Week Five

Lens-Based Artists:

 1.) Rebecca Sittler

     http://www.rebeccasittler.com/

Rebecca Sittler is a contemporary photographer who received her MFA from Massachusetts College of Art in 2003. I would like to focus on her body of work entitled “non-franchise” because it deals with what I am interested in. For this body of work, Sittler visited every single independently owned donut shop in Long Beach, CA (each shop had to have the word “donut” in it). Sittler then purchased two donuts (one glazed and one specialty) and photographed them in order to curate an archive of their differences. When I first viewed this body of work, I did not know that this was the intention of the work because the artist statement was not given until the end. In fact, when I saw this work, I immediately went down the road of consumption. Sittler photographed each donut as well as the receipt the donut came with. Because each donut changed as well as the receipt, you can tell that the donuts are from different places. My perception of the work deals with food consumption because it is something I can relate to. I am a very busy person who is always on the go, and I can relate to grabbing something cheap and convenient to temporarily sustain my appetite.

2.) Kelly Ichinose

      http://www.neiu.edu/~kaichino/about.html

Kelly Ichinose is a photographer who enjoys photographing the relationship between people and food. My favorite topic that Ichinose explores is the duality of how food is advertised by American media and how it is actually eaten in real life. The media portrays food to be pleasurable, but how do you look when you actually eat it?

3.) Leigh Beisch 

      http://www.therecipeclub.net/2011/09/08/photographing-odd-bits-an-interview-with-food-photographer-leigh-beisch/

Leigh Beisch was the photographer for Jennifer McLagan's cookbook “Odd Bits: How to Cook the Rest of the Animal”. I think that this work is interesting because the photographs actually look like normal food that you would find in a cookbook. After you read the titles of the work, you are grossed out because of what the food actually is. However, it does work for the point of the cookbook though.

 

Non-Lens-Based Artists:

1.) “Hamburger Bed

      http://www.hamburgerbed.com/ 

I came across this from a post on Facebook. This “hamburger bed” is exactly what it sounds like: a bed that looks like a hamburger. I think the idea of making a bed that resembles a hamburger is absolutely ridiculous. Do we really love food so much that we have to sleep with it? Nowadays, the consumption of food has almost started to become kitsch, especially when you start to wear it (Joy Kampia's dresses) or sleep on it. The artists that make this work (food clothes, food beds, etc) probably just want to make something cute that they know would sell. However, I see this work as being ridiculous. I cannot believe that we as a society have gone as far as to wear and sleep on/with our food.

2.) Xavier Cha 

      http://xaviercha.com/ 

Xavier Cha is an Asian-American contemporary performance artist. In her “Human Advertisement” series, Cha explores how the body can be presented as a form of advertising. In this work, Cha dresses up like a shrimp, fingernail, and fortune teller and dances around. Cha then video taped her performance and the reactions of people driving by. This absurd body of work relates to my concept because it deals with body image as entertainment. I am interested in body image as well as food consumption, and I am interested in the advertising behind it. Why do we objectify females as a form of entertainment? Why is this so successful when it comes to selling a product?

3.) Andy Warhol 

     http://www.warholfoundation.org/ 

Andy Warhol remains to be one of the most influential pop artists and cultural icons. I want to focus on his work “100 cans” because it deals immensely with food consumption. Warhol painted several cans of Campbell's soup on canvas using oil. When asked why he painted soup cans, he said “Because I used to drink it. I used to have the same lunch every day, for 20 years, I guess, the same thing over and over again. Someone said my life has dominated me; I liked that idea” (http://www.albrightknox.org/collection/collection-highlights/piece:100-cans/). When you look at the work from farther away, the cans appear to be identical and put into place in perfect rows. However, if you take a closer look at the work, you can see that the cans are all different, they are also not placed into perfect rows. On top of that, the bottom row of cans are cut off. This suggests that the work can continue off of the canvas. All in all, this work speaks about the consumption and mass production of food.