Nelson Ramírez de Arellano

Nelson was a quiet and warm guy. I went to the lunch with him and his benefactors where they expounded the downfall of his once beautiful country. His disagreement was apparent from small faces and sounds and polite contradictions. We had a long and vague conversation about the American embassy diplomats who got sick in Havana. Everyone seemed to be talking in euphemisms, hinting at what they thought happened, while many at the table didn't seem to have heard of the incident at all. I kept muttering that it was probably the CIA and it was like a USS Maine type of deal but no one was listening to me, the nut.


His presentation was great. He simply went through the history of photography in Cuba which situated his work in that specific cultural historical context. What a great way to do it.


The show itself reaffirmed my appreciation for documentary photography. Those were by far my favorite pieces in the show. In class I recently accused photography as capturing, not creating. I meant it as an insult but its really a powerful thing. No artist can create anything as beautiful as the little magical moments of coincidence and beauty that happen in the real world, and photography comes with the understanding that it represents reality. Yeah I liked Nelson's print pretty good but it doesn't compare to the documentary photography.

TimeLIEn

Tomorrow: watch all my footage with a notebook in a relaxed mindset :)
Monday: a five minute sound collage
Wednesday: initial visualization
Repeat until week 8 and then attempt Consolidation!

I can make you whole again

Hello my Friends. A lot of people ask me.. “what do you want your art to do, jack?” I want my art to fuck you up. I want my art to scare you senseless. I want my art to take your mind on a vacation from “Instagram” and “facebook” and show you the real fucking shit. Im talking about giving you a trip your mind won’t be able to recover from. I’m talking about a sort of metaphysical journey that creates a rift between your mind and your body that you will never be able to repair. Im talking astral birthright.

But most of all. I want my art to heal. I want to help you. but to help you. you have to follow me. I love you all but you must trust my wisdom before you see it.

A lot of people want me to define consciousness for them. The problem is you have to be ready to know what im talking about. You have to have bigger eyes to see the bigger truth. Im not talking about any of that third eye shit.  Im talking bigger eyes. Our eyes should be bigger, and that’s what I can give you if you trust me. and love me.

A pious Friend



Its a lot of pressure

I have a lot to work with here.

I have everything I need

Give me your mind.
I will make you whole.

Contiguous: A panoramic survey of power in Appleton, WI

Something is Happening show

 The show was a big hit. My book was the biggest which was a little embarrassing. And the gallery presented my prints at half the asking price I had requested. (No one bought them obviously, because people hate cheap art.) But everyone loved my work so I don't have to worry about my financial future at least. Thats a start! I brought feta cheese, baby dill pickles, pastries, and wine to the show. I left with oreos and hint of lime tostitos. What a haul!

With regards to my photos, I made some changes since the flickr album. I brought the title down a notch. And I did some cool things with zooming in on parts of the photos I liked and putting that on the opposite page. I'm pretty happy with it. Some of it printed a little dark. And it feels a little boring but I still like it. Overall I think it was a good exercise in self editing and self curation. I have trouble being concise or specific with my photographs.

John Cage

McLuhan was an inspiration and mentor to John Cage even though McLuhan was only a year older than the experimental composer.  Later in life they became friends. Among Cage's other inspirations/mentors/friends was Marcel Duchamp.

Both McLuhan and Cage agree that the eye has dominated the western mind. That we should take sounds more seriously. Both are interested in the fact that you cannot shut your ears. Both are frustrated with the rigidness of understanding space within western culture.  


“When we ignore it, it disturbs us. When we listen to it, we find it fascinating." 
This is an excerpt from an essay Cage wrote in ___. He explains his reasons for using chance operations in his compositions and expands on his ideas behind sound. After this essay the critical and academic worlds spent much less time on the content of Cage's art and mainly focused on his ideas about art and sound. This contradicts one of his main ideas that the intention of the artist is not important to the finished work.
For example, 4’33’’, probably his most famous piece, is usually talked about with regards to the ideas behind it; There is no silence. Listen to the sounds around you. The audience is part of the song... But they don't talk about the song.

"I have nothing to say and I am saying it." - John Cage
Maybe the critics prove him wrong. Is his work only valuable for the theoretical point it makes? 
 By using computer systems that run chance operations to determine what Cage does in his art, he is very literally using circuitry as an extension of the nervous system, like McLuhan says.

 

“Using chance operations assumes that each thing that happens is the best.”

The past few years

I was sad yesterday and I didn't think I was gonna be... But i started looking through sounds I recorded on my voice memos app over tha past few years and it made it a lot worse. I made a short peice out of these sounds .. I found the process very therapeutic but I feel a deep sadness when I listen to this piece. Much of that is due to my connection to the individual sounds. When I listen to it I feel I have died. I hope some of this feeling can be picked up on by the audience.

"The highest purpose is to have no purpose at all. This puts one in accord with nature, in her manner of operation."  - John Cage

I cant think this way.. I feel so idle .. I love to do nothing and observe but it also makes me feel purposeless, useless... bad. Here in many of these recordings I am idle, observing.. and still compulsively recording. appropriating. *Insert Sontag quote here*

I like the sounds of me holding the phone while recording too. the clicks and scratches and static. It creates a strange feeling of point of view and a feeling that reminds me of listening to an old tape recorder. It's amature nature. It makes it feel more autobiographical. I thought it was an interesting interplay of forms where I record a tape recorder playing old tapes of my grandpa taking voice memos, on my digital voice memo app.