What's the Rush exhibition

This is a long overdue blog post.

What's the Rush? Topics on Convenience, a recent exhibition at the Cal State Fullerton Main Art Gallery, featured artists Susan Jane Belton, Derek Buckner, Chris Jordan, Kevin Landers, Henriette Sonne, Maya Sutter, and Chris Wright. Uniting the pieces on display November through December 2009 was the visual commentary they portrayed of life in our fast-paced world. Depictions, paintings, photographs, and sculptures ranging from the things we carry in our pockets, to sculptures of bagged snack chips, to the scrutinizing details of a portrait depicting the two million plastic beverage bottles used in the United States every five minutes confronted viewers with the realities about our culture of excess.

What's the Rush provided a forum for discussions about the current state of today's convenience-focused society and want-it-now attitudes. The exhibition was as much about design as it was about the artist's individual expression. Each piece could be interpreted as a commentary on the design of the things we use and come in contact with daily. Cell phones, designed for the convenience of communicating on the go, are redesigned every year to hold the latest technology and sell more units. Coffee cups are branded by their respective conglomerate corporate chains to keep consumers loyal. Processed potato chips are dressed up in fancy, sliver lining and the brightest colors to appease your appetite. What's the point? The design of all these things influences the consumer habits we see today.

The exhibition was able to provide a snap shot of our current consumer culture. The artists' work on display started discussions about the need to consider the implications of our fast-paced society and its effect on our environment and our bodies.

*Update* Beautiful catalog photographs from contributing catalog designer, Johan Vilchez


What's the Rush? Topics on Convenience
Curated by Elizabeth C. Tallman and Krystal Glasman

November 7, 2009 through December 16, 2009
CSUF Main Art Gallery

Pollution by Brian Snelson

Pollution, an exhibition by Cal State Fullerton Ceramics major Brian Snelson, opened tonight in the CSUF West Gallery. Walls covered in plastic, signifying the pollution produced from life in an industrialized society, created an eerie feeling of suffocation within the space. This played well on Snelson's themes of convenience, environmental pollution, and pollution in the human body. A number of clay sculptures resembling human organs and products of industry, like automotive parts, occupy the gallery. Some are sloshed with a thick, debilitating glaze, while others are littered with corrosive rust that will continue to erode the pieces well past the moment Snelson's hands last formed the sculptures. Pollution provides audiences an abstract perspective on the current state of our environments. Snelson's exhibition reinforces the reality that we live in a increasingly volatile environmental crisis. A crisis that not only effects our physical surroundings, but also our physical condition.

In what ways have you felt the effects of environmental pollution in, or on your body?




Cal State Fullerton Art Department
800 N. State College Blvd.
Fullerton, CA 92834

West Gallery
Room VA198

Earth

Seven experts sharing their contemporary ideas of cohabitation on Planet Earth. What will all of them need when they are ready to bring their ideas to fruition?

They will need functional design to communicate their ideas and processes to the public at large.

That's where I come in. Visual communicator for essential ideas and philosophies of the new century.

Information is beautiful.

Sputnik Observatory for the Study of Contemporary People

Dyson Airblade

Sleek industrial design for the Dyson Airblade. Dries your hands in 12 seconds or less with a thin, powerful blade of warm air.

It's the fastest hand dryer – and it's hygenic too, cleaning the air before blowing it onto hands. And because it uses up to 80% less energy than warm air hand dryers, it costs less to run and is better for the environment.

The only hand drier that literally scrapes water from your hands.

Greenwala - The Green Social Network

Social networks are not created equal. First, the primary function of a social network must be established. Is it a job seeker's social network (OC JobTalk), a video sharing network (Vimeo), a political network (Rock The Vote), a network to reconnect with friends (Facebook), or even a specific interest network (Greenwala)? After the function has been decided, the design must be implemented. To me, a unified design must be prominent or the network will never reach its full potential. Factors such as user interface design, visual hierarchy, available community functions like blogs/videos/groups, the ability for users to intuitively navigate back and forth through the network connecting to the people they want, and many other factors contribute to a social network's success and must be easy to use.

I recently joined Greenwala, "The green social network". This year Greenwala is combatting deforestation by planting a tree for every member who joins. Its goal is to plant one million trees and create a million-member community engaged in the green revolution. That ambitious challenge alone sealed the deal for me when I signed up earlier this month.

I wasn't sure what to expect when I first arrived at their homepage. But, I like what I see and I like what I get. A large interactive component featuring videos, products, articles, and contests. An easy, and prominent interactive navigation bar. A large news feed similar to Facebook's that updates in real time with user generated content. When you join as a member, all of your relative content (profile, blog, classifieds, videos, events, friends, groups, and photos) and a large personal photo is consistently in the right column of every page. I appreciate the large photo and information throughout the website because it makes each page feel personalized for me.

Overall, Greenwala meets my expectations of user-centered functionality and appealing design, and it exceeds my expectations for a social network with a cause. The cause to go green should be on everyone's mind right now (Greenwala posts the figures to prove that).

Find and connect with me on Greenwala, have a tree planted in your name, and learn how fun it is to go green.

Plane Stupid Polar Bear Commercial

In an analysis of this video by NPR's "All Things Considered," Andrew Revkin addresses that the claims made by Plane Stupid are true, but more importantly asks whether the analogy is strong enough to influence people to change their minds to begin with. Are polar bears the strongest metaphor of the impacts of excessive greenhouse gas emissions and climate change? Meaning, can people really relate to the polar bears of the Arctic, when most people will never set foot on Arctic tundra? Possibly, to most people, the Arctic will only be a place they visit in their minds. Unless people are exposed to videos, programs, and movies such as those seen on PBS or the National Geographic Channel, the general public might not consider their everyday consumer choices, or use of air travel to commute, as the video targets, to be affecting the arctic.

What other analogies could be drawn to the carbon emissions from air travel, and how would they be illustrated?

(While it is true that current air travel carbon emissions are less than a few percent of all emissions globally, when the world population reaches 9 billion people in 2050, how will all of those people choose to traverse our tiny, pale blue dot?)

Nationwide Insurance: Empty promises?

Yeah, it's a great environmental installation, but, what the heck is up with the Nationwide logo? Empty promises? You missed a spot? iPod? Pantone swatch? What does an empty box represent for an insurance company? Look at that copy on the building. It dwarfs the logo. The logo has no presence. The letter forms all merge together when seen on that scale.