Author Archives: Teresa Lo

About Teresa Lo

My name is Teresa.

The Eye in NYC

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Today, I saw this at the 86th St. Station, The Eye of NYC. I completely passed by this without even noticing. Because of the delays, my eyes started to wander onto, coincidentally, onto an eye. From far away, it looked menacing and threatening, even. But close up, it was full of life, music, buildings, and culture. My favorite part was how theres a compass as the pupil. If I didn’t take a second glance at this, I would’ve missed the compass! I wonder what made the artist put together a piece that looks like an eye in the middle of the subway. Directly across the station, there is an identical eye but a different color. (I couldn’t take a picture because it was too far.) I also liked how this artwork is engraved into the tiles, and is part of the subway, part of NYC. Whose eyes are these? Why are the eyes across from each other rather than next to each other? Do you guys think there are other facial features in other subway stations?

Irving Penn

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Out of everything I saw in the Irving Penn Gallery, I felt like these are the portraits that screamed out at me. These four intricately connect with each other because these are all features on a face.

  1. I wonder why Penn & the makeup artist decided to make the model’s skin very white. It certainly made the makeup on the first model in the first picture stand out. I wonder what Penn was trying to accomplish when he photographed the model with eight vastly different lip stick colors.
  2. The contrast between the dangerous bumblebee and the lips definitely stood out to me. At any moment, the bee could potentially sting the model’s lips. On the other hand, the model’s lips can kiss the bee as well. There is a slice of unpredictability in this portrait. Both love and danger are incorporated in this one portrait and I admire its simplicity as well. I wonder what inspired Penn to mix nature and make-up together, because nature and make-up are two opposite things.
  3. Wow, I wonder how the model felt when the splash of cold paint (or liquid)hit her face. I admire how detailed the drops of paint are when they hit her face. When I first looked at this, I was shocked, yet I admired the beauty behind the purity of this portrait. I wonder what Penn was trying to achieve behind this portrait.
  4. I saved the best for last! This portrait is my favorite out of the four above. The whiteness of the skin contrasted well with the redness of the eye. I believe this portrait represents the moment when a young woman puts makeup on for the first time. It can be painful if any of the makeup goes into the eye, thus making her eye red and somewhat swollen. This portrait reminds me of Black Swan, the movie. The red eyes, the white skin, and the exaggerated makeup really brings out the reference. I wonder if the movie’s make up artists were inspired by Penn…

 

Happy (Belated) Mooncake Day!

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Just this past Thursday was “Mooncake Day” or also formally known as “Mid-Autumn Festival.” It is a traditional holiday for Chinese people to eat moon cakes on this day. There are different flavors and types of mooncakes and just recently, I began to wonder what the symbols on the cake itself meant. Ever since I was little, I didn’t question the food that was given to me. Inside the cake is usually made of red bean or lotus seed paste. The texture is thick and usually has a yolk in the center.

According to kaleidoscope.cultural-china.com, the imprints on top of the cake “symbolizes a family get-together and reflects the family culture and the special importance Chinese people attaching to the family reunion. The moon cake is not just a kind of food, but more of a cultural element deeply penetrated into Chinese people’s hearts, symbolizing family reunion and embodying spiritual feelings.” The cake was meant to be shared by a group of people, and thus is always a symbol for family union. I never knew that mooncakes had actual meaning behind just being food. It meant being part of a family and part of Chinese culture.

What other foods do you know have meaning behind it?

International Center of Photography: Pentheus & Girl Specimen Series

At our exhibit visit just last Tuesday at the International Center of Photography, I was amazed at the amount of complexity in a few art pieces. Most of them were very interesting but confused me, to say the least.

We came across Elliot Hundley’s piece called Pentheus, which consisted of extremely detailed figures attached to a canvas with long, thin steel nails. Hundley put a lot of his time and efforts into this single piece. Pentheus had hundreds of nails, individually holding its own letter, number, or human being. The collage also had words and photographs that bring the canvas to life. There are nude figures of both women and men. The background of the canvas isn’t blank, it has another picture of what appeared to be a man in a forest. There was also a single white bone sticking out near the edge. The magnifying glasses certainly gave it an even more unique touch to Pentheus. I wonder what it was meant to signify, maybe, the complexity of life itself. The little things in this canvas made it a unique treasure for many people to marvel at.

Pentheus- Elliot Hundley

There was also another interesting piece in the same area. Originally from Kenya, Wangechi Mutu created Girl Specimen Series, which consisted of ten pieces of artwork. Like Pentheus, each individual piece connected with each other to form one piece of artwork. In my eyes, I felt like each of these pieces were body parts, but in most of them body parts were included as well. For example, a frame of what appears to be lungs consisted of hands, legs, snakes, and animal skins, which were all interesting. Cut-outs of women in sexual positions were also included as well. There were pearls in some frames, which probably symbolized the fertility of women, thus making the title Girl Specimen Series a logical choice. The description says, “identity has been blown apart, now subject to input and bombardment on every level, from every direction.” This combination of pieces/body parts probably meant that both animals and humans make up of one organism. Below is one out of the ten frames that were in the complete artwork.

One out of the ten frames of artwork

Girl Specimen Series- Wangechi Mutu

Overall, it was an amazing experience. It definitely opened my eyes about museums. I hoped you enjoyed reading this, as I did writing this.