Dorothy R. Santos, Ph.D.

writer | artist | scholar

  • The Spectacular Seat

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    Click on the image to visit The Spectacular Seat site

    So, did you click on the image above to learn about The Spectacular Seat performance piece by Art Research Team (aka, artist, Tim Roseborough)? Go on, click on the image and read through the description and please feel free to submit a comment. I would like to know, do you think this is art? I’m interested to read your thoughts on the matter and would love to start a dialogue with you. By the way, this piece will be exhibiting at the Keeping an Eye on Surveillance show opening this weekend at the Performance Art Institute of San Francisco this Saturday, September 10, 2011.

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  • Living as Form: Socially Engaged Art from the Last 20 Years

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    To learn more about this project click here.

    Living as Form: Socially Engaged Art from the Last 20 Years from creativetime on Vimeo.

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  • Keeping an Eye on Surveillance

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    Isn’t it funny walking into an elevator and everyone takes out their mobile phone and starts tinkering around with it? Pretending they have a message or playing Words with Friends. Or, even funnier, how I throw up the middle finger when someone I held the elevator door for completely blanks me and just blurts out, “3rd floor”, like I’m the mutherlovin’ elevator attendant. Hmph!!! Often times, I forget that there’s someone watching me. Imagine all of your actions captured on film, recorded, and archived. I should stop making nasty faces and throwing up my digitus medius when certain people leave the elevator but I highly doubt it. All of the times my Mom said I better watch the facial expressions I make because my face might stay that way, well, to a certain extent, she wasn’t lying. My face will stay that way (on film). Scary thought, eh?

    Surveillance has been a topic I’ve covered in earlier posts but I’m bringing it up (once again) due to group exhibition opening, Keeping an Eye on Surveillance, Saturday, September 10th at the Performance Art Institute of San Francisco. The show is a provocative look at surveillance post 9/11 world through a wide array of artist perspectives. From visual to performative, the show will have you looking at your mobile device and everyday surroundings (even the restroom) with a keen and scrutinizing eye.

    The Artists Showing are:

    To learn more about the event, please click here.

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  • Please support Passenger & Pilot on Kickstarter

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    Passenger & Pilot

    Friends and Family:

    I wanted to get the message out there (again) that fellow Asterisk SF Contributor, Jonathan Hirsch’s band, Passenger & Pilot is on Kickstarter and trying to get funding for a full length album. They are a Bay Area band and incredible!

    When I first heard their music, I knew, instantly, it was (is) art. If you’re an artist, you know how difficult it is to make art. One needs time, patience, understanding from loved ones, rest (to make more art), fellow artists, and much more. Passenger & Pilot have been working on their album for the past two years with phenomenal results but they, seriously, need our help. I’ve noticed a couple of my friends have become Backers for their project (THANK YOU!!) and would love to see more. Please click here to view their Kickstarter page.

    Here’s one of their songs, Time to Come Clean.

    Please remember, supporting the arts is important and necessary because it is the one of the things in life that doesn’t fade. You can ALWAYS pull out a beautiful song when you need it. You can’t do that with many things. With music, with art, you can. Thanks so much for helping!! I know Jonathan and the rest of Passenger & Pilot are extremely grateful for your support. 🙂

    With gratitude,

    Dorothy

    PS: If people are willing to help me raise funds for $1000, I would SO LOVE the chance to have a song written for me (or us). I say “me” selfishly on top of a music lesson AND a ravioli dinner. Just putting it out there into the universe. Sigh.

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  • Wittgenstein

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    Lately, I’ve been exploring language and its role in our perception and understanding of art. I thought I would dig through some Wittgenstein text to whet my appetite for some much-needed philosophical art writing I’m working on. Here’s an excerpt of what I’ve been noshing on…

    We are handicapped in ordinary language by having to describe, say, a tactile sensation by means of terms for physical objects such as the word “eye”, “finger”, etc. when what we want to say does not entail the existence of an eye or finger, etc..We have to use a roundabout description of our sensations. This of course does not mean that ordinary language is insufficient for our special purposes, but that it is slightly cumbrous and sometimes misleading. The reason for this peculiarity of our language is of course the regular coincidence of certain sense experiences.

    ~ Ludwig Wittgenstein, Austrian Philosopher

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  • Bischoff Soren Black

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    I took shots from the Oakland Art Murmur this past Friday which did not import over to my computer. Bummer. Since I don’t have photos to go along with this post (how ironic since this is about photography and video), this will be a short one. As always, one of my favorite stops is the Johansson Projects (JP). The current show, Bischoff Soren Black, includes the works of Brice Bischoff, Tabitha Soren, and Ellen Black. Each artists uses photography as a way to alter landscapes and seascapes through both digital and analog techniques. These days, it’s easy to become a photographer using your smart phone with all these snazzy applications but the differentiation between artist and hobbyist is the concept that derives the work. Bischoff, Soren, and Black attempt to show the viewer methods and techniques of photography that rely solely on the ingenuity and imagination of the artists. All were fantastic and so worth seeing.

    My favorite: Ellen Black’s video installations

    To learn more about the artists, view their sites by clicking here, here, and here.

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  • Put some colored girls in the MOMA…

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    I had to post something fun and random since I’ve been fixated a bit too much on art theory and philosophy lately. This past week, as I was walking back home from work and listening to Kanye and Jay-Z‘s reflection on art and artist muses on the track, “That’s my Bi*ch” on collaborative album, ‘Watch the Throne‘, with Kanye West. Jay-Z has taken the liberty to weave lyrics together that offer a speedy discourse on the lack of women of color in the arts while paying homage to his wife, Beyonce. Interestingly, the woman singing the hook in the song is Elly Jackson (aka La Roux) who is, well, not a woman of color. Hmmm. Kanye references Basquiat but briefly.

    Now, if you can get over the word, ‘bi*ch’ in the song, it’s quite clever. The lyrics are posted below for your convenience AND Rap Genius (RG) where RG users can offer meanings to hip hop song lyrics (one of my favorites sites!) has a pretty good breakdown of lyrics to this song.

    **Please note: I didn’t post a youtube video due to many of the videos being modified and often times take down. However, if you’re at all interested in this post and learning about the song, I’m hoping you don’t mind doing a quick a search for it. Thanks for understanding! 🙂

    [Intro: Kanye West]
    Uh, hello, can I speak to, uh…uh
    Yeah, you know who you are, look
    You had no idea what ya dealing with
    Somethin’ on some of this realest shit
    Pop champagne, I’ll give you a sip
    ‘Bout to go dumb: how come?
    Yeah that’s my bi*ch
    That’s my bi*ch
    Shorty right there?
    That’s my bi*ch

    [Hook: Elly Jackson]
    I’ve been waiting for a long long time
    Just to get off and throw my hands up high
    And live my life and live my life
    Just to get off and throw my hands up high

    [Verse 1: Kanye West]
    I paid for them titties, get your own
    It ain’t safe in the city, watch the throne
    She say I care more about them basquions
    Basquiats, she learning a new word, it’s yacht
    Blew the world up as soon as I hit the club with her
    Too Short called, told me I fell in love with her
    Seat by actors, ball players and drug dealers
    And some lesbians that never loved ni**as
    Twisted love story, True Romance
    Mary Magdalene from a pole dance
    I’m a freak, huh, rock star life
    The second girl with us, that’s our wife
    Hey boys and girls, I got a new riddle
    Who’s the new old perv that’s tryna play second fiddle
    No disrespect, I’m not tryna belittle
    But my di*k worth money I put Monie in the middle
    Where she at?
    In the middle

    [Hook]

    [Bridge: Justin Vernon]
    Silly little vixen, mixes ’til morning, I’m yearnin’, ooh yeah
    Do you really think I give a damn ’bout that potion, stop motion, ooh, yeah

    [Verse 2: Jay-Z]
    Go harder than a ni**a for a ni**a go figure
    Told me “keep my own money” if we ever did split up
    How can somethin’ so gangsta be so pretty in pictures?
    Ripped jeans and a blazer and some Louboutin slippers
    Uh, Picasso was alive he woulda made her
    That’s right ni**a Mona Lisa can’t fade her
    I mean Marilyn Monroe, she’s quite nice
    But why all the pretty icons always all white?
    Put some colored girls in the MoMA
    Half these broads ain’t got nothing on Willona
    Don’t make me bring Thelma in it
    Bring Halle, bring Penélope and Selma in it
    Back to my Beyoncés
    You deserve three stacks, word to Andre
    Call Larry Gagosian, you belong in moseums
    You belong in vintage clothes crushing the whole building
    You belong with ni**as who used to be known for dope dealing
    You too dope for any of those civilians
    Now shoo children, stop looking at her titties
    Get ya own dog, ya heard? That’s my bi*ch

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  • The Treachery of Images

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    Funny how a picture (any kind of picture) is a mere representation. I wrote a couple of posts about perception some time ago. One on eye anatomy and the other on eye anatomy related to mental capacity. So, it was great to see a Calamities of Nature comic strip paying homage to Magritte (and Foucault).

    Recently, I had a conversation with someone about new media not being able to escape language, which is one of the reasons why painting is not going anywhere. It’s reliance on the artist’s gesture and capacity to visually problem solve make it an admirable art form (still). An aspect of New Media Art that fascinates me is the dependence on language (yes, programming is language) even if the result is to represent or create something organic looking. I’m working on a piece at the moment and will delve deeper into this topic. For now, I’ll just let you, dear friend, enjoy Ferd and company. Thanks for indulging me. 🙂

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  • Daily bread

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    Ah, daily bread can be taken in so many ways.

    Daily bread is the sustenance I’ve given my brain for the past eight months around all things art, specifically, New Media. Daily bread includes all the little bits to the gargantuan bits of information I’ve taken in since the beginning of the year. Daily bread equates to the art knowledge, writing practice, and mental agility its taken to wrap my head around concepts and ideas I wouldn’t have touched a few years ago.

    At first, it was a challenge to keep an online (daily) inventory of my reflections on art. With new projects and a lot of experience under my belt, this year has been phenomenal. I’ve learned a lot from my mentors, artists, and fellow writers. Daily bread has turned into extraordinary (daily) art feasts with Chimay and the best veggie fare you can imagine, which is just as amazing as that original hipster carpenter turning water into wine. 😉

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  • Why Art in Virtual Worlds?

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    Exploration of new forms has been a modus operandi of the avant garde for over a century, and New Media is doubly implicated in this gesture of praxis. New Media implicitly signifies novelty by virtue of its name alone, but also through its definition that includes emergent (but primarily digital) artforms. As a subset of this, one could recurse by saying that art in virtual worlds could be a “New” New Media. Before devolving into satirical discussions of comparative novelty, it’s notable that “new” media are a locus of expansion of art praxis for centuries, including oil, print, and photography. However, is novelty sufficient cause to merit the consideration of virtual art? Beyond the maxim of “Art for Art’s Sake”, virtual world art is part of a historical arc of work that engages social relations.

     
    ~ Patrick Lichty – Artist, Curator, and Theorist

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