Chris Jordan Research Paper Outline
Body Outline:
I. About Jordan’s work.
a. About Chris Jordan.
b. Intolerable Beauty Series
c. In Katrina’s Wake Series
d. Running the Numbers Series
II. Beautifying Ugliness
a. Chris Referring to his work:
-”There’s this contrast between the beauty in the images and the underlying grotesqueness of the subjects. And it’s something that I put in there intentionally.”-http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/09212007/profile4.html
-“Chris Jordan: I am frequently surprised by how little negative feedback I get for my criticism of the American way of life. Maybe it is because we all know it is true: that we are living insane lives governed by materialism and greed. Or maybe the lack of resistance is a reflection of the depth of our denial. When I exhibit my work and talk about our rampant consumerism, no one ever seems to think I am talking about them.”- http://www.orionmagazine.org/index.php/articles/article/70/
b. Critics Refering to his work:
-“American artist Chris Jordan’s large-scale images of human consumption in his current photographic series Running the Numbers: An American Self-Portrait look at US culture through the lens of statistics […through] a kind of neo-Pointillist composition. Yet the images sit awkwardly between lamenting and celebrating our colossal capacity for wastefulness and for guzzling the earth’s fossil fuels.”
http://www.adobe.com/designcenter/thinktank/peterhall.html
III. The Problem of Beautifying Americas Waste
-“Mr Jordan is an openly passionate advocate—or maybe a protester. While he is aiming for visually resolved images as an artist, the point is to heighten awareness about our collective environmental disregard. But art and advocacy can be at odds, the goals of one often canceling out the other. “My goal,” [Jordan] said, “is to try to face the complexity of the issue and honor it.” –from New York Times article by Philip Gefter, “A Great Big Beautiful Pile of Junk”.
-Criticality of America’s situation from Jordan’s perspective and others.
-Who views his work
-What are their perceptions of America before and after viewing his works?
-How is Jordan’s work actually effecting the public?
Chris Jordan Research paper: Thesis Statement
Artist Chris Jordan brings attention to America’s excess consumer waste in large format digital photographs. His work highlights social issues in the United States today by imaging the situation; Albeit, he doesn’t make it distasteful, rather he stages the ugly scenes beautifully. Is it right to make extremely problematic American consumerism appear beautiful when the truth of the matter is so vulgar and intense?
My ‘Concepts’ Installation: Materials/Methods
The space I’ve chosen to display “excess consumerism” in the University Lofts installation is the first floor bathroom. I will collect disposed water bottles around DU campus and dump them in the apartment’s bathroom. The amount should be 600+ water bottles and should overwhelm the viewer with disgust. The bottles will likely not reach over half of the vertical space and I will contain them with a Plexiglas barrier, cut to the size of the door. I will also post photos of the locations from where I collected these bottles, as well as fact sheets on the waste of disposable water bottles.
Response to “Ways of Seeing”
I believe the meaning of the art of the past belongs to those who can apply it to their own lives, but a part of it also belongs to the cultural hierarchy of relic specialists. I enjoy applying historical works of art to my life. I also like to gain knowledge of the works’ history. Who painted it and why? What was going on around that person’s life to inspire them so? These are the questions that can be answered by the specialists. And herein lies their crucial role in the history of art.
I value a piece of work for what it means to me… as much as I value it for being the work of an artist who created it with intention. When approaching art, first I form an opinion based off of sight. I can love something or hate it on first impression. I find that my opinion can be changed after learning the facts about it’s production, intent and context as told by the artist. For an example that is familliar to everyone, in this article, we saw a painting and we formulated our opinions. Then we saw the same painting with the caption “This is the last picture Van Gogh painted before he killed himself.” My first impression represents this work of the past belonging to me personally, whereas the information presented in the caption is provided by the relic specialists. So which way do I prefer to have art presented to me? Both ways. I think it is healthy to have a balance of both approaches. Healthy and necessary. Sometimes I love the history of art and sometimes I love the naked sight without further knowledge. I can appreciate either approach deeply and luckily for me, the world contains both these processes for me to explore. Not all art will be accompanied by facts, but a huge amount that was at one time deemed ‘valuable enough’ by someone, somewhere, will be.
US Alpine Nationals 2008
Racing to a 3rd place finish at US Championships in Sugarloaf, ME 3/21/08.
On Saturday, March 21st I had the best result of my ski racing career when I placed 3rd at US Alpine National Championships. The day was tremendously fun for me as I surprised myself a awesome finish. My parents and many long time ski friends and supporters were there watching the big event. The day’s feat was a bigger personal achievement than I think many watching understood. I raced as a member of the US Ski Team for two years between 2005-7 and then after one tough season I lost my spot on the national team. In May 2007 I turned my attention back to college to finish my degree at the University of Denver. I competed this season for DU and we had a phenominal year winning the 2008 NCAA Skiin Championships in Bozeman, Montana on March 8th. While competing for Denver, I could not ski as often as athletes who race and train year round — like I was able to do in past years. To show the skiing community that I still had the speed and skill to comete effectively at that level was unbelivably satisfying. I am proud of the fact that I raced hard and pulled it all together at the culminating slalom event of the season for US alpine racers.
