Lecture Ten, Dreaming!

So, Angela Joosse' stuff was cool.

I think I have to be honest here. The artwork presented didn't impress me very much. I think the Leona Drive project was certainly fun and sweet call back to a time which is now long-gone. It would have been entertaining to have actually been submerged in the project, and I can imagine that a faux-nostalgia made of real emotions would probably overwhelm me. And here I'm not trying to be polite but honest.

I didn't think that the project did very much else though. In Angela Joosse' statement on her website she expresses her concerns or hesitations with creating in academia or the arts. Joosse says,

"we are drawn to phenomena, to things, to events that are little known or scarcely discussed. In this way we contribute to what is known and also provide articulation of phenomena, people, things that may have been excluded from the current or dominant discourse. That is, we find ways to make thetic what was relatively unknown. The danger is this: that we bring what was in the shadows, what was ,cloaked in complexity into the open and in so doing leave it open to manipulation. We live in a world that has a restless appetite for novelty."

Well, I think perhaps Joosse perhaps committed what she is apprehensive about in this installation. By taking a complete strangers belongings who is little known aside from her family and friends and who accomplished no things in her life that were considered worthy of notoriety (that is not to say her life was pointless or useless, I am sure Ruth did a lot during her years) and creating an installation about it, Joosse creates a minor phenomena. I think it is a form of manipulation. The artists had a number of belongings of Ruths but ultimately knew very little about the woman and yet "a Ruth" and "her" habitat were created. I think that very much the piece was based on novelty.

It seems as though Joosse is looking for some kind of real avant-garde, or at least some way to figure out that her work and other's in the field are exploring things that matter.

"One of the things that is becoming of increasing concern to me is trouble of bringing a new thing/ a new articulation into the world...As we all continue to work in the academy we know that we must contribute, and some degree of originality is required in order for our work to be considered an actual contribution to the field"

The Leona Drive project I don't think articulated anything very new. The themes seemed recycled and reminded me of some sort of small museum which exhibits the artefacts of the town's older generations. All in all, I didn't think there was very much unique presented, but it was touching.

I did appreciate the writings in the letters and autograph books which Ruth owned. It certainly helped to conjure up old souls and timeless advice and romanticism.

I hope no one re-creates a vision of me when I pass.