When one thinks of Times Square, the concept of tourist attractions come to mind. One of the veteran places in this area that entices millions of visitors is the Wax Museum of Madame Tussauds, which features the wax figures of celebrities of the past and present. However, aside from the humorous poses with these statues, do you contemplate the process of making these works of art? Recently, Madame Tussauds undertook the task of creating eight was figures of the pop star sensation Lady Gaga for the wax museums created around the world. The process is a very long one, for the statues are created from scratch. Artists build up from a metal frame with clay to create a plaster mold in order to pour in wax. The hair of the celebrities are individually inserted as wigs, extensions, or both. Even the clothes are painstakingly made from various materials, and the shoes are cobbled.

The process of creating these wax figures reminds of Yigal Ozeri’s works. Artists create an illusion of skin color and makeup with paint using various techniques and building it up, just like how Ozeri creates an illusion of a photo with paint as well. I am also reminded of the moveable type printing press, for two molds of Lady Gaga’s face and body were made to form the eight figures. You can learn more about the process here:

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Beginning in 1954, an annual Christmas Display has been going on at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, due to the dedication and hard work of Loretta Hines Howard.  Howard began collecting crèche figures in 1925 and came up with the idea to display  these figures set up as a nativity scene alongside with decorated Christmas trees for the public to see in the holiday season.  Throughout the years, new crèche figures have been given to the museum and Howard’s ancestors have carried on her legacy in adding to the presentation.

Now, what exactly are these crèche figures?  In a normal nativity set, there are figures representing all who were around when Jesus was born in a manger.  These crèche figures are those figures that are in a normal nativity set, except these crèche figures are like little works of art themselves.  They are like small sculptures,  ranging from 6 to 20 inches in height and appear lifelike.  They are made out of terracotta, and were worked on by many famous artists in Naples, Italy.  My mother had actually seen this display when she was in her twenties and she said it was beautiful.  I think over the break I would like to go see it because I’m sure these pictures don’t do it justice.  I have seen many nativity scenes before and I’m sure the overwhelming amount of such intricate figures would be something worth seeing.  Here is a link to the article for anyone who is interested in learning more. Below, I will put some pictures 🙂

Recently, I discovered a new type of art that combines the use of science as well. After looking at some of the works, I was really impressed at its beauty. For those who do not know, liquid sculpture images are fluids in motion, frozen in time by a flash of light. They are droplets witnessed in mid-splash.

The man most responsible for creation of such art is named Martin Waugh. Martin’s utilizes high-speed photography make it possible to capture the smooth and effortless curves of the liquid beauty. He captures the droplets with a very high speed flash photography and with no alteration with the shapes or composition. The main effort of his work though, is orchestrating the lights and liquids to create the colors and shapes. He orchestrates these sculptures by accurately aiming the drops and releasing them with precise timing. Color, viscosity, and surface tension are controlled with dye, glycerin, and soap.

Waugh shows us the beauty of the free flowing aspect of water, producing a very calm and peace feel. He also gives each of his works a name, which relates to the picture that is being portrayed. For example, “Big Hat Little Head” shown below, possesses such a name because the large droplet on top looks like a hat.

"Big Hat Little Head" (left) & "Windshield" (right)

"Old Glory Bowl"

Waugh’s work has also been used in advertisements for famous companies like Smirnoff.

Waugh & Smirnoff

There are four words that some people wait their entire life to hear, and quite, some people’s lives depended on it. These words can’t just come from anyone or be insincere, it has to be something from your heart to be truly special and meaningful. Those four words are “Will you marry me?”. Some people come up with the most creative ways to say these words, and a lot of them use art.

Check out this video to see a man’s proposal to his girlfriend with the use of a video game! It’s truly sweet and adorable. Another example relates to a topic that we’ve talked about a lot, graffiti.

Art can do amazing things, helping people cope with their conditions or inspire love. Is there anything more powerful in the world?

The question of mainstream versus individuality is a huge question facing niche artists. There’s an amazing article in the New Yorker that discusses Lady Gaga’s awkward position of making the weird and off-beat mainstream. As Sasha Fere-Jones puts it Gaga “knows that the one-hit wonders are weirder and cooler than the well-paid musicians who stretch their careers over seven years on the stage and twenty more behind it. Can she have it both ways?” Lady Gaga tries to be an artist, calling her label Haus of Gaga, pushing the limits with fashion, and name dropping high-brow philosophers.

She also thrives off being different. Recently Gaga wore a dress made out of real meat, created an elaborate music video for Alejandro, and in general is known as an unconventional pop-artist. She allows for music snobs to appreciate her music for intellectual reasons. The question is how long can that last and does it matter to her. In this day in age pop has become weirder. Britney Spears and Jessica Simpson represent the cookie cutter, bland pop of the 90’s. Now artists like Rihanna and Gaga are pushing ahead with a new brand of pop. They have music videos that are more elaborate, more disturbing, more violent, than any ground covered by Mandy Moore. The question is what happens when weird becomes normal? This phenomenon happens with any form of anything. For example, punk music went from extremely fringe with dangerous undertones to so mainstream that Disney stars like Selena Gomez often wear clothing formerly identified with punk style. Personally, I’m interested in seeing how mainstream will affect the fringe groups. If everything is normal, what is weird?

Here’s a link to the New Yorker Article on Gaga.

Bill Gold is a world renowned movie poster artist. A little unconventionality is what Gold uses to help sell movie tickets. Before Gold came along, the art of movie posters were mainly pictures of three heads of the characters in the movie. Gold wanted his posters to tell a story, to be more than just 3 heads on a poster. His concepts have been used in countless movie posters, such as those of Casablanca, Rope, House of Wax and Barbarella, to name a few.

In Casablanca, Gold stuck to the idea of showcasing the characters on the poster, yet created mystery in the way Ingrid Berman looked at Bogart so as not to hint to their relationship. He created excitement by placing a gun in Bogart’s hand.

In Rope, Gold used the piece of rope in the poster to instigate curiosity. “What is going to happen with that piece of rope?” The red sky in the background he says is added for dramatic effect. “It’s not a settling sky. The red makes it more imposing.”

Barbarella was a sci-fi movie of the 1960s. In the poster Gold experimented with shapes and stills. He says, “You would normally have boxes down the side show all the stills, but this has a bursting excitement to it, like something has blown up. Pieces seem to be flying off the center. So here Jane Fonda is big up top, and then when you come down below, there’s a small sexy little figure with the tag line ‘See Barbarella do her thing.’ What’s her thing? We’d love to see it.”

Lastly, House of Wax was his poster of the first major 3-D film production. He says he’s not particularly proud of this poster, however the corniness and cheesiness of it is what they were going for. They wanted the poster to make it blatantly obvious that what you were about to see is a 3-D film where things jump out of the screen at you. That’s why he feels this piece is such an important part of history.

The art of movie posters is, in essence, the art of enticing people to come see a particular movie. Gold, now in his 80s, is a master of the art and has created over 2,000 movie posters in his career. Its a balance between art and commerce and in order for it to be successful it must appeal to customers enough so that they’ll reach into their pockets and put down the money to see the movie.

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Seeing this image for the first time, what would you conceive it to be: a mere photograph, perhaps?

Surprisingly, this was not taken with a camera.

The masterpiece above was painted on an oil canvas by artist Yigal Ozeri. His works frequently feature youthful women basking in the beauties of nature. The settings are not glamorous, but rather mundane. Yet, Ozeri creates his paintings in such a way that makes these settings appear fresh, surreal, and gorgeous. Themes of femininity and sensuality also dominate his creations in addition to that of nature. Realism is his trade, and this style of art is specifically dubbed “photorealistic painting.”

Ozeri was born in 1958 in Isreal, and currently lives and works in New York City. Since 1988, his paintings have been featured in solo exhibitions in New York, along in other international locations such as Munich, Basel, and Vienna. Currently, his works can be viewed in various locations, including New York: The Hudson Valley Center for Contemporary Art and the New York Public Library.

More of Ozeri’s work can be viewed here.
More photorealistic painters and their works are featured here.

Who wouldn’t be drawn to an article that’s titled “Squiggly, Tangly, and Angular?” It appears that “On Line” is a new exhibition at MoMA, which was organized by chief curator of drawings at MOMA Connie Butler, and a guest curator, Catherine de Zegher, the former director of the Drawing Center in SoHo.

This exhibit focuses on the transition of art throughout the twentieth century. Artists began to shift from using paper or flat surfaces as their sole artistic medium, and decided to start exploring real three-dimensional space through the artistic lenses. The exhibition has over three hundred different pieces of art work by a wide range of artists, and it starts with Picasso. At the entrance is one of his pieces from 1912 which displays cut-cardboard guitars that seem to shoot right out at you. Around this Picasso piece are the works of other artists who decided to explore art in all of its dimensions. There’s Malevich who uses drawn lines to somehow create a fourth dimension. Artist Kurt Schwitters who treats his lines like beams and risers in hi architectural collages. Kandinsky (the exhibition’s title stems from his writing)  transforms his lines into visual dances.

And high above all of these art pieces, are late 19th century women flapping around in their dresses, dancing and performing a piece by the choreographer Loie Fuller (1862-1928). Loie Fuller inspired artists during her lifetime to “to think of drawing not as static and finite but as action in space and lines as points in motion.”

This is a very interesting display based on the description. It’s historical and based on a transition that’s been going on for a century, and that’s what makes it feel so contemporary. Art is not a still thing, or at least an amateur like I never thought it was. It is also not flat and lifeless, or rather, it shouldn’t be. Even the two dimensional drawings on a paper have the potential to be brought to life. If I’m correct, I believe that some of these pieces are on a canvas, yet they seem to represent more dimensions than the flat piece of cardboard paper would normally allow them to represent.

For more information on the exhibition, you can go to MoMa’s site.

The poster for the exhibition.

There is a new exhibition now at The Hebrew Home at Riverdale called, “Lyrical Abstraction: Works from the Permanent Collection by Natvar Bhavsar and Robert Natkin.” When I first saw this, I had no idea what lyrical abstraction was, until I looked it up and learned that it was a period in America from the 1960’s-1970’s. It is characterized by a focus on color and texture, which is the first thing you notice when you look at paintings in that style.

This piece, by Robert Natkin, was painted between 1978 and 1979. When I first saw it, I was reminded of Vir Heroicus Sublimus by Barnett Newman, the piece we saw at the Moma. It is so simple, yet complex. At first glance, it may just look like a reddish blob, but after close inspection, you can see the different shades and colors that the artist used, and how it is able to capture the observer’s eye.

This piece by Natvar Bhasvar was made between 1986 and 1991, and although it was painted far after the period of Lyrical Abstraction, I think it really capture’s the spirit of the period. The center is a bright yellow, but the outer edges are darker, as though the center is a bright flame that is fighting against the darkness surrounding it. There is also some red speckled at the bottom and bottom-right, which gives the painting more texture and color, and adds more depth to it.

I think this looks like a great exhibition to introduce someone to a very interesting style called Lyrical Abstraction, and I think it will definitely be a worthwhile visit. The exhibition is at The Hebrew Home at Riverdale until January 9, 2011.
Official Site

Autism, in short, is a developmental disorder that appears in the first 3 years of life, and affects the brain’s normal development of social and communication skills. If anyone has ever met anyone with autism, you’ll know it is extremely difficult for them to communicate. They don’t speak out their thoughts and feelings like we do, which is our main outlet of frustrations or any other thing we need to release.

Susan’s blog “Crazy Art” and my psychology class were what led me to post this blog. Many autistic children uses art as their way of expression. A 12 year old boy named Wil makes paper collages as his way of letting out his emotions. All artist use their form of art to express something, whether it is an opinion or an emotion. Art is important for us all, but for these autistic children, that is their only voice. Some psychologists hope that they will be able to get a deeper sense of autism through these children’s work and help more with their condition.

Here are two articles about the autistic children: Click and Click

After reading Praveena’s great post on Robert Rauschenberg, I started thinking about all the great artists I’ve never heard of. Whenever I go to a museum it’s usually to see a special exhibit. Well, the other day I had that chance to explore the Modern Art section of The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Inspired by Praveena, I wrote down all the names of the artists whose pieces I particularly admired and decided to share them with all you fine folks.

The first artist is Yves Tanguy. This is the painting I loved, named “From Green to White”. He created it in 1954, a year before he died. He’s best known for his nonrepresentational surrealist style. This particular painting reminded me of a sci-fi version of Salvador Dali. It has a cartoon-like quality that I find amazing and I also love the vast landscape view. Just for background information, Surrealism is an artistic style founded in 1924 in Europe. Surrealist style focuses heavily on the idea of the subconscious and dreams. It represents the idea that art shouldn’t be understood logically.

This is a painting by Stephen Hannock. This painting is called “The Oxbow: After Church, after Cole, Flooded, Green Light” (2000) What I found so interesting about this work is that if you look closely you can the that tha painting is filled with little white words. His style is referred to as “Imaginary Realism” which is also linked to Surrealism. I found an incredible essay by art historian Jason Rosenfeld on Hannock. Click here to read it. He is noted for his use of light in his paintings. I particularly like the specifically American quality of this piece. I chose this piece to represent postmodern art.

This next painting represents the Fauvist style of early 20th century modern art. It’s called “The River Seine at Chatou” (1906) by French artist Maurice de Vlaminck. Fauvism is heavily influenced by Impressionism and is marked by the intense use of color. One of the more famous Fauvists is Henri Matisse.

I chose these specific paintings and artists to explore the wide variety of styles and artists that fall under the category of modern art.

I found it very fitting that Katherine wrote a post about remembering the tragedy of 9/11 through art on the night before my English class was scheduled to begin our analysis of Art Spiegelman’s “In the Shadow of No Towers.” Art Spiegelman is a highly respected graphic artist who is most famous for his Pulitzer Prize-winning graphic novel, “Maus,” which tells the story of his father’s life, illustrating the tale of his survival through the Holocaust. In the novel, Jewish characters are depicted by mice and Germans are depicted by cats. Maus not only tells the story of the tragedy of the Holocaust from a unique perspective, but it is a remarkable work of art that all of you should read if you haven’t already. However, “In the Shadow of No Towers” relates even more directly to Katherine’s post below mine.

Just days after the tragic events of September 11th, 2001, the cover of The New Yorker featured a black-on-black painting by Spiegelman of the towers that once stood tall at the sight that is now known as Ground Zero. When “In the Shadow of No Towers” was published in 2004, the same painting was displayed on the cover. The book was inspired by, but is not limited too, Spiegelman’s own experience in Lower Manhattan during the attacks. Ironically, the comic strips from the book were originally published the German newspaper “Die Zeit” because he wasn’t able to find a publisher in America. The graphic novel portrays many aspects of the 9/11 attacks through the use of symbolism that is more overt in certain panels than in others. The book also features old comic strips, some of which were published a century ago in American newspapers at time when political cartoons and yellow journalism were extremely influential in this country. While the old comic strips are very entertaining, Speigelman’s own depiction of 9/11 can have a much more emotional impact on the reader, especially if the reader is you: a New York City student who vividly remembers the day of the attacks.

Click on the Links at the top of the post to see the full images

Read The New York Times book review of In the Shadow of No Towers

Look inside the book on Amazon

The events of September 11th affected all New Yorkers, some more than others. But NYC has never witnessed such a tragedy as the terrorist attacks that happened on that day. Because it was such an enormous tragedy, September 11th has become almost synonymous with strength and spirit of New Yorkers. Therefore, a lot of art in New York City is reflective of the events of that day, and the many days that followed, when New Yorkers were trying to heal and get their lives back to normal, even though they would never be the same.

The Responders At Work

There is an exhibition currently at the New York City Police Musuem, called “Artist as Witness: The 9/11 Responders,” which focuses on the events that took place long after the attacks. The exhibition consists of 25 sketches and watercolors by Aggie Kenny. Kenny was a courtroom artist when she decided to take her sketchbook to the ground zero site during the Spring 2002 World Trade Center Recovery Operation. She didn’t take any photographs for reference and instead just sketched what she saw. Kenny explains, “After the attacks on 9/11, I was compelled to visit the site with my sketchbook. Sketching the scenes of the aftermath was my attempt to comprehend in incomprehensible.”

Exhausted Responders Resting

Kenny’s sketches focus on the responders, during both heroic and mundane moments. In her sketches, she captures the intense focus and strength of the responders, as well as their exhaustion. I think it’s important to see this exhibit to get a sense of what the responders had to go through. I can only imagine how exhausted, both mentally and physically, the responders must have been everyday after having to sift through all this dark, incomprehensible tragedy. I think that this exhibit can also provide at least some closure to the people who lost their loved ones on September 11th, and is an example of how art can heal. Through Aggie Kenny’s sketches and watercolors, we can honor the brave 9/11 responders, as well as the people who lost their lives on that tragic day.

Official Site

Matthew Chambers has been known to use many interesting materials to create some of his artwork.  Some of the art premiered over a year ago at the Rental Gallery consisted of works made using hamburgers, cats, and glass bottles.  The most interesting artwork there, perhaps, were those which was made up of “strips of canvases deemed beyond help or hope.”  These pieces, called “slash paintings” are comprised solely of things that would normally be thrown in the trash, which, as Chambers feels provides, “the perfect testament to the old adage, out of failure comes success.”  He takes the old and ugly, and transforms it into something new and beautiful.

(Sorry the picture is so tiny! It wouldn’t let me make it any larger.)  This picture especially reminds me of the artist’s work who made pictures using chewed gum.  And the idea is the same–taking something that most people would discard as garbage and using it to create something very cool.  It seems as if I could have done something like this, but maybe it takes one person to come up with the idea first, and coming up with that idea in itself is a work of artistic genius.

Chamber’s most recent art exhibit at Untitled (on Orchard Street) features 36 vertical four-by-eight canvases of the slash paintings.  This show differs from the last in that there are two large books upon entering the exhibit that explain each piece in detail.  They tell the story behind each of Chamber’s works, providing insight into his creative mind.