Event 3

On December 7, 2013 I went to the Griffith Observatory for the first time ever. The main thing I wanted to do there was see the planetarium show “Centered in the Universe”. I caught a showing and was ready to learn about my existence here on Earth.

The amazing thing about planetariums is they can take something so big and shrink it down to a perceivable size. They can do this by using the most power telescopes in the world and take you on a journey back in time though the universe on a journey to figure out what humans represent out in the stars.

The show begins with an everyday view of the sky that quickly shifts into an all-encompassing view of the night sky. Even though we all know realistically starts are very far away, I felt as if I was under the true night sky but could reach out and touch all the stars above me. However, just like I realized at the Museum of Jurassic Technology, all of this beauty would be possible without the use of some high-tech gear.

The planetarium is possible because of the Zeiss projector and, even more important because of the invention of the telescope. As Professor Vesna pointed out in week 9 part 1 of lecture, space exploration means micro and macro technology. The show touched on different cultural histories and how the views of the stars influenced culture. It ended with a note on Edwin Hubble, who was the first person to prove that the universe is expanding as well as show that there are other galaxies besides our own (Edwin Hubble). The Hubble Telescope was named in his honor.

The show ended by linking all this information together with the Big Bang Theory. I am very happy I attended this event because it really put into perspective for me how big the universe is and how small we as human beings are. Thanks to technology we can ask ourselves invigorating and interesting questions that “Centered in the Universe” asked and find some order in all the disorder around us.

References

Edwin Hubble. Edwinhubble.com. 3 May 2002. Web. 12 Dec 2013.

Griffith Observatory. Centered in the Universe. 2013.

Half65. The Rome Planetarium. 7 May 2010. Web. 12 Dec 2013.

Hawking, Stephen. Life in the Universe. Web. 12 Dec 2013. http://www.hawking.org.uk/index.html

Vesna, Victoria. Unit 9 View Lecture Part 1. 2013. YouTube. Online video clip. 12 Dec 2013.

     

Event 2

On November 29, 2013 I went to Culver City and spent hours in the Museum of Jurassic Technology. I was absolutely fascinated by every single thing in there, definitely more so than the Andy Warhol exhibit I previously attended. I think my favorite were the flowers by Albert G. Richards and I wholeheartedly believe his viewpoint on the beauty of flowers as quoted by him on his website:

Flowers speak to us in many ways. On happy occasions we send flowers to express our joy and on sad occasions to express our sorrow. Almost everyone is fond of lowers, but they may never see the secret beauty that lies within the blossoms.

At first glance you would think that these were just x-ray images of flowers, but they are actually stereoradiographs. This is a process that uses multiple x-ray images, all from slightly different positions, and splices them together to create a three-dimensional image of the interior of the body (The Free Dictionary). Richards used this procedure on flowers in the hopes to help people see the “secret beauty that lies hidden within the blossoms” (Richards). Without the ever-advancing technology we have today, Richards would never have been able to create these stunning images. His flowers were on the cover of over 2 million copies of the Smithsonian Magazine in 1986 (Richards).

Richards is a teacher of dental radiography and used the technology normally used to x-ray 3-D images of the mouth on flowers. This would not have been possible without Roentgen first looking at objects in a vacuum and eventually taking the first x-ray of his wife’s hand (Vesna, Week 4 Part 2). Even a cat scan machines utilizes some aspect of stereoradiography by combining multiple x-ray images into a computer to create cross sectional views of the body (Vesna, Week 4 Part 2).

Today huge news stations like CBS are featuring derivations of stereography and x-ray art. Overall, I thought the Museum of Jurassic Technology was a wonderful experience. On a side note, they serve you tea and cookies on the top floor and you can enjoy in a garden on the roof of the building. There is also a dove atrium up there. “The learner must be lead always from familiar objects towards the unfamiliar, guided along, as it were, a chain of flowers into the mysteries of life” (Museum of Jurassic Technology).

References

The Free Dictionary. Stereoradiography. 2013. Web. 12 Dec 2013.

Museum of Jurassic Technology. The Flor Stereoradiographs of Albert G. Richards. 2013. Web. 12 Dec 2013.

Richards, Albert. Floral Radiographs: The Secret Garden. Web. 12 Dec 2013.

Spiro, Lisa. A Brief History of Stereographs. 30 October 2006. Web. 12 Dec 2013.

Veasey, Nick. Incredible X-ray Art. CBS News. 2013. Web. 12 Dec 2013.

Vesna, Victoria. Unit 4 View: Lecture Part 2. 2013. YouTube. Online video clip. 12 Dec 2013.    

Event 1

On November 16, 2013 I went to Honor Fraser to see the Andy Warhol: Robots and Space Ships exhibition. The gallery were all Warhol drawings, paintings, and silkscreens of toy robots and space ships. Upon entering the exhibition I was initially shocked at how small it was. There were twenty-six pieces but only seven different repeated images. I was really confused and extremely underwhelmed until I began to read the program provided about the exhibit. 

I was already vaguely aware that Warhol was interested in the idea of consumerism, but honestly I had never thought about it much further than that until going to Honor Fraser. Turns out, he had this fascination with repetitive images because of the underlying machine-like connotations it depicted (Honor Fraser). On top of it all, all the art in this show was meant to highlight Warhol's dream to become a machine! Honestly, I am still confused about the actual pictures being displayed, and perhaps that is because of my own shortcomings understanding art, but what is truly interesting about the experience I had was researching on my own about Warhol and his want to become a robot.

Warhol was quoted, "The things i want to show are mechanical. Machines have less problems. I'd like to be a machine, wouldn't you?" (Genn). This really got my wheels turning. Even though I didn't necessarily understand the images in the Robots and Spaceships collection, I definitely understand his perspective on the technology, sophistication, and the idea of being a robot. Consumerism is driven by machines. Mass production would not be possibly without cutting edge technology and machinery to help pump out vast quantities of products. Today society is obsessed with mass production and consumer culture (Gompertz) and it is all because of technology and the ability to utilize the use of machines. In week three of this class, Professor Vesna spoke about mass production and assembly lines and I certainly feel like Warhol’s work was highly influenced by this idea.

The last thing I took away from this whole experience was a better understanding of the society and place I live in today. Los Angeles is so heavily influenced by technology that when you take a step back and look at it all it is shocking. You can’t even walk five feet in public without seeing someone on their smartphone, plugged into headphones, or using some sort of machine. Consumerism is taking over the world, and I think Warhol has an interesting perspective on that whole idea. He never says it is a negative or positive thing. Instead, he just accepts it for what it is and longs to adapt to the situation and show people what is happening through his art. “Everybody acts alike, and we’re getting more and more that way. I think everybody should be a machine. I think everybody should like everybody” (Art News).

References

Art News. Andy Warhold Interview with Gene Swenson. 1963. Web. 12 Dec 2013.

Genn, Robert. Andy Warhol Quotes. The Painter’s Keys. 12 Dec 2013. Web. 12 Dec 2013.  

Gompertz, Will. Andy Warhol’s Great Secret. Salon. 21 Oct 2012. Web. 12 Dec 2013.

Honor Fraser. “Andy Warhol: Robots and Space Ships.” 2013. Los Angeles, California. 16 Nov 2013. Museum.

Vesna, Victoria. Unit 3 View: Lectures Part 2. 2013. Youtube. Online video clip. 12 Dec 2013.  

Week 7: Neuroscience + Art

What is the genius that is potentially available to all of us? I think this is what neuroscience tries to indirectly explain. “At present our powers of creative consciousness are largely kept literally at a dream level” (Paige). Jung deeply analyzed dreams and the psyche stating that symbols and the meanings we give them are all apart of our psyche (Vesna Lecture II). Is it possible that there is something in the world that can root us to our conscious making it possible for us to physically manifest and understand our greatest dreams? After watching the movie “DMT The Spirit Molecule” I am beginning to think humans can regain connection to a plane of consciousness we lost long ago.

There is a new drug called dimethyltryptamine (DMT) and is thought to be produced by your pineal gland (Hanna). It is the most potent psychedelic known to man, and the craziest thing about it is that it is completely natural and the brain produces it every night when we sleep and right before we die (Hanna). Where it gets more strange is when we start looking to the one and only person who was brave enough to conduct scientific DMT research, Rick Strassman.

DMT opens up a new, vast, and beautifully stunning world for scientists and artists all around. A DMT hallucination is not like taking LSD or mushrooms. Countless artists have created videos, audio, and pictures trying to depict and recreate the marvelous journeys they had while under the influence of DMT. Strassman speaks in his book about how most of his tests subjects believe that they traveled into an alternate universe, and how he believes that this universe is inhabited by conscious entities

(Strassman).

However, the government has tried to do everything it its power to ban medical studies involving hallucinogens. It is almost as if the government has realized the potential of drugs like DMT and are afraid of what may happen if they lose control. “The government does not want us to expand our consciousness. If we being to recognize that we are powerful souls who create our reality, it will take away their [the government] power to enslave us” (Knowledge of Today). There is a reason why existence beyond the human body is so fascinating to artists and scientists alike, and I think it is because dreams and the unconscious mind is the root in discovering the beauty in being human and will give us purpose and power to change a realty that so many have become so disillusioned and unhappy about.

“At the center of awareness lies a simple, natural molecule that potentially exists in all living organisms. A molecule that consistently produces a mystical experience, and may be the seed to the ultimate connection to it” (Knowledge of Today). It would be so wrong for humans to ignore the wealth of knowledge we have gained from research conducted by people like Rick Strassman. It is wrong for artists and scientists to just re-enact, come up with theories, and have to draw pictures of the beauty that this molecule holds. The only way we will know for sure is if we dive deeper into the mind and open our consciousness to things we never imagined were possible.

References 

DMT Mantra. NewGrounds Inc. 2013. Web. 9 Dec 2013.

Don Haze. DMT The Spirit Molecule Full Documentary. 4 April 2013. Youtube. Online video clip. 9 Dec 2013. 

Hanna, Jon. DMT and the Pineal: Fact or Fiction? The Vaults of Erowid. 29 Jun 2010.  Web. 9 Dec 2013.

Knowledge of Today. Expansion of Consciousness. DMT: The Spirit Molecule. Knowledge of Today. 25 Feb 2012. Web. 9 Dec 2013.

Paige, Holly. Food for Consciousness. Blogspot. 2013. Web. 9 Dec 2013. 

Reptilious. A Personal Website of the Cool and Unique. Web. 9 Dec 2013.

Strassman, Rick. DMT: The Spirit Molecule. 2013. Web. 9 Dec 2013.

Vesna, Victoria. Lecture II. 2013. YouTube. Online video clip. 9 Dec 2013. 

Week 6: Biotech + Art

Everyone has their idea of the perfectly sculpted, beautiful, flawless human individual. Whether it be male or female, the stereotype of what it is to be hot, beautiful, and perfect in the looks department is constantly striven to be achieved amongst many individuals. With the advancements in medial technology, people can now redesign their faces and body type to fit into what they feel will make the most pleasing individual. Those with the financial resources can get a new nose, new breasts, a slimmer figure, and even design new faces to replicated that of a famous celebrity. Though it has been proven over time that it is physically safe to undergo plastic surgery, I cannot help but questions how the moral, societal, and ethical standards of optional plastic surgery (non-detrimental) has influenced art and our perception of beauty.

Plastic surgery really delves into Joe Davis's idea that the human body is a whole new pallet for artists (Vesna Part I). Intertwining this idea with Orlan and her goals to understand beauty (Vesna Part IV), we see the very perplex and controversial idea of cosmetic surgery arise, especially among women. Though I do not feel that Orlan and her work in any way promote the use of plastic surgery to create the perfect human being, her work does delve deep into the “status of the body in our society and its future…in terms of the new technologies” (Davis pg. 458).

Today, I feel as if the natural body has become sort of an obsolete vehicle due to technology allowing us to manipulate and change our bodies in accordance with social pressures and the journey of figuring out “who we are” (Davis 458). I feel that it is important to recognize Orlan’s work not as something that promotes the good of plastic surgery, but as something that sheds light on the innate struggle humans have with the conventions carried out by it, and the idea that we can use technology like this for good or evil (Jeffries).

It is artwork like that this "raise a wide range of technological, logistical, and, crucially, ethical issues" (Solon). Is it okay to alter our physical appearance to better fit social stereotypes of what a beautiful person is? Is it okay for pop culture to drive the idea into our minds that all women need to have large breasts and be skinny and that men need to be tall and muscular? I think these questions go hand in hand with Davis's statement that all our dreams are going to come true due to technological innovations, so it is very important that we have the right ones (Vesna Part I) or we may risk corruption and a society that cares about nothing more than outward aesthetics.

References

Davis, Kathy. “My Body is My Art: Cosmetic Surgery as Feminist Utopia?” Web. 9 Dec 2013.

Hess, Bart and Lucy McRae. Plastic Surgery. Today in Art. 2013. Web. 9 Dec 2013.

Jeffries, Stuart. Orlan’s Art of Sex and Surgery. The Guardian. 1 July 2009. Web. 9 Dec 2013.

Ruper, Stegani. How Perfect is the Perfect Body? Next Level Performance. 2013. Web. 9 Dec 2013.  

Solon, Olivia. Bioart: The Ethics and Aesthetics of Using Living Tissue as a Medium. Wired.co.uk. 28 July 2011. Web. 9 Dec 2013.

TheMRuiter. Metamorphosis. 8 April 2012. YouTube. Online video clip. 9 Dec 2013.

Vesna, Victoria. Part I. 2013. Online Video Clip. YouTube. 9 Dec 2013.

Vesna, Victoria. Part IV. 2013. Online Video Clip. YouTube. 9 Dec 2013. 

Week 9: On Insignificance

Am I alone in feeling that the more humans advance technologically as a society, the more obvious it is how insignificant and unimportant we are as a whole? The way the “Power of Ten” video slowly zooms out from a small picnic in the park to thousand of light years away was very traumatizing for me in that it showed how tiny I am in this universe (Powers of Ten). "It is a known fact that one day; humanity will cease to exist seeing that 99.99% of all species that have ever existed on Earth are extinct" (Atwood). In the grand scheme of things, the universe would not even be slightly affected if Earth just disappeared tomorrow (Atwood), and personally I struggle with this depressing idea everyday.

Carl Sagan’s "Pale Blue Dot" video really makes my skin crawl and fills me with anxiety because it brings into perspective how small humanity really is and how so many people take for granted how utterly against the odds it is that we has humans even have a position in the universe (Sagan). But, it is such sad ideas like that that have spurred the creation of such beautiful works of art and delve deep into the human spirit and make us ask “who are we and what are we here to do”?

I remember clear as day the moment I realized I was insignificant. It was a truly stunning day, but a sad one. I began to warp my mind around how many people have come and gone in my life and I wanted to try desperately to find some “mindless moral to the story in my day [but] at the end of the day, life is just a smattering of events shoved together with no real rhyme or reason. Not every single thing is connected” (Between the Broken Ends). 

The people we are today is nothing more than a collection of memories and experiences balled up into a present day representation of attitudes, morals, and social standards. I try my hardest to understand the beauty that what I have come to experience in the universe will never be repeated, never be fully understandable by another individual, and can never be taken away from me. Though I may seem insignificant, tiny, and outright unimportant, I am part of a dynamic system and my actions, though small, could produce very large variations in the long-term behavior of this system (Philosophy Forums).

What is so beautiful about this way of looking at the insignificance of humanity as a whole is that each individual, their life, and experiences can be viewed as a live work of art that has changed and progressed over time. The people we touch, the places we work, and the lives we live as individuals may be insignificant to the universe, but they are significant to those of us that are breathing, living, and existing right now and that is art in itself. “Whatever you do in life will be insignificant. But it’s very important that you do it, because nobody else will” (Our Last Night).  

References

Atwood, Ben. The Beauty of Insignificance”. Thought Catalog. 16 May 2012. Web. 1 Dec 2013.

Between the Broken Ends. 20 July. Web. 1 Dec 2013.

FreeScienceLectures. Planet Earth is Tiny, Tiny Object in Space. 3 May 2007. Online video clip. YouTube. 1 Dec 2013.

Kenyon, Dave. Insight Incites Change. 2011. Web. 1 Dec 2013.    

Our Last Night. Dark Storms. 2013. Web. 1 Dec 2013.

Philosophy Forums. Ghandi quote has got e stranded. Opinions? 31 Jan 2010. Web. 1 Dec 2013.

Powers of Ten. Unit 9 View. Online video clip. YouTube. 1 Dec 2013.

Sagan, Carl. Pale Blue Dot. Unit 9 Resources. Online video clip. YouTube. 1 Dec 2013.

TalonRisto. Human Insignificance – entry. 2010. Web. 1 Dec 2013.