Artist: Kiyomi Fukui

Exhibition: 1000 Paper Crane

Media: drawing, crafting, using intellectual applications to forms of art, paper

Website: http://Kiyomifukui.com

Instagram: kiyomimiz

Kiyomi Fukui is a print maker and former student at CSULB. Some fun facts about her is that her favorite food is Japanese noodles. She is fascinated by spiritual connections that can be discovered and revealed through art in a healing way. During a live interview she mentioned her parents lived in Korea but that they didn’t actually speak it the language. She has an emotional relationship with her father that goes beyond something that she can just skim over. For Kiyomi, her fathers journey in life was very significant. He had to change his identity and undergo many transitions to fit into society. This was something she later understood in life and could relate with her father.

In this exhibition, Kiyomi formed paper cranes in honor of her father. They were traditionally made to tell someone you are thinking of them, typically when they were ill. The cranes are placed along a narrow wooden shelf that outlines the perimeter of the white walls. There is not much color involved but the paper and the writing on it make it seem old-fashioned, like something of the past. Frozen in time, cards, messages, emotions, stored away in those paper cranes. The cranes are folded crisply but placed mounted on top of one another to reveal the abundance. The size is pretty small and invites you to zoom in for a more detailed observation.

As mentioned earlier, the main source of motivation behind the exhibit is to achieve some sort of therapeutic benefit. She has had many difficulties understanding her father and that is something she wants to heal from. The intention behind the project is to convey emotion and allow them to be felt. This artist creates more ephemeral art that comes with deterioration and everything else nature decides. She is not afraid of embracing her pain and struggles if it means getting to make the most out of something.

This artist is extremely enlightened and I agree with many of her concepts. I do believe that pain can be beauty and that sometimes that pain involves letting go. This idea of creating ephemeral art is more about the experience and the message, rather than the final result or physical qualities. I think it’s such a beautiful thing to expose yourself to your inner discomforts and struggles with the intention of healing. Doing this for yourself and sharing it with others is even more beautiful.

This was my pencil sketch. It was pretty easy but since I knew it wouldn’t be the final product, I sometimes tend to not care what it looks like.

This is the final result. I began with pink because I wanted it to be girly and pretty. The vibrant colors I used were to bring the drawing to life. Simplistic flowers and vines but they make all the difference. I enjoyed this activity because it felt like I was doing an elaborate version of my signature but with way more detail!

Here is me in the aftermath. The place of creation wasn’t as beautiful as what I created haha. Just a typical empty space in the house became my drawing studio.

For this project my idea was honoring the good moments that are very temporary. Eating ice cream brings me so much joy and comfort but when viewed in a broader spectrum it is only a frozen liquid that vanishes on the tongue almost instantly. I used vanilla ice cream and scooped up 3 blobs and put it on a cutting board. I then grabbed a silicone spatula and began to chop at it until it was flat. I liked that I could put the ice cream on a tool my mom would never let me use ordinarily for ice cream. It was more then just scooping ice cream into a bowl. The cutting board gave me the freedom to get messy. We definitely are impacted by ephemeral art and can appreciate the temporary feel to it. Because it is temporary we may value it more than sustainable art. Clean water, air, and land, should remain ephemeral because if it were to remain the same forever it wouldn’t be the beauty that nature is, spontaneous and unique. Everyone can participate in diminishing climate change by recycling, advocating, and taking other precautions. However real change would take a village.

Questions:

-A kiss’ value is not dependent on how long it lasts rather the intention behind it and how you feel towards the other person.

– The action of eating a great meal should last about 15 -20 minutes in my opinion. A great meal should consist of balanced items on your plate and it should take you a couple minutes in order to have chewed everything correctly and thoroughly

– I would hope that works of art could last forever, that way it is preserved as best as it could be for people to be able to see it even when we are no longer here. A work of art should last at least a couple of centuries.

– I believe in marriage so I think that it should last the couples lifetime, that is if the married couple is happy with each other and are not faced with divorce because things didn’t work out.

– I believe a century is an adequate amount of how long a human life should last. A century is a very long time and I think eventually we will have fulfilled our time on this earth and will have to depart to introduce new lives.

In this search, my main theme was fantasy. I know virtual worlds may already be categorized as that but I wanted to focus on concepts that were far from my reality. I chose 3 completely distinct types of artwork the first being a virtual female that’s Instagram is @jayaani_. This first artists seems to post pictures of her with her husband, child, friends, modeling, etc. Although this is similar to our world, the flawless depiction she shows is too good to be true. The second artist is Bobby Chiu who’s Instagram is @digitalbobert, this artist reminded me of Alice in Wonderland, which was always an escape form reality for me as a child. The third artist’s Instagram is @naylavrbh who creates art that seems very early 2000’s and was very fantastic.

This is @jayaani_. These Barbie like figures scream fantasy to me. The perfect body, perfect life, all resembles something like a movie or a story to me. I do like that this artist included details like the in-n-our logo to make this person come to life.

This @digitalbobert’s artwork. The images are cartoon like and very imaginative. They have played with our emotions with these pictures. The goblin with bunny ears makes him cute, the kitten with flawless grey fur and unique yellow eyes makes him more attractive etc. I love how I get lost in these images. Escaping reality.

This is @naylavrbh artwork. The reason I referred to this art as 2000’s is because of the colors incorporated, it seems that back then neon lights, galaxies, fairy dust, etc was trending and that’s what this reminds me of. This transports you to a magical world.

I found this assignment so wholesome. I have been home with my family so much lately but oddly enough we’ve been doing our own thing, not really spending time together. I sat my sister down and hyped this activity up and demanded she have fun with me . Haha. She instantly gave in, we put on our favorite tunes and started dancing with the markers. The funny part is we thought we were dancing together, in sync, when we finally looked down, we realized it was not synchronized at all. The masterpiece turned out looking like the sound waves of the music. I really enjoyed the freedom of not trying to create anything particularly pleasant or “beautiful” and feeling that the act was still worth doing.

Artist: Mahsa Soroudi

Exhibition: Nature’s Cadence

Media: Succulents

Website: https://www.mahsasoroudi.com/

Instagram: Mahsasoroudi

Mahsa Soroudi is an Iranian artist born into an open-minded and artistic family in Tehran, Iran. She lived in Malaysia for over a year shortly after marrying for exposure and better opportunities. Soon she moved to the states and according to an interview hosted by Glenn Zucman vía YouTube, resides in Southern California where she has expressed she now feels at home and has adapted well to the environment here. Mahsa has a BFA in Visual Communication and attended Azad Art and Architecture University in Tehran in 2006. According to the interview, Mahsa expresses she felt very homesick and out of place in the U.S. and spent a lot of time alone in which she observed her succulents and plants. They revealed more about her life then she expected.

For this exhibition, I was only able to experience it through the interview and the succulents shown. Mahsa explained how they grow, the struggles her plants went through and how they survived. The succulents were all different and unique, of different shapes and sizes. Oneparticular “leaf” that was used as a seed, had a lot more succulent developing then the others and sprouted with purple undertones that seemed more lively then the rest. In the bigger plants shown, one particular stem was facing down and had a brown hue that resembled rotting or damage. The stems didn’t follow perfect lines, rather almost shape shifting tendencies.

This exhibit was about Mahsa’s journey to feeling like she belonged, or whole again. She stated that she believed at one point in her life, that Iran would be the only place she felt at home and struggled a lot to adapt in the U.S. As she watched her succulents also decay with her, she suddenly decided to take care of them and save them. And her efforts were successful, the succulents survived the storm and this convinced her she could too. She observed their roots as inspiration to develop her own. Her interpretations of the plants were very personal and meant so much more to her then most of us could imagine. As an immigrant in a foreign land, she could feel the setbacks and the lack of acceptance or connection to Western culture and other aspects. Mahsa is now thriving just like the succulent in the bigger plant that seemed to have gotten a taste of death, but nevertheless persevered for its journey was not over yet.

As I was listening to the interview between Glenn and Mahsa, I immediately connected what she was saying to the many instances of emptiness that I too have felt at one point in my life. It is something difficult to explain and even more difficult to find answers to. Each person experiences different variations of emptiness and listening to their experience and story is such a beautiful thing. It simply reminds me of how complex humans are and that we can often get caught up in our sentiments and thoughts and truly let them dominate us. The interpretation of her succulents, was totally relatable as she was inspired by their resilience to hardships. I think the motivation she saw in them was actually coming from something deeper in her mind, a hunger for better times, a desire to give life more meaning. What better place can you look for to study life than nature?

“Te Recuerdo” (English Translation: Remembering you)

Te Recuerdo, viendo el azul del cielo (I remember you, gazing at the blue of the sky)

Pienso en ti, y vuelo (I think of you, and I fly)

Vuelo, y atravieso el tiempo, llego a ti (I fly, and surpass time, I arrive to you)

(Interlude)

Y siento, siento que ya te quieres ir (and I can feel you wanting to leave)

Ya no quiero que te angusties y que te asustes solo quiero darte amor y darte todo todo ( I don’t want you to worry or be scared, I only want to give you love and everything)

Dime porque no soy suficiente o por qué prefieres a la mala fama (Tell me why I’m not enough or why you prefer troubled paths)

Si sabes que soy de lo más más puro, que por ti hiciera lo inimaginable, lo sabes y aun así me desprecias y no quedas feliz. ( you know my love comes in the purest form, that for you I’d do the unimaginable, you know and you still don’t appreciate me and remain unhappy.)

Pero en fin, yo nunca pude hacerte ver las cosas como son. Ya no me sirve recordarte con tanto dolor, ya no existes. ( But in the end I couldn’t make you see things the way they really were. It’s useless to remember you with so much plain, you no longer exist.)

Tu existencia fue un regalo tan lindo, y siempre te recordare, con tanto amor. (You’re existence was such a beautiful gift, and I’ll remember you now with so much love)

Te Recuerdo, viendo el azul del cielo (I remember you, gazing at the blue of the sky)

QUESTIONS ANSWERED

This is a song I wrote thinking of a lost loved one. Someone who has died and you could have made happy, you felt they were the one. (Hypothetical situation)

I wrote this song in Spanish because I feel like the words are much easier to romanticize. I began strumming my ukelele and created a sorrowful yet uplifting tune which is where these lyrics were born. This process is difficult because it’s kind of like writing an essay. A lot of thinking and second guessing followed by insecurity and personal judging.

I think this song is successfull at evoking a feeling of pain and nostalgia. I used to write songs all the time, of course only for my ears and I used that practice as a safe space or “destresser” if you will. I missed writing music and this activity certainly sparked positive thoughts about this process. I plan on connecting with music again. However I’m not sure if writing songs is for me however creating music is definitely something I would be apart of; singing and playing instruments, not exactly composing the lyrics.

I have attached a brief sample of my practicing process and me just messing with the notes on the next post. Just to give you the general tune.

In these two pictures I am showing what I usually wear which is baggy clothes that make me comfortable and confident and then my job uniform. I asked my cousins about their impression of me from how I normally dress and then seeing me in my uniform. They noticed that I actually looked like different persons. They said the way I usually dressed made me look nicer and more unique but the uniform made me look neutral and kind of “invisible” in other words, it muted my personality. As I was about to start my shift I decided too ask the customers what they thought of me. Sunday shifts are always slow and customers are very nice to us so a few people did engage and answer my questions, but I didn’t mention to them that it was part of an assignment I just mixed in the questions through a normal conversation. Most people thought I was a lot older and guessed my major was something involving teaching… my major is International Studies. They thought I was a “Ruby” or “Stephanie” and Stephanie is actually my middle name coincidentally 😂. Although the results were not very accurate I actually get wild results from different people all the time. I think everyone views things differently and I’m open to hearing what everyone thinks, it’s quite interesting. I definitely enjoyed hearing what strangers thought about me, it always gives me much to think about but I always take their words with a grain of salt because these assumptions don’t define me. I am definitely more then my sensible beauty.

Artists: Ana Alvarez, Kelsey Steurnagel, Eli Rodriguez, Ricardo Corona (undergrad for preproduction)

Exhibition: Merlino Gallery “The Enchanted Borderlands”

Media: Drawings

This group was inspired by western concepts and fantasy characters. Although I only spoke to Ricardo, he mentioned that information to me about the main theme. The third picture on the top is of what he calls the “ambiance” which he noticed in an exhibition in Disneyland. I think they did a pretty good job at setting the mood. Ricardo is an undergrad in Preproduction who likes hiking, being outdoors, architecture, ceramics, writing, and many other things. You can really see how they capture the beauty of the outdoors in their drawings.

These drawings are very brassy-toned to achieve that desert and sunny atmosphere. I love the shades of green incorporated that give it life. The characters are drawn very neatly and perfected, and I love the idea of fiction incorporated. Ricardo mentions that he was inspired by Marc Medrony and that these artists really enjoy drawing characters that look realistic yet at the same time very surreal. I though the images were connected in a sense, as if they all told a similar story.

I was quite intrigued by the style of these drawings, they looked like animations created digitally. Personally, I am not very involved in Western style art but I do appreciate it and was drawn into this particular exhibition because it looked alive. The images very vibrant, the lighting was dim, they were playing music, their decorations made it cozy, it was very well done. I was also drawn to the skies they drew, I love a good blue hue with flawless transition of colors.

Red light and demons

1. WHY DID YOU CHOOSE THIS IDEA? I chose this idea because it is daring. I came across this sort of holographic image that was pitch black at a distance but contained this image at a closer angle in the Getty Museum. Immediately I thought of demons and horror films. Something about the shades of red made me feel uneasy and guilty.
2. WHAT DID YOU HOPE TO COMMUNICATE? By choosing this image I was trying to communicate something we all have within. Whether or not you all agree, I believe that we all have some evil in us. It was interesting to me how I had to get a glimpse of the image which wasn’t easy to capture, similar to how we see our own defects or negative aspects. Its hard to see in ourselves sometimes.
3. HOW SUCCESSFUL DO YOU THINK YOU WERE? I think this image just spoke to me more then anything, but as far as conveying my message I do believe the picture needed some explaining.
4. WHAT WOULD YOU DO DIFFERENT IF YOU DID IT AGAIN? If i had to do this again, I would probably take a picture of the context provided with this display so people can understand where its coming from.
5. WHAT IS ANOTHER IDEA YOU MIGHT EXPLORE THROUGH “SHOCKING ART”? Another idea I find worth exploring would be immigration and the situation of refugees trying to come to the U.S. It must be so horrifying for them, but it is important that people see and read about these things instead of turning their heads from it.