Monday, September 1, 2008

First Days of School

I moved into our shared studio today. It feels so good to have a home for my art materials. Now the work can begin. The space is relatively small, to share between 13 people at least, but it will have to do. The official first day of classes is tomorrow but I don't have my first class until Wednesday.  "Strategies in Public Art" will be my first breath of grad-school air. My impression of the instructor, John LeaƱos, is that he is not one to adhere to prescribed academic structures, but we'll see. I guess one (namely, "me") would hope that all art school educators, especially ones at the higher level, would think outside the box, but, damn, there are so many boxes!

So my first class is not until Wednesday but I think I'll go into the studio tomorrow anyway. I want to set up a little bit. I have some reading to do also: Walter Benjamin, Greenberg, an article about the Avant-Garde, + some others. Yes!!! Let it begin! I've already read the Benjamin and I remember it to be baffling-ly dense. I look forward to giving it a second go. 

I'm also going into the studio because I need to give the curators of PlaySpace (our student run gallery) some labels to go along with my penny collection. They are including part of my penny collection in their upcoming show about collections/collecting (I'm actually not quite sure what it is about, but, hey, it's good to participate, and my pennies are cool!). I gave them 4 small jars of pennies. There are "Found Pennies", "Canadian Pennies", "Wheat-backed Pennies", and "Smashed Pennies". I'm curious to see the exhibition all together, the opening is next week sometime.

Openings, Articles, and Artwork... Let The Games Begin!

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

You are going to rock!
I had my first class yesterday--Avant-garde. I am also taking a painting class, advanced studio seminar, a writing class and of course degree project 2. I had an accident on my bike. Is my beautiful new ride now marked with bad luck? I hope not.
I miss you too! I dream of California oceans and skies!

Anonymous said...

Oh yeah, also I read some Benjamin last semester--very good and in my avant-garde class we are reading The Banquet Years. It is a wonderfully complex picture of life in the turn of the century, bohemian life, invention, cultural upheaval and of course sex, extravagance, scandals and coup d'etat!

Loyal said...

Go Georgia! You are going to be great, not just fine.