Spent all night looking at facebook...

... because I wanted to draw my entire facebook feed on a brown paper towel roll.  Of course, that thing is pretty dang long, and I didn't make it nearly as far as I wanted.  It took several hours--and if I had several hours more, I'd continue until I reached the end of my feed.  (What does the end of your facebook feed look like, anyway?)  Here are the pics of my progress so far!

The project was satisfying in three ways.  First of all--most of us don't really read our facebook feed--we just skim it for the parts that catch our eye.  This project made me have to read every single word, and it's amazing how much detail I've missed when just skimming casually.

Second, I like the analogy of our facebook feeds being disposable, kind of like a paper towel roll.  We only usually read a friend's status update once before letting it pass into obscurity.  Friendships on facebook can be equally disposable, especially if the facebook relationship has no real one to back it up.

Thirdly, I thought it was interesting to take something that is pretty impersonal (its a quick typed message to everyone you know) and convert it to something painstakingly handmade (more like a handwritten letter).

A side note: I discovered that there are many tendencies in informal typed language (such as no uppercase at beginnings of sentences, emoticons, and excessive punctuation) which are far more rare in handwritten language.  I found out that when people use several exclamation points or word repetitions, they often use five.  I don't know why, but five just seems to be the number people gravitate to.

Of course my sample pool is hardly representative--mostly social dancers and college students :P


Best,
Tam

... and PAY THEY WILL!

So during one of my first visits to San Francisco I saw something really crazy. High up in a third story apartment, someone was projecting a prizefight through a covered window into the night. It was so cool--I could see it from the street. The setup was super homemade, and really startling.

Anyway, I decided to try it myself, only a lot bigger. The dorm I live in has an upstairs lounge with patio and glass sliding doors. The patio overlooks the bike racks where everyone parks. So I thought it would be neat to project sound and image out of the huge window so people would see it as they passed by. This was partially out of artistic impulse, and partially because I'd been wanting to see a classic Kung Fu movie for a long time :)

So, I covered the window with newspaper, checked out a projector, and set up my speakers on the balcony. Very simple setup, but again, super startling at night. I played a Godzilla trailer (Godzilla vs. Megalodon), and the watched Bruce Lee in Fists of Fury. My friends, it was better than a birthday.

Here's some footage!

And some of Bruce Lee in Fists of Fury--painfully abridged:

Isn't Bruce Lee impossible fast and beautiful?  Isn't he just impossible period?




Ah, my heart!
T. King

First Post Ever!

Hello!

This is my art blog for the 2011 Interdisciplinary Art course at Stanford.  I'll be posting a lot of ideas and inspirations here, both for my own use as a reference, and also as a way to share some of the things I've been thinking about and working on.

There are so many places to start.  Let me go get organized--I'll be right back.  In the meantime, allow Pink Batman to inspire you.


Best,
T. King