1. Fred Wilson is an artist who works with spatial arrangements of objects that already exist in the world before he handles them. He is making a wunder kammer in his own way by "taking objects and having things produced in the way i want to see them" "totally inspired by things around me - wondering what they are". This made me think of the first wunder kammers and what their intentions were in creating them.
I loved when he talked about feeling like he was related to everyone else... I can really feel that in his work and how he relates certain objects to each other. I will try to channel some of this passion into my project. Also trying to "be a sponge" is something I try to do every day, but is important to keep in mind when in the Field because its very easy for me to get overwhelmed in the environment there.
In The Museum of Jurassic Technology piece I enjoyed this exchange between to two: "WILSON: One of the things that we are greatly interested in is helping people to achieve states of wonder.
WESCHLER: So you're not upset when people come to you at the desk and are confused about what kind of place this is? WILSON: No. We feel that confusion can be a very creative state of mind. In fact, confusion can act as a vehicle to open people's minds. The hard shell of certainty can be shattered, and once that certainty is shattered, then I feel people are more open to broader influences."
I feel like keeping Wilson's responses in mind will help me and Ariella throughout the process of creating our wunder kammer. Its important to challenge the viewer - as well as inform. Confusion never fails to tell me a lot about myself - usually something negative about myself. I think the website for The Museum of Jurassic Technology is pretty horrible (was this intentional??) because nothing about it makes me want to engage with it. I hope to create a piece that isn't visually repellant. It doesn't matter how compelling your content is if no one wants to explore it because it is completely unwelcoming and/or unintuitive.
I also loved Grigley's smart usage of "White" to look at our culture and senses for the content and categorization of his whites. It was nice to be pulled out of biology for a bit to see how artists use biological inspired concepts of categorization in their work - consciously or unconsciously. I will argue that white crayons are not useless! It is the only crayon I work down to a stubby nub. Its great for blending and making things looks sleepy. I see that the seemingly stream of consciousness writing is actually from 43 friends - which would make for one dynamic wunder kammer - as we see in Cabinet Magazine. I didn't know it existed until today but is pretty cool!
2. Our progress from last week is: A. getting on the same page about the project B. narrowing the items down. We would love to have a C. on format but really are still up in the air and are putting out trust in our research to lead us the the right solution. you know like our noses.... FORM FOLLOWING FUNCTION... sorry I went there... It was funny for me at least...
So Ariella and I have split up our research for our ten items in our wunder kammer:
1. Anteater
2. Elephant
3. Saiga
4. T-Rex
5. Humans
6. Neaderthals
7. Something from Egypt (Yang suggested this but we haven't been able to look around in there just yet to see wazzup)
8. Long-nosed Bandicoot
9. Short-beaked Echidna
10. Southern Tamandua
I will be doing research this week on the ones highlighted in RED and we will switch and do research on eachother's assigned items to make sure all bases are covered biologically and also to maybe catch somethings not found the first time around. We, as you can see/read from the last post, are interested/have different takes on how we process information and what information we think find compelling. Switching items will be a great way to well-developed project.
Saiga Source: http://www.edgeofexistence.org/mammals/species_info.php?id=62
The Saiga has a brilliant nose the deflates and inflates allowing for only clean air to be breathed. This is because of the harsh conditions it lives in. Its nose allows for adaptation to carry out our most vital function of breathing. It has very long nostrils up inside the cute furry nose - with a lot of hairs, glands, and mucous tracks keeping the bad things our and the good things in.
T-Rex Source: http://phys.org/news144483753.html
Scientist didn't know much about dinosaurs sense of smell until recently - by looking at the brains indentations on the skull. When comparing the indentations of that of the nose of a ostrich it is seen that they are very similar shape - meaning the way they smelled prey may have been very similar. This leads us to believe the T-Rex was not dominate because of size - but because of keen smelling senses. This is obviously just a jumping off point for research, but I found it to be a good way to link evolution into the mix of our wunder kammer.
Humans Source: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2013699/There-14-types-nose--yours.html
This was an interesting article because it claims there are 14 types of noses in humans. No this is no a very scientific article - I know this - and I do have research about biological claims for noses... but this one is great for critique! Because it only includes Caucasian noses o__O
"Women like a nose like Angelina Jolie’s – a very delicate nose with not a lot of bulk,’ he said.
‘Men like straighter noses. In general people don’t like fleshy tips or excessive bumps.’
This research may be helpful when trying to look at items in the museum as either ugly, strange, or beautiful. Or to be critical of why our items were chosen to be in our cabinet.
Neaderthals Source: http://health.usnews.com/health-news/family-health/brain-and-behavior/articles/2011/12/16/sense-of-smell-helped-separate-humans-from-neanderthals
Humans may have outlived their Neaderthal cousins because of sense of smell. Humans have a better sense of smell. Our brain sizes were/are the same, but the shapes were/are different. Humans had bigger temporal lobes and olfactory bulbs - which are directing linked to smell. Smell is linked to memory at a high degree. I know this is the case for me... and I am sure all of you. I can remember the way my mom's hair smells, the way my grandma's bathroom cabinet smells, and the way our public pool sidewalk smells in my home town (which closed close to 6 years ago and I haven't been to since I was a tween probably). This article talks about how smells is related to social function... as you can see in my examples.
Long-nosed Bandicoot Source: http://www.ozarkwild.org/bandicoot.php
What a cute little guy. He finds is food by sniffing it out. Good thing he likes larva and insects with a long snout like his... because that is what works with the shape of his face/mouth because of his unique nose shape. This was good resource for now at least.. because I was having trouble finding any research that discusses nose shape alone for the bandicoot.
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