Printing on Grass

This is from the Chicago Cultural Center:

 

Sidney R. Yates Gallery: 7/14 - 9/28/03

Supernatural (after Piero di Cosimo

British artists Heather Ackroyd and Dan Harvey create a major new

work. "Supernatural" (after Piero di Cosimo) will be a 10-foot by 28-

foot living grass photograph of Piero di Cosimo's Renaissance

painting "A Satyr Mourning Over A Nymph." By exploiting the light-

sensitivity of young growing grass, Ackroyd and Harvey imprint

photographic images into grass that has been grown vertically,

creating the image on the entire length of the blade. Ackroyd and

Harvey's "photographs" cast in grass are created through a

photosynthetic print process. Instead of black and white, the images

are shades of green and yellow.

The public may witness the photosynthesis of a second piece by

Ackroyd and Harvey, on display in the vacant storefront windows

located at 151 N. State Street.

 

Sorry couldn't find photos on the site. Light variations in the

projected image cause the grass to grow into the picture.

Wow! Kind a like a Chia pet.

 

Wonder if this project was funded by the NEA?

 

RJ

...but is it archival grass??

I thot maybe yew wur sugjetin uhnuther kemikul tew add tew thu darkrum

Waste of a good smoke?? OOps! wrong grass!! ;-)

 

CP Goerz

I thought you meant Fuji plate negs.

 

We once had a Japanese co-worker, whom we knew loved to garden, come in one morning and say he needed new grasses. At lunch someone took him to a gardening store before they figured out he meant new glasses.

This fall I think I will leave the piles of fallen oak leafs I rake on my grass for different lengths of time before I bag them. Then when my wife complains about the yellow dead spots of grass you think I can call it a "photograph" or "art"?

Terence: THAT made me chuckle! You clazy bloss! (that's from an old cartoon I have burned into my brain from my childhood - and I can't even remember whihc one it is!)

Shock! Horror! Artist discovers photosynthesis and chlorophyll... Whatever next?

 

I'm only amazed they bothered to go to such extremes - surely just plonking a sod of earth in the middle of a large gallery floor, calling it "A Satyr Mourning Over A Nymph" and telling anyone who will stand still long enough to listen that it is "an attempt to redefine the boundaries of art" would have sufficed.

why, so many times, does photo.net seem like a haven for the narrow minded and ignorant?

 

This discussion reminds me of nothing so much as my Mother-in-Law who, when faced with anything but the the most literal and represntational of art, would say (of the likes of Picasso) "why couldn't he just paint a horse to look like a horse"; usually followed closely by a variation on "I know what I like and I like what I know".

I'm in total agreement with Kevin Gibson's statement...but,

moreover, I'm disappointed with those individuals who take the

cheap opportunity to malign a nationality because they cannot

pronounce a word(s) properly.

<p>

I'm not sure if this makes them "feel" superior in some remote

definition of the term but this certainly isn't an appropriate place

for that sort of ignorance.

<p>

What a world!

Ah - you mean the kind of people with sense of humour deficiency syndrome, who prefer to fire off pointless insults at people who they believe disagree with their world view? That kind of person?

 

The post is off-topic, will not be archived, and is not important, not least because it is unlikely anyone here will ever see the work in question - hence the jokes....

 

Personally, I'm upset that someone should feel the need to malign their wife's mother in a public forum without giving her the opportunity to defend herself. (Just to clarify: that is not true - it's a joke - possibly satire).

 

.

 

P.S. - I didn't say it was a *good* joke...

Bob,

 

Most of your other OT posts and bad jokes seem to have been archived... what makes you think this should be any different... :-)

Because we now have active moderetors.....

I hope.... :)

Bob,

<p>

It isn't that I don't have a sense of humor but I don't find cracking

jokes about someone's inability to pronounce "glasses versus

grasses" all that funny.

<p>

I suppose these same individuals would find humor in

someone with a cleft palate deformation to be funny because

they speak with a lisp...

<p>

If this is suggestive of my not having a sense of humor...then I'm

glad I don't!

<p>

As I said before, "what a world!"

Sorry H.C. - I should have been more specific - I was not refering to you; you did not feel the need to chuck insults about.

 

FWIW, I agree with your point - I've never seen the point of such "jokes" either, at least, not since I was old enough to realise the damage they do to our perception of other people who happen to be different from us.

In all honesty, that really was my first impression when I read the title. No offense was intended. I work with a very diverse group, so misinterpretations are a daily event.

 

The fellow in question in my story found it as funny as the rest of us. Had they not gotten all the way to the garden center it may not have been as funny. He was wondering why Americans would sell spectacles at a garden center. Another ESL (English as a Second Language) co-worker once sent me a memo asking me to "clearify" something. Made me wonder why we DON'T spell it that way.

 

Coming from Boston, and having worked in the Deep South, I can tell you that some of the funniest moments were what people down south THOUGHT I said.

Bob,

<p>

Thank you for indulging in my attitude towards this type of

humor...

<p>

I've found that the majority of people on this forum are decent

people who don't have a problem sharing information and

advice with each other. That's what makes this forum a rarity... it

doesn't strive to put people down for their lack of knowledge (as

newbies) and also enhances the knowledge of more

experienced users. In other words, we can all share via our

common love of photography.

<p>

Personally, I find this forum a reprieve from all the animosities

and crap from the outside world and that's why I was so annoyed

when I read the comments from a couple of the posters. There's

just NO need for that kind of commentary here.

<p>

Anyway, that's just one person's opinion.

The "pronunciation" humor is cross cultural.

 

Example:

 

In Mandarin Chinese, there are four ways to pronounce "chi" (rising tone, falling, rising and falling, flat). Each has a completely different meaning (two of them are: seven; and the "life force/essence"). They all sound the same to me, and my ability to pronounce them is even worse!

 

To a native Mandarin speaker, the four pronunciations are so distinct that he/she cannot comprehend that you would not hear the difference.

 

Do you not think that foreigners' pronunciation is a subject of humor in China? Or Japan, France, Russia, etc?

 

I think it is possible to understand and sympathize with a non-native speaker's pronunciation error, and also find it humorous. It just takes some perspective.

Getting back to the grass, there was a blurb on the local Chicago news yesterday about the exhibit. They said they shined light through a negative, which filtered out how much light each area got, and that the darkest areas receive the grass most the light. They said the grass would eventually die, but the piece could last as long as three months. I might be passing by 151 State tomorrow, so I'll post my impressions if I get a chance to see it. Have you peace pipes ready so we can pass 'em around.

 

Evidently there was an artical about the artists and the process two years ago in Aperture magazine issue no.165:

 

www.aperture.org/magazines_details.php?magazine_id=20 - 12k

If possible, can you can take a snapsot of it - after all this, it would be interesting to actually see what it looks like.....

 

Cheers,

Had a look at the display at 151 N State (the storefront, not the primary exhibit- and no I don't have any pictures, my scanner is down), but the exhibition there seems to be conceptually a bit different from the photo-grass printing process that's been discussed above. On display at the former home of Mort Coopers, purveyor of brightly colored attire for the aspiring player, gansta, or pimp, two bodies of a man and a woman lie in state in two separate display windows, that stand in the shadows of the Chicago theater and the a 2nd floor hair salon named Ossama's. The bodies, fully three dimensional, seem to be in a state of decay, though well preserved- their anatomical structure remain fully intact and detailed. However they also have the appearance of being more plant life and soil than skin and bones, as if roots are already weaving the way through the bodies.

 

Of course the the corpses SHOULD have appeared like interwoven plant matter and soil- because that's what they are. And roots ARE weaving their way through the body. At the other fringes of the corspes, grass is growing, while the top of bodies remains bare, giving the bodies the appearance of bear rug or the "Burning Man". The purpose of this exercise is off course to symbolize the return of our flesh to the earth; ashes to ashes, dust to dust. To assure this occurs in a controled manner certain parts of the body- the other edges, anatomical areas in shadow relief- have been treated with a dark substance (one can even see what looks like seeds in these dark areas), where presumably the grass will grow at a faster rate, so that the body will maintain a human anatomical appeareance even as plant life threaten to overtake it. In the artist description, they say the bodies will live, grow, rot, whither away and then die, presumably representing the circle of life that comes out of death.

 

The source of this life renewal process, however is not indicated in it's storefront window presentation. The bodies exist on a floating island of seamless white background and high key florescent lighting, making no connection with it's presented environment or the chaotic scene outside. The bodies lies in state like a gaudy funeral. Kind of reminds me of the funeral 15 years ago of the son of a South Side Chicago ganster named Flukey Stokes who had his son propped up at the wheel of Cadillac Seville as half the South Side came down to A. R. Leaks Funeral home to either pay their respects or check out the "Bling, Bling".

 

Maybe 151 N State was the right location after all.

 

But where do I go to get a suit for my next job interview?

 

(You can read more about this legendary Chicago funeral at: http://www.srvrocks.com/lyrics-willie_the_wimp.htm or just type "Flukey Stokes" into google.com)