facebook cigarettes

A graffiti artist who signs their work 2wenty goes around to poor areas and creates a piece of art which is light and comical to bring attention to the way the area is. Like many graffiti artists, 2wenty passes out stickers and puts up stickers everywhere he or she goes as a sort of business card. The idea is that others will also put up 2wenty’s stickers and his or her name will be known to all. His or her stickers are different than most.  2wenty has created a cigarette box but instead of cigarette printed on the front Facebook is instead.  2wenty believes that today, the younger generations are addicted to social media. The parallel between Facebook and Cigarettes is fitting because to many Facebook is a harmful addiction. Honestly, I check Facebook way too many times a day. There is no reason for me to be checking Facebook, other than to creep on people I don’t really care about and to procrastinate doing homework. My roommates and I have monthly challenges and first quarter one challenge was to see who could go the longest without checking Facebook. It took 2 weeks before one of us gave in. 2 weeks—that’s just sad. We have become so dependent on Facebook that people give up Facebook for Lint. I know several people that told me that Facebook or twitter is what they were giving up. You are supposed to give up something that would be really difficult to give up and people choose Facebook. I agree with 2wenty that the addiction to Facebook is becoming ridiculous. Facebook is a good website; I just think that people are becoming too dependent on it.  Like texting, Facebook is becoming an easy out for people; they no longer have to say something difficult to someone’s face they can now make it a status or message on Facebook.

                I would consider all of 2wenty’s work art because it is a personal disposal for his or her creativity. Many would argue that the stickers are not because they are computer generated but I would argue that they are because they were designed to be simplistically but they still provoke emotion and are something that a lot of creativity was needed to create.

                If you were going to design something very simplistic in looks to convey something in society that you thought was right or wrong, what would you critique? The war in Iraq, Twitter, our politics? I think that 2wenty. How would you distribute it? 2wenty wanted people to recognize their growing dependence on Facebook as a society so the sticker idea was a good choice. People will distribute the stickers whether they think they are cool or not because the act of putting stickers on public things is fun- it’s rebellious. 2wenty won’t have to travel to get his work to other states and countries; others will do that for him.  The sticker also allows others to manipulate the image and add their own work ontop of his, which many have done. 

BANKSY

The “guerilla” graffiti artist Banksy is “perhaps the most famous, or infamous, artist alive” because though his work is famous, no one knows who he/she/??? truly is (dailymail.co.uk 7/12/2008).  Speculations of Banksy’s identity are vast and some even believe Banksy isn’t just one artist but a union of many.  Banksy uses his public guerilla graffiti art to critique add irony, humor, and critique to our everyday lives.

When I first saw Banksy art, I was surfing the Internet, but I can only imagine what it would be like to see it on a building wall in your city.  I love Banksy because Banksy uses everyday environment to create art.

 

An ordinary street sign in London – turned into a hamster wheel by Banksy - forces a second glance and a smile at the simplicity of the art.  

In this example, also from London, Banksy adds irony to (what I assume to be previously drawn) graffiti by adding his own graffiti art.

Finally, this Banksy in Toronto critiques our society and particularly the humanity of corporations and “the business man.”

I think Banksy’s work is hugely important for society.  Being a Cleveland girl, I am constantly faced with news about the erosion of Cleveland and other cities in the “Rust Belt.”  Though London and Toronto, just two of the many cities Banksy works in, are no where near the critical level of Cleveland, public art for the masses can turn a wall of an abandoned building into a place of beauty – or even a tourist attraction.  The fact that Banksy’s art is “for the masses” is another important detail.  I enjoy art history and museums, but I do recognize that the audience who can afford to attend museums and feel comfortable there is limited.  Public art, and especially an art form like graffiti, is for everyone, whether they enjoy it or not.   Anyone who passes Banksy’s work can stop for a moment (or more) and admire it or dislike it, may it be a businessman with “0% interest in people” or a homeless person resting for the night.  It is a public art form that can not be ignored.  The Banksy “shop” on his website encourages that his work be used freely for everyone.  I put the word “shop” in quotations because it does not sell his work but rather lists what viewers can “Please feel free to [do]” and what to “Please do not” (www.banksy.co.uk).  Under “Please feel free to,” Banksy even asks that people “pretend [they] drew it [themselves] for art homework.”

The question of whether graffiti art is a legitimate art form (compared to expert opinions on Rembrant or Picasso) is trivial.  We live in a consumer culture today, in which museums and galleries don’t allow pictures to be taken in the hopes that viewers will buy postcards and mugs and umbrellas and prints and calendars and cooking aprons and on and on and on.  Banksy rejects this culture by creating critiquing, ironic, and funny art for the masses.

Lil Wayne Critiquing The Big Man

Music is art. Rap being classified as a type of music; therefore, categorizes it as art also. Rap is not my favorite type of music or art. Although I feel as if rap is art, I do not believe it is fine art or even good art. It does however provide as an example of art being used as a social critique. The example of this that comes to mind first for me is Lil Wayne’s single “Georgia Bush”. See link below for music video via YouTube (for fair warning the lyrics do get very vulgar.)

Georgia Bush by Lil Wayne

Lil Wayne was born and raised in New Orleans, Louisiana - a city and area he still has strong ties to. Shortly after Hurricane Katrina he released his single “Georgia Bush” which critiques the president of the period, George Bush (Georgia Bush as referred to in the song) and his effort for relief during hurricane Katrina. Due to Lil Wayne’s close ties to New Orleans, he felt as if Bush’s lack of timely relief during the catastrophe was racially motivated, unjust, and insufficient. Whether or not that it was racially motivates or not is a debate to be had elsewhere but the point being is Lil Wayne used his art or music to socially critique not only President Bush’s support of hurricane relief effort but also the efforts of other public figures. The question here is how much effect do artistic social critiques such as Lil Wayne’s rap single have. I personally stray away from political involvement so my views of hurricane Katrina came out of the lens of daily updates on the status of the affected areas. Therefore, I was unaware of the relief efforts headed up by our president at the time until I stumbled upon this song. At which point I automatically made the assumption that the information the song contained was true because human nature usually leads humans to believe what they hear.  I do not personally listen to rap music often and I am also not involved with the culture usually associated with it. People who are avid listeners and hold highly regarded artists such as Lil Wayne as role models must have had their views on our president swayed. Lil Wayne’s arguments were not completely untrue and most certainly not unbelievable. It is hard to blame people who enjoy rap music and follow closely to the rap culture to not listen to what Lil Wayne produces. After all Lil Wayne did help in the relief efforts and even donated over 200,000 dollars to the cause which lends him some credibility to his name in the area in which the hurricane struck. Many of his listeners live in or around Louisiana and the site of hurricane Katrina; thus, in a dire situation such as a hurricane people want someone to blame. Blaming Mother Nature does not make anyone feel any better; moreover, blaming the lack of relief efforts on a public figure head does serve as a convenient scapegoat for the suppressed anger. In this way Lil Wayne and the art he produced had a major impact on the opinions of people who follow his music.
     Do you think music as social critiques has an actually effect in society? How would you compare the effect that art as social critique has to the opinions of famous and well groomed people?

women in media

http://thefbomb.org/2012/04/why-the-media-assault-on-ashley-judd-is-larger-than-a-puffy-face/

The blog the f bomb is a blog focused towards younger girls to explain why women’s rights are still an issue today. The post selected is about the author’s reaction to a pop culture incident. Recently, Ashley Judd got a lot of negative comments back after appearing publicly. People harassed Judd about her appearance being ‘puffy’. Judd retorted back by saying, “The assault on our body image, the hypersexualization of girls and women and subsequent degradation of our sexuality…and the general incessant objectification is what this conversation allegedly about my face is really about”. The blog then goes on to say that today women are objectified more than ever and held to ridiculous standards regarding appearance.

The blog suggested that women are still being “contained” today. Most people seem to think that the containment of women is over and that women’s rights are a topic of the past. Even though women are receiving more and more rights, they are still being contained. The media today is what is holding women to a different standard than they wish to be held to. Like the article said; women are portrayed in pop culture as unrealistically skinny and pretty. It is this image that women are expected to uphold. Society has put women in a box when it comes to appearance. More and more young girls are having eating disorders because they think they have to look a certain way to be a woman. Girls think they have to look this way because their role models, models and actresses, conform to society’s standards by looking the way they are expected to look. So women are furthering their own containment by subsiding to the standards set for them. Along with this, guys have decided that looks are the most important thing. Commercials and some television shows have made it seem like as long as a girl looks a certain way nothing else matters.

Along with this, media today is also doing its share to end the containment of women. Several shows today are showing women as equals to men. 30 Rock, for example, shows Tina Fey as a working woman who doesn’t care what she looks like. There are several shows today portraying women in a new light. Years ago, women in television shows were always portrayed as the house wife who was unrealistically pretty – this is still going on to some extent as I said above , but more and more so, women are receiving their own distinct voices in television shows. The families are not always perfect but more realistic. Women have jobs in shows and men take care of their families not just women. So in this way, media is doing its job to end an era of suppressed women. Shows urge women to do what they want and not to be afraid to break the mold.

Do you think that pop culture today is doing more good or more bad when it comes to societies view on women? Do you think that they are still being “contained”?

Comforts of Rural Living

http://www.rileycountyks.gov/images/pages/N375/FallRoad.jpg

Please examine the blog: Understanding the Aspirations of Rural High School Students

http://blogs.learnnc.org/the-well/2012/03/01/understanding-the-aspirations-of-rural-high-school-students/

     This blog examples one of the instances of containment culture that I have personally witnessed. The author, Jonathan Bartels, couples himself with a researcher, Dr. Meece, to describe the underachievement of the students attending rural high schools around the nation. After completing their research, they concluded that rural students are not achieving at the level which they should be. They propose this piece for anyone who is not a part of or someone unfamiliar with the challenges of the rural life style. Although the writing is not persuasive, it does inform the reader of a moving topic – the containment of young rural students and their future. Informing the public is their main purpose for publishing their work because if people are not informed about the problems of our nation, they will most definitely never seek to solve them.

            

     This blog strikes home to me; growing up and attending a rural high school that could have easily been a facility for the author’s research. I see the containment of students from the bright futures that they could possess constantly. The problem is identifying who plays the role of “the container.” The blog fails to offer any real explanations, simply offering informative statistics and leaving out any in-depth reasoning. As a student and a rural citizen, I feel as if I escaped the containment culture of rural living. However, I did and still do feel the effects on my life. I feel like the cause of this containment culture comes from the lack of aspirations in rural living. Actually, it is less of a matter of aspirations but more of an issue of feeling too comfortable. I find that kids growing up in the rural areas are often times too comfortable or plain out unwilling to leave the easy life they live and seek out a bigger and brighter future. Although it may seem as if I am playing towards the cliché of big cities and big dreams, this is not my goal; actually it is the opposite of my goal. I want more students growing up in areas much similar to rural Bainbridge, Ohio where I have lived all my life to seek secondary degrees, seek promising futures, and most importantly seek to improve upon the live they have been living all their lives. Not to say that country living is bad; personally I love it and miss it dearly. I just know from firsthand experience that opportunities are limited in that environment. Of course most people analyzing the situation would offer that the education systems in rural areas lend student to be unable to handle a college course load or even getting accepted into college altogether. This is simply not the case; I went to a subpar high school and pay the price for it currently. I had little to no help or guidance while applying to and getting into college; now that I am here I find courses to be much more difficult than the average student and spend countless hours studying to compensate for my poor basal-education. However, I know it is possible for most rural students to come to a larger university and succeed; myself as an example, I maintain an above average GPA at one of the nation’s best universities in an effort to find a greater purpose in my life than living around the rural neighborhood and working a simplistic and non-skills related job. This requires me to live outside my comfort zone constantly – a thing more rural students should do. Doing so is the only way to escape the containment culture of rural living.

After reading this, are you reminded of any examples in your own life where you have “escaped” containment culture? If so, explain how and why you did.

Can you think of any other containment culture placed upon the youth of America nowadays that suppresses and limits their futures?