Donatella Versace

   Donatella Versace is the chief designer and vice president of the Italian fashion brand Versace. She was born in Riggio di Calabria, Italy on May 2,1955.Her father was a personal financier and her mother was a dressmaker and had a small business in the home where Donatella and her 3 siblings grew up. Her start in fashion came during the 1970's. While studying languages at the University of Florence, Donatella began to work for her brother Giovanni "Gianni" at his fashion label Versace doing public relations and supervising the photographic advertising campaigns of the company. Donatella and her brother Gianni had a very close and loving relationship. She became his muse and helped him in the creative process of the label by offering constructive  criticism. During the 1980's Gianni created a perfume inspired by Donatella called Blonde. He even created an extension of the Versace label called Versus it was meant to be a fashion forward label with a rock & roll spirit.

   After Gianni Versace was murdered on July 15, 1997, the rest of the Versace family went into seclusion at a private resort in the Caribbean. The fashion label canceled their Spring/Summer Collection and the company was at a stand still. After a year of mourning the death of her brother Donatella put on her first Couture show for Versace at the Ritz Hotel in Paris. Since then Donatella has helped the Versace brand flourish and expand. Today, Versace is one of the world's leading international fashion houses. Versace designs, markets and distributes luxury clothing, accessories, fragrances, makeup and home furnishings under the various brands of the Versace Group. Versace's Style Department employs a group of designers and stylists who work in teams. Each team is specifically dedicated to each fashion line or label. These teams operate under the close supervision and guidance of Donatella Versace.

  Donatella is a pioneer in the fashion world for associating the Versace label with high profile celebrities such as Jennifer Lopez, Demi Moore, Beyonce, Britney Spears, Angelina Jolie and Liz Hurley. She has placed well known celebrities as models for Versace's campaigns like Madonna, Halle Berry, Patrick Dempsey, and most recently January Jones. The Versace brand is an industry favorite because of their sophisticated, sexy, bold, and glamorous styles.

    

                                 

Some of the Versace items I found interesting:

http://www.versace.com/en/fashion-and-accessories

Beall Center Visit

 So, this past Monday afternoon I finally made my way to UCI to explore the Beall Center for Art and Technology. After a 1hr and 15 min drive and another 30 min of looking for parking and the building. I finally made it to the buildings front door only to realize it was locked!! of course I decided to go on a day when it was closed. I'm disappointed that I didn't get to see the exhibits. All I have to show is the above picture of me in front of the building. But hey at least I attempted to do the assignment.

New Media Artist Research Bill Viola

Bill Viola was born January 25, 1951. He is an internationally recognized video artist with over 40 years experience in the art field. With the use of videotapes, architectural video installations, sound environments, electronic musical performances, flat panel video pieces, and works for television. Viola has established himself as the leading artist figure in new media. He grew up in Queens and Westbury, New York and in 1973 graduated from Syracuse University with a Bachelor in Fine Arts Degree specifically Experimental Studios. After graduation he worked as a video technician at the Everson Museum of Art in Syracuse. And from 1974-1976, Viola served as technical director at Art/Tapes/22, which was a pioneering video studios located in Florence, Italy. While working there he was able to closely observe the works of Nam June Paik, Bruce Nauman, and Vito Acconci. During 1976-1983, Viola was the resident artist at WNET Thirteen Television Laboratory in New York. In 1977 he was invited to show some of his work at La Trobe University in Melbourne, Australia. He and the cultural arts director Kira Perov later married and have been collaborating on work ever since. In 1983, he began teaching Advanced Video at the California Institute of the Arts, in Valencia, California. It was during this time that he created one of his best known works, The Greeting. Viola also worked as a Scholar in residence at the Getty Research Institute, Los Angeles.in 1998. He was even elected into the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2002. Today, Viola resides in Long Beach, California were he has lived for 25 years with his wife and 2 children. His woor has been on display all over the world and in countless galleries. 

    Violas work likes to emphasize on human emotion and experiences. Like birth, death, and different levels of consciousness. Traumatic experiences in his life have inspired some of his work. Including his mothers death when he was a child, his near death drowning experience when he was young, which he described as "The most beautiful world I've ever seen in my life and without fear, peacefull"And his fathers death in 1999.

The Crossing 1996 Video/Sound Installation

Five Angels of the Millennium 2001

Silent Mountain 2001

The Greeting 1995

More Information :

http://www.billviola.com/

http://www.designboom.com/eng/interview/viola.html

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-4498864086957786589#

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-8X_pLvyk9U

Midterm 3/7/11

   The midterm for Identity Module 2 went off without a hitch. I had a busy week prior to the midterm and worked hard to put some nice quality work into my blog. Since I am in group B, we were the first to meet up on Monday morning. I have to say we had a nice lunch that had a theme of hamburgers! :) I decided to take a nice cookie platter. I really enjoy meeting with my group and discussing our blogs. I feel each time we meet up we get to know each other a little better and learn a new fact about one another. Especially this time around because we had to discuss our Identity collage. We got the opportunity to see each others identity and learn what we all think defines us, with mostly the use of pictures. Going over our museum trips is always great because we get to see each persons taste in art and usually we all end up picking different art pieces to discuss. Reviewing each artist research the group members had to do is also great because we get to learn briefly about different artist. I hope each time we meet up the group keeps up the great work. Can't wait till the next week when the new module begins and we get to do a project,museum visit, and artist research all over again!

Music Video Art

   I am a big fan of 80's music and one of my favorite songs from this era is "Take On Me" by the Norwegian band A-Ha. The song was recorded in 1984, and reached #1 on the U.S. Billboard charts in October of 1995. A big help in the song gaining popularity was the cutting-edge video, that was on constant rotation on MTV. It was directed by Steve Barron and uses a pencil sketch animation called rotoscoping mixed with live action. Rotoscoping is a type of animation technique in which animators trace over live action film movement, frame by frame. It is commonly used in animated films. This video has always been interesting to me, I thought it was ahead of it's time and memorable. I'm sure if you ever mention the band A-Ha to a person, they will make reference to this video. 

LACMA MUSEUM

I visited LACMA on Friday, March 3rd. I had not been feeling well so i decided to go late in the day and luckily got in for free (because i got there after 5pm) and only had to pay $10 for parking. The first thing that caught my attention when I got off the elevator were all the lit lamp posts that are outside on the sidewalk of the museum. They looked so nice and interesting, I had to take a picture.

Nympheas 1897-98 oil on canvas by Claude Monet

   Of course the first thing I asked and looked for when I got to the museum was the Claude Monet paintings. The workers at the museum were very nice and told me where they could be found. I love the two flowers in the the center of  this painting and the turquoise lily pads that surround the focal point flowers of the painting. I have been a Monet fan for a couple years now and it always makes me smile when I see his paintings they are so beautiful and calming. The colors and subjects of his paintings are always simple but he always manages to make amazing artwork.

Jacob's Ladder 1650 oil on onyx by Jacques Stella

   Although this painting is small when seen in person, it caught my eye because it is so beautiful. I'm not a religious person, but the angels coming down from above to the aid of the injured/deceased  person on the rock really caught my attention. And made me think of some personal experiences. The colors are so vibrant, glossy, & shiny that is really almost looks like a photograph. I was also surprised to read that the painting was done on onyx, I am so used to reading oil on canvas on every painting that I see. It was nice to see something new.

   The dresses in the "Fashion Fashion" exhibit were so elegant and simple, it was nice to see a different type of art that wasn't hanging on a wall. I reminded me how much I used to love fashion and why it used to be the career I wanted to pursue. When I got out of High School my dream was to attend FIDM, but that never panned out. Fashion has such a huge impact on society. It has the power to define eras in time. Weather it be bell bottoms from the 70's or the skinny jeans that are in style right now. It was nice to see this type of Exhibit at the museum.   

Campbell's Soup Can 1964 oil on canvas by Andy  Warhol

  My visit to the museum could not be complete without checking out the Andy Warhol paintings that were on display. Especially the famous Campbell's soup can paintings that are his trademark. Although it is a simple painting I can see the hype that people create over these paintings. I had never seen a Warhol painting up close, so this was a nice first time experience.

Guillermo Gomez Peña

   

   Mexican-born performance artist Guillermo Gómez-Peña is a well known performer, writer, and cultural critic whose artistic work pushes boundaries. Born in 1955, Gómez Peña was raised in Mexico City and studied linguistics and literature at the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México/National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM). In 1978, he moved to the United States and studied post-studio art at the California Institute of Arts. Guillermo's work mixes English and Spanish, fact and fiction, social reality and pop culture, Chicano humor and activist politics to create a "total experience" for the viewer, reader, audience member. These strategies can be found in his live performance work, his radio chronicles, his award-winning video art pieces, and his five published books. Through his organization La Pocha Nostra, Gómez-Peña has focused very intensely in the notion of collaboration across national borders, race, gender and generation.

    In 1988, Guillermo created Border Brujo, a solo live performance that combined autobiographical monologue with a series of rapidly shifting characters representing diverse border identities and positions, including mariachis, Border Patrol agents, gang members, priests, and a few white american's seeking excitement and jovial obedience from their Mexican neighbors. It was performed in various combinations of Spanish, English, and what Gómez-Peña claimed is Nahuatl (an Aztec language), Border Brujo was a performance that challenged the notion of “authentic” identity and fixed borders, humorously commenting on the ways representations circulate in relationship to politics, economics, and self-perception. In 1990, director and producer Isaac Artenstein created a video version of Border Brujo, that was also written and performed by Guillermo Gómez-Peña. 

  Guillermo's most famous live performance piece is called "The Couple in the Cage" in this traveling performance that included Guillermo Gómez-Peña and Coco Fusco, two caged Amerindians from an imaginary island were exhibited in a cage. While Gómez-Peña's and Fusco's intent was to create a satirical commentary on the notion of discovery, they soon realized that many of their viewers believed the fiction, and thought the artists were real "savages". The record of their interactions with audiences in four countries dramatizes the dilemma of cross-cultural misunderstanding we continue to live with today. Their experiences are interwoven with archival footage of ethnographic displays from the past, giving an historical dimension to the artists’ social experiment. His performance allows outside individuals to create their own interpretation of how they view the couple in the cage. The individual's behavior is studied and shown to have misunderstandings of people who are different than them. 

   In 1993, Guillermo, Roberto Sifuentes, and Nola Mariano founded La Pocha Nostra in Los Angeles, California. In 1995, La Pocha Nostra moved to San Francisco's Mission District, where it has been based for the last twelve years. It was created to allow different artists to collaborate with each other. The created projects range from performance solos and duets to large-scale performance installations using video, photography, audio, and cyber-art.

More information about Guillermo Gomez Peña :

http://www.pochanostra.com/home/

http://www.body-pixel.com/2010/06/16/interview-with-guillermo-gomez-pena-you-know-i-worship-the-imagination/