Brian Vargas
Gallery Exhibition Essay Assignment FINAL
In the world, many people constantly want to buy things just to show others what to have. Then at one point, they will discard them and not care about them anymore. This can apply to a variety of items that humans use such as electronics, clothes, cars, and shoes. Many people do not think twice about throwing away their items without a second thought on where those items can go. They don’t think about how their electronics can end up in the sea or in the wild where animals can be confused and think it is food. Big companies also don’t care about any of this as they just want to make money and profit. Most people only care about status and use items that companies promote for that status. In the gallery, I saw a project that interested me was the project by Vandana Jain called Throw a Dog a Bone. I thought it was an interesting project on how the artist took everyday items such as plastic bags and gave them some value by adding some gold chains and created a unique design in the form of a ladder.
The artist’s name is Vandana Jain she is an artist and a textile designer from Brooklyn, New York. She received her bachelor’s degree from New York University and went to further study Textile Design at the Fashion Institute of Technology. Her project can be connected to reading by John Berger because in the reading he goes on to explain how humans use many items such as clothes and cars for pleasure and how publicity is never for the pleasure itself and how it can be for the future buyer. One quote that can connect to the project by Vain is “This is why publicity is never a celebration of a pleasure-in-itself. Publicity is always about the future buyer. It offers him an image of himself made glamorous by the product or opportunity it is trying to sell. The image then makes him envious of himself as he might be. Yet what makes this self-which-he-might-be enviable? The envy of others.” This goes to show how sometimes items are always about trying to look better than others rather than the product itself. Most people just want to be envied by others to feel better about themselves. This can be seen as a form of reassurance for people.
What Jain did in her project was make something that was not attractive and added some things to give it value and bring the attention of some people. She turned a useless item and gave it some luxury; most people would view the bags as completely useless once they fulfill their purpose. In the Interventionists, Krzysztof Wodiczko constructed a Homeless Vehicle that would draw attention to the homeless problem in the United States. In the reading, it states “The Homeless Vehicle embodies Wodiczko’s practice of interrogative design by thoroughly combining the design needs for the immediate purposes of a homeless individual while additionally supplying a visual strategy for the overarching condition of homelessness in the United States. The Homeless Vehicle is a modified shopping cart that facilitates bottle and can collection as well as provide a temporary shelter. Wodiczko is not interested in producing surrogates for social service institutions. Instead, the project is meant to bring the issue of homelessness to public attention.” This can connect to another piece by Vandana Jain in which she illustrates corporate logos to bring attention to the world. The logos she posted on her project represent the biggest businesses in the US from Microsoft to Amazon which many people look up to. Just like Krzysztof Wodiczko when he was constructing his Homeless Vehicle to bring attention to the homeless problem that is occurring in the United States.
They are both trying to bring big issues to the US known. These messages can connect to also what we have been talking about in class about consumption and consumerism. We have talked about and read about how people buy expensive things that they don’t need to stand out and have people be envious of them. We have also talked about how people buy expensive things to copy or fit in with celebrities. Much of what we buy and wear can be based on what celebrities are promoting or wearing. Publicity is something that can generate a lot of money for people and businesses alike but sometimes there can lead to a huge difference in the economy. Companies would rather make money by exploiting workers and not pay them enough for their work. In a quote by Berger, it states “The power to spend money is the power to live, According to the legends of publicity, those who lack the power to spend money become faceless. Those who have the power become lovable.” This shows that money is equal to power and those without the money have no power and are not important. Jain also has another project with shows the value of a dollar bill for the workers and companies as productivity rises.
This selfie shows that certain brands people like to wear
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