Monday, January 31, 2011

Snow Week

Photos I took downtown during Snow Week.


More Than Muses

Last semester I invited some of my instructors to come and see my final installation of For Colored Girls Only now titled Myself When I'm Great.  My History of Photography instructor was one of the people I invited, she wasn't able to make it but I sent her images from it and she loved it.  She asked me if I wanted to display my work in the More Than Muses Feminist Art Gallery in the Women's Study department and of course I accepted!  So this traveling show will be up till March 25, 2011 and I will be on the calender of events for Women's History Month so come check me out!  Here are some images of the space, it's a more intimate space that I really dig.  You can also check out my last big install of this piece here Myself When I'm Great


Monday, January 24, 2011

Denver Big Air

So this past weekend Bryan and I did dinner and a lil bar hopping downtown (even though I am the only one that drinks) and it was very fun btw!  On our way to 3014 on Colfax we noticed this massive ramp in the middle of downtown Denver between the court house and Civic Center Park and snow machines blowing snow everywhere.  We soon realized it was the ramp for the snowboard and ski competitions we keep hearing about on the news and sports radio.  It is Mile High Snow Week and the event is called  Denver Big Air  Denver Big Air presented by Sprint, is a two-day international ski and snowboard competition that will kick off Mile High Snow Week and the SnowSports Industries America Snow Show. Opening night, Tuesday, Jan. 25, will feature the Nature Valley Big Air Challenge, a skiing big air event showcasing some of the best male skiers in the world. Day two, Wednesday, Jan. 26, will feature the LG FIS World Cup Snowboard Big Air, a World Cup sanctioned event that boasters an international roster of the top male snowboarders from around the globe.
I always have my camera so I was fortunate to be able to capture some awesome images of what is to come. 






Wednesday, January 12, 2011

Takashi Murakami


The combination of red and blue with a creature that has long been thought as a symbol of one’s destiny is my attempt to reaffirm my devotion to art - the creative process for the paintings resembled a prayer offering.
--Takashi Murakami
Gagosian Gallery is pleased to present new paintings by Takashi Murakami. This is his first solo exhibition in Rome.
Two epic paintings - Dragon in Clouds – Red Mutation and Dragon in Clouds – Indigo Blue – each comprise nine panels and measure eighteen meters long. Cloud- and-dragon paintings, known as Unryūzu, were also key references for Soga Shōhaku, an eighteenth century Japanese artist whose eccentric and daring visual inventiveness has been a great inspiration for Murakami. The distinctive representations from traditional Japanese mythology allowed Shōhaku to conjure a fantastic world where overloaded ink drips verged on abstraction, transforming the dragon from more conventional depictions into a vivid, animated monster. Unlike the dragon’s dark associations in Western iconography, the Japanese dragon - an amalgam of the Buddhist iconography that originated in India before reaching China and then Japan - is considered a symbol of good fortune and optimism. Several Buddhist and Shinto temples in Japan are designated as dragon shrines that denote the creature’s exalted status. 


Murakami is one of my favorite artist, I love his colors and the size of his work. He is one of the main reasons I work on a large scale.  When I first started college I began studying him and his choice of colors were similar to what I am drawn to and what I tend to use when I work.  The bigger the better is what I always say!

Monday, January 10, 2011

To: Januari

The OC, Cali Love

We frequently fly out to Cali to see my sis so this past Thursday, January 6th my older sister Tin and I flew into Orange County to go see our other sis Januari for her birthday which was on Friday the 7th.  When we got to the OC we stopped by the grocery store to pick up food for that night and breakfast in the morning.  All the stores in California sell liquor so we were able to by breakfast and mimosas.  We had a plan of waking up the next day and eating our gourmet eggs, soy sausage for me and regular sausage for Tin.  Our plans were derailed from 9am the next morn till 1pm because Jan's car needed new brakes.  Not to be discouraged we got the breaks fixed we went back to the house (they had just moved and it was gorgeous by the way)I fired up the hookah I cooked Tin and I awesome egg whites with grilled tomatoes, tomato pesto sauce and a hint of pepper jack cheese, it was great!  We topped it all off with Mimosas.  The weekend went great hanging out till 6 in the morning and hanging out with friends playing The Michael Jackson Experience on Wii and kicking ass at it too!  I didn't get a lot of shots on this trip because I was on extreme relax mode, maybe more next time.
Mimosas and Hookah
A view from the walk we took on the 7th




Thursday, January 6, 2011

Graff Lab, Los Angeles, California

These are some images I took at the Graff Lab in Los Angeles, California.  It is a a place where the kids can go and hang out to stay out of trouble.  When we got to the Graff Lab we were fortunate to meet the director of the Lab and he told us about the place and L.A. Gang Tours.  The gang tours are intresting.  When I first heard of the L.A. Gang Tours I pictured a bus full of at risk teens being educated on why they should choose a different way of life.  My sister that lives in Cali and my boyfriend and I actually arrived at the Lab when a Gang Tour where going on, it was nothing I expected.  It was a bus full suburban middle class white women and their suburban middle class children, it seemed odd, a spectacle if you ask me.  I wondered what could they have possibly told these people? Where they taking them around town to places where notorious gang members were murdered so they can "oooh and awww"?  I don't know.  They even allowed the people to take pictures with the tour guides who were all former gang members.  Maybe they do have at risk kids they take on the tours I just wasn't there at the right time.  
Over all it is a faboulos place and I absolutley LOVE it and I want to visit it everytime I visit California and some day I want to be a contributor (not as a graffiti artist).  The graffiti artist contribute something like $20 or more and then they can come and paint on the walls, the walls are repainted on every so many months for the new contributing artist.
The director even told us personally his plans on the biggest Michael Jackson mural.  One thing I always remember he told us about why he was doing it was not because MJ was the King of Pop, but because he helped so many children in his lifetime.  He talked about the good things MJ did and how much money MJ gave to so many organizations.  
I think that is a dope way to remember someone.


 







Wednesday, January 5, 2011

Natural color

These are some un-manipulated photos I took with the exception of this first image, I used a solar lens filter.
 These two images were taken on the same day, one at the front of the house and one at the back of the house.  It seemed as if the sky was on fire.  Great color!
Images taken from two different days of the court house downtown denver.

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Mikkey Halsted - Field Nigga Blues Ft. Freddie Gibbs (OFFICIAL VIDEO) +M...

I love this song and video.