Improbable Monument

Introduction

Def. of Promenade (n): “a leisurely walk or ride especially in a public place for pleasure or display.”

- Merriam Webster 

Promenade is a place where one can watch other people, while being similarly watched. My improbable monument addresses this odd situation.

Background

Third Street Promenade is a pedestrian mall in Santa Monica since 1960s. It is one of the most popular shopping areas in West Hollywood. It includes three theaters, large tenants (Gap, H&M, Apple, Pottery Barn, Barn&Noble, etc.), and biweekly farmer's market. Many street performers and entertainers are seen every day and night on the promenade. 

Def. of Monument (n): "a lasting evidence, reminder, or example of someone or something notable or great." - Merriam Webster

“Monuments and memorials can be devices of detournement or slaps into consciousness.”
- Seeing in the Past in Present Tense

I wanted the viewers to be aware of my monument and remind them something, then questioned myself what I wanted them to remind and to be aware of. My desire was to have them to become aware of what I was aware of. This reminded me of how the people at the promenade dressed up to 'look nice and show off'; to be seen, while they are themselves looking at others similarly dressed. It is sort of game. And all engaged in such game extremely conscious of self and others, the promenade has become a show of superficial evaluation rather than just a “leisurely walk.” Personally, I felt very uncomfortable and uneasy to be watched from head to toe by strangers. It was as if I were an alien or a rare species of human.

However, people are not conscious of the frivolous superficiality dominating the environment, which they have become habituated to and therefore a part of. 

Project Description

My monument would be placed in the middle of Third Street Promenade in Santa Monica, L.A. because this is where I personally experienced this unique situation. The monument signifies that the superficial evaluation dominating the space provides discomfort in the same space. This monument plays an important role in raising awareness of consciousness among people on the promenade.

The monument would be larger than life-size to outstand and attract people on the crowded promenade. The design is Art Deco style because Art Deco is ornamental, which only has an aesthetic aspect. Similarly, people on the promenade are very cosmetic. Thus, the style symbolizes the superficiality.

The original image of the monument.

My monument would be stone or metal sculptures in white color, so that the projection can reflect on the surface of the sculptures.

This is how it would look like in day time.

At night, it would look like this.

The images of faces are projected on the sculptures’faces as seen in “Texas Big Face.” With the sensor system, the projected images of faces, especially eyes, follow as the pedestrians walk by. In addition to the images, a sound system would be installed right beneath the sculptures (inside of the foundation). The sculptures are able to make a sound of giggle, sigh, etc.

These effects would provide the viewers uneasy experience of being watched and evaluated.

People might be displeased with the monument. Since the sculptures are larger than life-size, they basically look down on the viewers. With the effects of the projection and sound, the monument aggrandizes feeling of discomfort of being watched in the space where people are to be seen.

However, this monument is improbable because of the environment. Even if it is at night, the promenade is decorated with hundreds of lights and too bright to project the images clearly. Also, the projection can’t be seen in day time when more people are on the promenade compared to night time. It would otherwise appear to the viewers that they are just ordinary sculptures on the promenade.

Benefits

The public would experience displeasing moment in a busy place like Third St. Promenade which is supposed to be a place to have leisure. Hopefully, the audience would realize that the monument is just reproducing a part of the activities happening on the promenade.

Timeline of tasks

If I could implement my proposal, I would first talk to people who have knowledge about projection and sensor system to discuss how I can install it on the promenade. This phase would take a while to figure things out in order to succeed. Then, I would work on making sculptures as working on the sound system installed on the foundation.

Improbable Monument: projection

Texas Big Face on Instructables.com

 

Texas Big Face - Video Documentation from Kirk Moreno on Vimeo.

This website provides an instruction to project a video on sculpture.

Improbable monument proposal

Deal with awareness.

Monuments, I believe, should be objects to bring or raise awareness. It could be historical events, person, etc. to remind us. For this assignment, I'd like my monument to raise awareness of people's awareness on other people in particular area - shopping malls.

My improbable monument would be placed probably in Third Street Promenade in Santa Monica because that is where many people are dressed up, hang out, and shop, and interestingly, (and you will know if you are there) they look at you from head to toe as if they are judging you whether you are cool or not. This made me really uncomfortable, but it was funny to me that they were not aware that they were judging the others while being judged by the others.
For my monument, I'd like to use this trick to reproduce this situation.
Disney Haunted Mansion Ride's trick on Youtube

Making of Haunted Mansion on Youtube (at 4:10)

Inspiration

"Erratic" by Roxy Paine

For the final assignment, I'm thinking of installing my improbable monument somewhere in Los Angeles. While looking for the best place to install, I found this sculpture, "Erratic," done by a New York-based artist, Roxy Paine. His work is installed in Beverly Gardens Park in Beverly Hills. When I first saw this sculpture while driving Santa Monica Blvd. early this year, I thought it was a huge silver turd and so bold to place the turd next to Beverly Hills because I perceived it to show that celebrity culture is a full of crap, but people who live there are very rich.
However, Paine's actual concept of the work is to depict the struggle between the natural and the artificial; Humans always attempt to reproduce nature, but with technology, everything made by humans is unnatural.
In spite of his actual idea, it makes sense to me where the work is located because the culture and people's mentality and lifestyle in this particular area, I think, are unnatural or bizarre. I'm interested in finding out why this work is installed in Beverly Hills because I'm sure it's not accidental.

Monument Intervention

My group decided to do three different projects; dressing up statues, (pretend) watching TVin public, and putting up photoshopped Civil War pictures in Union Square. The former two projects were taken place in Golden Gate Park. Luis came up with the idea to dress up statues and we could have some of them to be dressed up.

This project definitely caught some people's attention. Some were laughing and others were taking pictures of them. And we were able to capture their response.

Angeline's "watching TV in public" was an interesting idea, but the setting and the layout of the park didn't work that well for this project (we did it anyway). 

Although this project didn't intervene in a way we wanted, her handmade TV in public was a little surprise to some.

Lastly, my project was to put up photoshopped Civil War pictures on a monument of a heart in Union Square. Before the Civil War began, Union Square was named after Union Army to show support for the United States of America. This place was once used for Civil War rally. Today, Union Square is a 'heart' of shopping and entertainment. So, I wanted to show the history of Union Square but in a funny way.

The picture above is a little funny to me because in one picture, Union army soldiers also have Nordstrom shopping bags.

Where we first place the pictures didn't attract people's eyes. No one bother looking at them, so we put them up on the back of the hearts. 

A few people briefly looked at my pictures. I guess that makes it a success. 

Here's the details of the pictures.

Culture Jamming -Monsanto

my hiking history on Google Earth

Hike on Google Earth: KMZ file

My Google Earth project is a document of my hiking experience. It starts out with places where I have gone hiking in Japan when I was little and moves on to hiking trails I recently have gone since I came to the States. It goes back to Japan to show where I'd like to hike in the near future. 

The main idea of my project was to show that I like to go hiking. As a child, I was actually not that interested in hiking and I don't remember much about what I did while hiking. But, since I came to the States and went hiking with my friends often, I came to appreciate nature. Then, I realized that Japan had many beautiful places - Yakushima, Mt. Fuji, etc. - and I felt I missed out on exploring and knowing my home country. That is why I'd like to go back to Japan to hike those places. 

I divided six places into three parts - past, present, and future - and attempted to show that I went hiking, go hiking, and will go hiking. Using Google Earth was, to me, a funny experience because, for example, Mt. Kabuto Park  looked a huge park to me as a child, but on Google Earth and comparing other places like Morgan Territory, the park looked very small. And, El Scorpion Park and Morgan Territory seemed to be vast fields when I hiked, but they appeared small on Google Earth. From this experience, I got a sense of how small I was on earth; how gigantic the earth was. 

Culture Jamming

Bubble Project by Ji Lee

Since corporate ads dominates in public space, Ji Lee posts blank speech bubble stickers on top of ads in New York City to encourage people to write their thought or comments. People get involved with this project by filling the blank and transform "corporate monologues into open public dialogues."

Indetermancy

Luis Pascual, my partner's recipe.

Step 1:
Take a total of 12 photos, 3 photos for each topic/subject.

• make sure each photo is roughly the same size & dimension.
• make sure to desaturate or make all photos black & white.

Step 2: Divide all the photos into 12 equal quadrants, and create a blank layout sheet (also similar in size & dimension to the photos) also divided into 12 equal quadrants. 


Step 3:
For each photo you roll a set of dice (2 die) twice.

• First roll determines which piece to take from each photo corresponding to the number rolled.
• Second roll determines where the piece will be placed on the "blank layout" according to the number rolled. 

1. If a number is rolled again the piece on that number and all the images before it gets moved down one space. 
2. If there is a piece in slot#1 and has to be moved down, then it gets moved to slot#12 and so on and so forth.

3 photos from each subject:

• Organic
• Living
• Mechanical
• Technological

Extended Body

I thought about what part of my body I want to enhance with technology. I'm not fond of the idea to embed artificial or robotic materials in my body because it sounds painful, and then I came to think that I was satisfied with my body and its ability (it's obviously not perfect but I feel comfortable enough with it).
I got my idea from a conversation I had with my friend. She referred Karl Lagerfeld on fur that it has to be for the rich because, she explained, if fur were produced massively,that would degrade the value of fur. Though unsure about fur, I do appreciate leather's functionality, yet, in a way, I took that skin from animals. I realized how human skin was so weak and sensitive that we take animal's skin to cover our skin. So in the picture, I strengthen my skin....by growing fur. If the technology became developed enough to invent some sort of chemicals to have stronger skin, we would not have to kill animals or strip off their skin while they are alive.

Artists working with robots

Tweenbots by Kacie Kinzer

This tiny robot has a objective, to go across Washington Square Park, but it can only move straight. It needs to be guided by humans to achieve the goal.

Dean Kamen's Artificial Arm 

(this is not an artwork, but I post this anyway).

The inventor of Segway invented this advanced prosthetic arm, Luke Arm, for returning soldiers who lost their arms. 

The user controls the arm by nerves, muscles, and foot pedals.

The Colbert Report	Mon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c
Dean Kamen
www.colbertnation.com
Colbert Report Full Episodes 2010 Election March to Keep Fear Alive

Chance Project

1. Identify your favorite adjective.

2. Google the images of the adjective you picked.

3. Look at the clock and see where the the short hand is on.
(If the short hand is between 1 to 5, count 1 as 13, 2 as 14, 3 as 15, 4
as 16, 5 as 17)

4. Pick the images first appeared on Google and as same number as the
short hand is on.

5. Choose a self-portrait that describes or matches the adjective.

6. Using photo editing software, make all the images
20% transparent.

7. Combine them all into one image.

8. Reverse the tone.

9. Take a break from working on this project..

10. Identify your least favorite adjective.

11. This time, look at your cell phone and identify the hour hand when
you last time made a phone call.

12. Repeat the same procedure (Step 4 to 8).

13. See what you got!

Lucky

Cute

Google Earth Art

Google's World by Alejo Malia on Flickr

Alejo Malia's series called "Google's World" represents some of the elements that we see in Google Maps in the realistic setting. I think that this series signifies today's way of using a map and, in a sense, that it is  not only a virtual reality, but happening in reality because, with GPS, Google Maps guides us as we move. Only thing is that we just don't see those icons in reality. But, this series intrigues me to put virtual icons into reality.


Space Junk Spotting by SAŠO SEDLAČEK

Space Junk Catalogue: KMZ File

Using Google Earth, the Slovenian artist created a catalogue of junk exist in outer space.The dilemma of this garbage dump is that the owners of space junk shirk their responsibility, but then they claim their ownership, thus it makes it impossible to clean up or recycle the garbage in space. The theme of his project is to question the limit of dumping garbage into space and the owner's responsibility of space junk, and suggest the possibility of recycling. Based on a database of a U.S. government-owned space observatory, he mapped the position of space garbage and the information of each piece of junk on Google Earth.

Stolen Identity

Aya Kowashi's facebook

My persona, Aya Kowashi, is a Japanese high school girl born and living in Tokyo. She's interested in cultural exchange particularly American (pop) culture. She only exists on facebook. 

The idea of creating my persona is a stereotype (I have) of Japanese girls. I have been overly thinking and analyzing Japanese girl's behavior I have few friends who are self-conscious and the problem I have with those girls is that they strive to look cute thought what they do doesn't appear to be cute to the others eyes. On her facebook, Aya uses many emoticons, hearts, stars, exclamations marks. She thinks adding those extra decorations are cute and will look cute to the others, too. But the fact is that Japanese culture tells girls what is cute and the girls just follow what the culture tells them, so "extra decorations are cute" is generated by the culture, not her true opinion. So, the behavior of Japanese girls is superficial and truly driven by their unconscious self-consciousness, and that's what my persona is.

My work

Tumblr

Sol LeWitt

20. "Successful art changes our understanding of the conventions by altering our perceptions."

I believe that this Sol LeWitt's statement is true because our response matters the most for conceptual art when art challenges us aesthetically and visually, but I think that an artist is not only the one who makes successful art but we make it successful. “One and Three Chairs” by Joseph Kosuth, for instance, is about ways of expressing an idea, not a chair itself. When an artwork is installed in a setting such as museums or galleries, we assume that it is art, but if we don’t recognize that idea, we are unsuccessful to understand art and the artwork has no effect on us thus nothing is changed. The object does not change our understanding like a magic. We are the ones who change it by our reflection to the object. I believe that whether it is successful art or not is pretty much a matter of how we interpret it.