ANTONIO

PROUD TO BE MADE IN ITALY

50% HARD WORK ETHIC
35% HONESTY
10% GENEROSITY
5% UNFORGIVNG

SEE REVERS FOR INTERACTION INSTRUCTIONS

back side:
AVOID ARGUING OF ANY KIND
BE HONEST WITH
AVOID BOASTING
ESPECIALLY ABOUT
WEALTH

Individual Tags

NANCY
MADE IN USA
75% LOYALTY
35% PRACTICALITY
15% PASSION
10% STUBBORNNESS

SEE REVERS FOR INTERACTION INSTRUCTIONS

back side:
AVOID DISHONESTY
BE DEPENDABLE
WHEN IRRITATED
CALMLY WALK AWAY

Maria's Tag

Back Side says:
HANDLE GENTLY
WITH RESPECT
AVOID DISCUSSIONS
ABOUT INNAPPROPRIATE
LIFESTYLES
AGREE WITH VIEWS
ABOUT HOW TO LIVE APPROPRIATELY

Artist Statement "Care Tags"

Dolores Cuccovia
Artist Statement
Fall 2008
“Care Tags”


As an Artist, I use empathy as a means of purpose in my work, creating dialogue and making connections between people on a humanistic level. Discovering and reacting to relationships that exist in our world is imperative to my inspiration, as well as using the expression of conflicts within the self as a therapeutic form. My interest in psychological, societal issues causes further discovery during my creative process. This piece is a communication themed piece that touches on qualities of individual characters and how to effectively interact with them. The piece is composed of clothing with tags that have been recreated to reference each specific person. Since the people referenced own the clothing used, the viewer is given a sense of each character. I found clothing tags to be an effective medium since the information provided on them applies so well to human care instructions. With this piece it is my goal to humorously remind viewers to be cautious and thoughtful when communicating with other humans.

survey questions used

HAVE YOU BEEN IN A BROKEN RELATIONSHIP? I HAVE. CAN YOU ANONOMOUSLY TELL ME ABOUT IT??
If you could answer one or more of the following it would help my project tremendously. Thank you!

When you were or are in this broken relationship, how did it affect you? In what ways did your personality change? Did friends/family notice your behavior?



If you were to give some words to describe this relationship, what would they be?


Who had more control in the relationship? In what way/s?



How long did it take you to leave before you realized he or she wasn’t right for you?

Artist Statement "Paired Cups"

Dolores Cuccovia
December 19, 2008
Artist Statement
Paired Cups


As an Artist, I use empathy as a means of purpose in my work, creating dialogue and making connections between people on a humanistic level. Discovering and reacting to relationships that exist in our world is imperative to my inspiration, as well as using the expression of conflicts within the self as a therapeutic form. My interest in psychological, societal issues causes further discovery during my creative process. I apply and present personal situations in a clear way to induce empathy and connect with viewers. A recent installation of mine involved collaboration with strangers about broken romantic relationships. Relationships are an exchange of consumption. I found coffee and teacups were an appropriate medium specific to this issue. After collecting information about individuals broken relationships through a survey. I formalized the information to create an installation of paired coffee mugs and teacups to represent each couple’s situation. Within each relationship there is an uneven distribution of power. One always has more hierarchy over the other. The suspended cups resemble those who hold themselves above the other. This piece was intended to be therapeutic for both the strangers, myself and for viewers who can relate. It is my goal provides a sense of comfort to those who have experienced or are in the comfortable un-comfort of a broken relationship. This work is a tribute, a reaction to those who have shared their side of the broken relationship story.

Cup Installation

SIM class performances

I just got back to my apartment after watching some great performances by Dawn Kramer's SIM class, "Modern Dance Techniques". Some of those who performed tonight I've been in classes with. Watching it made me wish I danced more than I do. It was awesome to see them grow as performers. A couple of the pieces were based on the idea of restriction. One of them started off by the performer limply sliding across the floor towards a chair lit by a spotlight. There was a wooden 2x4 strapped around one of her legs and up her back. Her goal was to get up and sit on the chair but obviously she couldn't complete the task due to her restriction. I enjoyed the fact that the material that restricted her was the same as the material she desired. The performance was done well. It was long enough to build tension but not too drawn out. There's an incredible freedom that comes with moving the way some of these performers did tonight. It's really great when a performer has conviction. I'm not sure I used that word in the right way but I think you get what I'm saying. Matt Serpico's solo performance was also incredible. It's obvious his dancing in itself is like a huge spirit that fills the room. He's very bold with his movements. Anyway, I'm glad I was able to go and support my classmates.

Care Tags for people

I definatly find that starting a new project is much easier after accepting the struggles involved in the previous project. I went to my place of inspiration the other day, Barnes and Noble and looked at a book called, "Social Intelligence". I found it helpful in pushing my ideas along. It talked about how emotions are contagous and about how the neuronic structure in our brains work. It was really inspiring and definately one of my main interests. The base of this new idea is tags for individual people. Similar to tags on clothing, I want to make tags for people I know personally. I'm thinking I might collect pieces of clothing from these people. I'm thinking of making tags out of the pieces of clothing they lend me. I will use the formula on actual tags to describe my way of dealing/caring for each person. For example. Tags usually have the percentage of what material it is composed of. For a person I may say something like 50 % sensitivity 50% compassion. Next usually comes with information of how to clean/care for the material. I may say something like, "Avoid blunt comments", " When upset, comfort accordingly, Mail this person a personalized card to let them know you are thinking of them. Call and check up on how they are doing, then arrange to take them out for a good time." I was thinking of interconnecting these tags with wire to symbolize neuronic structures and the relationship between those personality types. At this stage, I forsee this taking a sculptural form.

Cup Installation

So the cup installation I've been thinking out is completed. I skipped some steps in between with this blog since I was preoccupied with making the piece. I will catch you up with the information. I was trying to figure out a way to get information about others relationships while still being discrete/not forward with requesting such information. Andrea suggested I do a survey. I really liked that idea. So I wrote several questions on several pieces of paper and put 2 boxes up in school. One was in the bathroom and the other in the student lounge. I asked questions like, who had more control in the relationship? In what ways?, If you could name some qualities to describe you and your partner what would they be? How long did it take for you to figure out this person wasn't right for you? I was really happy with how many people responded and how sincere they seemed to be. After buying a bulk of interesting cups from the thrift store in Davis Square, I sat down w/ the cups, read the situations and matched them up appropriately. I suspended the cups that seemed to have more control in the relationships. They were hovering over the passive cups. I had red string dripping out of each cup into the partner cups. I used textile hardener to mold the string into words from the surveys. I used words that conveyed what these people got from the relationship and what they released due to what they were given. I really enjoyed making this and was really happy with the reactions of those I showed it to :)

One Step at a Time

I definatly feel like my idea with these cups is finally getting somewhere. I made a drawing of it for my Printmaking class that I feel satisfies what I was trying to get at. I'm pretty happy with the amount of information the drawing provides. I'm planning on creating an installation involving multiple pairs of cups/relationships. I'm still working out the details. Today I bought a good amount of cups at the Goodwill in Davis Square. Lucky for me they have a great selection. It's really amusing to think of these cups as people. The cups I chose have qualities that can really speak to interesting characters. Right now I'm in the process of getting familiar with these cups and writing small blurbs about them as if they were people. It's really entertaining. I feel pretty good about where this is going. I hope this project turns out to communicate well and be enjoyable for viewers to experience.

Relationship cups?

I've been looking into what it is I really want to convey and realized I'm not sure myself. So I've been trying to clarify things. I've been writing stream of consciousness. I've been thinking about social comfort. What we do when we get up in the morning. What we do to ourselves to make us ready to face the world. I know for me, being a young woman, I think about what I want to wear and make my face up in a certain way so I feel comfortable enough to go outside. I think it is common for many. I came across this website I found to be really interesting. Basically it is a company that helps to transform people into more proper/politically correct beings. http://www.socialimage.net/services.html
They have services that help people with make-up, dancing, personal fitness, wardrobe and personal shopping, etiquett, speech and diction ect... The company claims to help promote individuality. Although I do find this social stuff interesting, I'm starting to feel like I'm forcing this concept and its not happening. I have been working on this drawing for my printmaking class about relationships. It is of 2 cups. It is of a mug lying on a shelf pouring down into a cracked smaller, feminine cup that is pouring out all the contents that it has received. I'm wondering if I can do more with this idea since I already have it flowing. I feel like this cup drawing is directly related to something personal to me. I feel like the social concept I had previously is loosing its flame. This is where I'm currently at in my lagging process.

Equipment issues

I'm going to do this project this weekend. I've been not giving it enough attention and feel guilty and feel the need to write this because I want to be honest about it. Ahh there its out! I've been giving this project more thought than action. I emailed my teacher who has a digital camera that is small. Unfortunately I can't borrow it because a grad student is currently using it. :( I went to AV yesterday hoping they would have something like it but no luck. I'm going to try and see if SIM has one, but I'm pretty sure we can't take equipment out after we graduate from the program. Not sure how the digital camera is going to pan out yet. haha get it? PAN out. bad bad joke.

Inspiration from family

This picture is unrelated to my art at this time but makes me happy and inspires me so I thought I'd put it up anyway. My niece Maya Avery :)

Process

So I decided I'm going to make 2 different set ups. One shelf will be modern looking. It will have 3 blue nalgene type looking water bottles on it. I bought clear sticky labels which I will print specific words on. I'm thinking of painting the shelf red so it stands out. I was thinking red is also appropriate since it is the color of emergency/medical survival so hopefully it works for social as well.
The older looking shelf will be a bit rickety looking. It will have small medicine bottles on it with similar if not the same labels as the water bottles had. When these are displayed, I will be looking for what age group is responsive to it. I'm wondering if an older generation will lean more towards the old aesthetic. More importantly, I'm looking for people's general responses. The purpose of this project is to comment on the inner strength humans have and take with them every day. I'm turning these things into portable objects.
Potential labels I'm thinking of writing:
confidence
self respect
public flatulent suppressant
tear stopper....

Process moving forward

With the help of friends and good conversation, I have been able to fine tune how this project will happen. The idea of a social survival package is definately something I could turn into some sort of sales performance, however I don't feel this would be complimentary to my personality. I do think that observing people reacting to this object would be appropriate and natural for me to do. I'm leaning towards the idea of using medicine type bottles on a wooden shelf mounted near a bus stop. I can't seem to escape the thought of using antique looking glass bottles on an old shelf. I can't seem to accept using age appropriate objects. Now that I think of it, old aesthetic does work with the idea since having inner strength is definatly no new concept. If the aesthetic is old in a public setting, it should also catch observer's eyes. A friend of mine suggested that the bottles remain empty. She said it raises the question, "Did the observer consume the contents of the bottle already?" I really liked that notion. I need to fine tune the exact labels that will be on the bottles and I was thinking video-ing people's reactions as documentation of this public installation would be appropriate.

Nathaniel Stern

I recently came across this multi media Artist who I thought was pretty interesting. His name is Nathaniel Stern. He does video art, printmaking, and installation. He creates these per formative prints where he uses a custom-made scanner and battery pack along with his laptop. He scans imagery in various lakes, and other landscapes. The per formative aspect of it comes in when he does things like, tie the scanner around his neck and swing over flowers, or do pogo-like gestures over bricks. When I read this on his website, it made me laugh because its just such a playful thing to do. It's refreshing when Artists show a carefree/childlike side to their work/process. After he has the image's, he crops them and uses more traditional processes like hand coloring, lithography, engraving along with others.

Process

This always seems to happen. I fear getting started. Going into projects, I get caught up in the success of it. I get worried that I may not maintain my inspiration with it since I tend to drift with whatever I'm doing at the time. I guess that's all the more reason to actually go through with it, getting over the initial hump. I was thinking about an idea I sort of neglected last semester. I think I'm going to bring it back in addition to this "social survival" one.
With this past idea, I was thinking about was about relationships. It was about how persistent people can be with trying to make things work even when they really know in the back of their mind, it probably won't work out. I started the idea with making a cup out of clay with a big split down the middle. I found a mug to be appropriate since a relationship is so related to consumption. Also, I associate coffee mug's with "down time"/ comfort, and conversation, which are also present in relationships. I ended up making charcoal drawings of mugs with these cracks but they didn't satisfy me. I think I'm going to make prints of them since I've been into this contemporary printmaking class.

1st new blog in a while

So, inspiration is running thin today, but it was helpful to meet in small groups. We talked about what time period the materials I'm using refer to. I seem to be tending to old materials for aesthetic reasons. I still have to work out exactly what kind of containers I'm going to use and what context they will be displayed in. I guess what I'm trying to do with this project is to make others pay notice to what we muster up in ourselves each day. The internal strength and energy we use/have every day to get by socially rather than physically as we do from day to day. I hope to have a humorous element to it. It's not often that my work has a light hearted element, but I appreciate funny Art and hope to make someone laugh. We'll see how it goes.