Blog Assignment: Biennale 2008

Visited the Biennale recently and was indeed pleasantly surprised by the works which were exhibited.

I would say it is a real life reflection of some stuffs which we learnt in sch, both previously and presently.

The "Good" work

I'm Not Expensive (2008) by Lee Yong Deck.

This piece of work by the Korean artist is extremely clever, in my opinion. By making use of the various ways the human eye perceives things, this piece of work engages the audience to take a step back, think about what we had just seen and then decide on making a comment/decision.

From an angle, it may seem that the figures are moving closer. But when u simply take another step forward and look at it again, it may suggest otherwise.

In essence, this piece of work prompted an internal question within me, "is everything we see right before our eyes as apparent as it is?"

It may, or it may not be.

Interesting. :)

The "Bad" work

Swing (2007) by Tse Su-Mei

Somehow, this piece of work did not come across as strong as i felt it will when i was reading the guidebook before seeing it in real life.

Indeed, it gave the uncanny feeling of an empty swing moving without anyone on it, but that is just as far as it goes.

I couldnt establish a link between the usage of neon tubes and the attached connotation of "untouchable" and "unused" as i don't see a reason why we cant touch a neon tube?

But i guess the physical installation of this work plays a part too. It was sited in an open room, with a lot of demarcated space between the viewers and the actual artwork. Somehow, i felt that i was not able to make a closer examination of the artwork, and thus, may lead my unfair judgement of this piece of work.

Nevertheless, this visit has broaden my view in the respect of conceptual art forms.

Looking forward to the next Biennale.

Assignment 5: Still-life Expressionism

For this assignment, we are to take photos which denotes human expressions, but without human elements.

Here are my takes:

1. The Solitary Tree

A serene and tranquil scene, yet with a tint of sadness and desolute.

2. Unknown Soldier

Died without an identification, this soldier lies among many who similarly gave their lives for a worldly cause.

3. Bitten

Unwanted, rotting away..

4. Crushed

An expression of refute, unwanted and frustration.

Blog Exercise: Looking at photos, critically

Many a times, when we read newspapers, what captures our attention most are the images that comes with the stories.

It is therefore interesting to analyse these photos and see how effectively (or not) are they able to complement the article that comes along with it.

source: Quinn Rooney/Getty Images

This photo was taken at the 2008 Asian Beach Games, Indonesia and its a gold medal match between Thailand and Indonesia in the Women's Beach Sepak Takraw.

Obviously, this photo falls into the photojournalism category but it cleverly made use of bodily contortions which gave it a little expressionisic feel.

I shall touch on a few formal elements which I observed through this photo:

Light quality - This was shot on a beach, and the sunlight was apparently strong and harsh. It may seem a little on the high side, but I think its fine as it lit up the faces of the players nicely, showing their intense facial expressions, which denotes the excitement of the game.

Angle of View - I believe the photographer shot it from an elevated angle and this approach seem to work as it places the viewers in the eye of the spectator who were actually on that venue itself.

Framing/Composition - It cleverly places the player in blue's face along the intersection of the thirds and it leads the viewer to see the Takraw ball. From there we then explores the other 2 players in red. The back of the red player's jersey shows "Thailand" and the one in blue shows the Indonesia's flag. This enable the viewer to further understand that it is a match between the 2 coountries.

Color: Interestingly, the red and blue jerseys appear to stand out against the yellow tinted beach and it made the players jut out into the foreground.

Being a person who is always amused by how fascinating a human body can be a source of insipration for ideas, this photo further reinterates this belief of mine. The contortions of the Takraw players gave an exciting feel to this photo, but at the same time, seemed a little surreal to the human eye.

Random surrealism.

Was flipping thru some books and was suddenly inspired by the idea of a "Cyborg" - a human-machine that has a life of its own. I suppose a cyborg is an offset that spun off the age of industrialization and machineries.

A human, deeply influenced by machines, who became a machine himself.

Then i thought, how abt an "Urban-borg"?



Remembered that i took a photo of this cute little girl quite sometime back. Decided to do some random effects to it.

Dun think its very nicely done tho.. oh well, all in the name of fun! =)

comments are definitely welcome!

Assignment 4: Urban Fantasy - Second prototype

The second version.

Personally, i felt that the previous version has too much information to send across. I guess going simple will actually make it less cluttered and eventually, a neater piece of work.

Thru this piece, i hope to send across the message of breaking free from this urban phenomena that we are all being slowly consumed into.

In the foreground is a myriad of buildings, structures and objects. A messy and cramped up environment.

Thus, the hand, symbolises the "human element" is reaching out and hopefully, escape from this clautrophobic situation.

Comments from the class included that the overlay of bricks seem a tad too heavy. Kind of shifted the overall balance of the work.

Will continue to touch up and for now its work-in-progress.. =)