Well, it has been an astonishingly long time since I’ve posted on here, and for several reasons. Firstly, winter quarter is always the worst one — the weather combines with a badly-timed schedule of very difficult classes to make doing anything at all seem like a challenge akin to climbing Mount Everest. Secondly, I didn’t take any studio classes last quarter — only a “theory” class that was more focused on psychological aspects of contemporary art, among them “the violence of the male gaze” and “the Mirror Stage,” which are completely and utterly ridiculous. On the other hand, if you aspire to be an artist and this day and age, you may take some comfort from the fact that you can do absolutely anything, such as putting a dead shark in a tank of formaldehyde, inventing a machine whose sole purpose in life is to produce feces, or taking pictures of strangers standing together, and it will be considered great and wonderful in the so-called “art world,” all three hundred of them that live in New York. (Although if you have any degree of sense whatsoever, you will renounce that path and continue to create tasteful and eloquent work, at least as long as you are under Skocko’s roof. After that, you may consider a murderous rampage; I know I did after ten weeks of blatant psychological nonsense.) So even if I had had the time, there was nothing worth writing home about.

Anyway, after last quarter I came very very close to wanting to leave the art major in a fit of extreme disgust, but I had already signed up for a class in Relief Printmaking with the same professor from whom I took drawing in the fall, who is awesome, so I decided to wait out the year and see what happened. And what has happened, so far, is that I got into the studio and realized I was happier creating stuff than I would be doing pretty much anything else I could think of. This epiphany was quickly followed by another epiphany in which I realized that I had just sealed my own fate and condemned myself to a path that, while fun (at least for now), has very little practical use in the real world. So I may wind up as the stereotypical starving artist, unless I can make a living drawing webcomics (this year has been extraordinarily full of both epiphanies and existential crises — whatever else goes on, there’s never a dull moment).

I was rather confused as to the differences between relief printmaking and normal printmaking, as I had never taken any sort of printmaking class before. I still don’t know what normal printmaking is, but relief printing involves carving things like blocks of wood or linoleum, running an ink roller over them, and then squishing a paper onto them with a printing press. I had though that was normal printmaking, but I guess I was wrong. Interestingly enough, over spring break, my mom and I went to see an exhibit at the Museum of Art down in Balboa Park featuring Japanese woodcuts, so all the ideas I’ve had for my projects this quarter (both past and upcoming) are Japanese-themed in nature. It’s just like Skocko says — synchronicity. And I tell you, it’s a good feeling to be inspired and to be producing work again.

I’m also taking a class called 2D Foundations, which is apparently the only actual theory (visual theory) class the art department here offers. The professor mentioned that numerous students have informed him that that class was the only one in which they got any education about color theory, which he found hard to believe. I didn’t — the art department seems rather weak on theory — but given the number of studio classes they offer, I really can’t complain. Unless I want to take digital art. According to my art TA from last quarter (who actually did seem pretty down-to-Earth, and was also from San Diego) that’s all conceptual nonsense too, so enjoy the Mac Lab while you can, unless you plan on going to a trade school. Although speaking of trade schools, Paul (my drawing/printmaking professor) mentioned to us that he much preferred teaching at a general university to teaching at a trade school (he gave a talk at one once). Here, we have a plethora of inspirations; we may be taking chemistry or physics or programming or history or literature classes alongside our studio art, so we’re exposed to a much broader range of influences. At a trade school, you’re shoehorned into a very narrow field of specialization, so you don’t get that base. Interestingly enough, that is the precise reason I chose a public university as opposed to an art institute of some sort.

So this quarter is looking to be a most excellent experience, full of work and creating awesome things. And with any luck, I’ll be able to post more than approximately once a quarter.

(On a side note, my midterm project from fall turned out to be a fantastic project. I chose to draw close friends I made in college, and it was one of the funnest things I’ve done in my whole short artistic career. I highly recommend it, for anyone who wants to practice their drawing skills.)

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