User:Bruce mclachlan

bio

Bruce is an urban tumbleweed that sprouted in Hornchurch, Essex, England, and has rolled comprehensively through London, San Francisco, and Seattle. He’s been a Royal Marine Cadet, has worked in demolition and kidney dialysis, for the Ministry of Defence, McDonalds, Harvey Nichols, Texaco Oil, Cupmark Meats, Fords, and Selfridges on Oxford Street. He acquired a BTEC National Diploma (Associate degree) in Display Design from Havering Technical College UK which he put to use for ADIG studios and as an assistant for Lloyd Hryciw Photography (the guy who did the Visa dove). On the trumpet he achieved grade 3 and 4, the former with merit, and played in several orchestras including one for the YMCA. He held membership in the Killerwhales Swimming Club and competed in a oodles of competitions (even winning a few). He founded several guilds and organizations in the live role-play organization Labyrinthe where he also worked in their armory making replica fantasy weapons and equipment as well as freelance manufacture. He was a volunteer for the Evergreen Trustand assisted in their fundraising efforts for environmental preservation and the alleviation of poverty in Africa.

Extensively published both as a writer and an artist under various pseudonyms he may well be a figment of his own imagination.

assignments

1: Art Walk

- What was the least ‘public’ piece of art you saw today, and why?

Tom Wesselman’s Seattle Tulip. I think because I’ve walked that street so often, and passed it so many times, just going somewhere, that to my eye it’s like any other lamp post or road sign or fountain. So when I was actually required to view it, for some reason I just couldn’t notice a humungous metal flower dominating a street corner.

- Did you see anything you would not define as art? Why?

The Garden of Remembrance. I’m not convinced that art should serve an actual physical purpose, hence why old clock towers, bridges, and other intricately and thoughtfully planned and executed items, while historical and impressive are not really quantifiable as art. The garden, while excellently evocative, thought provoking and masterfully presented, serves as potent reminder that these are not just names on a roster but people who died, who had families, who had dreams, hopes, and things they wanted other than to die in battle in a land they probably hadn’t heard of until they were sent there. It stirs emotion as art should, but it serves a material purpose as a focus for grief, like a gravestone, hence why I personally would disqualify it or at least question its status as art.

- What was something interesting you saw that was not officially on the tour?

I went into the antique store on the waterfront for the first time and marveled at many a long lost piece and item.

“Brewing Storm, pacific coast, stand of firs, Cumberland”, a photo by Glenn J Rudolph etched into granite.

The climbing/falling men on the garage at Jefferson and 6th.

The frieze on the Pacific Northwest Title Company, 215 Columbia street.

The metal fountain outside the ferry terminal.

The big orange metal thing on the corner of Yres and South Washington Street.

Some nice Susanne Kelly woodcuts in the windows of the unfortunately closed Gallery 110.

(I was also amazed that just by holding a piece of paper and looking from it, to the surrounding area, you seemingly emit the 'I have spare cash, booze, and fags' mating cry for every bum, slob, junkie, and drunk within ten blocks.)

midterm

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v470/Porcupyne/jim_1.jpg

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reflective assessment

Week 1

It’s strange how different one can be perceived so differently just through the addition of a piece of paper and by looking around. What would ordinarily be a normal pedestrian, a denizen of Seattle is turned into a bumbling tourist just because they don’t look like they know where they are. Confidence. It’s a powerful currency. Just by looking like you know what’s going on, by moving with determination in an unwavering path, people seem to know not to trifle with you. Pause, look bewildered, show doubt and uncertainty, and those who would exploit and make use of it flock to you like vultures over a recent kill.

Week 2

The vehemence with which Christo addresses his art is both inspirational and well, kind of unnerving, it made me consider being more passionate about my own work, but to keep an eye on the gauge lest it wander into the red. One of the most interesting aspects of the umbrellas project was to see the contrast between the two cultures. Not just the usual superficialities, but the more unexpected facets. When the Japanese talked of only being able to eat hamburgers should they be in America was expected, but the steak and oranges comment was not so easily anticipated. Where the woman was just too intimidated to even say hello, because Christo was clearly so important, this could not have been a more radical contrast to the fans who mob stars in the States.

It was strange that the same number of umbrellas, in the same sort of valleys, on two different countries, claimed the same number of lives each.

I was also miffed that we will cover Banksey next week because, being a fan, I picked up ‘Wall and Piece’ over the break and when the mid term was brought up, I instantly thought of him. I enjoy his ‘rats’ period, and his brandalism, and his work on the illegal wall in Palestine shows true determination, commitment, and flare. My interest in him was also rekindled when I ran into an entire tunnel of Banksey or Banksey-esque art when I visited home during the summer break.

Pictures of the art: [1]

Week 3

Ah the wonders of YouTube. The most potent weapon of free speech ever conceived. That which would be oppressed is everywhere – unstoppable and magnificent.

YouTube is like a mine. You dig relentlessly through piles and piles of dull rocks and stone, there’s occasional stinking methane pockets or other noxious fluids and deposits, but then there’s the coal that makes you smirk or intrigues, providing fuel for thought, and then there are the gems that dazzle and make you want to show them off to everyone you know.

Never underestimate the power of a viral video. Something you haven’t seen since you were a child, something precious, something trivial to others is almost certainly on YouTube, preserved for all time. To quote Sir Arthur Conan Doyle “The small things are infinitely the most important”.

Looking at the day, I see that YouTube reminds me that small victories in your life are not just extinguished, they live on, they spread, others tell the tale, they pass it on. The past lives, and like with youtube, we can visualize it, and remind ourselves that our lives may be fleeting and finite, but the smallest deed can leave a legacy we would never have even considered.

Week 4

- Thoth

My reflective? -- Envisage your future and it will be so. I watched a man create his own world and then act as a sort of emissary/minstrel, bringing the sung tales of that land to ours, in the language of those people.

I have found myself wincing at words of intolerance towards other countries because they are not as ‘enlightened’ as America. “They don’t let women drive”. “They don’t allow free democracy”. “They persecute and oppress”. Now I know why I cringe.

Upon seeing what was levied against Thoth, and a man and a woman whose only crime was to fall in love and be of different skin color makes me furious, more so because this was not some old man retelling this sorry chapter in U.S history on grainy black and white film or on parchment rather these were home movies -- this was less than half a century ago.

No matter how well you are doing, or how far you think you’ve come, never become complacent because in the end, all your ‘advances’ are ant tracks in the dirt.

Don’t judge other cultures because they don’t have the same ‘freedoms’ or ‘values’ as you do because those freedoms you’re so proud of came about in the last few nanoseconds of human existence, before that, this land was just as crap to people as those authorities it would condemn.

I’m going to try and remember that humanity is on a journey and all of the crowd is in motion. Some dawdle, some stomp forward, some run, some fall. Just because one member of the Earth crowd had this neat idea while they were beating the shit out of someone because they had different skin, different genitalia, different beliefs, and suddenly realized that perhaps that’s not nice, don’t then call everyone else in the crowd a violent thug and an ignorant bastard when your knuckles are still bruised and bleeding.

- Style Wars

One mans art is anothers god awful visual pox.

From this week I assimilated this -- Never underestimate the power of herd mentality. Tell people trains are supposed to be white and shiny, make it so for a few decades, and anyone who says different, or tries to do different is scum to be reviled, and mobs will form to undo what they have wrought.

Trouble is, those dissenting voices, lashing out, creating at 2.a.m left a mark as indelible as any architectural marvel. Who can picture NY without the graf covered trains? Even though they lost, even though the artists are gone, they burned their tags into our minds eye and we can’t picture the Big Apple without them.

The victory of the authorities was hollow.

Imagination. Creativity. Energy. Passion.

They win every time.

Week 5

There is a reason so many stories evolve from techno fear, it’s because we are becoming increasingly reliant on something that is utterly unpredictable and fails without warning or reason.

From this class I learned to work on the premise that anything involving technology will screw up, and the more high tech it is, the more screwed up it can get. Power point may seem simple and even banal, but well, it’s near certain to work.

Simple slides may not have the impact or glitz of a streaming video or swanky graphic effect, but when the power point works and the ‘cool’ thing is a blank screen? I don’t think ‘honest, it was REALLY cool, I swear it!’ will work on client or fellow professional.

If I have any media to show, I now know to download in advance, onto a thumbdrive, and possibly with a CD as a backup incase that goes wrong somehow (dies, explodes, become self aware and wipes out the human race with thumb-inators).

My self assessment?

“Hope for the Best. Prepare for the Worst”

Week 6