EVENT BLOG ONE

Linda Weintraub’s lecture

On Tuesday night, I attended Linda Weintraub’s lecture at the Broad Art Center. Weintraub spoke on the randomness of nature, eco materialism and contemporary art. While I did enjoy her own work presented later in the lecture, this blog will focus more on the artists Weintraub presented towards the beginning of her lecture.

Selfie I took at the conclusion of the lecture. This was during the questions portion. At the top is the
timestamp of when I took the photo.

Weintraub presented many different artists and with each one discussed the idea of artists being separated from their art. Maybe because I just had never thought of separation between art and artist or maybe because she started off talking about drone strikes, but I was fascinated by her presentation.

I remember Weintraub used this photo for her slideshow,
but I didn't get a photo of it. Notice the total disconnect between
the subject of the photo and how it is viewed.

The first artist that Weintraub presented was James Bridle. Bridle posts google earth overhead photos of United States drone strikes on Instagram. These photos display the landscape effected by the impact of the predator missile strikes. I distinctly remember sitting in the lecture dead tired from football practice wondering to my self “Ok this is cool but how the hell is this art”. It was at that moment that Weintraub opened my mind in a way that shocked me. She explained that what Bridle was doing was commenting on a technologically-disengaged media and society. These deadly drone strikes were ordered from thousands of miles away and guided by a joy stick to the target. For the people in the village or area of the strike, the violence and devastation was real. Bridle used photos taken from google earth to post these snapshots of death on a social media platform that can only be viewed only through the use of technology. He is completely disengaged from his art. This disengagement is used strategically by Bridle to represent how our society is completely disconnected from reality by our technology. I honestly think this is a very cool subject.

Malevich's block painting I referred to. Notice
how it is simple and has no relation to
the actual subject matter. It also clearly
represents the Suprematism movement.

Similar thoughts entered my mind as Weintraub showed the simple block paintings of Kazimir Malevich. To give you an idea of my initial thought of his work, in the notes I was taking I literally wrote “bullshit block painting picture” (excuse my language) referring to Malevich’s work. Weintraub once again opened my mind to what I was seeing. She explained that his work was inspired by the early experience of flight and emergence of the Birdseye view. His work was a radical transformation because it bares no relationship to observed reality. Taking a second look at the block painting, it made much more sense. The idea of a Birdseye view and flight literally blew peoples mind at the time. Before flight, the idea of looking down on the earth was reserved only for the gods. This radical new idea caused a movement called suprematism. Of course the ability to look down on the earth would have been a mind blowing development! Malevich was just responding to this new idea and technology. Instead of focusing on specific details or objects that he was observing, he painted what he felt. To me, his paintings represent when you are that high above earth, everything becomes simple. It is not what Malevich is painting, but the idea and context behind it.

Monet's Castle over a lake painting. Notice how
the background and foreground hold equal
importance.

Weintraub also shed more light on the paintings of Claude Monet. Obviously, I had seen his paintings before, but Weintraub’s lecture made me understand them. The reason for Monet’s blurry (for a lack of a better word) painting style is because he was involved in a visual interaction between himself and the world around him. Basically, all Monet saw was light and he painted beams of light. He believed the artist is an eye without a body. His work represented a dematerialization of world around him. The painting of a castle over a lake that Weintraub displayed made much more sense. In the painting, the castle was painted with equal importance and detail as the lake or the sky. Looking at his paintings now, I really do notice how he paints light. 

Honestly I had planned to write more about the other artists Weintraub examined, but I feel like this blog might be getting too lengthy. In summary, Weintraub’s lecture really opened my eyes in a way I had not expected. Before the lecture, I wouldn't quite understand most of the works that Weintraub presented. Of course I would recognize that Monet’s paintings were beautiful, but now I feel that I understand the “why” behind the works. I honestly would recommend her lecture because it was not only informative, but it also peaked my interest and left me with a desire to learn more.

image sources:

Me!

http://jamesbridle.com/works/dronestagram