O-O post #2

There's a bicycle sitting in the sun room of my father's house. It's blue and white paint is slowly chipping off the poorly assembled body. I can say poorly assembled because I assembled it. My homeroom teacher, a portly man who lived in the suburbs far away from civillization, asked offhand if anyone wanted a bike. His wife, a similiarly shaped woman, had won it in a raffle the previous month, and it had been sitting in a box in their hallway ever since. Not expecting him to be serious, I said I was in desperate need of a bike.

Getting it out of the box wasn't the easiest task, it was haphazardly returned to it's packaging without much thought to order or correctness. it's bolts were shiny and new then. Everything about it screamed "just off the factory floor." It must have been cheap, the bolt in the seat, when tightened to the point of security snapped the metal supports. Now it's adorned with a "Diva Feather" gel seat, which my friends sister had lying around. The wheels loose thier air all too quickly, and the chain jumps if you don't shift just perfect. however the bike has always let itself be fixed, gotten to the gas station when it's tires are low, and carted it's rider to and from Pius XI High School.

The handlebars are bent slightly after a failed attempt to cross a creek when the shortcut I usually took home was full of busy machinery replacing the bridge. Everything seemed alright until I hit a rock and rolled down the hill. the bike was scratched and slightly off center after that, but took me home as it continued to do for the duration of highschool.

o-o post #1

I don't prize much in the way of material objects. I'd like to say it's because of my free spiritual nature, my detachment from the physical, my independence from the all mighty drive of capitalism: Getting Things. The truth is, however, that I break and lose things, especially important or expensive things. However there is one object which effects me and the course of my life in a very real and daily way. This object is my Rochambo coffee mug. It stands out in the cupboard or the dishwasher, blue and white with the pictures of what seem to be hip trendy kopeli men discussing something vital over a cup of java. Almost constant use has caused the picture to wear away revealing the solid white plastic that makes up the body of the cup. The word ROCHAMBO is illegible now, though anyone who knows what it means would recognize it instantly. It's the name of a coffee shop where all the hip kids hang out with the grizeled hippies. It's right around the corner from my house back in Milwaukee, and frequent gathering place of my friends, the caffiene addicted youth. However artsy and pretentious the coffee shop is, the Mug isn't much to look at. It's hard pastic, holding just over four and a half cups of liquid, with scratches and stains on the detachable lid. what it lacks in luster, it makes up for in dependability. it's been dropped off tops of buildings, thrown across fields, filled with boiling liquid, survived more than one time through dishwasher on the "EXTRA HEAT" setting, and kept me awake, at any and every hour of the day, through the worst of crisies and stresses, and through the sunniest of mornings.

I love my coffee cup. And I think, deep down, it loves me back.

Writting Project #2

This painting, like most of Doug Argue’s works, is untitled. There’s a reason for that. His works are a variation on a theme, different aspects of the same picture, and as such aren’t differentiated by a name. If one were to look at dougargue.com, find the gallery marked 1994-95 there would be dozens of pictures of chickens, sometimes alone, or like this painting, in groups. most of these paintings too have no title. Argue's chicken painting lack of title makes the observer focus on the appeals of the content, and draw your own conclusions as to the statement.
The first thing, that can't be accurately displayed here., that one notices about this painting is it’s sheer size. It’s twelve feet tall by eighteen feet high. As you walk into the Weisman Museum of Art in Minneapolis, Minnesota, the painting is positioned on a wall in such a way that it may be a doorway leading through a hall full of chickens. The chickens close to the edge of the painting are life sized, if not a bit bigger. Each individual feather is painted on in a different brush stroke, clearly visible. The attention to detail creates chickens that, while not having picture perfect realism, have a very real sense of life. This gives a logical appeal to the audience. It sets up that this is no mere splattering of paint, no cartoon sketch, but actual portrayls of living things. Doug Argue's chickens too, aren't your avereage paintings of chickens. They're not perfect and semetrical, but have growths bumbs, and uneven eyes. They are flawed, and because of thier flaws, they are unique. And as you look towards the center of the painting. The detail diminishes only slightly. Going towards the chickens in the far distance you see a myriad of tiny lines that make up tiny chickens. This could almost be compared to a pictorial statistic. Each chicken is a seperate entity, and as you look at the painting, you can count each individual entity. Compare that to the space in which all these entities are held and you have a logical idea of what these chickens lives are like.


The chickens go on forever, each one as real as the next. taking a step back, it hits you how many chickens are there in such a small place. Each living breathing being, given it’s own life and independent appearance by Argue is cramped together with so many other living breathing beings . The appeal to pathos is strong. It makes you pity that they are all crammed into such tiny cages. Disgusted at the hallway filled with filth being burnt by the heat that the endless ceiling fans suggest in no uncertain terms. You feel the heat, smell the excerment, taste the air, hear the tortured clucks and crows. Does this really happen? you think. Most people know of huge commerical poultry farms that exist, but rarely think about what it's like for the animals. Is this so far off from life you're McNugget had? But is this so different from your life, you think. The chickens are in tiny cages lined simetrically, with a street running between sets of cages. How different is your apartment builidng? How different is your dorm? On the street there is filth every where. take a walk down a busy avenue sometime, look at the side of the highway in a populated area. isn't there trash haphazardly thrown everywhere? you think of the sweltering heat these chickens are artificially foreced to live in. isn't the whole world getting a little hotter every day because of Global Warming? Take it a step further in a marxist vein, and aren't all of us working class people here to live complacently in our cages forced to produce until we're no longer able, then simply expected to die?

So, what is this painting about. Is it just a fun piece of art that plays with perspective? Is it an angry outcry for animal rights. Is it a not so subtle reminder of the former living conditions of your last trip to the drive thru window? Is it disgusted look at modern american life? Any title given to this painting would seem to suggest one of these over the other. It would try and contain the essence, direct the audience, summarize the action. This painting, however, remains untitled. And because it's untitled, we are left in a never ending analysis, searching for meaning though knowing we'll never know for sure.

Writting Project #2