Writing response: Exhibition Visits

Let Art Do the Talking 

The Lemmerman Gallery and the Visual Arts Gallery have different kinds of artworks that are showcased in order for people to not only see but also think about the real meaning behind the artwork and why did the artist do this specific kind of work. This was my first time visiting the two galleries that NJCU provides and I was amazed by how different the two galleries were. The Visual Arts Gallery has two artworks in the middle of it and the Lemmerman Gallery does not, the two artworks that I chose are "Bonding with Plastic" by Olga Mercedes Bautista and "Porto Wine Siesta" by Ricardo Fonseca. I chose these two artworks because it just stood out to me as soon as I walked in the Visual Arts Gallery. 

Olga Mercedes Bautista
Bonding with Plastic
2019
Silicone,Leaves, and Plastic debris

The first artwork I'm going to talk about is the work by Olga Mercedes Bautista called "Bonding with Plastic" this is the elephant in the room because as soon as I walked inside the gallery this was the first work that I saw not because it was in the middle but it stood out to me because it is the reality even if we do not want it to be. Plastic pollution are impacting our Earth in a negative way, plastic do not melt right away; depending on the plastic some may take years or decades to decompose. This work was started after Hurricane Sandy hit New Jersey and left a number of trashes across the beaches, parks, neighborhoods and on the oceans. Diving into Olga’s “Bonding with Plastic” it is shaped as a tree bark with the use of paper mâché and she added plastics collected from the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy. This is to give awareness to everyone that throwing away trash wherever we feel like it can harm our lives. A quote from Susan Sontag states “For one thing, there are a great many more images around, claiming our attention” what if she’s right? Images in the form of photography where we hit a button and it takes a picture is not the only “image” that claim our attention, and images such as artworks that provide awareness to us, for example “Bonding with Plastic” can be another image that we need to pay more close attention to and not just images we take from a vacation. This piece by Olga Mercedes Bautista should be more than enough for us to take it as a warning to stop throwing trash wherever we feel like it. 

The second artwork I'm going to talk about is Ricardo Fonseca's "Porto Wine Siesta" I chose this artwork because this reminded me of the quote from Susan Sontag that says "To collect photographs is to collect the world" I find this close to home because in our generation of smartphones, we would always take pictures of everything we see, especially the new places we have not been to. Collecting photographs is an important gesture not only to us but for our memory. We cannot always go to the same place in the blink of an eye, so we take photos in order for us to reminisce the experience we had during that time. Ricardo Fonseca’s work is the definition of the quote because most of his photos are filled with different place he’s been to and he can look back at them to remember the memories he made while visiting. “Porto Wine Siesta” addresses space and location by having a person lay down facing the buildings while separated by a river. As a photographer, we want to make the audience feel what we felt when taking a photograph.  Ricardo Fonseca’s “Porto Wine Siesta” is also called “Bench People Series” according to Fonseca, he only takes a picture of the people who are on a “public” bench and are not looking at him or his camera. Every picture that Ricardo Fonseca has ever taken he is always thinking about what the person is thinking about at that moment. To Fonseca it is not only something sitting on the benches but also the story behind it and why they chose to sit or lay down on the bench. I feel for what Fonseca is talking about because we normally only sit on benches if we’re tired but what if the meaning is something deeper than that? What if we just want to be alone and think, think about what we are doing with our lives and if we do not like where we are, how can we make our lives better. A picture has more meaning to it than just a normal photograph because depending on the picture we can visualize what the picture means to someone that had it for a while, maybe a dead relative. If we look at a picture there is always a meaning behind it than just a photograph. 

Richardo Fonseca
Porto Wine Siesta
2019
Black and White Photograph

Bibliography:

2019 Santa Aguila Foundation. http://plastic-pollution.org

Bautista, O "Bonding with Plastic. Visual Arts Gallery. New Jersey City University

Fonseca, R. https://www.ricardofonseca.com

Susan Sontag "On Photography"