Game Contribution

The game development process was definitely harder than any of us expected it to be but nonetheless we got it down unfortunately it was a little glitchy.  As far as what we each contributed we each had a specific level and my level was the Saharan poacher game.  I wanted to incorporate a point and click aspect to the game since everyone else's levels involved walking or swimming.  am i pleased with the way my own level came out? No, i could've done so much more but i let my ideas float around for too long and in the end it cost not only me but my group.  however I enjoyed my use of traps and weapon choice that the player must avoid, steal, or break in order to stop poaching, only if it was that easy.  I don't have illustrator so i had to find backdrops and send them to my other group members on order to have them image traced to get a different aesthetic feel.  In the end we did carry our own weight yet some members did manage to go above and beyond when some of us did;t have the time to attend to problems at that given moment.

Agustin Lara

May 7, 2015

Art 381

Gallery Critique

Emancipating Jane by Priscilla Varner

            Emancipating Jane is a gallery that focuses around sex workers, but not necessarily hookers, what I meant by that is not all sex workers are hookers and that’s something I learned after this gallery.  Each series of photographs that are in the gallery are named after the courtesan that they represent, for instance one was Cherry, another Anna May, Stacy and so on. That not only gave the images a little more life and meaning but also helped the audio tell the girls story quite better.  The audio is simply a short interview with each of the girls that was involved with the gallery.  One of the more interesting reasons for working at the Mustang Ranch was she needed to support her mother.  Ironically her mother knew what she was doing and was ok with it, I mean as long as the bills get paid.  Another girl said she was just too deep in debt so she had to dropout and start working to pay it off and she liked the money so she stayed and is currently finishing up school. One of the girls named Ashley Alexis made the statement just because McDonalds lowers their price doesn’t mean you should. That just goes to show that even though they work in the field of sex they still have self-esteem and shouldn’t be looked down upon. Another interesting topic that came up was some people thought that the girls weren’t able to leave and that’s false they don’t live at the ranch the merely occupy a room and have normal lives outside of their work. This gallery gave me a different perspective on these girls and other girls like them, we should never judge a book by its cover (not that I do) and this is a prime example, I never knew these girls’ situations and for some this was the only option.  Before you judge someone take the time to get to know them and what they’ve been through you might learn a thing or two.

Agustin Lara

May 7, 2015

Art 381

Gallery Critique

Tehching Hsieh

            The man that used up a year punching a time sheet every hour of everyday for one whole year is finally here.  I wasn’t able to attend the lecture however I did get to attend the gallery opening and wow I have never seen so many photos in one room all my life, and to be honest they almost seemed overwhelming.  Hearing about this piece is one thing actually seeing the pictures of every single hour that he punched in is crazy.  As you go through the pictures you even get to see him grow hair, how crazy is that? I respect this piece because it requires an immense amount of dedication in order to punch in on time every single time and never miss one single punch in. in order to complete his task he had to deprive himself of sleep in order to stay consistent, in order to do that he set up multiple alarm clocks with amplifiers to wake him up.  once you made your way through the crowd you eventually came up to a projector and the punch machine itself and what a sight to see, the actual machine Hsieh used himself.  The projector had all the images playing in a time lapse which had a bit more of an impact than the pictures because it creates movement and brings a little more life to the piece.  This was probably the most famous artist gallery that I’ve attended to this day but it definitely will not be my last I enjoyed the photos, time lapse video, and setup of this gallery.

Agustin Lara

Art 381

May 10, 2015

Artist Lecture

Joel Swanson

            Joel is a digital artist whose themes incorporate the materiality of language, indexicality of art/language, quirks, glitches, inconsistencies of language and the technologies of language.  When he first started to show us his art I wasn’t to intrigued by it, I was rather bored.  I didn’t appreciate the fact that it was just words until he went on to talk about the different ways people used them and the impact they had, suddenly his works seemed a lot more interesting. The piece that I found most interesting was here/there. The piece itself is twelve feet by two feet; it’s a big piece.  He scanned and printed the words here and there however the printer didn’t print them right however the misprint is where all the magic happens. The smeared words create a different aesthetic feel than if the words would’ve just gotten printed normally.  Another piece that he talked about was his “Speak & See” piece. I tried researching it outside of the lecture but I couldn’t find anything on it. Swanson however did say that it was going to be an installation where whatever you said would be illuminated on the screen as text.  In the end his neon signs and misprints won me over and I became a fan of his work.

Agustin Lara

Art 381

May 10, 2015

Artist Lecture

C Sleezy a.k.a Da Sleepman a.k.a. Clint Sleeper

            I was running a little late to the lecture due to other obligations however I knew that I was headed to the right place due to a loud variety of electric sounds screeching at me down the hallway. Once I walked in I looked at the projector screen and saw Clint himself squeezing lemons on a keyboard.  If you’ve never seen a performance like this I definitely recommend it.  The musical piece of razors hanging form wires, I can’t remember the name, was also a very intriguing piece. As he was, I assume trying to avoid cutting himself, wandering the room he would tap the razors creating a musical note and it wasn’t annoying or weird but rather soothing.  Its interesting to see an object meant for cutting used in such a way that it became an instrument like that. Up until this point the majority of the pieces he had shown had to do with sound.  What I also liked about some of his pieces like the keyboard lemons and the “Performance for iPhones” was the intensity of the noise, and especially for the iPhone piece was all of the lights.  This was a very in your face type of piece that was appealing.  Aside from almost falling off of a table the lecture was good and interesting, every piece that was shown kept your attention because you didn’t know what to expect.