Event Blog #3 - Fowler - Singular Spaces

Jo Farb Hernandez's collection of photographs from various artists highlights something we have talked about a lot this quarter.  Art is a naturally occurring practice across mediums, cultures, and resources.  We have looked at those in all fields and societies from those with little access to technology to those whose art comes out of state of the art laboratories.  Hernandez's work highlights the organic nature of the creative process in less developed countries.  

What I really got from this series of photographs is that the creative mind will use whatever resources at its disposal to create.  The act of creation is the same across all collective consciousness, whether it be an artist using a Scanning Tunneling Microscope to write UCLA in individual atoms or a rural, illiterate field worker finding thousands of clam shells and using them to create detailed patterns and designs both outside and inside his house.  When we talk about ArtSci we are really describing how creativity latches onto anything available to an artist and this collection of unique and detached folk art sends this message clearly.  

According to Hernandez regarding her work she says many of the creators of these remote pieces don't even consider themselves artists as many have another trade and simply create for creation's sake which is interesting to think about.  Many of the creators of these spectacular monuments do this for no pay in their free time; they simply have an urge to build and design.  This practical art is mixing the organic form with inorganic structures as well as creating structures with organic materials and the concepts are universal.  

The sign which is pictured below encompasses this idea well.  "Art is a poison that forces you to follow it until death" This sentence rings true for so many we have encountered throughout this class.  We have looked at the most extreme cases of art, such as Orlan's radical transformations, in which artists have a need for expression through creation and stop at nothing to spread their messages.  When a creative brain latches onto an idea, creation follows.  

"Art is a poison that forces you to follow it until death"

This series of pictures brings to public viewing a medium of art that without Hernandez's efforts, would be unappreciated by large numbers of people.  This art however is personal in nature and is created for the sake of creating and to see that on display, however unintended, is rewarding.  

Works Cited

"About Seymour Rosen." SPACES Blog RSS. SPACES, n.d. Web. June 2015. <http://www.spacesarchives.org/about/seymour-rosen/>.

"Department of Art and Art History." Jo Farb Hernandez. San Jose State Univeristy, n.d. Web. June 2015. <http://www.sjsu.edu/art/community/faculty/arthistory/jofarbhernandez/>.

"Fowler OutSpoken Lecture: Jo Farb Hernández on Extraordinary Spanish Art Environments." Fowler Museum at UCLA. Fo, n.d. Web. June 2015. <http://www.fowler.ucla.edu/events/fowler-outspoken-lecture-jo-farb-hern%C3%A1ndez-extraordinary-spanish-art-environments>.

"Singular Spaces: From the Eccentric to the Extraordinary in Spanish Art Environments." Fowler Museum at UCLA. Fowler Museum, n.d. Web. June 2015. <http://fowler.ucla.edu/exhibitions/singular-spaces-eccentric-extraordinary-spanish-art-environments>.