the end

unfortunately, there won't be any pictures of my last piece :/ my own forgetfulness led to it being misplaced. i was quite sad when i realized this, because id felt like this piece really expressed a lot of what i had felt throughout this semester, and my journey in a way. i felt like the spirit and rhythm of the music came out...full of color and movement. creating it felt very intuitive this time around, and id been hoping to keep this piece.

but we all learn from our silly mistakes, hopefully.

 i began this course with really, very very little experience in art. my first art class was at cal, spring semester of sophomore year! id always been interested in art, but id never gotten the chance to take classes before, so i jump at the opportunity to mix them in with my plethora of bio classes. 
before beginning this course, i had a semester each of beginning drawing and beginning painting, both of which i enjoyed very much. however, that also meant that i came in with the idea that a certain aesthetic was what i wanted and was capable of doing. i wasnt expecting to test any sorts of artistic boundaries at all!
my understanding of mexican culture, on the other hand, was something that i knew could only improve through this class, as well as my grasp of the language. i had had little to no exposure to the mexican culture, made especially apparent now that i have taken such an integrative class.

to be quite honest, the first couple of weeks (and here and there thereafter) were quite difficult for me. i could see how talented everyone else, their spanish fluency, and their commonalities as people who grew up with a strong mexican (or spanish) influence. it isnt that i felt unaccepted, but every class was a huge reminder of what made me different, and made me wonder if i belonged in the class at all.

i think my comfort level increased as i became more familiar with the class format, and exposed myself to the music and allowed myself to open up more and let my weekly pieces reflect that. creatively and conceptually, i learned to try to push my boundaries, and use materials i was unfamiliar with, like wood and bags and other found material, or work with ideas that required some more research. the week i used a long slab of wood and a piece of cloth for fiesta/tristeza were real turning points for me.

i developed a sort of routine too, of using the readings and music as a launching point and trying to stick to those ideas and imagery as close as possible before trying to see how it fit into my life as an asian american with my own heritage and ideas, and then almost forcing myself to experiment with new materials.

i think this class has definitely pushed me into making work that i never would have made on my own...i would have continued limiting myself to my paper and pencil/charcoal! which is fine, but i think the class has also come to see that this is not "my" medium. this class has definitely challenged my thinking as well, trying to understand mexican culture and how that has affected their generalized mindset, and also just learning to be in situations that are not within my comfort zone. im still not fluent in spanish, but i think ive grown more comfortable looking for those key words and trying to put two and two together, but also being comfortable with not knowing or fully understanding sometimes. not everything should be squeezed, and stretched, and forced to be repackaged into another language for another listener to understand. its just not the same. on both an artistic level and emotional level, this class has challenged me, and i really am very grateful for that.

things seems to come in trios

i definitely remember feeling out of sorts when i worked on my project this week, and i think vreni really hit the spot in her assessment of my work. while i did not intentionally make my work to be difficult to enter and relate to, i think my state of mind at the time was reflected in my work, and im glad it did--at least in retrospect. 

i had tried to use the three songs that were used in the plot of ry cooder's story as launching points, but i think i ended up putting in more of a commentary on myself than anything else. its funny how that happens, isnt it?

a fading candle, an eye that allows one to see yet also serves as a barrier...your own perspective from that of another. 

this farolito of mine

i wish i had had more time to figure out a better way to display this. maybe a sturdier paper?

it was a simple concept for me...my little subtle light, enough to shine in a dark place. i'd spent a lot of time thinking about it, but i think i could have done better with the actual execution.
it's hard to see, but i promise the farolito is there!

fade, fading, faded...para las mexicanas

i thought a lot about the concept for this week, and i wanted to do something very different...especially in comparison to last week. i was so guarded in my piece last week, and i wanted to do something that revealed everything, in some sense anyway. 

i feel like i basically wrote a journal entry (hopefully in more interesting and poetic language than in an ordinary one) on the piece of wood, before writing the lyrics to some hymns that came to mind over it. and then i smeared lotion over it, smearing the already difficult-to-see words. Throughout the night, the lotion absorbed into the wood. In this picture, the lotion has already faded, but you can still see some remnants of the lotion.

who knows if what i was going for translated well to the viewer...our class never got to my piece, so i dont really know what sort of feelings were evoked when they looked at it. but i think im satisfied knowing that it was viewed. the process of making this piece was like compacting a lot of the things ive been going through lately into one small block of wood, guarded and restrained, yet free flowing in a way. and i wonder if this is how some of the singers felt too, taking feelings and emotions from their own personal lives into their performances, yet never truly divulging it all. it just wouldnt be wise.

letra de perdida de los panchos, on the back

i think i love flaco de oro

I don't have a favorite yet, but his music is so beautiful! I can see how women still found him attractive, and how he was able to woo Maria Feliz :)

Little lantern that just brighten,
my empty street
I saw many nights crying,
knocking on your door
It take more than a song,
A piece of my heart
But take nothing more than a kiss
Chilly, naughty, bitter and sweet

It take more than a song,
A piece of my heart
But take nothing more than a kiss
Chilly, naughty, bitter and sweet

He always looks so nonchalant and aloof in his photos! Who knew such a withdrawn looking man was capable of such songs. When Agustin Lara falls in love, he falls hard. 

Either that, or he's just great at sounding like he does.

facets of romanza

when a man is smitten by a woman, he sees her everywhere, no?

I found the words for this week really intriguing in their connection to romanza, so I guess it kind of makes sense that I had a hard time coming up with my concept. But after finding my materials, it became easier to come up with the ideas.

I focused on the word trovador. The expression of love in those times was so different from now...there's something very delicate yet passionate about it, a beauty that comes from the restraint and chivalry that is expressed through poetry. I was reminded of other ways in which revealing little can mean so much more, and I thought of the way a geisha physically reveals so little that every glimpse of skin that she gives is supposed to be almost tantalizing. 

And so geishas will paint their entire faces and necks white, sometimes leaving a patch of skin with a few tips left bare. I saw this as a version of the relationship that a trovador has with his lover...expressed completely, but still controlled, in small private doses that makes it all the more concentrated.









I feel like there is an aspect of distance, of being unable to cross it at least for the time being. He loves from afar, but still drawn by her essence, which I tried to convey with the grain of the wood, the way it traverses this particular side.

her handkerchief, his shadow

part dos! [this is going to be kind of long]

just thought i'd post while things are still fresh on my mind :] tonight was really amazing...everyone had such beautiful work, and i wish there was enough time to hear everyone's stories! i suppose this is why we have our blogs!

i already posted a bit about my thought process for last week's project, but here's the final piece.

after reading valdemar's post, i decided to use as many corn colors as i could for his face. i feel like hes really lived many lives during his short one, and is such a compilation of different cultures and subcultures, that it only seemed natural that he be compared to maiz criollo, and have that same patchwork quality.

theres his giant face for you!

as for my second unfinished piece, im starting to wonder if i should explore it further, because im starting to like how it turned out more and more. its rather simple, but each layer has meaning to me.

i decided to use the bag because the stripes made me immediately think of the american flag. i can relate to what doha said about those colors too...even though i was born and raised in america, i have a kind of indifference to that kind of patriotism that might even be on the verge of repulsion. i just cant and dont relate. america is definitely a great country and provides so much for which i am grateful for, but like every other country, it is not perfect. despite the strong patriotism prevalent among its citizens, having an american passport actually makes it more difficult for me to travel in certain countries, and i feel almost branded each time i am forced to show it. so i ripped it, to show what might lie underneath.

maguey and arroz plants! i feel like rice is to the chinese as corn might be to the mexican. i watched the video that valdemar suggested even though i couldnt understand a word, but seeing the images and listening to the rhythm of their words made me think of my own heritage. my great grandfather had opened a rice shop, and when the communists came in, they arrested him and tried to hang him. fortunately, his rope somehow broke, and since chinese people are so superstitious, they just let him go because they felt the gods must have wanted to keep him alive...hence the phrase from the chinese national anthem: "起來", or "Arise".

whether it be by communists or the spanish, invasions leave people hurt, disenfranchised. the culture and customs of the original people are marginalized. thus, the hope for the original people to arise once again.

maiz

i LOVE david zaizar's cuatro milpas. i looked up a translation of the lyrics, but i cant help but feel like im missing out on a lot of emotion and cultural meanings, which i'll just have to accept i wont ever come to fully understand. this really applies for all of the songs that we learn and sing in class...but it seems that feeling of unattainability (real word?) is only magnified when we talk about a time thats been lost.

this is what google translate gave me: 


Only four cornfields remain, 
the hut was mine, alas! 
From that little house so white and beautiful, 
sad thing that is. Pastures are no cattle, the lagoon dried wire fence that was in the yard also fell . lend me your eyes, brunette, I hold you in the soul, look there, the spoil of that house, so white and pretty sad that is. crops were losteverything off is over, alas no longer doves, or flowers or flavors and all over. usencia mourned his palms were dry lagoon ay ahy pions and carriers toditos went and nobody wasdark so I'm sad so I feel very sad to mourn remembering the happy afternoons spent in the two that place ..

even though the translation of la letra is clearly faulty, the underlying feeling and emotions manage to transcend the language barrier. the speaker in the song has lost everything, and can only remember the past while surveying the present, a sad shadow of what had been.

id started looking up aztec images, and after about an hour of scrolling through sculptures and trying out sketches, i suddenly realized that depictions of the mayan/aztec gods have a startling resemblance to my boyfriend...in a few ways at least

im not trying to compare him to a god, but he definitely has the lobes and nose down pretty good. i wonder why i hadnt realized it before!

he's half mexican and half white, but he doesnt identify with his mexican heritage very much because his father was in prison most of the time he was growing up. he jokes about it a lot, but i think theres definitely a part of him that wishes he had been exposed to his heritage more...a part of him that i suppose he never really had, but still feels like he had lost. and so its with this in mind that i decided to approach last week's project :]

he'll hate me for this, but heres a picture of him:

voz

i really wanted to do something that came naturally to me again, and to have each aspect of the piece to have some kind of autobiographical meaning.

i felt i could identify with what octavio paz said about the mexican being ripped open for his voice to be heard. it does take a lot of out a person to share and to be open about his thoughts, his emotions...it's like sharing a piece of you to your audience. it can be therapeutic and healing, but it can also be scarring--evidence of that kind of sudden emotional outburst might never go away. hence, the (hopefully) suture like sewing back of the ripped pieces. yet, what is revealed underneath can be quite beautiful, and it can still flourish.

this doesn't really have to do with anything

but i thought this was really beautiful :] its from a website called lowriderarte.com

i think i just almost set my apartment on fire

i hadnt been very satisfied with one of my old art projects, and so i set it on fire, kind of on a whim. i thought i could incorporate the ashes/remnants into this week's project, because id felt like my voice hadnt come out the way id wanted it to in the project. i felt that kind of suppression, whether self inflicted or not, is something that octavia paz talks a lot about in his project.

and with those good intentions, i set out to burn up the project i had done on paper. i think i probably should've planned the burning a little better though

the pictures don't really do the damage justice. i ended up losing control of the flame, and the whole thing just lit up. luckily, someone had left two cups on the table, and they both had some water in them, so i dumped it on the flaming paper i was still holding. have you ever seen the movie "signs"? that moment of providence felt like that.

it turned out the flame wasn't completely out though, so i ended up dropping it on reflex. on to my wooden table.

i ran to the kitchen and grabbed our water filter and just poured it all over. everything.

heres to hoping my roommates dont notice the mess and the smell of burning!

fiesta/tristeza

my concept for this project actually changed a few days before the deadline. originally, i'd been thinking about using the image of a bird flying freely out of a cage to comment that the bird can only truly celebrate freedom after having experienced imprisonment.

but when i started thinking about tristeza, and how i've experienced it, i started thinking about tears and a kind of solitary sadness. i also started thinking about the kind of materials i wanted to use. i wanted there to be a softness, a kind of vulnerability to the material i used for tristeza, and so i ended up cutting up an old sweater i had gotten oil paint on a year ago. i also liked the idea of putting fiesta on something sturdy, and so i picked up some wood from kroeber.

everything just kind of came together on its own when i was working on this project, and i was really happy with the result and what i felt like each thing symbolizes.

you cant have fiesta without tristeza

I've been thinking a lot about the idea of fiesta y tristeza, and how one cannot exist without the other. After a lot of trial and error, I finally put together an image that I hope others will be able to understand! Do you see what I see?

A fiesta cannot truly be enjoyed without having endured tristeza as well. Knowing sadness gives you the ability to know celebration.

I'm still working on how I going to incorporate this into my project, so we'll see where this goes. I've been thinking a lot about deconstructing and cutting up my work, so hopefully you'll see my efforts to take your advice too :]

aren't we all kind of playing a masquerade?

When I first started thinking about what I wanted to do for the project, I leaned really heavily towards interpreting the prompt quite literally, and incorporating masks and other sorts of ways things get hidden away. I was looking at a lot of different images...I'd recently watched a Spanish film called The Skin I Live In, which presented the mask in a sort of eerie and creepy yet provocative way. We'd also been looking at Frida Kahlo paintings in another class, and I was really attracted to the way she represented the mask as well, and what it might have meant to her.

The Skin I Live In...Elena Anaya is so beautiful in it. Her feminine features still come through, even with the mask on!








Girl with a Death Mask










Although these are both interesting concepts to me, I realized that none of them related to me personally. And so I thought long and hard about a time when I felt like I had to wear//was wearing a mask. Insignificant though it might sound now, I think the last time I felt like I was wearing a mask and hiding my true self was when I was a little girl trying to overcome my shyness. I was so shy that I remember feeling like no one knew who I was because I couldn't bring myself to act in a way that showed my true colors. I was a rather melodramatic little girl.

I'd started off playing with the idea of the intertwining of vida y muerte...eventually, it sort of morphed into an image that reminded me of swings, something I loved to do when I was little. I haven't decided yet exactly where I'm going to go with it, so I guess we'll just see tonight!

la muerte

the whole time i was reading the section on death, i basically had this image in my head:

death can feel like such an unknown and fearsome idea, yet the mexican is able to embrace it and make death a large component of the culture. it becomes something beautiful, and even alluring.


















shrouded in mystery, and maybe some danger, yet there is an irresistible quality too

anhelo

i had a rather hard time coming up with an idea for this week's project. 

anhelo. longing yearning desire craving eagerness

but when i began listening to chavela vargas' canciones, specifically "ella," i could feel and hear that emotion of anhelo with every sad pick at the guitar, every drawn out rhythmic strum. after looking up a translation of la letra, i almost immediately knew what i wanted to do.

theres just such beautiful imagery in the [english translation of the] lyrics. lost in a deep abyss. black as my luck. with tears in my eyes, i raise my glass. it definitely made me think of something with a lot of movement, a longing that manifests itself in a physical sense, maybe even distorting. yet there's a beauty to it, as reflected in the song. it made me think of dancers

the chapter on mexican masks also reminded me of anhelo. is the mexican mask there voluntarily, or a thing of tradition? does the mexican WANT to be "always remote, from the world and from other people. and also from himself"

i feel like the chinese culture has a very similar mindset, of believing that opening up and showing emotion is a sign of weakness. but it calls a question to mind: is the "fortress" built to keep intruders outside, or to keep the prisoner inside?

perhaps paz is right, and that is just the kind of attitude that allows the mexican people resilience and fortitude. i also found the image of the long-suffering, vigilant woman that paz describes. both man and woman, hardened by suffering, became a much more stoic and invulnerable shell.