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Today was a better day in the studio. I often use studio time as time to listen to local bands on myspace and today was filled with Imaginary Cities - a local band filled with fun local people. I've attached this video because my friend and old roommate Alex Campbell (the guy in the plaid shirt walking down the hall in the beginning) plays keys in it. Also while I was checking out their band photos I noticed that they did a photoshoot in front of my old sculpture prof, Gordan Reeve's, Agassiz Ice sculpture at Assinaboine Park!
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Ahh... Winnipeg is small :) Enjoy this little diddy filmed in a bathroom!
And here are before/after photos I promised of the painting I sabotaged earlier this week. One of my thesis advisors came into my studio today and told me he liked where it was going which was a confidence boost considering the last time I touched it and covered 3/4 of it with cotton candy pink/blue, I had that "What am I doing - is my hand possessed?" feeling.
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| Before sabotage |
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| After sabotage - still very much in progress |
I am simultaneously working on a new idea I had yesterday based on the breast milk cheese that has been all over CBC, The National Post, and the Globe and Mail the past couple of days. Mirium Simun who is a Harvard student in New York has been making human cheese from a combination of breast milk from consenting women in the New York area and goat's milk. Although using breast milk for consumption is unusual, it is not a new concept. I think most people's initial reactions to the thought of cheese made from breast milk is disgust but I believe this is because society chooses to see breasts as primarily sexual and secondarily functional - and only functional for infants. A mother's milk is full of necessary nutrients for their offspring but is not actually natural for grown animals or humans to consume as adults because we don't need these nutrients anymore. Hence why so many people are lactose intolerant. We've been consuming another specie's milk that was meant for their offspring for so long that we have forced animals such as cows into domestication and often unfavorable living environments, while destroying our environment at the same time. The main reason why I was initially intrigued by these articles was as a vegan, I thought about my reasons for being vegan, and if the human cheese were not mixed with goat's milk, and was completely comprised of human milk, in theory I would be ok eating it. There is consent from the human's providing it and it is a readily available resource. Imagine if we had done this years ago - there would be less of an 'ick' factor when thinking of breasts as functional, maybe breasts would become less sexualized, we wouldn't be in such an environmental predicament, and these animals wouldn't be injected with chemicals and kept in tiny stalls to spend their lives producing milk for us. Imagine that. I realize I went on a bit of a rant there but I feel it's necessary to explain the concept of my new piece. I am making a 'water' fountain that will supply breast milk. I feel that by creating something that connects to the wall like a water fountain will give the idea that this substance is readily available and by sculpting the women as reclining nudes it blurs the line between sexual/functional. Here is the first nude I sculpted out of clay today - the milk will be coming out of her breast and will trickle into the 'trough' (for lack of a better word) between her arm and her torso. This is probably one of the weirdest things I've ever thought of to make but I'm really excited about it!
And in other completely unrelated news, I took some photos during the painting class I taught yesterday.
The class is 'Abstract Landscapes in Acrylic' so for the first assignment I have everyone combining images of landscapes (for example, a country setting combined with penguins and glaciers) while referencing a contemporary abstract landscape painter. Some of the painters being referenced include...
be sure to check out this awesome video of Robert painting 'Nevada'.
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