This week we had our home project critiques and since I have finished my class project, I worked on NAHS tagging because I am a president. It was a really rough week for the entire school so I was not super productive.

This week I started my home project because I have already finished my in class project... they don't take me very long. An ideal quality for a ballet dancer is slight bowleggedness. However, sometimes it can go too far. This is a drawing of someone with rickets syndrome which is caused by malnutrition and it causes the femur to curve.  I like the irony of this.

Censorship is a product of what makes somebody uncomfortable and produces a reaction. Art cannot be successful if it does not provoke a response. Usually though, someone trying will to get a reaction may step beyond the boundaries of what is considered acceptable. People love art, but people hate to be challenged. Humans do not accept criticism or denial of one's own personal beliefs. This leads to limiting what we see. It is also a natural human trait to want control. Censorship is as much a part of deciding what the public should be allowed to see as an expression of power. 

In places like China and Russia, politicians use their ability to any art that is critical of the government. Actually, all of these readings showed how censorship is an expression of power. In Russia people creating critical pieces, like German Vinogradov and many others get arrested or fined. In Russia, art that is critical of the government is considered terrorism and is a political crime. In Brooklyn, the show "Sensation," caused huge controversy over certain pieces, like Chris Ofili's "The Holy Virgin Mary," that offended the mayor and his religion. A common thread across issues of censorship is that it offended someone in a high level, so with the power they had, they were able to do something about it. This raises the issue that if something is offensive to someone with political stature, but is not offensive to others, does the official have the authority to remove it from the public rest due to his personal opinions? The answer is no.

Another connecting thread across controversial pieces is the issue of religion. I think there should be a division between religion and how people interact, but because of the nature of religion, this cannot happen. Religion can be very personal, but since it is so personal, people feel the need to reflect their religious views in the way they act. A central issue in many of the readings was the removal of a blasphemous piece, as in "Sensation" at the Brooklyn Museum or "Forbidden Art" in Moscow. Insult to a religion is something people will not stand for anywhere in the world which is somewhat shocking. "Blasphemous" art will spur controversy and sometimes removal anywhere in the world. Religion extends to the social issues and societal issues explored. This includes the homoeroticism of Mapplethorpe, the experimentation with culture and material of Ofili and the criticism of consumerism and Christianity in Russia. It does not matter if it is in as rigid and controlled a nation as Russia or a nation who prides itself on the separation between church and state and free speech as in the US. 

For the most part, the articles gave good examples of censorship around the world and how it affects different nations differently and how it is handled. However, the articles did not really provide lots of different perspectives on similar events. I think that censorship is wrong, but the articles did not provide a counter argument. There were basic reasons given for why something was censored, but there was not a definitive argument from the side of those doing the censoring. This is a weakness especially given the audience. The people discussing the issue are for the most part socially liberal and open minded artistically.  Because the articles are for the most part this way as well, it is not building upon the discussion, rather just giving a list of examples to support the opinions we already have. We will for the most part agree that most art should not be censored. If articles with valid points as to why something would be censored, it would create a much more varied discussion with acknowledgement of varying viewpoints that cannot be had now due to the inherent bias of the articles. A complete statement from the Chinese or Russian government, from the previous mayor of New York City or Smithsonian would add a level of understanding to the discussion and it would probably strengthen our opinions.  There is a higher level of understanding of the complexities of censorship in the arts, but the answer to the overarching question has not changed. 

Jack Spencer Ashworth was born in Norfolk UK and currently lives and works in London. He has a degree in architecture, but his paintings represent a really impressive combination of architectural geometricity and the human form. His pieces portray a really intriguing tension between the body and the manmade, animate and inanimate, and the natural and the synthetic. This struggle represents a dichotomy between painterly fluidity and architectural order and control, between the illusion of depth created by paint and the flattening of modern nonobjectvity. He creates an ambiguous human figure that is imperfect, but universal. His pieces are gender neutral, allowing the viewer to connect more to the figure. The figures are dissipated and abstracted into recurring motifs like grids and perspective- both man made and standardized. The ambiguity of the pictorial spaces they create allows the spatial restriction of the human form to be read as a metaphor for emotional and cultural confinement.


I really responded to his work. I love his mark and his exploration of figure. I love the idea of an ambiguous figure, one that is profoundly imperfect. I was really drawn to his work because I think it reflects my own. The subject matter is different but the visual effect of his work is what I am going for. He shows imperfections in a really astounding way and I love the shock factor his pieces have. His work is ugly and grotesque but it is engaging and personal. I would like my work to do the same. I love the underlying dichotomy of his work as well. Contrast is intriguing and I would like to explore the dichotomous relationships in my work.


http://jackspencerashworth.com

I worked on the feet a little more and finished them up I think. I don't mind how they turned out but I am a little bored of them and I want to do something else next...