TImeline of Art

Over the years, art has evolved with its different genres into what it is today. The start of this evolution would be Picaso who simply skewed art into basic shapes, an outrageous move that made everyone question what art really was. And then there was Pollock who made everyone question even further what really is art with all his paint scribbles. Photography and video became other ways to not only capture what was around but put in the right perspective could cause people to see the world in a different way and was questionable as to why it was art. Then there was Lichtenstein and Warhol who made everyone give up on being able to not call any and everything art.

Sketches from England

sketches

Here are all the sketches I did while I was in england.

Some pages have multiple pictures on them, like the one from the tower of London. I should have done a better job of labeling where each of these were sketched... but I was usually yanked away from finishing before I could do so.

England Day 7/8

The last two days have gone in a bit of a blur. Its hard to believe that we only have 4 days left.

On Monday, we started at 9:30 and went out to the Tower Of London! It was actually VERY interesting learning about all the history from the audio device after a bit of coaxing from Jim to get one. I went around and spent a lot more time looking around, sketching and taking notes than I thought. The crowned jewels were definitely amazing to see, its weird that I was so close to objects that are worth more than my entire life! It was no wonder that they were protected by doors which each weighed 2 tons each, solid steel with titanium bolts! The only damper on it was that a a few of the objects weren't present, they were in use at that moment, most likely by the queen.

I left later than I was supposed to since I was supposed to meet Jim for a run through Hyde park at noon... I left the tower at that exact time.

I hurried back and ended up missing him, so I went on a run by myself, hoping to run into him on the way.

No cigar...

However, the run was very pleasant, long and hot, but pleasant. The small lake was a lot bigger than I thought, but running through it was very nice.

I returned just in time to head out to the London Eye. I got to see the 4D experience and before going up (which was lame, I'm sorry, it just was) and then we went up! UP up up! We were up higher than Big ben!

Ok, Side note! Big Ben; Such a let down. Biggest disappointment of England. I thought it would be so big that I would be able to see it from anywhere! But no, that puny little bell tower is so hard to see, I can never hear it, and you can't even SEE "Big Ben" because Big Ben is the bell, the clock is just called the Clock Tower. So dumb! The London Eye is definitely the new thing I will think of when I think of London, so much cooler!

Big Ben = Fail.

Tuesday morning, we started at 8:10am and headed out to Canterbury. Yeah, the only time I have ever heard the name is Canterbury tales, which just so happened to have taken place here... or something like that, I really have no idea what the canterbury tales even are to be able to tell you what its significance to the town is. I apologize for my lack of information on the subject.

We went to the Canterbury Cathedral which was rather interesting, very nice architecture, high ceilings and what not, and very old fashioned. It was interesting to be able to see the age on everything and to think that they built this hundreds of years ago, and many many years before the machinery was built to be able to make this in any decent amount of time. I pondered on that a bit as Rick and I left and went to see the Augustine Abby. Sadly, the AA was closed and we had to take our few pictures through a gate.

The rest of the afternoon was relaxing. We had lunch, some tea and scones, and just simply enjoyed the little town as much as we could. It had some nice design and was very quant and interesting to see, but all in all, the town was boring. There really wasn't anything incredibly fascinating about it aside from the Cathedral.

When we got back, we went out and had dinner at an old pub. It was a very cool pub to go to seeing as how the downstairs basement area was build in the 1300's as a monastery and years later in 1667, the top floor was built and the whole thing was turned into a pub. I had Lamb.

Tomorrow is the National Museum. It promises to be a blast and has all the pieces I have wanted to see. I'm stoked.

To Be Continued.

England Day 6

This morning began with hunger!

First thing I did after my shower and shave was a nice English Breakfast downstairs, had to fuel up for Oxford!

To get to Oxford we took:

The subway

A Train

A bus

And more busses throughout the town.

It was very interesting going through a town devoted to scholastic endeavors. It was a lot like Claremont, except for the fact that it had so much more history!

Our first stop on the Double Decker bus was Alice’s Shop, which had a lot of Alice In Wonderland gear. It was amazing to go in that little shop and actually understand everything I was looking at, I appreciated the fact that I read the book earlier in the year.

After that, we walked through a few campuses, and had the best Cream Tea and Scones I had ever had. The Tea I had was called Junsung and it tasted like a bon fire! I know that makes no sense, but trust me, it was bloody brilliant!

The rest of Oxford was just a lot of exploring, more of a relaxing day. We saw Einstein’s chalkboard which had his equation for the expansion of the universe (which I know is complete rubbish, but it was still a very interesting equation, even though I in no way understood it.)

We had a lot of random experiences, one of which being the Pub that CS Lewis and JR Tolken founded… or something like that. It was a great place and felt very scholarly for a pub. We stayed there for a while just talking and sketching and just had a good ol time. We then ventured over to a Gallery across the street which wasn’t particularly interesting (hence why I don’t remember the name.) and then to dinner, to a lovely little park by a pond, and then to the bus that took us to the train which transferred us to the tube, which took us home.

Then some of us guys went down for our nightly pint and discussed the day. I will have to say, a very relaxing day, followed by a relaxing drink and good conversation is awesome, but I don’t think it would be particularly effective in America.

Only in London.

To Be Continued.

England Day 5

Dear Blog Readers,

I really tried to update everything early this morning, but it just doesn’t seem like England is a place for the Internet. I went over to Starbucks early, but it just did not seem like it was a dream that I shared with the green tinted coffee house.

So after a frustrating half an hour and a rather tasty breakfast, our group was off to the Tate Britain.

We arrived at the side entrance and Emily and John did their presentations for us, which was very informative and got me excited to see some video media and something a little more contemporary.

Walking through the Tate was very interesting, especially doing my photo assignment which involved me taking a ton of pictures without using the viewfinder. It was a weird assignment at first but after a while I started to get the hang of it.

After the Tate, and some awesome Damian Hirst art, we went over to uptown London (which was not as easy as it sounds) and headed into Notting Hill (yes, same as Hugh Grant and Julia Roberts). The journey there was long and we got lost a few times, but once we made it, it was well worth it. We went to the market which is much like the LA Swap meet but with a whole lot better gear. I bought a few gifts (you luck people you) and a new watch and sketchbook for myself.

Once we left the crowded streets, we headed back and had Pizza at an Italian Restaurant. It wasn’t a very pleasant meal, I found a weird wire in mine and of the two ladies that worked there, one did not speak English very well and the other was very pushy.

After dinner, we headed into Piccadilly Circus and went to the movies to see Robin Hood. I fell asleep from the long day at the beginning, but after my short 15 minute nap, I watched the rest and enjoyed it very much. Rick and I stopped at HMV and bought season 1 of Coming of Age (which is playing on his Laptop right now) and then headed back where we went and had a pint across the street and then headed to bed.

Overall, I would say it was a very productive day, but I am definitely ready to get a little more out of my day tomorrow at Oxford.

To Be Continued.

England Day 4

"what time is it? Why is it 6:05... I'm going back to sleep."

...

"what time is it? 8:50... Crap, no time for breakfast."

Woke up and got ready in a blur and headed down to Starbucks to post the blogs, get a quick breakfast, and meet up with the group at 9:30 to go to The British Museum!

We walked down and our first stop was actually the Victoria & Albert museum. Our photo assignment was to take pictures and not look through the viewfinder.

I looked ridiculous.

The museum was great! I saw a lot of great casts and paintings and sketched a sculpture of Eve.

We all left at around the same time and ventured down and looked inside Harod's, a HUGE department store. I ended up buying a baby blue satchel (no, not a man bag, a satchel!) and Jim bought one too, but his was wider, more of a messenger bag. We decided to switch off the way it faces as to not seem like twins, people need to be able to tell us apart.

After going through the department store ( which was huge and amazing and had a memorial for Princess Di) we left and had lunch and gelato.

When we finally arrived at the British Museum, it was with much excitement at finally getting to see the Rosetta stone! We walked around. Huge roundabout and finally made it around to the stone used to decipher hieroglyphs! It was very shiny and protected by a thick pane of glass.

Around the gallery there were many works with hieroglyphs, a bit of egyption art and some awesome ionic pillars (yeah, I've been picking up some terminology from Jim).

After the British museum, we made our way to the "white cube" that had an instillation by Mark Quinn Which was very... Interesting. There were sculptures of girls with penises and guys with vagina's and 2 huge Michael jackson heads. It was very trippy, but also very interesting.

We then made our way back to the hotel and the rest of the day was ours. I was going to go buy a copy of Peter pan and go find the statue at Hyde park and read, but I ended up going to piccidelli circus and seeing a play called avenue Q.

Since I travelled by myself, I was able to test my knowledge of the tube system. I was proud, but I did wish Sheley had been with me for Ave Q, she loves that play and is the reason I decided I needed to see it in the first place.

After the show I came back, got some food, and retired to my room for the night in order to get plenty of rest for the TATE Britain!

To be continued

England Day 3

“Huh… there’s actually sunlight at 5am in London…”

And that is how the morning started. Finally feeling a little accustomed to my surroundings, yet still combating Jet Lag, I got up and hopped in the shower (which I got working in under a minute this time) and was ready to head downstairs at 5:30.

We met in the lobby and then hurried into the tube to Kings Cross as quickly as possible in order to get to Paris and the Musée De Louvre.

A couple hours on the train (we had an awesome compartment to ourselves… except for that one guy, but he didn’t stay long.) and finally we had arrived in Paris, France.

We walked down to the Louvre, me brainstorming my missions for the day and of course keeping a weary eye out for Gypsies who were actually showing all the sign’s that Rik had warned me about. Kent and I had decided we would have to find barrettes and then I told Heidi that I wanted a chocolate croissant, and then thought about getting a Crepe when Jim mentioned it, and of course, I needed to buy a shot glass for Sheley and 1ft Tall Eiffel tower for mom.

Mission Start.

We got to the Louvre and boy was it breathtaking. The Pyramid was probably my favorite… no second favorite part to see. It was as epic as seeing Stone Henge! I gave my presentation which I realized halfway in that I had a lot more information to tell everyone than I thought, which ended up being awesome! I then headed in and the first big piece we went to see was the Venus De Milo, which was pretty dang awesome!

But as we ventured to see some other sculptures, I heard the call from the most breathtaking apparatus I had ever seen. I broke away from the group and headed up the marble staircase to get a closer look and low and behold, there at the top… wait for it…

Wait for it…

THE WINGED NIKE!

It was absolutely amazing; pictures did not do it justice. First of all it was HUGE! A lot bigger than I had imagined. The craftsmanship was amazing and looked so real! I stood there and I dubbed it my all time favorite sculpture. I reckon she would have nodded at me had she had a head, but that’s all just semantics.

I then turned and ran to catch back up with the group, but found way to many things that caught my eye instantly, so I decided, hey, I’ll just find the group when I find the group, no big deal. I’m a big boy.

I explored a bit more on my own and actually ended up finding them again, after I had come across Hermes, the god of… speed or something. Messenger?

We then went back to the Winged Nike and I was able to spend another 10 minutes with her, drew a bit of a sketch and took more pictures. Then it was time… for the Mona Lisa.

Now people had been telling me all kinds of things like, “Oh it so small!” “There are just too many people in front of it.” “It’s really small…” So I’m thinking… ya know… that its small and stuff.

No, it’s a normal sized painting; it’s just right across from the biggest freaking painting in all of the Louvre. It wasn’t breathtaking or anything, but it was really interesting to see. After that I walked around with Rik and Rachel and we just explored a bit, tried to take in a bunch but after the main things, there really wasn’t anything too epic to see, not that everything we did see wasn’t great or anything, just wasn’t the Winged Nike.

We went down to the gift about an hour later, and what a let down that was. They didn’t have anything interesting in there. We then had lunch at a café and then re-surfaced back with the group. Our next destination was the Musée d’ Orsay. But first… CREPES! It was amazing! Crepe with Nuttella and Banana’s! So good! And then I spotted it…

5 minutes later, I was sporting a brand new Black Barrette! Another 5 minutes later and Sheley’s shot glass was tucked safely into my backpack.

This Museum was rather spectacular if you ask me. It had a lot of good paintings and sculptures and even photography. But getting in for some reason ended up being a huge pain for Jim and Kent who had to retrieve our tickets. It wasn’t until about an hour after that we finally made it in and we weren’t allowed to take in our bags and we could not take photos. This gallery was only for show, not for tell. They were very strict, but it ended up being alright. There was one rather obscene painting that was in a back room which… well, lets see, you know how there are those curtained off back room area’s in video stores? Well… this museum didn’t really have curtains, but definitely had that back room for a reason.

I was talking to Marissa later about the Gallery and she said that her and Emily were completely geeking out over how many paintings and sculptures they recognized as being some of the pieces that inspired them to be painters themselves. I can’t say that I particularly appreciated it as much as they did, but I did enjoy it quite a bit.

We then left and Shawn and I were separated from the group, but we knew where our meet up destination was; the Eiffel Tower! So we followed the river for about 2 miles as the tower grew closer and closer, took some awesome pictures on the way, and finally made it to the tower, and took TONS of pictures of it. Didn’t go up because it didn’t seem all that practical, but we did enjoy watching people get chased by the Police through the square right after I bought the 1 foot tall Eiffel tower statue off of one of them.

While I was taking pictures and waiting, I decided it would be a good time to call Sheley, and that it was. Her voice was definitely the soothing stimuli I needed to take the edge of the paranoia I was feeling by being surrounded by Gypsies.

About 40 minutes there and it was time to head back home. We took the subway back to the train station and that was disgusting! The subway was packed like no other and everyone was just sardined into the darned thing for at least 10 stops.

When we finally got to the train station, I realized I needed to get rid of my Euros because they were of no use to me in London. I spotted something similar to a chocolate croissant and MAN was that amazing! Finally boarded the train and started our ride home.

When we finally got back to the hotel, it was 11:15p and I was exhausted, but as I was saying good night to Sheley, I decided it would be a great idea to show London how much I appreciated it over Paris, and what better way to show London Pride then to head down to the pub across the street and have a pint of London Pride. I convinced Rik to go down with me and we conversed about the day, finished our drink and went back upstairs, to the shower, and to the bed. And with that, I am going to sleep and will post this up tomorrow before we head out to the BRITTISH MUSEUM!

Cheers!

To Be Continued…

England Day 2

Day Two in England physically hurt getting up for.

Man, this Jet lag is killin’ my vibe, but it was definitely worth it!

So I got up and stumbled into the bathroom and fumbled with the knobs and dials in the shower… there were a lot more than I had anticipated.

My 3 minutes shower turned into a 12 minute crash course on British water works.

Finally Rik and I got downstairs and went to breakfast in our hotel. It was actually REALLY good! But as you may or may not know, I enjoy eggs of all kinds so that wasn’t too hard.

We took the tube down to the train station and then took the train to Salisbury (yes, like the steak… EXACTLY like the stake)

Once we got to Salisbury, we got on a double decker bus and took the far too narrow streets down through beautiful green and amazingly yellow (due to flowers) fields until we hit the top of the hill and low and behold arrived at Stone Henge!

This place was like nothing I had ever seen before, It was a bunch of rocks, yet it was so curious and in such an order that one could not help but drop a jaw and oooh and aww (Props to Dr. Seuss for my rhyming skills) I have a theory that someone from the future went back in time and used advanced technology to lay the stones the way they were just to play a prank on us… I’d do it!

After that, we went back to the quaint little town of Salisbury and at some Fish… ate some chips (which are actually fries! Yeah! We call them French Fries, they call them chips! Crisps are the things that we like to dip in salsa and eat coated with BBQ powder during the Super bowl and other major sporting events that we enjoy on the Tele.) and went to the Salisbury Cathedral. Actually, that’s a lie, Rachel and I first went to the other tall towering spire thinking that was the cathedral we were meeting at to find we were sadly mistaken and going to be late, so we yelled out “Bollocks!” and turned around to find the other one.

The Salisbury Cathedral was amazing! Its architecture was so detailed and fine-tuned that one’s mind cannot help but be blown, and since I am a one and not a two, my mind was in pieces.

After that, we took the train a little further down to the Roman Bath’s! This was pretty entertaining and interesting, though the water was so rank! We tried to get Kent to jump in, but he wouldn’t have it (he claims that Bail money would have been too expensive, psshh)

After the bath’s, we had some time to kill, so Jim told us to return in a couple of hours and that he was going to see the Victoria Art Gallery and if anyone wanted to go with him they could. I decided that could be fun, so I accompanied him, however our first mission was issued by his wife to have us indulge in some Hot Chocolate. I claimed that it tasted just like what we get in the little baggies around winter time rather than melted down milky chocolaty goodness, but after a few more sips, I was proven wrong and it was quite delicious. Jim then gave me half of his Turkish delight, which I will definitely have to go find more of, and him and I set off to find the gallery.

One hour later, we had not found this gallery.

Whether or not this place ACTUALLY exists is still a question on my mind, but we followed sign’s (which pointed in different directions), the guidance of the owner of the Hobgoblin Pub, an acquaintance of his who overheard our question, and my London to Go app on my iphone and STILL could not find this place. We instead found a Chapel that was housing some kind of what looked like girl scout ceremony with color guard flags and a cluttered memorial wall, but never did we find the gallery.

We then had dinner at the Lion and the Lamb pub with Rik and Shawn, met back with the others, got on the train to Paddington Station (yes, where Paddington bear is from, there was a statue also!) and then to the subway and back home… (yes, our own Bailey Hotel on Gloucester Road is my London home)

Tomorrow’s mission: PARIS, FRANCE! The LOUVRE BABY!

And thank you Rik! As I sit here in bed, he is telling me about Gypsy’s and how I’m gonna get my stuff stolen tomorrow… frick town!

To Be Continued.

England Day 1

Let's see... how long have I been up...?

My computer's clock says its 1:45pm but according to my new Talkmobile LG phone (and Big Ben way over there) it's 9:46p.

It's been such a splendid, (yes, splendid!) yet tiring day.

Started with my amazing roommate Andrew taking myself and Moo to the airport at 8am! and through the traffic we finally arrived at the bane of my existence, L.A.X.

4 hours (and a phone call to the mom and the girl) later we were finally on the 10 hour and 45 minute plane flight to London, England.

It took a little over an hour to finally emerge from airports and subways into the brightly lit streets of Gloucester Road. We dropped our bags off at the hotel (too early to check in, it was 8:30p at this point) and we jumped onto a Double Decker bus or two, camera's in hand and saw pretty much all of London for the next 5-6 hours. It was absolutely amazing, yet so tiring. We stopped at the Sherlock Holmes Pub (I know right!) and had Fish and Chips for lunch, it was amazing!

We then went back and checked into the Bailey Hotel (which I am now looking at the front of for spelling, I love that this starbucks is right across the street!) and Rik and I took a bit of a snooze!

We woke up 45 minutes later to the Jerusalem's bells ringing, and a roman calvary choir singing, and walked down a few districts to find me a phone so I could call Sheley because I missed her so. After calling her and letting her know I was alive, I called my family who did not answer, but I of course left a message so that they were not worried. We went to have Japanese food for Dinner in Piccidelli Square and then a few of us went to a pub and had an Ale together to celebrate our new residency.

All in all, it was a tremendous start to an amazing 2 weeks in England! Tomorrow, STONE HEDGE!!!

To Be Continued!