inside of my laptop. That’s, well… not so great. It comes with the territory, I guess. So now I have a critique in exactly one week’s time with NO WORK to show. In all fairness, the water left a really cool pattern burned into my screen… I could probably show that as a visual statement against consumerism or something.

03-11-05

Spring break, the blessed gift that MECA gives me every year just before I think I’m going to lose my mind from all the work that’s piling up. I guess normal college students go to Mardi Gras or Kansas or something… my friends and I prefer staying in Portland and organizing themed dance parties. The What-If-Winston-Churchill-Played-Doctor-Who themed party didn’t go too well (no one really realized they were supposed to dress up as Winston Churchill dressing up as Doctor Who, instead everyone thought it was going to be some kind of book club thing). However, the Pennsylvania-Dutch-Meets-Seattle-Grunge party was a rousing success. I mean, funnel cake, pretzels, and flannel? It’s a match made in heaven. The rest of spring break has the New Media majors building elaborately beautiful installations in our studio spaces while listening to Glen Gould, mostly using panes of glass, projectors, and Oreos (what can I say, every system needs a fuel source).

03-04-05

Its March… that means it’s almost spring, right? This is the time of year when the snow starts to get a little old. In November, the first snowfall is really refreshing… snowballs, snowmen, snow, uh… hamsters (they‘re just like snowballs only you give them little twig whiskers). But after a while it just gets depressing. Of course, you have to take the good with the bad---Maine summers are a huge payoff. It’s one of those things you really have to experience to realize how awesome it is. I mean, look at all those blockbuster thrillers… the family always has a summerhouse in Maine, and for good reason. Now, just strip away all the weird paranormal stuff that always seems to happen in those houses and you’ve got a pretty good idea of what this place is like during the summer. In all fairness, though, winter has its benefits. This week a few of us went to Two Lights beach… if you’ve never seen a beach in the middle of winter, I would have to say that you should seriously consider seeing a beach in the middle of winter.

02-25-05

Upon arriving to my studio class today, I was handed a manila envelope containing roughly 80 pages on the history of WWII era military installations in Maine and a single ticket for the ferry. The only explanation I got was “The Ferry leaves at 9:30. You better hurry.” The entire major hurried to the pier, where we sailed off to Peak’s Island (my advice: no matter how beautiful the scenery is, DO NOT go up on the top deck in the middle of winter without a hat on--seeing a couple of cute sea lions wasn’t quite a good tradeoff for nearly catching frostbite). After we got to the island, someone somehow figured out that we were supposed to walk… somewhere. So we just started walking into the woods. I’m not sure why this seemed like a good idea, especially with several feet of snow on the ground. But eventually we stumbled across--surprise!--a WWII military installation. What followed could only be described as an incredibly surreal mock murder mystery. We spotted a hat, an imprint of a body, and some red ink splashed in the snow. After a while of hypothesizing and examining parallels to the scenario and various Borges stories, Chris Thompson, our visiting professor, waltzes out of the woods. He points out that if we were part of a murder mystery, there probably would be blood--not red ink--splattered in the snow. This eventually leads to a discussion about willful suspension of disbelief and virtual worlds, which in turn leads to a lot of open ended questions and long, reflective pauses. If you ever feel like you have a grasp on critical theory in art, I recommend going out into the woods and taking part in a murder mystery, then ask yourself why you’re out in the woods taking part in a murder mystery.