Studio Snapshots

Studio activity has ramped up as OS31 prepares to leave for Thanksgiving. With only a week of working time after break, students are keeping their noses to the grindstone amidst critiques and paper editing. Check back in two weeks for more studio snapshots - they're guaranteed to rise in messiness and intensity along with the times.

The "before and after" of one element of Isabel R's Final Project: a performance based video piece. 

Kevin's palette, Esther's sketches, and the state of our studio tables these days.  

    

Palmer, Sam, Kendall, and Jeff at work (and play).

Workspaces of:  Palmer, Cecelia, Hannah N, and Claire K.

Visiting Artist Workshops in Review

Each semester, two artists are invited for ten day residencies at Oxbow. This unique opportunity allows for students and visitors alike to explore ideas and take new directions in their art making, both individually and as a group. OS31 hosted Anna Von Mertens and Michael Arcega for two wildly different workshops. 

Anna Von Mertens' art is heavily research driven; investigations of phenomena crossing the realms of scientific study and her private world are of particular interest. These are translated into subjective pieces usually via means of hand dyeing and quilting. She says," These patterns reveal to me aspects of our existence, whether it is how we experience time and face the infinite - embedded in that is our own mortality - or how the boundary of the body is presented to others versus how it is felt internally. I see all of these elements as a form of mapping, reflecting the need to get my own bearings in this vast universe."

Anna coached OS31 through several quilting projects, culminating in a large collaborative collage which now hangs in our historic dining hall. 

Michael Arcega is a sculptor and installation artist whose work utilizes language and historic narratives to explore sociopolitical dynamics and unbalanced power relations. "Jumbling signifier, material, linguistics, and site," Michael uses considers cultural connotations found in "food, architecture, visual lexicons," and the rich contrasts of insider vs. outsider knowledge. 

With this in mind, Michael asked OS31 to create a series of body extensions meant to consider the body as an art medium and raise questions of functionality, intent, ingrained social perceptions, and redefining the physical limitations of the body. Ranging from techno-heads to buddy suits to musical helmets to plastic claws to clothes tents to an epistolary approach, these projects are exciting in their inventiveness, playfulness, and capacity for serious commentary. 

quoted text from http://annavonmertens.com and http://arcega.us/home.html. Photos: Finn N, Patrick, Pattiann, Megan 

Glimpses of Project X

The Project X show is finally installed! This is the first long term project of the semester where students pursue their own line of inquiry via in depth research and artistic experimentation. For long term followers of this blog and experts of Ox-lore, you'll remember that Project X is a top secret deal, the details of which are kept under lock and key each semester until the launch. In the spirit of keeping secrets (but also wanting to showcase OS31's incredible work), here are tiny peeks of each piece created over the past month.

Enjoy!