The final project I made in Studio/Seminar is not what I would have made on the first day of class.
If I were assigned to this project in the beginning of the semester, I would have over complicated things. I learned that the quality of an art work is not reflected by how decorated it is, nor does that indicate the effort that has been put in it. I have become simpler. I realized that not everything has to be a puzzle, and that there is no harm in creating a piece of art that is honest and straightforward. There is no harm in being a blunt person. New York City has shown me a new approach to life: to become more effortless, quick, less hesitant, and less apologetic. Being unnecessarily over the top will not get me where I need to be in this harsh, demanding environment. No one cares if I spent 30 hours on a project if the outcome is cliche. So what if I work harder than the person next to me when we have the same thing to offer. The way we chose to present ourselves in front of everyone is extremely important. These are the things I have learned after coming to New York, and they have influenced me during the making process of this project.
Although I haven’t yet become this new improved person based on what I mentioned above, I feel like my improvement is still significant enough. Finishing and completing homework from all of this semester changed me in a way that would have never happened if I weren’t here in New York, all by my self. I forced my self to write more, even if it is the most grueling part of every project, because if I don’t I will never improve. Before, the only thing that motivated me to complete an assignment was its due date. I have received countless projects that I felt like were too much to handle, such as the doing words with things project and the braided essay. Still, completing those projects changed me in little ways that I never would have imagined.
Especially after this project, I have become more detail oriented and practical in the sense that I am able to gauge what may or may not work within the time frame that I have set for myself. I have also become more happy.
The Final Studio Project Assignment and my Process
For this assignment, we were asked to curate an exhibition based on a random word we picked from a dictionary. From that point onwards we used that word as a basis for all the mini assignments that built up towards our final bridge project. The word I chose was fuzzy, my only reason for that was because the word was so simple and that I felt like I could do a lot with the word. In my seminar braided essay, I wrote about fuzzy in the context of texture, object detection, and video surveillance. During the research process of the word, we went to the Met and Moma museums to pick pieces that expressed our word. In those two visits, I picked both paintings and sculptures. I also picked works from artists online which I felt like belonged in the gallery such as Nick Cave’s soundsuit.
As for my actual object which I featured in my gallery, I chose to make a soundscape to evoke the feeling of fuzziness: which can be both the texture and how vague things are. Not only did I layer white noise, ambience, and static, I also decided to add piano notes and the cello to ‘confuse the audience’ and create that initial feeling of vagueness.
