Go Dayton Flyers

This week I decided that instead of looking at your typical art, I’d go watch the art of athletics at the University of Dayton Stadium. I went to watch the Dayton Flyers play University of Akron on Tuesday November 16th at 9:00. Unfortunately for me, we have the worst seats in the house… the major nosebleeds. It is super dark up there and you can barely see anything. I wouldn’t mind if I didn’t actually enjoy watching people play basketball. I love basketball. There is nothing like it when your team had the sweetest dunk ever. But that is beside the point. For the first half of the game I sat in the nosebleeds until we found empty chairs in the student section. Now those are great seats. Nothing beats sitting in a crowd of Red Scare t-shirts screaming, “ GO DAYTON FLYERS…”
As for the game, at first it was close with both teams going back and forth to get the lead. But after halfway through the first half UD broke away and got ahead to end the first half in what looked like a success. But this was not the case for the second half. Akron came back out like it meant business. They kept scoring and eventually got in the lead, which was only adding to the suspense of the game. (Brief side note: if you want to increase your stress levels, going to athletic events is one of the most stressful things imaginable. I mean it makes sense when you are freaking out because your team isn’t winning when you want them too.)
This game was getting intense. Dayton was majorly slacking and needed to get back in the game. There was only 11 minutes left when thank god UD decided to actually play some ball. With in the last 11 minutes UD caught up, broke off again and managed to stay on top for the remainder of the game. It was beautiful and definitely an invigorating game to watch.

Coalesce Depart

This week I went to the Senior Art Exhibit at the Rike Center Gallery. The show was entitled “Coalesce Depart”. The point of the show was to advertise all of the seniors’ talent and potentially sell some of their artwork. There were all sorts of artwork from photography to paint to sculpture to graphic design. There were a few really abstract pieces. One was entitled “Pay No Attention to the Man Behind the Curtain”. This piece was a mirror covered in green clear fabric with a green light shining from up top. At the bottom of the fabric was a pair of red shoes. I interpreted the point of the piece was like something from the Wizard of Oz. You weren’t supposed to look into the mirror and rather just be the opposite of Dorothy and pay no attention to the man behind the curtain. This piece definitely stuck out from everything else. Another one of my favorite pieces was called Light and Air. This piece was basically 3 panels of fabric that had all of these warm colors depicting a sunset. I have always been a fan of paneled artwork, which is probably why I was attracted to this one so much.
One artist put an actual installation on the wall where he hand painted on the wall a self portrait of himself with his birthday and some other things he liked. The piece is priced for $2000. It is an amazing piece of art.
Being a design major like I am made going to this art show inspiring. I know I’m exhausted of my classes but seeing what they have created only inspires me more to keep going and create something even better.
Art is truly something amazing. It can turn your day from a complete waste to something relaxing and great. Even if it isn’t the next Mona Lisa, a simple craft could take your ordinary day and turn it into extraordinary. I feel like in the hustle and bustle of today’s society no one makes time to appreciate the little things. People should focus on what is going on around them and not fret about all they have to do. We all need to take a deep breath and notice all the little things we seem to overlook that make our day great.

The Social Network and TNL

This weekend I went to see the movie The Social Network. The movie is about the creation of facebook. Facebook was created one night at Harvard University by a drunken freshman that was mad at his girlfriend. He first created a website called face mash where you would rate people’s attractiveness in comparison to each other. After his genius broke into Harvard’s IT system, two upperclassmen found him and asked him to be the programmer for this website they wanted to launch which was social networking for Harvard students only. Mark Zuckerberg (the creator of facebook) took their idea and turned facebook into what it is today.
In the process of taking these guys idea, he also had his best friend invest a large sum of money into the company and later kicked him out.
The filming of this movie was great. It was never confusing and always interesting. The unfortunate thing about this movie is the truth about how much of a jerk Mark Zuckerberg really is as well as the creator of Napster. It is sad that these people who create such great inventions have to be so rude and such elitist snobs.
Overall the movie was good, not one of my favorites but I would definitely recommend it to anyone searching for any form of entertainment.

On another note, I went to Thursday Night Live again this week because my friend Mary was performing. She sang five songs and played guitar. She was great, and she dedicated a Backstreet Boys song (You Are My Fire) to everyone on the floor that went to support her. Another one of my favorites she sang was Stormy Weather by Billie Holliday. It is such a nice peaceful song and it was in such a peaceful setting. She sang a duet with a guy named Anthony called Say Hello by Rosie Thomas and Sufijan Stevens. This Thursday Night Live was by FAR better than the previous one I went to. It was the perfect day to sit in a nice café and listen to music. It was cold and dreary while the café was warm and lovely.

A creative Halloween

I always struggle with what I am going to be for Halloween. Each year I end up coming up with some costume within a day or the day of. This year was going to be different.
Liz, Paris and I went to the Green to find costumes each having somewhat of an idea as to what we were going to be. Once we got there we realized how unnecessarily expensive Halloween costume stores are. I was not about to pay fifty dollars when I could easily make my costume. I decided to be a Native American and we went to Wal-Mart to get some feathers and a pillowcase.
Once we got back to the dorm I pulled out the biggest pillowcase I’ve ever seen. First I cut out a neck hole. Then I cut up the side seams so I could try it on to see what I was really dealing with. After I figured out what I needed to do, I began fringing the sides. Liz helped me turn the bottom of my costume into one of straight out of Disney channel. We cut the bottom of the soon to be native dress into a diamond shape then fringed it.
After we finished cutting and making my costume look decent I realized that it needed something else. It was boring because the fabric was just plain and beige. I decided I wanted to be like Pocahontas and have a bear claw on my costume. I was afraid to free hand one on the fabric so I decided to use some of what I learn in my 2D design class to good use. I printed off a picture of a bear claw and I traced the claw on tracing paper. Then traced the opposite side of the tracing paper and traced that on the pillowcase. It was perfect. I painted it red and then added a belt to bring it all together.
On Halloween I received many compliments about my costume. I had colorful feathers in my hair and a tomahawk on my hip and the best part about it was that I only spent 7 $ on what some paid $50.
Halloween is a great time to express your creativity. There is no reason that you cant be whoever or whatever you want on this special day. And there is no reason that you can’t be creative while doing it. I saw a million Indians out there and none of them looked like me.