Kinetics

Grace Brown and I had a ball with our kinetic project. Focusing on a satirical view of religion, we created a talking Jesus portrait.
We knew we wanted to do something that might make people laugh or feel uncomfortable; I wanted the audience to walk away affected emotionally. Many sketches and meetings with Michelle later, Grace and I headed to Lowe's and bought the necessary supplies. Using plywood as our backing we printed out on photo paper and collaged a traditional Jesus portrait using hot glue to adhere. For the frame we cut down moulding and nailed to into the plywood. We chose to lacquer the pieces of moulding gold for a more Renaissance/Gothic feel-- easily stereotyped as a more Baroque aesthetic, the gold exalts the subject matter, who here happens to be Jesus.
As far as the mechanics went, we cut out a strip from the plywood backing right there Jesus's mouth would be. This served as a track for the dowel that attached to the mouth shaped cut-out we used as the kinetic part of this project. A sanded, oblong piece of plywood was connected to the motor. A vertical dowel (placed to run along the oblong gear) connected to the horizontal one, which caused the mouth to move.
Placed on a table that was draped with white, two church candles flanked the portrait. It ended up being three feet wide by three and a half feet tall. Its size and the presentation made it appear to be on an altar. Darwinism playing in the background provided the comic.. or rather sacrilegious.. aspect we were going for.

Big picture: Jesus sitting on an altar, speaking Darwinism to his beloved congregation.

The collage gave a more modern feel to the portrait-- it wasn't perfectly aligned, and the image was slightly pixellated. This is what we wanted. Printed from technology and rearranged for the twentieth century, a religion after such a long history undergoes slight changes, cracks, falls apart, despite the gold frame and the period style in which it is presented. Where it looks almost perfect and old, juxtaposed with this is the crystal clear voice of Darwinism coming straight from the savior's mouth. The fight between science and religion is an old one.





The video is an informal record of our success at getting the kinetic part of our project to work. It was really exciting at the time, though I wish later we had documented the whole project better. That was something I certainly learned from the Time class experience.

Final Project

Olivia and I created a printed portrait of Jesus whose jaw moves up and down while an audiobook about the Theory of Evolution played in the background. The idea was how religion has been warped so much over time that it is not so much religion anymore. The collage look of the Jesus represents the change people have created in religion. The theory of evolution playing in the background represents how science has killed/changed religion. In the past, God was the one expected to perform miracles, now, everyday people can perform miracles, such curing diseases. As Nietzsche said, "God is dead."

Time Automata

My time automata had two sources of sound: a scraping stick on a large screw and a bell. To create sound you had to turn the handle counter clockwise. Elements I used were cardboard, a screw, a bell, popsicle sticks, and a dowel.

Chalk

For six hours on Tuesday 9 February I drew on the outside walls of Cannon Hall and Teft Hall. I started with a small box of chalk and as I began I realized the chalk was breaking down fast. I was going to run out of chalk before the six hours were up so I had to draw really slow. I drew an octopus and underwater scene, a lion-like animal, and a monster in city scene. After the six hours my fingers were scraped and raw and the chalk I was using was miniscule.

Chalk

On Tuesday the ninth of February 2010, I will be drawing on the outsides of buildings for six hours straight with chalk. I cannot go inside. I cannot speak to anyone excepting the following phrases: "I'm drawing on the walls with chalk." If I run out of chalk I must use things I find outdoors to complete the six hour drawings.

Performance Piece

For my performance piece I went around Cohen, not talking to anyone, pretending to twitch and scratch at my hands. Periodically I would take a pill from the bottle I was carrying around (vitamin D) and look around afterwards. The idea was to see what people's reactions would be, because when I did this in Cohen, the people viewing this were strangers to me.

Sonic Postcard

multiplicity

multiplicity from ethan martin on Vimeo.

Record of Time

For my record of time of Thursday 21 of January, instead of using a clock, I wrote down segments of conversations I had over heard or had. I wrote them on and with materials I had at hand wherever I was. It turned out that what I had overheard throughout my day was pretty interesting, I had never noticed until I compiled pieces of conversation.