Artists Vs. Museum: The Funk Shall Prevail

Artists Vs. Museum: The Funk Shall Prevail

SFAI’s contemporary practice class was given the opportunity to install an art piece at the

Berkeley Art Museum for the Spring 2014 semester. The students chose to pursue an

installation based on Funk culture. Though the students shared a passion for the inspiration for the piece, they faced many challenges in executing a piece reflective of this love for all things funky, due to typical collaboration misunderstandings and mostly, the controlling looming presence of the museum staff. Many students wanted to create a piece displaying the insane, glam, and explosive side of Funk culture. Whereas, many students wanted to explore the more intimate, “just got home from work,” groove side of Funk culture. Through many rough patches, outbursts, and clarification of common communication based misunderstandings, the students were able to create a funkadelic contraption of an installation, which merged the best of both sides of Funk. An explosion of hanging colorful, shiny fabrics were muted by a plain white tarp hiding the path of the suspended fabric.

Though the satisfaction of completing the collaborative project, with so many diverse and

outspoken minds, was one to bask in, the experience as a whole raised many questions about the credibility of the museum industry. BAM is located in an elaborate, massive architectural masterpiece. The museum consumes so much space, with great potential for experimentation and exploration in curatorial projections. However, the museum policies are overly strict. For example, one project director was scolded for simply making a charcoal drawing on one of the walls, and great turmoil arose with plainly trying to find a ladder to use. These bureaucratic museum policies severely hindered progress with the collaboration. One is led to question the true motifs of the museum’s administration: Is their mission really to educate and engage people with the art world? Do they really possess the power to define the artistic process and impose arbitrary restrictions to distance the artist from their work? In the future, will it become a place of innovation and critical thinking or will it remain a washed out skeleton of an establish with no meaty artworks, and on that note, no balls?

-Natasha

The Nothing: Day 2

Day 2: Instillation at the Berkeley Art Museum

It was one o'clock and I was running late for the installment of our fabulous piece at the museum. When I finally arrived there were four people trying to pull together this installation. I was excited with the progress of the piece when I got there and the conversation that was going around. Collaboration is a challenge, but I thought we worked very well in the long run. For the next two hours we got going on our piece. Our original idea for the piece was to install this huge funk explosion on the wall from corner to corner. We wanted the tarp to be the background of the piece and install all of these funky objects on top of it and have the piece coming out at you. When communicating with my fellow collaborators I was informed of the restrictions we had for our piece. Apparently we couldn't bring in a latter nor draw on the wall or paint. We also couldn't put holes in the tarp. We were a little set back and it was a bit of a loss, but I knew we could pull the piece together and make it great. What was on the wall when I got there were a bunch of silver and gold reflective paper and a few funky records. It was a start, but I knew from the restrictions it was getting a bit frustrating. After observing what was already applied on the wall and how the group was feeling, I started throwing out ideas.  I thought it would be a cool idea to hang the tarp on the wall to bring it back to the "minimal" instead of the tarp exposing this "funk". It was time to put away the funk. This was an original idea of mine to only put the tarp on the wall and to hang it in an organic and free formed way. I thought that we had made progress with the "funk" but it was time to cover some of it up. We hung it up very loosely and organically so it came out at you. It was looking very cool. This white tarp that billowed out at you and the funk pouring from the bottom. It was looking AMAZING! I thought that the piece was complete, but some of the other students thought it would be an interesting idea to put some of the colorful, reflective glass below the instillation. And wow! That is exactly what it needed. The lights in the room hit the red, reflective glass so nicely and made a beautiful glow on the wall. It also reflected off of the other reflective paper that was in the piece. I was so satisfied. We cleaned up, took the piece in, and went home.

As I have said, collaboration is a challenge, especially when there are so many talented people with brilliant ideas. I really did enjoy collaborating with this class and thought that we pulled together an amazing and tasteful piece.

Acid House Is Over

We finished it. We came with the plan to the museum, but it had to be put aside. Before our eyes there was not a garbage, it was quite a good things which we couldn't spoil in any way. And not all things were permitted to us. We couldn't draw, couldn't glue, etc. So we had to create a new idea, forgetting the original. We could use a thing, but at the same time couldn't touch it. As a result we began to built something from nothing. We added things which we didn't saw and didn't thought to add before. I was only a little help with the creation, but even because of that small help I already am proud of myself. I am proud that I opened and broadened my mind, I saw a new side of how you can create. People who remained up to the end were able to make the final touches, which is important. Thanks to them, visitors of the Berkeley Art museum will see the end result of what we were working. By the end the focus was more going on what "is not there", rather than "what is there"

Not all people can work in a short time. Somebody needs to sit down and think about the idea in ​​calm room, create all the details in the head and only then begin to realize imagination in real life. In our case, everyone had to work quickly and spontaneously. The old idea does not fit? Well, we immediately can think of another one! And begin to implement it on the go. Something does not work? Don’t worry! We can replace this and it will succeed. The tension was really great, everyone were tired and exhausted. But it's done.

Summing up the results of our collaborative project with the class purely for myself, I want to note the following:

1. I am a person by nature that is not conflicting and I usually like to work in team with someone. Always at heart I felt a certain enthusiasm from work with several people. So this time it was something incredibly overwhelming. So many interesting and creative people who have helped me to see things more widely and broader my horizons. For this I can only be grateful to the class and teachers

2. Yes, as I already said, my outlook and vision of the world and situations has changed somewhat. And, probably, still continues to change and long time will continue to do that. I will honestly say, that before I have never loved installations and in the majority of them didn't understand the meaning (or maybe I didn't want to understand? who knows) But this project not simply forced to open my eyes and look at the creation of installations in a different light, but also invited into his arms, as if telling «See, it isn't so bad in this world and you can create and embody the most craziest ideas you have» it was truly an unforgettable experience which absorbed me with the head for the first time. It makes me feel out of place, and in any other Universe … and I like this feeling.

3. ALWAYS check your email twice. Sometimes stucke in the web-network with your work email may not reach the addressee. And then what? And nothing, haha :) 

For everyone else? 

It seems to me that it helped some of us to better understand each other, to learn to hear other voices and to take them into account. In team work you stop being a single and an individual, everyone have to become more patient and restrained. This is what we learn from the collective work

The Nothing: Day 1

I would first like to say that this has been an incredible opportunity to be apart of a collaboration with you all at the Berkeley Art Museum.

These are a collection of my thoughts, ideas, and progress working on the piece for the Berkeley Art Museum:

Day 1:

I didn't know what to expect of the Berkeley Art Museum. I had never been there before and frankly I didn't expect it to surpass my expectation. Wow... what an amazing building and center. The architecture of that building is simple and tasteful. When hearing that they were going to change locations made me sad... but oh well life happens. Anyway, The Possible is the current exhibition at the museum. It is an experimental exhibition that encourages multiple mediums to come together and create in a collaborative manner. Walking through the exhibition, I felt very inspired and motivated for the piece that we were going to install in The Something.

As we made our way through the levels of the building we reached The Something. At first I wasn't sure if the pieces that were created in the space were still in progress or finished. What had been installed in the space was a clear box that held many glittery and "funky" items, a large projection of typical mac book wallpaper, and a huge tarp that looked like a circus tent. I was very pleased with the pieces, but noticing all the extra material lying around I knew that the piece was not complete. There we met with Zina, one of the main artists in this collaborative project, where she introduced us to the materials we could use, the space itself, and the meaning behind this addition to The Possible. She also talked a bit on her experience with collaboration in all aspects. She told us that one of the members of her collaborative group threw this big white tarp over almost all materials that they had been working with. In collaborative groups it can sometimes get a bit challenging and some firm choice and direction might be called for. Zina was expressing how with so many extravagant thoughts and ideas it sometimes gets overwhelming and it might lead to thinking about the minimal.

Side note:
At that moment I knew I wanted to incorporate the tarp in some way. Even the tarp being the piece itself. To be honest, at that point I was a bit burnt on the idea of this "funky" instillation because I thought it was turning into a more extravagant idea then I thought... So at that moment I took a step back and brainstorm on a minimal, yet powerful and slightly funky, piece.

When Zina was finished laying out the rules, we were free to have at it! Immediately we started dressing up in masks, sparkley material, and cloth. Towards the end we had gathered all of the materials that we thought would be necessary to make a successful and funky piece.

At this point, I was very excited to get going on our awesome collaboration and be apart of this "funky" instillation at the Berkeley Art Museum.

Stratego: The Big Bang

Collaboration: the action of working with someone to produce or create something.

For class we were asked to bring in a found object, off the streets of San Francisco, to bring into class to do an on the spot collaborative piece. Between everyone in the class, there were some very interesting materials. Some of these materials were sticks, flowers, a McDonalds french fry cup, a book, newspaper, a plastic bag, some cigarette butts, and the board game Stratego. We laid out out findings and started going for it. As we started working with our found objects it was clear that the Stratego game would be the "canvas" of our piece. Almost instantly we started to assemble the pieces from the game. We cut out faces from the newspaper and started to paste them onto the board game pieces. It started to feel like a community. Using goofy cut out words and diverse people from the newspaper, our community started to grow.  Alongside this "community" a sculpture was being assembled out of the sticks and flowers that was brought it. It was nature and community hand in hand and looked great. But we were a bit torn on what exactly we wanted our concept to be. We knew it could be bigger and better. Somehow we decided that we were going to destroy this community with the "distractive" found objects. That was the McDonalds cup and cigarette butts. We took the plastic bag, filled it with all fifty of the butts, the McDonalds cup, and water to make the "bomb". This is when our project turned more into a performance. Out in the quad on campus, we laid down a tarp and on top of that went a white cloth, white paper, and our community. After reassembling our community three times from the wind knocking it down, we were finally ready to set off our bomb. From the amphitheater (about two and a half stories tall) the count down began. Three, two, one.... splat! A bullseye! The nasty concoction destroyed our community and pieces flew everywhere. It was quite the sight. What was left of the community was this white cloth that now held beautiful dirty markings, the smell of wet cigarette butts, and collaged pieces of newspaper. A white flag of surrender? We let the flag blow in the wind to dry. Finally, all that was left of the piece was this white hanging flag.

I thought that this collaboration was a huge success. I think that it is very challenging to work with many people on a project in such a short amount of time with very minimal materials. We worked very well together and pulled together something that was interesting and fun. I felt like EVERYONE was solid about participating. I think it is interesting how we built this complex community, only to destroy it with even more complexity, but then finish with a piece that is so minimal and elegant. I congratulate everyone in the class for this collaboration. Cheers!

Mothers From Another Mother

~What is a mother? I mean what does it really mean to be a mother? Is it to give birth to something? Maybe to take care of someone else's something can make you a mother. Did all the whimpering crocodilians think of Steve Erwin as there mother? I think so. Maybe to bear a relation like that of a mother, as in being the origin, source, or protector. If that's so, then we are all the Mother in this amazing collaboration. The Creators, the Originators, the Protectors, the SOURCE. We are the artistic life line flowing through the random material given to us by the world around us. Without us the material is just dead, lifeless, and dirt. Stepped on and ignored was the material until an artist, a creator, a mother, comes by and puts life into it. Its not hard to put life into something. All it takes is a positive touch, maybe even a negative touch. Depending on how you want your child to come out, your touch will be crucial to your work of art. Move forward with it, take your art to experimental level, have fun, and be happy. What you put into your child is what you get out.

 ~Here is 54 different kinds of ways your child can come out: Great, marvelous, positive, satisfactory, valuable, wonderful, happy, satisfied, superb, nice, pleasing, rad, prime, gnarly, gratifying, agreeable, disagreeable, expected, inferior, insignificant, OK, ordinary, poor, unacceptable, unhelpful, unimportant, unnoteworthy, unsatisfactory, worthless, minor, detestable, evil, fake, forged, immoral, inadequate, incompetent, inconsequential, mean, misbehaving, noxious, intoxicated, rotten, sinful, tainted, unpleasant, unreal, unreliable, unskilled, unsuitable, unvirtuous, vicious, vile, wicked.

~Here are those words in french: Grande, merveilleux, positif, satisfaisant, précieux, merveilleux, heureux, satisfait, superbe, gentil, agréable, rad, premier, noueux, gratifiant, agréable, désagréable, prévu, inférieur, insignifiant, OK, ordinaire, pauvre, inacceptable, inutile, sans importance, unnoteworthy, insatisfaisante, sans valeur, mineur, détestable, mal, faux, faux, immoral, inadéquat, incompétent, sans conséquence, moyenne, mauvaise conduite, nuisible, ivre, pourri, pécheur, contaminé, désagréable, irréel, fiable, non qualifié, ne convient pas, non-vertueux, vicieux, vil, méchant.

~Here they are in Arabic: عظيم، رائع، إيجابية ومرضية، قيمة، رائع، سعيدة، راضية، رائعة، جميلة، والسرور، راد، رئيس الوزراء، نرلي، مما يثلج الصدر، مقبولة، طيفين، يتوقع، أقل شأنا، تافهة، OK، العاديين والفقراء وغير مقبول وغير مفيد، غير مهم، unnoteworthy، غير مرضية، لا قيمة لها، قاصر، مقيت، والشر، وهمية، مزورة وغير أخلاقي، غير كافية، غير كفء، غير منطقي، يعني، الفاسقة، الضارة، مخمورا، الفاسد، خاطئين، الملوث، غير سارة، غير واقعي، لا يمكن الاعتماد عليها، غير المهرة، وغير مناسب، unvirtuous، مفرغة، حقير، الأشرار.

~Here they are in spanish: Genial, maravilloso, positivo, satisfactorio, valioso, maravilloso, feliz, satisfecho, magnífico, bonito, agradable, rad, prima, gnarly, gratificante, agradable, desagradable, que se espera, inferior, insignificante, OK, ordinario, pobre, inaceptable, inútil, sin importancia, unnoteworthy, insatisfactoria, sin valor, menor de edad, detestable, mal, falso, falso, inmoral, inadecuado, incompetente, intrascendente, medio, mal comportamiento, nocivos, intoxicado, podrido, pecaminoso, manchado, desagradable, irreal, poco fiable, no calificada, inadecuado, no virtuoso, vicioso, vil, malvado.

 

What you think while creating your work is how it turns out. All that we are is a product of what we have thought. Pick and choose the words you like and think about them throughout your creative process. Watch how your child mirrors the thoughts you create.