Me @ The Santa Barbara Museum of Art

I have always been a fan of art and last year while in Santa Barbara I was happy to see that their Museum of Art had some Claude Monet paintings on display! here are some pictures of some of my favorite Monet and other artists paintings! I was even lucky enough to see a Van Gogh!

Charing Cross Bridge by Claude Monet

Waterloo Bridge by Claude Monet

Painting by Vincent Van Gogh

Villas At Bordighera by Claude Monet

Artist Research on Neck Face

   The anonymous tagger/ artist / skater known as "Neck Face" was born in 1984, in Stockton, CA. He created his nick name and works anonymously because he believes this keeps the public interested in his work. His career in tagging began when he was in middle school and continued into his high school years. In interviews he always states that he hated school and that he never learned anything in the later years of his education, because by that point he had stopped caring. The only thing he credits school with is letting him explore his creative side. "I think I learned more in school in the earlier years than the later years. I think if you are a teacher you should teach the kid as much as you can in the beginning years of school." As a teen he began to gain notoriety with his tagging/graffiti by plastering his self made stickers all over the city of Sacramento. The easily-recognizable scribble, “Neck Face” with accompanying random quotes, not to mention his awkward demonic monsters and larger than life hairy arms and clawed-hands lurking ominously around the sides of buildings became widely noticed. This spread to other surrounding cities like Stockton and Lodi, CA. After high school Neck Face attended The School of Visual Arts in New York City for 2 years before dropping out.

   When describing Neck Face's style the words dark, creepy, and violent come to mind. He credits his early exposure to horror films for being the inspiration to much of his work. He believes it to be a kind of comic relief. "I have a lot of favorite horror films. Two main ones that I like are Halloween and Nightmare on Elm Street. I’ve watched a lot of horror films now, but those two are the ones that fucked with me when I was a lil’ bastard."  Metal music is also an influence, especially King Diamond, which he calls his father and describes the discovery of this artist as a kind of awakening. The fact that his family had a dark sense of humor also influenced the direction in which Neck Face's art has evolved. He says the reaction he gets from his violent images are what he likes. Especially when he sees people laugh at his violent pieces , then look around and wonder if it is ok to laugh at it. Neck Face wants people to walk away from his art entertained. If they had a bad day or are going through some drama he want the viewer to at least for a bit, forget their problems. 

After dropping out of art school Neck Face made New York his permanent address. His most famous public art piece once appropriated the sign on an abandoned storefront of the store "My Old Lady" in New York City's Chelsea neighborhood ; he painted under that "...♥'s Neck Face". Recent renovations to the storefront, however, have removed the sign. 

   The attention Neck Face received from his tagging/graffiti , allowed him to move his work off the streets and into art galleries. Galleries that have shown his artwork include the New Image Art Gallery in Los Angeles, the Luggage Store in San Francisco, the Dactyl Foundation in New York, and the OHWOW Gallery in Miami. And he is just as surprised as the public is that he got such an opportunity. "I guess it’s natural because I kinda just fell into it. I wasn’t going around showing my work to galleries and shit, it just happened, but I’m very thankful that it happened to me and I know that I’m lucky". Showing in Galleries have also allowed him to become more mainstream and he recently made a deal with Vans and Baker Skateboards to have his art on the companies merchandise. Since Neck Face has also been a skateboarder his whole life aside from painting this was a great and very fitting merger.

   Aside from just doing tagging/graffiti Neck Face says, "I like to work with all mediums; I like to keep it movin’ around here. I get bored with stuff real quick, so I like to try out new shit. But you know what they say; “Trying is the first step to failing.” He has recently begun using water colors and making metal masks.  In addition to appearing across billboards and buildings in the United States, Neck Face's work can be seen internationally in places such as Melbourne, Sydney, Copenhagen and Tokyo. While researching this artist It's obvious fans of his work have an aquiered taste and that not everyone will like it. Neck Face is aware of this but he doesn't care. He currently lives and has a studio in New York.

BTW*I tried to contact Neck Face through his myspace page to get some of his input into my assignment but he never replied* 

Links:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qPI9OFLeqgA&feature=player_embedded#

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neck_Face

http://hypebeast.com/2010/01/order-neckface-interview/

More Art:

Listening to some Coldplay while I comment on classmates blogs for comment Friday!

Graffiti Lecture 1/26/11

   The film we watched on the art of graffiti called "Bomb It" was quite interesting because it explained the different types, styles, and reasons why people graffiti. Weather it be political, a freedom of expression, or in some cases marking gang territory, graffiti and its popularity have increased. And in some parts of the world it covers every street corner. The movie took us around the world to meet different artist and they gave us a back story to their art. One artist from Amsterdam was a school teacher during the day and graffiti artist by night. I honestly didn't like her art. She said she drew eye balls & aliens!?? She said something about it meaning we are always being watched. My favorite artists from the film were  "The Twins" from Sao Paulo, Brazil (one of their paintings is pictured above). To me their art was colorful, interesting and different. I liked that they painted characters, not words. I think they would be successful if they used their drawings on merchandise. The place that mostly used graffiti for political reasons was Cape Town in South Africa. Especially during the incarceration of Nelson Mandela in the 1980's. The graffiti is also used to depict the large population of poverty stricken citizens in the city. I think graffiti is a great way for people to express themselves since it is after all art. I just disagree with it covering the walls of the city I live in. If these people want to paint they have every right to but, they should go to an art store and buy a poster board or some canvas to pain it on. Graffiti in my opinion does not look nice. Most of the artists in the movie said they don't pain on homes, school, or churches but still the other places they graffiti on are public property and we all have to look at it. We don't get to vote on what goes on there its community property. I'm not going to acknowledge gang graffiti because I know that's not art and it's quite sad that these people think its ok to write  all over their communities. In general I enjoyed the film because it introduced me to the "graffiti culture" which I really knew nothing about.

CAVE LECTURE 1-24-11

   Aside from getting to watch some great scenes from the movie The Matrix, I enjoyed getting to know some early history about art. The cave I found most interesting was the one located in Lascaux, France. The size alone is impressive and the fact that it has been around for 17,300 years is amazing. The mural content is quite interesting, these primitive people did not draw complex drawings. They kept it simple by depicting large animals, hands, and shapes. And even more difficult they drew on the ceilings of the caves. It would be great to see these large murals in person!

BTW: I'm the kind of person Professor Zucman described (using the Mona Lisa example) I would be the typical tourist waiting in line with my camera waiting to see the famous Mona Lisa, even if it was soooo far away that it looked the size of a postage stamp!! of course I'm a little more educated on it's history and back round. And of course I would post it on facebook :)

Welcome to Blogging

Hello Blogging World!I guess there is a first time for everything.Lol I was forced to start this blog for a College Art class I’m taking. So I’m gonna do it and let’s see what happens! My name is Evelyn and the most important thing you readers should know is that I am crazy obsessed with the band Coldplay (as you can see by the picture I have on my page and by my user name). Music is a big part of my life I love listening to the radio or my iTunes library and I’m the kind of person that sings along! Haha so hopefully you readers & fellow bloggers will find my random posts interesting! Till next time :)