Name: Alison Boliek
Artist: Kehinde Wiley

In the December 2006 issue of Vanity Fair, “The Art Issue”, the works of eight young artists amid the New York art scene were discussed. I enjoyed reading about each of them, but the work of Kehinde Wiley really caught my eye. He became known for his paintings of young African-American men. His approach to portraiture is anything but traditional. His works reflect an urban hip-hop culture and capitalism. They evoke a sense of power and opulence, and are very confrontational as the figure is nearly always looking directly at the viewer. Wiley lets his models pose however they like. They mostly wear sweatshirts or sports jerseys and backward baseball caps. The naturalistic masculine figures are placed atop backgrounds of flat patterns. These backgrounds often use French rococo influence and are commonly floral. The contrast of the three dimensionality of the figure in the foreground with the flatness of the background cause the figures to really pop. However, in some of his works, Wiley chooses to continue the patterns overtop parts of the figure to hold it back in space. His use of vivid colors aids to the incredible energy each of his works exudes. Kehinde Wiley is definitely an artist to check out.



Additional websites referenced:

http://www.artnet.com/awc/kehinde-wiley.html

http://www.sfai.edu/People/Person.aspx?id=944&navID=6&sectionID=2&typeID=1



While researching for our Natural/Artificial project, I came across an article called, Is Every "Natural"?, by Ernest Partridge of University of California, Riverside. The article contains a wide variety of information which really helped me to investigate many different issues for my project. The article included a discussion of the psychological aspects of human behavior and the effects they have on global warming. It is suggested that if humans are part of nature, they cannot harm nature. For some reason, I always thought of something natural to be something good until i read this article. But now, I have realized that if people are natural, and people commit immoral acts, to be natural is not always a positive characteristic. In summary, the article made me realize that my preconceived ideas of natural being good and artificial being bad are not valid. The article made me understand the possibility that everything really is natural, good or bad, and artificial simply does not exist.



Article website:

http://gadfly.igc.org/eds/envt/natural.htm