Today in lesson, we were able to really discuss as a group and as individuals what art is to us. A girl in my group said the quote above and that really got me thinking about the process of creating art.

For me, art has to evoke something. When I look at art, I want to be able to understand, sympathise, empathise or simply enjoy the visual in front of me.

I put it like this: art is what you make of it. It is easy to call yourself an artist but if said art does not evoke any sense of emotion, can it really be called art?

For me, the longer the lasting effects of a piece has on the audience, the better the art. Take for example the work of Andy Goldsworthy, who creates installations made from the natural world. Part of their poignancy the installations only last as long as nature allows it to, and in the process of decay, the visual of the piece alters.

 ‘Andy Goldsworthy is a brilliant British artist who collaborates with nature to make his creations. Besides England and Scotland, his work has been created at the North Pole, in Japan, the Australian Outback, in the U.S’ (Caddy 2014)

 

(Goldworthy, 2010)

 

 

 

 

Look at the reverse of this, sometimes a grotesque way of creating art results in something that can be deemed as aesthetically pleasing and almost beautiful. As an example, I would like to draw attention to an artist, Millie Brown, who creates her pieces through drinking coloured milk and then regurgitating the colourful liquid on to a canvas. These are some of the works that have come from this practice.

You could argue that the actual act of regurgitation is art in itself, but referring to my previous statement, how can anyone find this process aesthetically pleasing!?

Food for thought…

NOT to be regurgitated…

 

Cited Texts

Milliebrownofficial.tumblr.com, (2014). MILLIE BROWN // ARTIST. [online] Available at: http://milliebrownofficial.tumblr.com/ [Accessed 19 May. 2014].

Bibliography: Caddy, J. (2014). Morning Earth Connects & Celebrates Arts & Ecology. [online] Morning-earth.org. Available at: http://www.morning-earth.org/ [Accessed 25 May. 2014].

Class Exercise, during which we were given the opening:
Lights go black, chair extreme down left. A very tight spotlight comes up on it, from the side. A voice is heard…

From here, my hands began to write faster than I could think! This exercise opened my eyes to how creative you can be if you let your mind runaway with itself. Although the outcome was a monologue of a dark nature and tone, I felt I had written something that could really be developed in to something that could eventually be performed. Here’s what I came up with:

 

Lights go black, chair extreme down left. A very tight spotlight comes up on it, from the side. A voice is heard…

Lights go black, chair extreme down left. A very tight spotlight comes up on it, from the side. A voice is heard on stage as the lights go up on the chair.

 

Voice:

That’s where she sat. The last time I saw her, she was different.It was as if someone had removed any positivity from her thoughts. Through the reflection on her face, I could see what she could see. The bleak reality that things  weren’t about to get better any time soon. She turned to me and asked with her eyes wide, what can I do? How can I make this better?

The sound of flatlining continues throughout the rest of the speech, because of this, the voice struggles to be heard and is forced to strain the retelling of the story.

I hesitated. The worst thing I could have done. Because in that moment of hesitation, the reflection of my face, she  could see what I couldn’t see – a way out. A way to make it better, to make her better.

The voice stops.

Lighting change, up on to a figure, on a higher platform, blue light. Figure stands looking down as if ready to jump.

It was me who had to tell her parents. I was waiting at the hospital, with a mind in disarray. Was this my fault?

Mrs. Croft walked towards me, removing her gloves, cheeks pink from the cold outside or from running towards her daughter’s fate. I began to rehearse what to say in my head. Do I admit fault? Do I tell a mother that because of a slight moment’s hesitation from her daughter’s best friend, her precious baby girl took her own life? As she made her way through the ghostly hospital hall, she saw it reflected on my face. The despair or guilt, which one more prominent I am unsure.

What happened next, was not to be expected. As Mrs Croft registered my facial expression, what I saw reflected in her face, was not that of despair, bereavement or loss, but relief.
She sighed, stood still and in the softest sweetest voice, she says, – what a shame. She moved past me, redressing her cold hands in the gloves removed just moments ago, confusion clouded my vision as she added ‘I suppose it had to happen at some point’.

Rage is the only thing I remember next. They say their are seven stages of grief – for me, anger came first but in the most unexpected of ways.

Actor pulls out a book, titled ‘the seven stages of grief’

____________________________________

 

 Texts Explored

Recover From Grief, (2014). 7 STAGES OF GRIEF. [online] Available at: http://www.recover-from-grief.com/7-stages-of-grief.html [Accessed 21 Feb. 2014].