Simulation, Reality does it really matter?

To say that I was lost for this part of the project is an understatement.  Figuring out a video to make from the images and ideas I had already was not easy, nor was filming.  In fact, I filmed and refilmed multiple times and was never truly happy with the outcome.  I also found my idea changing quite a bit.  When I started the idea I had was to really show the original idea that I had, which was to just walk around and find the extraordinary in the everyday world around us.  So originally the video was of me walking the route I took when I was taking the pictures, with me focusing on the subjects on the pictures.  However, I felt that this did not come out well at all so I completely changed my idea.  One of the things that I realized as I was going over my material was that things looked very different because the images were shot with a 20mm lens whereas the video was shot with a 50mm one.  So I decided that in my video I should really highlight the differences between the two.  So then the video became a back and forth between the images and the clips of the subjects from the video I took.

Can We Really Change Our Future

What struck me most from Bill Viola’s convocation lecture was in the beginning when he talked about how blessed we as young people are to be born into a world that is falling apart so we can try to fix it.  This really struck me as interesting because of many conversations that I have had with my own parents on this exact topic.  It was an interesting take on something that many in my generation see as our doom.  When talking with my parents about this topic what both interests them, and scares them, is how forlorn my generation is about their future.  Individuals from my generation look at the future and see nothing there.  The environment is being destroyed, every day the news tells us that we are one step closer to one war or another, there is constantly more violence, and the economy is just terrifying.  So for us who are just entering into the world for real it is not something we really look forward to.  That is why Bill’s idea really stuck out to me.  He wants us to look at the world and all that is going wrong with it and not see our impending doom, but see a way to prevent that doom that is staring us right in the face.  While this seems like such a simple thing to do, it is in fact an incredible undertaking for us to make, me especially.  It requires us to overcome the fear of what may happen and look onto what can happen instead, and for someone like me who for so long wanted to enter into a profession that profits from the short coming of our own government, it is quite a jump to make.

What is Real

When going over the pages of Simulations for this project the idea that really stuck out was that of hyper-reality.  I was thinking about this one night on the way back from the Bar’s when the idea hit me that even the real world around us can be quite surreal.  Therefore in this project I wanted to try and pull that surreality out and put it on display.  I did this by walking around town looking for things that just seem like they should not exist in the way they do.  Then from there I took these images and over saturated the colors in order to make it seem that much more hyper-real.  I really enjoyed this project and think that I was able to make my vision a reality.

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Sonja Thomsen

I had extremely mixed feelings about Sonja Thomsen work.  I found a lot of her ideas to be very interesting but her execution of them to be lacking.  Many times I found myself extremely intrigued with an idea or theory that she was presenting but then I saw the actual piece I was let down.  As well, the exhibit that was show here at Lawrence I also had very mixed feelings about.  As usual I found her idea to be extremely interesting but execution somewhat lacking.  The biggest issue I had with it was the images themselves.  I loved the presentation of the images and the way the whole gallery worked but I thought that work its self was lacking.  I felt that the images where quite bland.

       

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