Event 2- Color Light Motion: Ann McCoy DESMA9

On May 7th, I attended a zoom meeting with lecturer Ann McCoy. While centered around the work of Otto Piene, she

discussed other similar artists, as well as the themes that inspired such new approaches. Some of the non-linear works that deconstructed the status quo we are accustomed to were shocking and quite interesting. I would certainly recommend anybody who is intrigued by varying degrees of strange or simple art to attend McCoy’s lecture; or to look further into the work of Piene, the Zero Group, and light projection art. 

One piece we specifically focused on was Piene’s Lichtballet. McCoy drew many conclusions from its deceivingly simplistic

experience. As Piene’s choreographed lights danced around the exhibit, McCoy drew parallels from this to the ethereal

nature of the stars. 

[3] The stars were a crucial point of interest for McCoy. McCoy made the point that students and artists from the past had a particularly distinct view from today; in that they maintained a spiritual essence. [2]

She claimed that in ancient cosmologies, before the notions of the big bang and the rather bleak reality of our

existence that most of us accept; there was a perspective of our psyches being intertwined with nature and the stars.

She believes that to interpret and create art in an ethereal manner, one must think in terms of cosmologies and keep this

ignored piece of the psyche in view. 



McCoy also discussed another artist inspired by Otto Piene named Anila Quayyum Agha. [1]

Like Piene, whose art was an escape from the war that plagued his life, Agha’s art was a method of escaping prejudice that had a

traumatic effect on her ability to experience life as an equal.

In conclusion, the lecture from McCoy was quite fascinating and looked at topics that I did not know about previously

or expect. I am very happy to have attended such a lecture, as it opened my eyes to an entirely new form of art, as well as

a reminder that art can be a method of escape and spiritual healing.


Proof of Attendance:


Images Cited:

[1] “Anila Quayyum Agha: Between Light and Shadow to Transform Toledo Museum of Art Galleries.” The Toledo Museum of Art, 14 Aug. 2019, https://www.toledomuseum.org/about/news/anila-quayyum-agha-between-light-and-shadow-transform-toledo-museum-art-galleries.

[2] Carey, Brainard. “Ann McCoy.” Interviews from Yale University Radio WYBCX, 26 Nov. 2020, https://museumofnonvisibleart.com/interviews/ann-mccoy/.

[3] “Otto Piene: Light Ballet at Sprüth Magers, Oranienburger St, Berlin.” GalleriesNow.net, 29 Apr. 2017, https://www.galleriesnow.net/shows/otto-piene-light-ballet/. 


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Week 8 Blog Post DESMA9

Image
    This week’s topic revealed a surprising connection between nanotechnology and art. We watched lectures from James Gimszewkski, who has over 35 years of experience in the field. He provided a brief history of the beginnings of nanotechnology, various parallels between it and art, as well as what a possible future of nanotechnology will look like.     Much of the science of nanotechnology was predicted by Richard Feynman in his lecture at the American Physical Society in Pasadena in December 1959. He discussed miniaturization, and how it is theoretically possible to manipulate things on an atomic scale [4]. This would of course come to fruition in the near future, notably with the advent of the scanning tunneling microscope. This new method of observation allowed researchers to capture minute details all the way down to the atomic level; and even allowed researchers to manipulate individual atoms on the surface of materials [5]. [3]       ...
Read more

Week 7 Blog Post DESMA 9

Image
There are many interesting links between neuroscience and art. It is amazing how far we’ve come in the relatively new field of neuroscience. In the late 1700s, Franz Joseph Gall, who was a schoolboy at the time, noticed that his classmates that could memorize long passages with ease all seemed to have prominent eyes and large foreheads [4]. [3] From this he inferred the origins of phrenology; the idea that neural abilities were indicated by external features of the skull and different organs in the brain. Another important figure in this field is Santiago Ramón y Cajal, who is dubbed the father of modern neuroscience. This would be a surprising fate as he was raised in the preindustrial Spanish countryside, far from any labs. However, it seems that the connection to nature that this environment endowed him with would give him a unique perspective from other scientists at the time. In his autobiography, he wrote, “I regret that I did not first see the light in a great city” [2]. ...
Read more