Week 15: Eye catching art work!

This week’s art work was really amazing, nonetheless I must say that this week I saw something that just blew me out of proportion. The art work or rather sculpture of the animal that seemed to be a cat or some sort of dragon cat was really eye catching. I just could not believe it was an art piece as it was extremely realistic. Although I really wanted to touch it, I did not as I respect the hard work of the artist. I must say if that art piece was up for sale I would consider buying it, it was just to cool. Similarly all of the other art pieces in the room were very attractive. Here are some photos of the art work that I considered my favorite at the time.

Week 15: One week before final’s week! _ Meeting Serena

This week I met Serena Carvajal, a freshman student here at California State University of Long Beach pursuing a Bachelors of Science in Civil Engineering. Unlike many students, Serena really knows what she wants to do in the future because of the amazing opportunity that she had the summer after she left high school. During that summer Serena was an intern at the Port of Long Beach working with the Project Manager. That great adventure really opened her eyes and made it clear to her that she wanted to become a Civil Engineer. Although she is aware that the 4 year journey to obtain a degree in C. E. is quite challenging she is up for it! Serena went to high school here in the city of Long Beach so she is pretty familiar with the city, in addition her parents currently live in Long Beach but that did not stop her from experiencing living in the dorms here on campus. During her free time Serna likes to play ultimate frisbee, that is why she joined the ultimate frisbee club here on campus. Overall, meeting Serena was a cool time.

Week 14: Fantastic Art!

This weeks art show made it quite difficult for me to decide which art piece to choose as my favorite, the gallery room was just filled with awesome work. I have attached some pictures of some of my favorite art pieces of this weeks art show at the Gatov galleries. Although I could not find a specific connection with the art work that I found eye appealing this week, I did enjoy the detail and the extreme precision of how realistic of of the portraits displayed looked. I assume I could say that I relate to the painting with the family that you can see here below. The reason why I think I might relate to that art piece if because the family looks as if they might belong to a certain hispanic culture, Mexican culture being my own. Furthermore, I really enjoyed the emotions that these paintings expressed. The painting in the man in orange gave me a feeling of someone with a very serious background. I was unable to confirm this but I believe the orange outfit to be uniform of a prisoner. Overall this weeks art work was quite fascinating, here are some photos of the art pieces displayed.

Week 14: Meeting Nok Pham

Today I met Nok Pham, a freshman student here at CSULB pursuing two majors, one in communication and the other in biology. She is double majoring and the interesting part about it is that the majors do not really relate. Nok has a pretty interesting background, although I do not know it all I was amazed at the facts the stated which I though were pretty amazing. Nok was born in New York and hen moved to Cypress, here in California. After some time she then moved to Newport Beach where she currently lives with her parents. Overall meeting Nok was a great experience. 

Week 13: Extra Credit: A General Mock of Valerie Arredondo’s Algorithmic Art Work

Because I interviewed Valerie this week I though it would only make sense to mock her algorithmic art for the extra credit opportunity. The down side to re-creating her algorithmic art work was that I did not have all the tools that she mentioned in her instructions such as painters tape, an exact-o knife, acrylic paint, and brushes. In exchange I made this very general and followed her algorithm of creating triangles and spinning them around the page. My outcome was not near as great as her original art work was, but I did create Valerie’s Algorithmic Art! This was a great experience, and made me realize that even if it is an algorithm, art will continue to be art because even when repeated the outcome is quite unique.

Week 13: The Detailed Art by Shihori Nakayama

As soon as I glanced inside of the Dutzi gallery I knew I would really enjoy the art that was being displayed inside. From a distance the art looked extremely detailed and when I actually walked inside and took a look at the art work I was in shock. The art pieces were extremely complex and super detailed. I was impressed by how close each line was to one another and how they overall created a very unique and elegant design. The first thing I thought of when I saw Shihori’s art work was it can make amazing tattoos. The lines were as thin as lines that are made with needles, just too thin to maintain precision. Here are some pictures of some of her work to express the dedication she put into her art work and the level of patience that it requires. 

On the other end of the spectrum, I was really amazed by the projector that was hung up at the gatov-east gallery. The art displayed in the gallery was amazing but I was really impressed by how the projector was hung up on the ceiling. It was perfectly in place and balanced with the use of chains. Being into computers and technology quickly made this s scenario catch my attention.

And last but not least, I was touched by the pictures that were also displayed int at the gatov galleries. I remember of the times when I was in Elementary school and would buy the ‘churros’ from the churro man outside of my school. We’ve come a long way and showing these pictures I believe pay a huge respect to those who struggle making a living.

Week 13: Meeting Valerie!

This week I met Valerie Arredondo, she is a freshman student here at The Beach and is pursuing a Bachelors of Science in Biology. Ms. Arredondo went to Long Beach Polytechnic high school. She was born and raised in long beach and continues to live here in the city where she commutes to the University on the daily basis. She currently plays Rugby and swam all four years during her high school times. The most interesting part of the conversation was when I introduced myself to Valerie because my spouses name is Valeria which is very similar to Valerie. Valerie was very polite and extremely outgoing, I encourage other students to interview her sometime during our final 2 weeks of class. Check out her blog at https://valarredondo.wordpress.com/.

Week 12: Algorithmic Art Work-Creating simple HTML code

This is a very general and simple procedure to creating an HTLM code and opening it through your internet browser, wether it is google chrome or Internet Explorer or any other browser this will work with whatever is default to your machine.

First, open either textedit if you have a Mac or Notepad if you are a PC user.

To keep things simple we will just type a title for the page as follows:

<!DOCTYPE html>

<html>

<head>

<title>This is __________ ‘s html webpage! </title>

</head>

</html>

Although the details can go for hours, this is a very simple way to begin. Know that you have typed the code above, save the file as a “.html” file.

Now that you have created the file go ahead and open it by locating it wherever it is you decided to save it.

Tada you have created your own html webpage!

Week 12: Extra Credit

My top 3 favorite activities were in order

1- Week 1) Web Design

Without this activity none of the following weeks would have meaning to our future. I believe that having the opportunity to create a website and build onto it throughout the semester was one of the most amazing things I have done in my academic career. This is jotting down memories and creating a strong foundation of who we are when it comes down to art, feelings, and integration.

2- Week 2) Painting and Drawing

In addition to really enjoying the activity to week 1, I was also a huge fan of week number 2. The reason why I really enjoyed this activity was because I had the freedom to hang out with my wife and create legal graffiti with my wife, which would have never happened without this course.

3-Week 11) Sculpture

Similarly to the second weeks activity, I also enjoyed week 11. Going to the beach with my wife and creating a molding of my foot and her hand was one of the funnest adventures at the beach. It brought many memories, and allowed for us to catch some fresh beach air.

Overall, my favorite part of the entire course has been meeting on Tuesdays and listening to the words of Mr. Zucman. I really enjoy his discussions and I believe them to be a very effective way of helping freshman students and in general all college students to open their eyes and get a bit of the real world.

Week 12: Art art the Werby

This week’s art work was quite fascinating. At the Werby gallery I saw the following art piece;

In addition to enjoying the art work, I actually learned something new about working with art. I use to think that every part of the art work was intentionally crafted to represent or mean something in specific. I believed every part of an art piece had meaning. Nonetheless when the artist Piet explained how he simply added the square on both ends of the art piece or rather through the art piece was because it was not symmetric to his eyes. Adding the hole on both ends and placing a white ball in the center completed the art piece. Actually listening to an artist describe how he simply added something to his work because it was what he believed to be missing was eye opening, as I believe the entire art work was to be based on meaning. Overall, I really enjoyed Piet’s Art show.