Friends Not Dancing

  The reading for this week centered around the idea of patterns and repetition. The text states,”By understanding how to produce patterns, designers learn how to weave complexity out of elementary structures participating in the world's most ancient and prevalent artistic practice.” (185) This sentence about sums up what I have gathered the chapter to be about. It seems that patterns by nature are simplistic and elementary but the ways in which artists are able to manipulate them makes them anything but that. They can use so many complex techniques to make infinite new possibilities. This is obviously a little difficult to make fit for what I am doing in this class but I am hoping to incorporate it in an abstract way. I had covid this past week so I was unable again to interview someone and make a new song but I am putting together another original song regarding my own life. The song will be about patterns of behavior in my life, which in an abstract way relates to the reading. I

  For this week, I did not have the energy to make another song as I have been doing a lot of songwriting this week so I decided to use a song that I am writing for one of my other classes. I The song I am writing really fits perfectly with the theme of nostalgia as it is a reflection on my childhood. Its a reflection on how a child processes grief and the ways in which its difficult to conceptualize when you are so young. For the video this week, I used old home videos and I edited them together using imovie. In class we talked a lot about how media today is faking nostalgia or attempting to appeal to it by using random old video clips with a vintage feel. I think I avoided this phenomenon because the video clips are from my actual life and were shot on a video camera, not just a filter to make it look like a video camera.

One aspect of this weeks reading that I attempted to incorporate into my art for this week was texture. The reading discussed that the beauty of texture design often lies in its juxtaposition and the contrast between the varying textures.    In this screen grab from the video that. I created we see a smooth textured backpack, along with a wooden background, photographs and a soft bag. All these different textures really give this image life and make you feel like you can jump right in and feel all of these things.  A similar thing is happening in this image the image of the hair fraying contrasts the subjects clothing and the beading of the necklace adds even an other layer. I think the varying textures really bring the image to life. 

  The phone and social media has entirely changed the landscape of photography, in the text the author writes, “By diminishing the importance of the media object, by making it close to or literally disposable, social photos recenter communication itself.” Social media has made photography a form of communication and has entirely restructured my world. I take photos of myself everyday and send them to my friends, often without words that communicate some sense of what is currently going on in my world. The text writes that these photos are “disposable” which is true, I would not care if most of these photos are wiped from the face of the Earth, they mean nothing to me. This is an example of a photo I might send to several of my friends several times a day, it does not even convey emotion or a message, it is literally disposable. In my art I want to capture images that might seem ordinary but are embedded with some deeper meaning, even if only for me and the subject. Here is an example b

 The title of this project is called "Friends Not Dancing" because it will comprise of my friends and strangers who will become friends and they will not be dancing! The idea behind this project is that each week I will ask my subject, who may be a friend or who may not, a thought provoking question. This first week I decided on the question, "What was a time you felt truly understood?" Then I record their response via voice memo, I take what they tell me and turn it into a song through my own interpretation. The song includes sound bytes from the voice memo. Then I create a video using short clips of them and the surrounding area to create a sort of music video.  This project is appropriate for social media because its a visual way to represent peoples stories through music. I am also excited for the challenge that it presents, that it will always have to be new and entirely made up. I am excited to connect with other creators and see if others are doing something