I chose my clear glass dishes as the “product.” I like them because they’re fun and colorful and do interesting things with the light. I wanted to surround them with things that made the dishes look as if they were being used in a fun atmosphere with good food, etc. I added my wood cutting board for some texture, as well as a linen napkin, a hunk of crusty bread, and my fruit basket. Plus I scooted my jade plant into the background. And in some of the images I incorporated an orange. I think the overall look is friendly and playful and manages to highlight the dishes. I enjoy the super harsh lighting I was getting in my kitchen just before the sun went down. It was fun to try to work fast to capture an image in that lighting and it helped me to not overthink things too much.
summary: France gives the United States the statue of liberty, the United States panics about what to give France back. Someone says they like cheese, and they use Etsy to find a gift to give back–a giant cheeseboard with a tiny amount of cheese on it, which France loves.
pros: Hilarious, plays into our notion of ourselves as a country, shared history, plays on our stereotypes of French people loving cheese
cons: could be seen as mean to French
He Gets Us
summary: AI generated images of people of different backgrounds washing the feet of someone in need, while the background displays moments of conflict including a protest, an abortion center, a greyhound bus
pros: Super interesting that they used AI generated images–allowed them to focus on more conceptual ideas and gave a sense or removal from partisanship by not using real people or places.
Gave a sense of a non-partisan Jesus– catering to LGBTQ people, pregnant women, immigrants, people in distress.
cons: Its confusing to know what the message is. Ultimately, its still an ad for organized religion and the ad doesn’t address the fact that organized religion does not often share the same values as the Jesus figure in the ad
the ad seems to have an anti-conflict stance. It shows people choosing to remove themselves from conflict situations to do the right thing and wash someone’s feet. It’s nice that it shows people connecting despite conflict, but it glosses over the idea that conflict can be necessary in advocating for the right thing.
I would like to get better at making patterns digitally, so I would like to challenge myself to make wrapping paper.
I like to make geometric, quilt-like patterns with markers and paint in my own art. I’d like to try to translate some of these patterns into the digital sphere and get as comfortable making them there as I am with markers.
This project would develop my illustrator skills and familiarity with tools that I’m not great at using at the moment, such as blend, repeat, and envelope distort. I also want to start using more textures in my projects so this would be a good place to start using that.
I also like the idea of finding a way to actually manufacture one of these patterns into wrapping paper. Now that we’re learning more about indesign and printing and spot colors, it feels more possible to try to actually get a product made. Going through the process of talking with a manufacturer would be a huge learning experience.
Me visiting the Overlake Village pedestrian bridge/bike path after it finally opened
B I’m proud of my role on a team of fabricators that painted this pixelated mural for artist Leo Berk. This work is part of Sound Transit’s Link Light Rail extension in Redmond, WA. It spans a freeway connecting a new light rail station and the Microsoft campus.
A This was my second large fabrication project as a art fabricator and the first where I was in a managerial position. In addition to many, many hours of painting, this project required a huge deal of organization and tracking of pieces and progress. Each vertical louver has a series of pixels painted on the right, and left. Each piece had tow corresponding computer files attached to it that we projected onto the louver and used this to make sure we were painting the right colors in the right spot. Part of my job involved making sure we had the right file pulled up that not only corresponded with the correct louver, but the correct side, North or South. Once we had each piece painted, North and South, they all needed to be moved to temporary storage to dry for 14 days, then to permanent storage until install.
The project involved a lot of systems thinking. I had to make sure pieces were in the right place so that we could keep work flowing smoothly. And I managed a huge spreadsheet tracking progress on the 1000 louvers and whether they had been painted on each side and placed in storage.
We encountered many issues along they way. Occasionally we painted the South image on the North side of a louver. This required tracking down pieces we thought we were finished with, fishing them out of storage and re-painting them.
We also encountered early problems with the paint. Despite being rated for Navy use, the first batch of paint flaked off too easily and was not going to work for a very public and accessible art piece. It was a great learning lesson for me seeing my boss, Leo, navigate negotiations with the paint manufacturer as well as the company that he had hired to apply the underpainting.
R Ultimately we accomplished the piece with relatively few errors. It took a ton of team work with 3 art fabricators, and the project vastly improved my systems thinking and organizational skills.
One huge take-away for me came from observing Leo’s process. He expanded my idea of what art could be–incorporating technology into the making of the piece, building a room that the louvers could be painted in that contained the paint fumes, designing the geometry of the louvers himself and getting them extruded at an aluminum factory, working with a paint company to use a type of paint that had never been used before, and trusting three young artists to paint and organize the project. I have a lot of admiration for how big Leo thinks. I really appreciated that he dug into his large budget from sound transit and took big risks with huge material orders and contracts, and it really paid off.
This project gave me the confidence to take on more organizational tasks moving forward, and made me a better systems thinker.
