I use to analyze different parts of art such as paintings, sculptures, and pop-art in my home country. Now, I got a chance to try myself in different culture, fortunately I’m looking forward to start. I really like the first lesson of arts appreciation, by our teacher Mrs. Hagit Barkai. She has his own method of conducting the lesson, which makes the lesson really interesting and attractive. The most valuable piece of the presentation on my opinion is “Package” by Christo.
Christo is American artist, who was born as Christo Alexandr Jovacheff in Bulgaria. He and his wife work together for many years on different projects. Christo and his wife Jeanne-Claude were born on the same day. Christo works with wrapped objects and packages. The first attempt was in 1961 when Christo transforms familiar objects into ambivalent presence, sometimes rendering them unrecognizable and often raising doubts about their past, present and future identify and function. In their more epic endeavors, Christo and Jeanne-Claude question the relationship of art to both the urban and natural environments. Clothing-as-as package touches most of us every day. A gift-wrapped object is guaranteed to elicit curiosity, promise of a surprise withheld. Concealment also implies preservation and, in some cases, suppression and censorship. Egyptian mummies tell us that wrapping is related to death and the presentation of matter for the afterlife. Package is a commonplace object, which change the life history of arts. All kinds of services and information: there are “financial packages” in banking and all-inclusive” insurance packages”.
Christo seems to have hit upon the idea of wrapping not through any preconception about how his art should look, but rather through the more arduous of making sculpture out of common found materials. It is significant that the bottles , cans, boxes and barrels have one thing in common: all are containers to begin with.
All works of Chriato create ambitious images of freedom. Cans and few bottles are only the forms we can recognize, which bound with rope. Christo, however, does not seem to conceive of wrapping as an act that falls just short of transformation. On the other hand, the packages are exactly like actual objects: they occupy their normal space, in contrast to the ideal, virtual space occupied by any figurative sculpture that is not the same size as it is in real life and that, in addition may occupy a niche or be otherwise “distanced” . On the other hand, Christo does aesthetically “distance” his objects by wrapping partial transformation in which mundane materials retain the same identity while assuming a new meaning. Finally , “Package” by Christo is made of general materials which makes it value more attractive.
Everything can be a art work, even thought it is a "Package". Do you have any pictures can show us? -Li-
ReplyDeleteSorry to be responding so late. I have been studying for my midterms.
ReplyDeleteI was glad to see pictures of this artist work. Artists like all of us, are influenced by the time and the place of their existence. Future people will get a sense of this civilization's “leftovers,” based on how common found object art is. I suppose that part of the artists job is to help us psychologically process our surroundings and in this culture, that is all of the stuff that we are bombarded with. At the very least, they are doing us the favor of of saying "Look at all this stuff! Why is it here? What do we do with it? Toss it? It still has value, it does! ... Doesn't it?" It makes me laugh.
Often, the response of the public will be "Well, that was obvious, why is this stuff in a museum?" and that is valid and true but I believe that, somebody has to state the obvious that "There is a lot of stuff." in a public and official way, because it is psychology soothing for our collective selves. We would go crazy if we didn't get this kind of public validation of this common experience.
There are many "materials" "objects" "waste" that have become the "evidence" of our civilization isn't there?
After considering all of this, I find that there is something heart breaking about this work,...he is trying to use our discards, create value by wrapping up these things up like little gifts.
I agree with you that he is manipulating our perception of the objects that we are familiar with by triggering our sense of wonder in covering them up. In creating a sense of wonder, he is changing perception of these commonly encountered objects.
You gave many examples of what "covering" or "wrapping" signifies, but I feel as if you would be more comfortable if you scaled back your examples into simpler concepts. It would benefit you to ask yourself “What is it that I want to say?” and let your essay and examples grow from your own authentic understanding
for example:
"Egyptian mummies tell us that wrapping is related to death and the presentation of matter for the afterlife."
It is true that we have a intuitive sense that a covering or wrapping is used as preservation in many areas: secrets are covered to preserve them from exposure, books and objects are preserved from the the elements, food is preserved from spoilage, it is only because we know a little bit about Egyptian death culture that we know that the wrapped mummies are related to the presentation of matter (specifically) for the afterlife... Historical information is also needed to know context is needed to make this conclusion so I would have left that example out.
Lisa Pearson
Slav, it's good to see that you did some reading and I am glad that you enjoyed the class about Christo. When you are citing someone, state clearly who this is, and then what your opinion about it is and why you think so. Before you do that, it is hard to respond to this.
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