For the recording project I took my classmates and Julie to Granville Island waterfront and told a personal story about my self through poetry.

The poem went like this:

Memories

My second school was where train stopped.
Like a station where the memories could be loaded to the freight cars.
Memories packed in parcels of all sizes and shapes.

The first day at Emily Carr I brought with me memories from AB Lucas Secondary School.
The memories from Lucas was like being in an animal farm, caged, captured, and kept all one race and country.
Koreans, fellow students.

But I left them behind.
My train had moved on.
Pulling my memories behind me, like a growing string of box cars at the point where my memory is.
At the station, the conductor formed us in to lines.
Introduced and embarrassed me with her foreign words.
To others, it was English.
But to me, it was strange.

There was room in my freight car for activities.
The smell of fresh baked bread, cookies or cakes.

The beauty of folded paper becoming flowers.
Origami, a place of contact with my class.
The fear of getting in to Emily Carr replaced by the pleasure of acceptance.

Emily Carr accepting me as students became friends.
Field trips, new sights, colors and emotions.

Installation Review.

“There/Here”, Germaine Koh & Gordon Hicks, Installation

I went to Surrey Art Gallery to see “There/Here”, Germaine Koh & Gordon Hicks, Installation. Both of the artists were well known to collaborate together for displays and shows. The piece, which consisted of two home sized doors connected with Internet connection wasn’t obvious to see at first but they were linked in that manner. “There/Here,” was displayed without much complexity. It was an interactive piece meaning that the doors were installed to open and close for the viewers.

“Here/There,” was something that I have never seen before, but it reminded me of the first video artist named Nam June Paik. Especially one of his works called, “Buddha.” There were several reasons why the piece reminded me of, “Buddha.” First of all, both of the work consists of two objects connecting to each other and provoking a meaning through connection and the fact that it involved the element of digital technology. Also both works can convey different meanings to individuals. However, what was different about “Here/There,” was that two people who are opening the doors from two hanging doors are interacting with each other. For example, when someone opens a door from the left, then the same would happen to the door from the right and it goes from shutting the doors shut. So it is almost a non-verbal argument between the two participants that could go on until one person gives up to shut and close the doors.

The meaning behind the piece in connection to Internet was that the doors act as two separate places and it gave the meaning of same action happening at two places, at once and at the same time. I thought that by having participants to open and close the doors, the work and it’s meaning expressed without having to think too much about the meaning of the piece.

If they were to further progress their work further, they can even use even four doors happening connected at the same time in pairs of two so that more participants can participate rather than just looking at two people interacting with the doors.

The interaction between the piece and the audience was a successful one. They were simple enough for anyone to participate in and does not require much thinking unless the viewer wanted it to be a complex idea. Their key idea of how modern life is connected it, “doubled things, spaces and people, it is argued, is integral to modern life,” is well interpreted through the use of Internet connection and two doors closing and opening at the same time when one action was caused by either side. “Here/There,” reflected their main concept clearly without much flaw.

Critical Review.

I went to the In Transition: New Art from India in surrey museum on February 28th, 2011. I found Randir Kaleka’s work entertaining and his works struck me the most. I went to the exhibition for an hour and left. His work called Reading Man opened my eyes to new ideas and conveyed interesting stories as the paintings overlapped each other, and sculptures to form a shape of his work. There were three paintings side by side, and three sculptures that stood in front of it. First painting was of an Indian man, second was abstract painting of a forest and third was of a road. The three sculptures were made of metal and was of chair, and two men laying down and standing up. This work was quite large in size and stood out. It was colorful and since it was a collage, the paintings looked as if they were connecting but what really got my attention were the metal sculptures in front of the paintings. They were unique, and it was a different way of sculpting with metal wires and was also a simple technique of making them. There were no real intimate connection I felt with this work. However, I imagined the meaning behind the work and why every piece put together are overlapped and the way each piece is positioned to create a form. I think it has much to do with the history and the myth of the Indian culture. The man in the painting is a hero and that saved his people, he is in a moment where he runs through the darkness with a weapon in his hands. The forests represent the journey he is going to be taking. And the color becomes darker as he would run through the two forests, so the journey is going to be tough. And the metal sculptures represent the current life after the hero has saved his people, so the people he saved are more civilized. Therefore, the are no trees , just people positioned in different levels enjoying their time of existence. I think it has a strong meaning but it does not do a great job at conveying it. Without the sculptures that are made of wires, the paintings can hold stronger representation of the hero, and the adventures of his journey. Overall, the painting looked very foreign, a mixture of European style technique with Indian cultural patterns that would be used for celebration of their culture and heritage. The artist has done a great job mixing the two styles together. However, the meaning lost its value when the sculptures were involved.