Tag: black and white

  • Shirin Neshat

    Shirin Neshat (Persian: شیرین نشاط‎‎; born March 26, 1957) is an Iranian visual artist who lives in New York City, known primarily for her work in film, video and photography. 

    Her artwork centres around the contrasts between Islam and the West, femininity and masculinity, public life and private life, antiquity and modernity, and bridging the spaces between these subjects. Neshat often emphasizes this theme showing two or more coordinated films concurrently, creating stark visual contrasts through motifs such as light and dark, black and white, male and female.

    Although Neshat actively resists stereotypical representations of Islam, her artistic objectives are not explicitly polemical. Rather, her work recognizes the complex intellectual and religious forces shaping the identity of Muslim women throughout the world. Using Persian poetry and calligraphy she examined concepts such as martyrdom, the space of exile, the issues of identity and femininity.

    Neshat has been recognized countless times for her work, from winning the International Award of the XLVIII Venice Biennalein 1999, to winning the Silver Lion for best director at the 66th Venice Film Festival in 2009, to being named Artist of the Decade by Huffington Post critic G. Roger Denson.

    In July 2009 Neshat took part in a three-day hunger strike at the United Nations Headquarters in New York in protest of the 2009 Iranian presidential election.

    Work

    Neshat’s earliest works were photographs exploring notions of femininity in relation to Islamic fundamentalism and militancy in her home country as a way of coping with the discrepancy between the culture that she was experiencing and that of the pre-revolution Iran in which she was raised.

    Unveiling (1993):

    Women of Allah (1993–97):  portraits of women entirely overlaid by Persian calligraphy.

    Logic of the Birds 2001-02 a full-length multimedia production with singer Sussan Deyhim andproduced by curator and art historian RoseLee Goldberg. Neshat uses sound to help create an emotionally evocative and beautiful piece that will resonate with viewers of both Eastern and Western cultures.

    Neshat has also made more traditional narrative short films, such as Zarin.

    Book of Kings series

    Other Works

    • Turbulent, 1998. Two channel video/audio installation.
    • Rapture, 1999. Two channel video/audio installation.
    • Soliloquy, 1999. Color video/audio installation with artist as the protagonist.
    • Fervor, 2000. Two channel video/audio installation.
    • Passage, 2001. Single channel video/audio installation.
    • Logic of the Birds, 2002. Multi-media performance.
    • Tooba, 2002. Two channel video/audio installation based on Shahrnush Parsipur’s novel Women Without Men.
    • Mahdokht, 2004. Three channel video/audio installation.
    • Zarin, 2005. Single channel video/audio installation.
    • Munis, 2008. Color video/audio installation based on Shahrnush Parsipur’s novel Women Without Men.
    • Faezeh, 2008. Color video/audio installation based on Shahrnush Parsipur’s novel Women Without Men.
    • Possession, 2009. Black & white video/audio installation.
    • Women Without Men, 2009. Feature film based on Shahrnush Parsipur’s novel Women Without Men.
    • Illusions & Mirrors, 2013. Film commissioned by Dior and featuring Natalie Portman.

    Biography

    Neshat is the fourth of five children of wealthy parents, brought up in the religious town of Qazvin in north-western Iran under a “very warm, supportive Muslim family environment”, where she learned traditional religious values through her maternal grandparents. Neshat’s father was a physician and her mother a homemaker. Neshat said that her father, “fantasized about the west, romanticized the west, and slowly rejected all of his own values; both my parents did. What happened, I think, was that their identity slowly dissolved, they exchanged it for comfort. It served their class”.

    As a part of Neshat’s “Westernization” she was enrolled in a Catholic boarding school in Tehran. Through her father’s acceptance of Western ideologies came an acceptance of a form of western feminism. Neshat’s father encouraged each of his daughters to “be an individual, to take risks, to learn, to see the world”, and he sent his daughters as well as his sons to college to receive their higher education.

    In 1975, Neshat left Iran to study art at UC Berkeley and completed her BA, MA and MFA.

    After graduating school, she moved to New York and married a Korean curator, Kyong Park, who was the director and founder of Storefront for Art and Architecture, a non-profit organization. Neshat helped Park run the Storefront, where she was exposed to many different ideologies and it would become a place where she received a much needed experience with and exposure to concepts that would later become integral to her artwork.

    During this time, she did not make any serious attempts at creating art, and the few attempts were subsequently destroyed.

    In 1990, she returned to Iran. “It was probably one of the most shocking experiences that I have ever had. The difference between what I had remembered from the Iranian culture and what I was witnessing was enormous. The change was both frightening and exciting; I had never been in a country that was so ideologically based. Most noticeable, of course, was the change in people’s physical appearance and public behaviour.

     
    Source: edited and extended from Wikipedia

  • Zentangle

     

    Zentangle website

    Anything is Possible One Stroke at a Time
    At first glance, a Zentangle creation can seem intricate and complicated. But, when you learn how it is done, you realize how simple it is . . . sort of like learning the secret behind a magic trick. Then, when you create a piece of Zentangle art, you realize how fun and engrossing the process itself is.

    We love presenting to a class or seminar full of people who are convinced they can’t draw the Zentangle art we show them. Then, within 15 minutes, they have easily accomplished what they thought was impossible. This is one of our favorite Zentangle moments, because then we ask, “What else do you know that you can’t do?” You can transfer that insight and experience of success and accomplishment to any life experience. Something may look complicated, but you now know that you can do it, one simple stroke at a time.

    Deliberate Stroke
    In our Zentangle way, you draw each stroke consciously and deliberately. We are always making “strokes” (thoughts, words, deeds) in our life. By practicing the Zentangle Method’s suggestion to make each stroke deliberate, you understand how those apparently small and insignificant “strokes” of our moment to moment lives contribute to an overall life pattern. This is another reason that we say that life is an artform and everyone is an artist. Indeed, everyone draws.

    Deliberate Focus
    As you make a deliberate pen stroke on your Zentangle tile without concerning yourself of what it will look like when you are done, that very act of putting your pen to paper focuses your attention in a special way. As your eye follows your pen strokes your attention shifts to a state that allows fresh thoughts, new perspectives, and creative insights to flow unhindered by anxiety or effort.

    No Eraser
    There is no eraser in life and there is no eraser in a Zentangle Kit. However, in creating Zentangle art (and in living life), you will discover that apparent mistakes can be foundations for new patterns and take you in unexpected and exciting new directions.

    Unknown Outcomes
    Unlike much art, or most activities, you start out intentionally not knowing what your Zentangle creation will look like. The Zentangle Method allows you to discover new possibilities that you might not have anticipated when you began. We can most always tell when we’ve preplanned a specific outcome when using our Zentangle Method. It almost always looks forced and stiff.

    No Predetermined Solution
    With no predetermined correct answer, the Zentangle method offers both a freedom and a challenge. Unlike crossword, jigsaw, or Sudoku puzzles, there is no one predetermined solution. You cannot fail to create Zentangle art. At first this freedom might be a bit unnerving, as many of us have been trained to look for the one perfect solution. Soon however, this becomes a freeing and uplifting experience as you realize you can create never-ending, ever-changing “solutions” in your Zentangle creations.

    Elegance of Limits
    In seeming contradiction the limits established by a Zentangle string frees up your creativity. As you use the Zentangle Method, you’ll understand.

    Abstract
    You always succeed when you create Zentangle art because you always create a pattern. A Zentangle creation is meant to be nonrepresentative with no up or down. Since it is not a picture of something, you have no worries about whether you can draw a hand, or a duck. You always succeed in creating a pattern in a Zentangle way.

    Portable
    A Zentangle tile is 3 1/2 inches (89 mm) square. A Zentangle tile is designed to be completed in one sitting. Keep some Zentangle tiles in your pocket or purse. You can finish one in as little as 15 minutes. You get an immediate sense of accomplishment by completing your work of art. Of course, you can spend as much time as you like on a tile. Time melts as you focus on and enjoy your penstrokes.

    Inspirational
    The Zentangle Method’s non-verbal language of patterns and proportions can open doors to insights which seemed locked before. Creating in a Zentangle way opens those doors, not because they were locked, but because those doors swing on non-verbal hinges. When you create in a Zentangle way you can enter a state of relaxed focus in which intuitive insights flow freely. Get inspirations, ideas and answers unhindered by expectations or worries.

    High Quality
    Out of respect for yourself and your craft, we always encourage people to use the best tools and materials possible. We designed our Zentangle Kit with that in mind.

    Ceremony
    Like a Japanese Tea Ceremony, when you create Zentangle art you also create a personal environment. You can use our Zentangle approach as a tool to deliberately focus your thoughts.

    Gratitude
    Gratitude is our foundation. It also informs our product design and our teaching method. Whether its appreciating the texture of these wonderful paper tiles, becoming aware of the patterned beauty around us or thankful for the opportunity to put pen to paper, we always return to gratitude.

    www.zentangle.com

    Zentangle basics

    https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=30ZjgmV3YOQ

    Introduction to traditional approach.
    No rulers, 0.1 pigment liner

    More advanced variations

    Alternative from art geek. Uses ruler, brushes and thicker marker

    20 patterns Art Geek

    24 patterns speed up art

    https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=SW7-uVzhavs

    Paradox