After making a presentation based around this Varoom article for context early this 2nd year, I feel it made an impression on my work. Lyle discusses how Le Gun (an underground illustration zine) is rebelling against the commercial influence in illustrative production. They also state that digital mediums should only be used as a tool because it is currently replacing our natural art heritage of hand-rendered work.
This theme has come up a few times during the course of the year: within context, the discussion forums and the advice people have given me about my working methods. I feel that illustration and art aren't what they once were, such as the great movements of the late 19th and early 20th Centuries. That period in time posed as modernism, and I believe that what this article is proposing is that we are living in a post-modern world where commercialism has devoured everything that was once underground and has simply plastered it all onto t-shirts. The article has made me more cynical I think, but it's at least raised my awareness.
2) Ways of Seeing, John Berger
I read this book to gain knowledge on how to better my critical writing skills. As well as that, it opened my eyes a lot more than they once were. Each of the essays within it increased my perception of things around me, such as: how we view art and where we view it (it's location being in various contexts). The essay that caught my attention most of all was the role that women play in society.
Berger discusses that women are the surveyed gender in society and that they are not only surveyed by men, but by themselves. I studied English Literature and History at A Level and both subjects included and delved into this social factor. Men have objectified women for centuries! The way I read it from those two subjects and from Berger's discussion, is that women are almost sometimes considered to be a sub-gender (even in today's world, both in Western and Eastern culture). Being a man, I perceive women just as equally as I do other men. It saddens me to think this has been happening for so long and it still continues today as though it's a social norm.
The reason why Berger exclaims that women survey themselves just as much as men do onto them, is because of the pressure placed upon them by the long-reigning patriarchal society. It also makes me wonder as to why women must suffer monthly periods and child birth too.
3) Manic (film)
I watched this film recently with my girlfriend and I really enjoyed it. It's about a teenager named Lyle (played by Joseph Gordon-Levitt) who gets admitted to a juvenile psychiatric ward because he beats someone up with a baseball bat. He has anger issues relating to his abusive relationship with his father.
The reason I like this film is because of the confined relationships he is forced to create with people in the ward. He befriends two people, Kenny and Chad, who both have similar social problems, and has a sexual relationship with a girl named Tracy (played by Zooey Deschanel) who has reoccurring nightmares of herself being raped. His relationship with Chad turns out the strongest due to their similar interests in music and their desire to escape the place to go to Amsterdam.
A connection and symbol within the film relating to the study of art is the scene where Sara and Chad are debating over what van Gogh's painting Wheat Field with Crows means. Sara says, "freedom" and Chad cynically responds that it is about, "depression and confinement because of the borders."
The main reason I enjoyed this film is because it brings back a sense of nostalgia of the 1990's. This is evident in my work because I particularly loved American cartoons and the music from that era. There is a scene in the film that evokes a great sensation in me. It's the scene when Chad puts the song Headup by Deftones on the stereo and everyone starts moshing out together. The sense of community I feel whenever I'm in a full-on moshpit at a gig is one of the best feelings ever...
Best scene ever.
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