There and Back Again

Between July 1st and July 22nd of 2010 I had the opportunity to visit Kazakhstan. While most people would jump to conclusion that I went to meet Borat, I actually went with a purpose to learn about the culture and the people. I was astonished by what I learned and saw. The people were wonderful and open to myself; they were even more gracious when they learned I was from America (and not Russia!). During days when I toured around the large city of Almaty I ventured into museums and art shows.

Of all the artists I saw during my tour, I favored Gulfarius Ismailova the most.

She was born in the same city of Almaty (called Almata at the time) in 1929. As a Kazakh woman, she was proppeled into the field of arts by the collegic system of education. By 1956, Gulfarius graduated from the USSR’s I.E. Repin Institude in Leningrad. After her graduation, her artistic works gained her fame among the people and membership to the prestigous Artists Union of Kazakhstan in 1957.  To this day the artist still lives in Almaty.

Over the decades she has won awards in both socialistic societies (USSR) and capitalistic

Portrait of A. Kasteyev

Kazakh Waltz

Untitled

(Repulic of Kazakhstan). She based her paintings on scenes that captured the various aspects of humanity. Her leadership in her country gave a meaning and headway for more artists to arise.

Below are a few choice paintings I personally saw on collection.

No Reception – Only Reaction

This class is mainly consisting of Alaskans. We are, by partaking in this course, part of Alaska. We see the trees, the beasts and the people. While Fairbanks, Anchorage or Juneau can not stand up to the cities in the “lower 48″, there is a commonsense that there are many people in Alaska.

In a broad and unspecific but overall (scholarly) guess, the population of Alaska nearly hits the 700,000 mark. Over 50 years the state has accumulate these numbers. This number incorporates your friends, relatives, coworkers and everyone else you see on a day to day basis. These Alaskans are an embodiement and personification of Alaska’s life and people.

Now imagine something. Imagine something that is flabbergasting but not impossible. Imagine all those people you know. Imagine all those buildings you see in the streets, full of lively people. Imagine all the people in all the cities of our state. Now, imagine them all gone. Now, imagine them not only gone but dead; not only dead, massacred. If this seems still in your ability to imagine then put it all into a timespan of less than a year.

700,000 people gone from this world within a year. A sad fate. Even though this has not occured, something worse has.

800,000 people of women, childern, workers and relatives gone from the world not by disease or natural disaster; gone from the Earth by the means of man’s own hand.

If it has not come into mind yet, the story of Rwanda is tragic beyond belief. We can not recieve such information logically. The idea to imagine our entire state killed off within a year is hard to due, yet 700,000 is not even close to the 800,000 in a small African country; and the killing did not even take a year. All it took was 100 days, less than 3 months of bloodshed. We do not understand. We do not properly empathize. We do not recieve.

We have reacted though. Just as stubbing a toe on a door, we react against something we know is not wanted or tolerated. Reaction can come in many forms. The most powerful of the forms is by art. A median of art can escape the blockade of logically grasping the situation. It is by art that the nation of Rwanda can even being to digest what happened during the bloody year of 1994. Below are the samples of art I chose.

A murial, on a wall, shows the tragic and unreal circumstances of the genocide. The artist uses a blend of distraught images with a blend of colors to portray his or her ideas. Artist is unknown but painting comes from beginning of 21st century.

A famous poster in Rwanda. The different hands show the different races of the region. By unifying at the skull, the poster claims for bonds to be made over the death and genocide of the people it occured onto.

While the massacre took place in Rwanda, many forms of [Western] art have arose.

Eric Humphrie's "Atrocities" was created in 2007. His style notates the plausibility of human reactions and their violent nature. Notice each individuals facial expression. (If the format is blurry, use link below)

http://paintedatrocities.com/sitebuilder/images/Rwanda_Genocide-467×254.jpg

Descent to Genocide

The Way Forward

The glass paintings were designed by Ardyn Halter. He  was born in London and a scholar in Cambridge University. He created these two paintings in 2003 and installed them in Rwanda in 2004.

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Can’t Go Back When We Are Already In It

Remember those cheesy futuristic movies made back in the late 1980s and early 1990s; the movies glorified the wacky and outrageous stereotypes that audiences associated the “future” with. Perhaps the visionary works of Terminator, Back to the Future, and Bladerunner were not to far off. What if, in foresight, there is (actually) a high chance of machines taking over, crazed doctors medillingly in time travel or perhaps even a rapid growh in scientific knowledge of prosthesis to excel beyond glasses and limbs?

By either, neither or all accounts the saying of “We’ll see what the future holds” is closest to the truth. As humans we explore the realm of time in history and future. Some of us, humans, follow a philosphical format (existentialism). Others will make sense of the future by means of art. Few, or at least a small percentage, groups take their future into their own hands so it will come much “sooner”.

The exhibit below shows each style of human beings making sense of the future culture, economy and arts.

Created in 1988 by Phil Stanton, Chris Wink, and Matt Goldman, the self-titled "Blue Man Group" has been bending audience's perception to the power of music and theatrical acting. They have revolutionized sound far beyond the common normalities of the 1990s and present decade.

The group does performances of both live television (The Tonight Show) and also scripted television (Arrested Development). The three co-founders joined forces after discovering their similar interests in the non-ordinary styling of theatrical music. By culuture and musical instruments, they still go beyond our century’s style of art.

Also created in the 1980s, Cirque Du Soleil is widely praised and accredited to its transending style and fashion. Created by Guy Laliberte, the performance company features 4,000 employees with headquarters in Montreal, Quebec, and Canada.

Still going strong, the theatre group is performing around the world and has gone beyond theatre halls. Their works include fashion, clothing, music and dance studios. They have an everchanging style that fits to the contemporary of modern times. It is by their contemporary image that keeps them beyond the present.

Titled as "Entropy of Love", the painting details a timesetting that is not of our own. Mariko Mori painted this work of art in 1998 and credited its creation to her own personal perceptions of the world around her.

Mariko Mori has stated that she recieved no teaching for her artistic skills. Perhaps its for this reason that she has the ability to bypasss the tranditional artistic blockades. Her art features a futuristic setting of a dead earh and windmills in the background. Perhaps she is portarying that even though there is love for the Earth, we can not turn back the mistakes we’ve made.

The musical auditorium features complex curves that border on the definition of ridiculous. Yet, what more can futuristic architecture be. Designed by Frank Gehry and completed in 1996, the concert hall is unprecidented in accoustic sound quality.

Shiny, shiny curves. The building screams “look at me, I’m unusual!”. With no adjacent buildings looking at all like the concert hall, the WDCH seems to be a building dropped in by another realm. It’s slender, sleek and overall shine transmits the viewer to question just what time period this building should be in.

Titled as "Hydropolis Underwater Hotel and Resort", the planned (and unbuilt, so far) hotel features the designs by Professor Roland Dieterle. Beyond the run down and dripping underwater resort featured on Futurama, nothing can be more appealing to a tourist who is aquatically inclined. Unfortunately, due to complications in late 2006 there has been a halt in the speed of its construction.

The hotel resemebles the buildings you’d see of popular Scientific Fiction shows. As soon as I saw this building, I couldn’t help of think of my favorite cartoon, Futurama. It is because this building is so far out of our normal structures that it can only be related to a wacky cartoon and not of any other present structure.

Honestly, what is the epitome of futuristic architecture if not terraforming. Building inhabital land out of an ocean is a feat within itself. Now, being able to form a shape? Truely outstanding.

The terraformed land mass was constructed by Nakheel Properties, a property developer in the United Arab Emirates. This corporation hired Belgian and Dutch contractors Jan De Nul and Van Oord. Nothing more can be said the the picture that “captures a thousand words”.

Goo-goo gah-gah

Humanity had come upon a new era of thought after the initial World War, or “the Great War”. Before WWI, an established order of warfare was set not by political and ethical limitations, but by sheer brass and brawn. Rules of engagement revolved around the political acceptance of warfare. Come to the dawn of WWI’s end and humanity is now no longer limited to the capability of one’s weapon.

The change in mind set did more than just affect the section of warfare. A great shift occurred in nations, especially America, who were part of the “Roarin’ Twenties”. An economy that seemed to have no glass ceiling suddenly came tumbling down; and when it tumbled, it sheered through the mindset of all social statuses.

Between the two devastating changes, warfare and economy, there would be nothing left of the modern worlds’ mindset. As the legend of the phoenix lives, from the ashes of destruction, renewal was born.

Renewal took on many forms. From politics to banking and from theatre to paintings, the world began to rebuild a structure of thinking. An artistic structure, that I find represents renewal perfectly, is DaDa. What else can capture the sense of rebirth than paintings that are meaningful in a mindset of a child.

DaDa art aimed to turn the world up and around. Condemn the old and embrace the new, seemed to be the new dogma of this particular artistic style. What else could capture such a dogma than Marcel Duchamp’s painting, L.H.O.O.Q (created in 1919).

By only looking at the painting, the observer will know the meaning behind the smile mustache.  A meaning would be found that represents the rebirth of the “developed” world’s culture.

Two Ends of an Emotional Spectrum

The emotions that are utilized by the Impressionistic paintings have a wide variety. Many different paintings are considered to be apart of Impressionism.  Yet, despite their differences, the paintings have a commonality. Each painting includes an emotion. The emotion is not expanding in a spectrum; it is linear and unique.

A blend of stroke pattern and color characterizes Impressionism, Sunrise

To examplify the this quality of Impressionistic paintings, I will use Claude Monet’s painting of Impression, Sunrise (created in 1872). Impression, Sunrise harvests the emotion of tranquility. The red sun encompasses the natural colors that appear during a late fall sunset. The waters and the sky are identical with the painting’s brush strokes. A sense of unity is established by this style of painting. With unity comes the sense of tranquility. The emotion of tranquilty is developed by the slight of hand and the methods for how the artist wants the emotion to be portrayed. Emotions of Impressionism come from a solemn source.

A high level of emotion flows out through the characters.

All paintings in ths era did not follow this pattern of showing emotion. A shinning example of a non-subtle painting is Francisco Goya’s painting titled Third of May 1808. In this pantining, the artistic stylings collide with Impressionistic paintings. The differences of these paintings speaks volumes for the diversity that existed in the era. This diversity creates a figurative spectrum to compare other paintings to.

Two Paintings – Two Classes

A sharp contrast is obvious between the two works of Lady Elizabeth Delmé and her Children and The Artist and Her Daughter. The source of the contrast comes from the two portrayals differs in the perception a viewer will have. Lady Elizabeth Delmé and her Children, created by the British born Sir Joshua Reynolds, has a loft attitude. The feeling forecasted from the colors has an undefined arrogance and superiority to the one who is studying it. The arrogance and superiority separates it from the humbled middle class. The Artist and Her Daughter, created by French artist Elisabeth-Louise Vigee-Le Brun in, creates the sharp contrast by withholding the painting styles that create a sense of superiority.

The Artist and Her Daughter shows a family similar to middle class folk

The latter painting connects to the middle class on many levels. Solid and bland colors decorate the mother and child. Mother and child are embraced tenderly. The mother’s hair is short and unkept. The child is clothed in proper but not extravagant clothing. Now, compare these traits (clothing, hair, color and stature) to Lady Elizabeth Delme and her Childern. The differences speak for themselves.

Lady Elizabeth Delmé and her Children shows a family that resembles an aristocratic lifestyle

What would cause these differences to arise? Perhaps, it is a simple answer of them being created in two different areas. The nation of France went through a monstrosity of turmoil which ended up in an “enlightenment” for the middle class. Even though the artist herself was apart of the fleeing aristocracy, her painting was not associated to the level of society she held. The painting was powered by the appreciation it received from the middle class. A revival of the middle class created a new style of art appreciation.

The new appreciation led to a broader appeal. No longer was a certain section of the populace able to connect with the art to fully appreciate its wonderment. Now, with the wider range of the population supporting a new form of art, a demand for art featuring the middle class was created.

Untangible Differences

Upon viewing the painting, shown above, the mind searches for a plot or theme. Obviously, there is unease and violence occuring. Why is this so? The men dress the same. They are all of the same age (relitively). They are all of the same nationality. These similarities are tangible, they can be seen and touched. However, the clue to the mischief behind the tension rests in the realm that is not tangible. It can not be seen. It can not be touch. It exists as thought.

Titled suitably as Defenestrations of Prague, the visual art portrays the clash of religous moralities. Set in May 23, 1618 (in the midst of a Baroque styling), a resistance arose of Bohemians against their overwatching Habsburg authorities. The scene depicts  a struggle unlike the majority; a struggle that would lead into the Thirty Years’ War.

Created by Matthius Merian [the elder], the struggle against Protestant chapels and Roman Catholic officals is capture beautifully. There is no colorization or overdrawn expressions. The event of throwing a man out of a high window (which is the definition of defenestration) is capture solely as an act against religious ideals. The people under the Bohemian flag drew outrage and supported the arts for defense in a olden day “PR War” (as I like to think of it).

The main reason why this painting stuck to my liking is the way the artist shows how a struggle can exist without having any visual and tangible boundaries. One is sure to mess up who is fighting who since the entire debacle is over-winded. The two teams of men look the same; yet, they are entirely different at their core.