Introduction Practice Entry

Hello world, my name is Nicole, I am a mother, student, artist and adventurer.

I am a thirty two year old full time student. I am about to graduate with an Associates Degree in Fine Art from Glendale Community College (only eight weeks left).  I will be starting my Bachelors program in Fine Art at Arizona State University in the spring and will be getting a Masters Degree after that, (hopefully at the University of Washington).  I work full time as a tattoo artist and painter, and use what little free time there is left to spend with my family, and we do our best to travel and see new places as much as possible.

 This is a tattoo I recently completed from a zodiac series I am currently working on.  

This is a painting that I made in a old drawer I found in an alley.  A lot of my art borders between sculpture and found art that is re purposed for painting.  My interests are in art, with all its different styles, but recycled and re purposed work really strikes an internal chord with me.

I would like to end up working in a museum someday cleaning the works of art with my Fine Arts degree.  I really find joy in the thought of going to work someday and dusting old magnificent works of art for a living.

For now though, I just work on smaller projects of my own design.  When I am not working my hobbies are camping, yoga, and road trips.  

This is a photo of myself with my boys; we were near the Utah border in northern Arizona in an area that people used to live inside the rock formations.  Having a sense of adventure and willingness to explore the unknown is something I believe in and try to share and experience with my family as much as possible.  Thanks for getting to know me a little better.

Entry #11 Final Post (for now anyway)

So as my blogging days come to an end for now I reflect on the whole process and what I gained from sharing some causal thoughts with the world.  All in all I would say this has been a learning experience that keeps me learning how to do more nifty tricks with a computer. Inserting cool something here because I now know how, yippee!

I wouldn't say that I truly love blogging, but it has given me the opportunity to work on how to make my entries, (hopefully at least) a little interesting for anyone who was willing to read some of my rhetoric.  I really do hope it wasn't to painful for my tiny audience to endure.

In trying to blog on a consist time line I attempted to make the topics interesting or entertaining for my audience while attempting to maintain a humorous tone.  Overall I feel like keeping a light tone to the writing was important for me because I believe that ultimately my blogging opinion is just a spec in a universe of blogs.  While my writing exists and floats around the internet, I don't think it's actually that important it exists or has a real impact.

I will however say that blogging as an ongoing assignment in an English Class is something that I was surprised to be doing and found a little refreshing.  No offense to the English majors here but I am pretty sure this might be a pretty interesting way to involve students instead of reading countless more papers from student work.  Blogging is also nice since your saving trees at the same time while reading someones work; score!

Lastly, my suggestion for my English Professor on using a blogging assignment would be to consider letting the students choose their topics and give a solid base of what is required in an entry to see what comes of a blog that is not limited to particular subjects.  Blogging in this way could lead to some really fascinating topics; or maybe be specific in saying what may not be talked about to eliminate popular subjects in order to create more diverse subjects that will be shared by the students. 

So for now, I bid you farewell, I may return shortly though, English 102 is only 2 weeks away. 

Nicole Davy

Over and Out

Entry #10 Serial Killer Art

So I paint as part of my job.  I make commissioned paintings as well as art to show at different galleries and events I participate in.  This is the most recent piece in a two part series I made for a commision to a client in Chicago.

 As a student, most of my studies is to become stronger and more well rounded as an artist.  Something that took me by surprise is how much I would enjoy art history; stories of why things were painted, what it symbolizes, and who values it. 

Van Gogh is now considered to be the father of color theory in the painting world.  His works have been sold for over forty million dollars in the last fifty years.  Historians say that during Vincent Van Gogh's lifetime he never sold a painting and was never accepted in the galleries of the time; he was considered a failure and rogue in the art world.  There is much documentation that suggests that Vincent was a difficult person to get a long with.  There are few paintings in his large collection of work that he created of other people, (partially from dying young).  Historians say that Van Gogh made other people uncomfortable so he had to pay people to sit as models, but because he was not successful as an artist he could not afford to do so very often.  Thus leaving a large collection of self portraits and landscapes for the lack of willing participants.  In the case of Van Gogh, his lonlieness might not have only drove him mad, but created a Master of painting.

All artists hope that there is a market for the work they make to help them further their careers.  One thing that I found shocking during my Art History class though was finding out how collectible it is to own art created by serial killers, and how much people will pay for them.  Murderer and rapist John Wayne Gacy killed 33 young men and boys after raping them.  Gacy also dressed as a clown and worked childrens birthday parties in order to help him get closer to some of his victims.  While in prison, Gacy took up painting and began to paint himself as his clown alter ego "Pogo". 

Some of Gacy's paintings have sold for up to twenty thousand dollars in the open market.  It's kind of creepy to look at, the clown figure; it's creepier when you find out that cannibalism was part of the crimes Gacy was found guilty for.  Gacy wasn't the only killer that had collectors scooping up valuable paintings made by a murderer; another killer whose art became quite the collectors item was Adolph Hitler.  Hitler was an aspiring artist before World War I,  if the art school that turned him down from attending in Paris had only said yes, we can only begin to guess what World War II might have looked like, if it would have occurred at all.

 

So why do people want to collect the art from notoriously bad?  Maybe so we never forget, or maybe because the world loves to put even the bad guys on a bit of the famous pedestal in history. I can't say for sure that I might not consider the opportunity myself if given the chance to acquire a painting from one of those serial killing weirdos; if only to look at the painting each day to ponder the dark-side of humanity and its capabilities.  Would you let one hang in your house?

Entry #9 Pink Slime

What the heck is pink slime?  Apparently, its food we eat in the United States.  A hugely popular fast food chain has been feeding us pink slime for some time now and was put in the hot seat over it.

So while Ronald McDonald helps those cute sick, handicapped, and dying kids, he is poising the rest of us that purchase meals at McDonalds all at the same time; thanks Ronald!

You must admit, McDonalds smells pretty good if your driving by or walking past when you are hungry.  They certainly do offer a affordable price with any size soda fountain drinks for $1 any day of the week.  Its so easy to buy a white cup and fill it with the perfect amount of ice to then top with sweet smelling fizzy soda.  The food is fast and affordable, which is such a life saver for busy family nights.  Except, its quite the opposite of life saving, its more like contributing to the bank of future diabetes for yourself or loved ones when eating it; the public is starting to notice too.

So with public figures finally calling out the dangers of cheap processed food, whats happening to help prevent such terrible things from being fed to the public? People are talking more and shopping more for better options than the pink slime.  Important people like The First Lady are trying to start from the ground up with educating children and families on what healthy food looks like with organizations like Lets Move!

 Jamie Oliver, a chef that is rattling the cages of fast food Titans like McDonalds are helping regular people have more of a voice in what goes into our food.  Change is possible, we just need to be more aware of what needs to change to help us navigate through what is safe and good for our consumption.

We can influence businesses to change, because if we say we will not eat this poor quality, they must change in order to survive as a profitable business.  Because Jamie Oliver was passionate enough to stick to his guns on what should be considered food that is safe enough to eat, McDonalds had to change the way they were producing it.   We have the ability to help change these things, and what we give not only to ourselves, but to our loved ones as well.  Can you stick to your beliefs and help to do the same?  Let's all say no to the pink slime for the rest of time.
 

Entry #8 Would you live on Mars?

So I'm no space geek but there has been a lot of discussion of space in the news lately; between the recent lunar eclipse and NASA finding water on Mars there is a lot of information to be read on the topic. 

As the lunar eclipse happened September 28th, 2015, I was looking at the sky and thinking about how hard we are working as human beings to learn more about space.  I thought it was a strange thing,  that we could be controlling objects that a hurling through space and communicating with this technology to learn about what lies beyond our planet.  It must be such perfect timing for the upcoming movie called The Martian to be coming out in theaters

So as scientists just found out that there is water on Mars, I couldn't help but wonder how long it might take for humanity to try and live there too.  As I read more about the water found on Mars, I also read about a group called Mars One.  This organization that is planning on sending a group of people to live out the rest of their lives on Mars, to try and make it a sustainable place for human life to live. 

It made me really wonder what it takes to commit to the rest of your life to a risky adventure, and if I could ever see myself risking it all to go into deep space.  For me, I will say no thanks if the opportunity ever knocked on my own door, but would you go?  Its an amazing thing to think about really, to be someone who participates in colonizing a new world with Humanity; its certainly a mission for the adventurous.  I guess I feel hesitant only because Humanity doesn't know how to live on the bottom of the ocean of our own planet, so I wonder how successful we can truly be at living on another world.  Everything in baby-steps though I guess; until we are being hurled through space ourselves.  Please comment, I would love to know if you  would go given the opportunity; let me thank you for being braver than me if you would go.

Entry #7 Is the Food We Eat Our Choice?

We have all stood in a supermarket, all different kinds of them, but did you really get what you needed?  My answer to this question a lot like everyone's would be of course I did; until I stopped to think about it after watching the film FRESH. 

 The truth is, for most of my life in its entirety I have not stopped to think about where my food comes from, how it came to be in the supermarket for me to buy it, and what it took to get there.  We live in such a time of great convenience, we take things for granted, because we know of course the supermarket is going to have the food we need.  After watching the Fresh documentary though my mind has been racing more and more each and every time I step into the grocery store.  This film has made me really think about how I live, eat, and what quality of the food is that I am feeding my family.

The Fresh documentary's  main purpose of the film was to share information about how industrial farms bring food into the supermarkets for the consumer and how we need to change the design of industrial farming to be safer and healthier for people, animals and the planet.  The films message really spoke with me because I feel like I am in the group of people who can make a difference in what is eaten in my home.  The documentaries primary audience would be adults who grocery shop; the film showed how we can improve the quality of growing food in both the farming setting while still including ways to grow food in an urban setting too.

This film really opened my eyes about how food is grown and how animals are treated in a industrial farm setting.  I am not a vegetarian but it made me really concerned about the meat I eat because of the treatment of animals in industrial farms. Fresh showed the amount of waste industrial farming creates, the hormones, additives, and antibiotics that are given to these animals; most importantly the film shared the quality of life provided for animals in the industrial farm setting.  For me it was downright horrific to see and know that an animal lived an entire lifetime in a space that isn't humane and fed chemical ridden food just so I could by prepackaged cheap meat at the grocery store.  What really hit home for me though was that this food I am buying at my convenient grocery store is conveniently poisoning my family and myself slowly at a quick and convenient price while conveniently destroying the planet that I am trying to help preserve and save for my children.

I try not to sound preachy or like I need you to listen to my soap box, but this made me want to shout out-loud to everyone, "The fucking supermarket is going to kill us all!"  Not too extreme right?  Maybe it does sound extreme, but please, watch Fresh if you think it sounds crazy, watch it if you wonder if you really have a choice in food.  Fresh left me realizing that I can do a whole lot more to open up my options for the food I eat, and how it comes to end up on my plate and how animals live before they wind up under my fork.  Please watch Fresh and tell me what you thought of it,  I care about your soap boxes too.  Here is a link to the documentary's website, it provides some video clips from the film and you can purchase the film to watch there as well if your inclined after watching the clips.