My (our) move into the art world

The past few days have been filled with some quasi-pretentious art endeavours. And yes, I have enjoyed them. I like art and I like thinking about art, making my own interpretations and trying to understand the artist's meanings. I could be able to go into art criticism, but never be the artist itself. Despite the nays of loved ones, I am a crap artist. I was never a visual artist and I think even said loved ones would say that anything visual I did was rather shite (though I hope my mother enjoyed the mosaic house number plate I made for her)(I made that two years ago). I did some writing when I was younger. Though I enjoyed it, I never could manage to get any better. I hated that I had these ideas, but no really good way to say it. So I've stopped writing. Fiction that is. No, you'll continued be subjected to this.

I've seen two excellent, some might say art-house, films in the past week. Hidden is a French film that is a metaphor about the role of Western culture has played in the collapse and breakdown of some non-Western cultures and their people. Think of Western culture's role in the breakdown of Afghanistan, Africa, or the Middle East. Or of white America's role in the failures of their country's ethnic people (Black, Native American, etc). The ending of the film was very powerful and shocking. Lady Venegence is a straight-up revenge film in the vein of the Kill Bill series, but, in my opinion, better. This Korean film, also known as Sympathy for Lady Vengence, was beautifully created and filmed. I would highly recommend that you see both films if you can.

Though criticism is good, today the Boy and I became more than mere art critics. We were the creators of art. How did this, a shite artist and a mathematican scientist creating art, occur? Well, I shall tell you.

We went to an exhibit of three artists at the Fruitmarket Gallery. Edinburgh, being a capital city, has a large number of incredibly good galleries, both national and public. Though the gallery said that the three artists profiled asked some of the same questions with their work, thereby allowing them to be shown in the same show, I thought the exhibits were vastly different.

Before the talk of the creation, I have to tell you about Sean Snyder. This guy had gathered amateur pictures taken in Iraq (by soldiers, contract workers, etc), with the subject matter not the war itself. For me, it was to see images that differed from the ones constantly photographed and broadcasted -- bombing and wreckage -- and for us to see it as a real place. Some of good ones were of a make-shift 7-Eleven (selling a Jesus Christ rug) and a traffic jam. A particular favourite was of a cat sitting behind some barbed wire. (Cos, I mean, when you think of Iraq, do you think of the cats there?)

Pia Rönicke had a series of seven pictures on the topic of urban planning and living depicting either different ideas of such topic or different aspects of that topic -- I haven't been able to figure it out. That, however, was not the best of Rönicke's work. Five lightboxes of 30 lights were wired to a large switchboard (with switches numbered 1 to 150), allowing people to manipulate the the lights. Letters could be made and words written -- as long as they have five letters or less. After deliberating (and eliminating the use of any rude words), the Boy and I have created a 'piece', pictures of such are below. When I suggested the word, he instantly agreed to it. He was very good at quickly figuring out which switch to pull or not -- the mathematical artist (or artistical mathematican?). Anyway, leave your comments on your interpretations, criticisms, and feelings on our 'work'. If you think we're good, we might have another go. You never know, this might be us moving on to a second career.











Do know that all that above (the talk of the 'piece' and our 'work' and moving into a second career) is a piss-take. A joke, people.