Oral Presentation Outline

Matthew Barney

I. Matthew Barney's background

       a) Born in 1967 in San Francisco, California.

       b) Grew up in Boise, Idaho.

       c) Attented Yale University.

       b) First wanted to study plastic surgery, but after two semesters he changed to the art department.

II. Matthew Barney's art skills

       a) Sculpture, films, photography and drawings.

III. Matthew Barney's influences

       a) Bruce Nauman

       b) Vito Acconci

       c) Richard Serra when it came to body-based performance art.

IV. Matthew Barney's art styles

       a) Fuses sculptural installations with performance art and video.

       b) Foregrounds physical rigor of sport.

       c) Explores the limits of the body and sexuality.

       d) His works reflect his own past as an athlete.

       e) Barney appears in most of his works.

V. First Matthew Barney's work: The Drawing Restraint Series

       a) Barney uses his body.

       b) Barney uses his experiences on the football field.

       c) Restraints body to create drawings.

       d) It's mostly video and photography.

VI. Second Matthew Barney's work: The River of Fundament

       a) One of the most challenging works that Barney has ever done.

       b) His first major solo museum exhibition in Los Angeles.

VII. Third Matthew Barney's work: Cremaster Cycle

       a) A series of five featured length films.

       b) Matthew Barney wrote, directed and acted in each film. 

       c) Includes sculpture, photographs, drawings and artist's books.

VIII. Last information about Matthew Barney

       a) Considers all the things he works with attracted to him, even if it disgusts him.

       b) Matthew Barney once said "My work is not for everyone" which I definitely agree on.

Sources:

1) https://www.guggenheim.org/artwork/artist/matthew-barney

2) https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2014/jun/16/matthew-barney-river-of-fundament-film

Documentary Wasteland

  The artist named Vik Muniz went to his country Brazil to this place called Jardim Gramacho. Jardim Gramacho is located in Rio de Janeiro and is one of the largest landfills in the world. Vik Muniz decided to create art with the cooperation of the people that worked there every day collecting recyclables. The people that worked there were called "catadores"since they were unemployed. People in there had different stories, which Vik Muniz kinda interview them and takes a photograph of them individually. He then decided to get all those people who he took pictures of and tell them about the art he wanted to create with also the help of them. The "catadores" decided to join the project and started recreating the same photos of themselves on the floor but in a way bigger photo made with recyclables. They worked really hard and the results were amazing and very beautiful. Those people couldn't even believe what they have done with only the use of recyclables, which was made into art. 

Now the Vik Muniz art project changed more than one life of the garbage pickers. They dreamed of improving life for their community and they were able to do it. All artworks they all created were sold. The money created by selling of the artworks was giving back to the "catadores". Also, the prize money from the film awards was giving back too, in order to help the "catadores" and their community just like they dreamed of. This documentary made me notice more how art is a way of expressing yourself and making dirty things to something beautiful. going from bad to great because of art. But the most important thing that I took away from this is to never doubt yourself because you have nothing, instead try to make the best of anything you do because you never know what can happen in the future like a person coming into your life and helping you. To always have hope in life no matter what and most importantly that hard work pays off. 

Matthew Barney

Matthew Barney was born in the United States San Francisco, California in 1967. He is an American artist who works in sculpture, films, photography and drawing. He attended college at Yale University  in New Haven, Connecticut thinking to go into plastic surgery, but then after two semesters he change to the art department. Barney had his first studio in Brooklyn, but then he decided to move to another studio in Lorey street. Matthew Barney's style of work is contemporary art. Now there are many artists out there hat influenced Matthew Barney like Richard Serra when it comes to body-based performance art, also Bruce Nauman and Norman Mailer. Matthew Barney's early works are sculptural installations combined with performance and video.  He has gotten many awards like Hugo Boss Prize, Guggenheim Museum, 1996, Kaizer Ring Award, Europa 2000 Prize. etc. Barney stated, "My work is not for everyone". What unites all Barney's work is its preoccupations with the body, life, and death, creativity, belief systems, power, and industry.  

Matthew Barney: RIVER OF FUNDAMENT, September 13, 2015- January 18, 2016

This is Matthew Barney's first major solo museum exhibition in Los Angeles and one of the most challenging and ambitious projects.

Pop art

The name of the artist is Andy Warhol who is an American artist born in Pittsburgh, PA in 1928. He is one of the greatest artists in visual art movement known as pop art. Pop art is an art movement that emerged first in Britain and then in the United States. This artwork is called “ Campbell's Soup Cans” which is one of the artworks that made Warhol famous worldwide along with the other artwork called " Gold Marylin Monroe" . The style of this artwork is pop art which is based in modern popular culture and the mass media. This artwork consists of thirty-two canvases, each measuring 20 inches(51 cm) in height x 16 inches (41 cm) in width. Also, each consists of a painting of a Campbell's Soup Can. The cans at first seem like they all are identical, but looking at the artwork closer the cans are different, the color red where some are lighter, the other ones are darker, and each canvas corresponds to a different flavor. In addition, they were displayed together on shelves, like products in a grocery aisle. Andy Warhol once said about Campbell's Soup that he used to drink this soup for lunch every day for 20 years, so he made this artwork to show this since it was the same soup over and over again.   

Surrealism

The name of the artist is Salvador Dalí who was born on 1904 in Figueres, Spain. Salvador Dalí was a prominent Spanish surrealist painter. This artwork is called “ The Persistence of Memory" which symbolizes Dalí's theory of "softness" and " hardness" and it was made by Dalí during the year 1931. The style of this artwork is Surrealism which is a 20th-century avant-garde movement that sought to release the creative potential of the unconscious mind. The goal of Surrealism in to liberate thought, language, and human experience from the oppressive boundaries of rationalism. Also, Surrealism was founded by the poet André Breton in Paris in 1924. Now in the artwork, the colors are very vivid, the soft watches are a symbol of relativity of space and time, the iconography refers to a dream that Dalí had experienced, and the clocks symbolize the passing time as one experiences in sleep. In addition, Salvador Dalí often described his paintings as "hand-painted dream photographs". The landscape he uses on this artwork and also in others are based on his seaside landscape on the cliffs in his home region of Catalonia, Spain.

Matthew Barney

Matthew Barney was born in San Francisco in 1967. When he was six years old he moved to Idaho with his family. His parents got divorced and he went to live with his father in Idaho. He will also visit his mother in New York City, where he was introduced to art and museums. In the video, I saw on 21 art website Matthew Barney considers all the things he works with attractive to him, even if it disgusts him it would still have some type of attraction. In the video, it shows him directing a film called " CREMASTER 3" in where he would use different things in order fir the film to have a meaning. Matthew Barney would create customs for the horses he uses on the project. He also made his father participate in the film he is working on. Robert Barney, his father said that Matthew Barney wanted to be a plastic surgeon before becoming an artist. Matthew Barney said "A system that has an internal object, Freudian narratives—consumer and producer, violence, sexually driven, NFL films—these are the things I think about,".

Impressionism

Impressionism is a style in which the artist captures the image of an object as someone would see it if they just caught a glimpse of it. The artists paint their pictures with a lot of colors. Also, landscapes and ordinary scenes were among the subjects of the artists during the period of impressionism. Moreover, the impressionists would capture the optical effects of light. One example would be the artwork called "Vetheuil in the Fog" by Claude Monet. This painting offers a subtle, albeit distinct impression of a figural form. It is also an Impressionism style because it's a landscape.

Post-Impressionism

Post-Impressionism is a predominantly French art movement that developed roughly between 1886 1905. During this era what was very important were the symbolic and highly personal meanings. The artists would focus a lot on abstract form and pattern in the application of paint. The color used in the paintings would be very bright. Also, these paintings had structure and order. One example would be the artwork called "Portrait of Doctor Gachet" by Vincent Van Gogh. In this painting, the artist Van Gogh strove to elicit a complex mixture of emotions within the viewer, rather than portray a naturalistic description of the sitter.

Baroque 

The title of this artwork is "Judith with the Head of Holofernes" and the artist's name is Massimo Stanzione and he is from Italy (1585-1656). The date that this artwork was made is ca. 1640. The theme in here is an accomplishment for Judith. Judith was very brave to make the general Holofernes drunk and then cut off his head accompanied by a servant. We see symbolism in this artwork since the head symbolizes successfulness because that would be Judith's trophy. We see asymmetry in the painting and the primary colors used which would be one formal element. The primary colors stand out and we see darkness too. This artwork has the dramatic contrasts between light and dark. The lines look very clean and the shadows make the painting look more realistic.  This artwork is a very good example because the Baroque era was very dramatic even the use of colors is very dramatic. Also, it's emotionally intense. 

Renaissance 

The title of this artwork is " Venus and Cupid" and the artist's name is Lorenzo lotto and he is also from Italy (1480-1556). The date that this artwork was made is ca.1540. The theme in here is happiness, love, and marriage since we see that this painting is very humorous and very symbolic too. We see Venus and his son Cupid  peeing on her. This artwork was most probably painted to celebrate a wedding and Venu's features may be taken from the bride's since Venus is the goddess of love, sex, beauty, and fertility. This painting has a lot of symbolism. For example, the conch shell  represents of her birth from the sea and the rose petals are a symbol of love.  The ivy is symbolic of fidelity and the myrtle wreath was worn by the bride. Also, cupid's urination refers metaphorically to the sexual act, but one that is pure. The colors in this artwork look very vivid and also the lines are very well done since it makes it look very realistic. This artwork is a good example because in the Renaissance era each figure is placed in isolation from each other.  This era was a time of cultural change,  social change, and happiness. Also because the knotted ribbon around her wrist is a symbol of love, an object alluded to in Renaissance poetry.

Artists unify their artwork is several ways to create a sense of harmony and wholeness. One of those ways are that artists use similar elements and what they do is that they place them in a way that would bring them all together. Unity would help the artwork to look very organized and easy to understand. Repetition of warm colors is also another way to create unity in art. They tend to use space and common background. For example in this artwork by Wassily Kandinsky we see that the artist is using unity by the way he uses repetition of circles. Also the artwork has a neutral background. 

Artists create an asymmetrical balance by making the two sides not identical, but differ from one another. They use two forms in where a large form gets more attention than a smaller form.  Artists also use heavy and cool colors. They arranged the elements so there is a sense of balance. In their art they create asymmetrical balance where a textured form is heavier than a smooth form. For example is this artwork by Hiroshige is asymmetrical since both sides are not identical. It is balanced asymmetrically because he uses dark values on the right which are heavier than the light values. Also the mountain on the right is balanced on the left by empty space.

Scale are created to correctly show the size relationship between objects. Also allows the size relationships between objects to appear real or believable. There is also distortion use of scale which it shows a much bigger size of what in reality actually is. For example going back to the Ancient Greek art, Michelangelo’s sculpture David represents a good example of scale. The size  is larger than life which is 13 feet tall. Also the sculpture towers far above from the viewer which shows scale since it’s played on a pedestal taller than the average human.

(C. 1341 BCE-C. 1323 BCE)

                                                           Egyptian and Greek & Roman styles

220 BC.

The Egyptian and the Greek & Roman styles have similarities and differences. For the Egyptian styles this image shows the leader of the ancient Egyptian government which is the Pharaoh King Tutankhamun and we know it’s a pharaoh because of the cobra. Most Egyptian artworks involve the depiction of many gods and goddesses which art is one of them. In the image it shows the cobra and in the video explains that it symbolizes divine authority or royalty. The kath that the pharaoh used to wear. He also has his sceptre which symbolizes power and a  whip that would use to whip the slaves. the colors are very important too. For example the blue symbolized creation and rebirth, and yellow  was the color of all the pharaohs, which is why the sarcophagi and funeral masks were made of gold to symbolize the everlasting and eternal pharaoh who was now a god. Now for the Greek & Roman styles there is this art called “ Barberini Faun”. This is in the Hellenistic period. It shows nudity which in Greek art was nothing new. It’s a Satyrs which were human-like male woodland spirits with several animal features, often a goat-like tail, hooves, ears, or horns. The art depicts like he has fallen into a restless doze on the rock because of being intoxicated by wine. It also expresses realism in an erotic style.

                                                                                                                                                                                     

Both the Egyptian and the Greek & Roman styles have several similarities and more differences. The similarities are that both use high authorities such as kings and gods for their sculptures. Also they shared rigidity of pose, stride, and clenched fists. They both did shared nudity, but in the Egyptian art nudity was only used in statues of children and servants  and in the Greek & Roman art nudity was in vogue. On the other hand, the differences were that the Egyptians was death and afterlife. The Greeks were Humanism and Idealism and later Realism.  Egyptians was more towards religion and the Greek & Roman was more towards philosophy. The Egyptians art would use a lot of symbolism, hieroglyphs and their artwork was very stiff, but Greek & Roman styles look very natural and focuses a lot on the lines to make the person look so realistic, very interesting and be able to see their emotions and expressions. Last but not least reason is that the emphasis of  Egyptian statues was based more on the symmetry and for the Greek & Roman statues were not based on symmetry at all.