02 - The advantage of being an amateur is the combination of artistic freedom and physical flexibility. Amateurs can explore diverse visual styles, experiment with unconventional techniques, and capture moments spontaneously without the pressure of financial returns or adhering to strict production schedules. Often times there is a mindset difference in comparison to professionally trained or acclaimed artists- where there is no fear of failure repercussions. This flexibility can lead to more authentic and personal work, capturing the beauty and depth of everyday life that is usually unseen by those functioning in a professional space.

03 - This document might influence our classroom design to emphasizes creative exploration and the joy of learning. The class could encourage students to embrace the mindset of an amateur by focusing on passion-driven projects rather than purely technical proficiency or commercial viability. Emphasize the creative process / allow for failure within the creative space / critique that develops constructive feedback on more than a rubric- but more so expression, vision, and feeling / encouragement and resources for new technique exploration.

04 - As a graphic designer and wedding photographer, I lean into less professional forms of amateur art that convey personal expression and spontaneity. I am inspired by visual narratives driven by feeling and emotion that resonates. Experimental graphic design projects like passion pursuits capture my attention more so than anything else. Experimental film photography, especially when showcased as a collection is incredibly stimulating both visually and tactically. These art forms often capture raw emotions, unique perspectives, and moments of everyday beauty that resonate with a genuine, heartfelt quality.

A happening can be elaborate, articulated, detailed, vague, or simply. An ideal happening in my mind would circulate around the idea of doing nothing at all.

Rest /

Learn to rest

Find new ways to rest

Do no actual rest at all while thinking about rest

Understand what restlessness feels like

Try again, repeat.

Repeat.

Repeat.

“500 noses are more beautiful than one,” is explicitly staged as the grid pattern defining the composition. These B&W crops are from a selection of my client couples, shot on both digital and 35mm film. My work is done in a documentary style approach, which I consider to be happenings unfolding right in front of me. Their wedding days, beginning to end are happenings, and I capture it as such.

The phone number, is copied 500 times moving in coordinating counter clockwise and clockwise animations. Out of the numbers in my phone- this one is interacted with the most, and the person behind it is apart of all of my happenings. As the piece states this happening to occur for a minute straight, as does the animation. These circles coordinated at a 30 second time stamp for the remaining 30 seconds, to highlight visual exclamations of the word ‘yes’ as an ode to my response to any given opportunity. I say yes to things, far more than I say no to allow happenings to occur and experience the world in the fullest capacity. 

Pranks are disruptively calculated to push social boundaries and practices. In poetic, thoughtful, artistic, and unconventional avenues- pranks are a call out through social misconduct. They are often used as an attack to unbalanced power, structure, and distorted political pursuits. Derives are a way of feeling and acting, pranks are a way of thinking and communicating.

When I go to bookstores, I am on a mission. I go right to the beautiful art books, with analog photography and beautiful language... never ever do I pick up alternative genres. I've never truly experienced a bookstore before, which I have recently learned to be closed-minded! Not intentionally, I suppose I just know what I like. In the mindful exercise to stay grounded an present in my atmosphere, I let myself sit with the unfamiliar. Maybe out of context, the experience would have be uncomfortable, but with a filter to ground me and the foundation of the exercise to pull from, it felt facilitated and rich.

I appreciated the construction of going to a specifically named section, turning to a specific page each time, finding a word, keeping it in mind, sitting with what I found, collecting it rhythmically from nine books, and then pulling them together in cohesive unity. It felt full, genuine, and valuable. Almost like an icebreaker? With that being said, going forward my level of comfortability opening random books, from random genres in a bookstores seems a lot more enriching and approachable. It was an act of pursuit of my environment. I wasn't just existing in it, I was mindfully experiencing what it felt like to be apart of the space.

With that being said- here are my words and poem!

History - Stone

Romance - Serenade

Gardening - Sprout

Religion - Ritual

Biography - Whirlwind

Cookbooks - Blend

Law - Barrier

Horror - Whistle

Children's - Wonder

[ Where empty voices seem to tell a meaningless serenade.

[ Shifts, trends, progressions, sprouts of curiosity shape perception.

[ Like an unpracticed ritual we move forward and forget the past.

[ Amongst the chaos, conversation, and controversy a whirlwind stirs.

[ A harsh blend of what has happened, and anticipation of what's to come.

[ Somehow yet it's only our mindfulness remaining barrier.

[ Newness and peace beckon and whistle our attention.

[ Yet we are left to wonder at which degree true change is possible.

This poem is a response to the shifts in cultural dilemmas, a catalyst and call out to social change. Outlining transformations in our ethical dynamics and practice of mindfulness in regards to change.

I quickly became attached to Lavender and her pursuits as a source of inspiration. I found all of her work to be diverse, powerful, and charged by the human experience. The way she pulls personal predispositions to the common experiences of the people is seamless. The second piece I found myself on is titled "Terraforming a Sanctuary," a feature of four audio channels, with the base sound recording from the Lincoln Park Conservatory fern room in Chicago. Her work is a comment on the tension between meditation and sound pollution in both internal and external contexts. The symphony elevates the concepts of well-being, solace, and memory through exploration sounds of 'forest bathing,' a Chamberlin Mellotron, and New York Catskill frog audios.

Over the course of exploring her work, I connected deeply with Dream Within a Dream- a live edit from Lavender's performance at Union Pool in Brooklyn, New York. The building tension, modulation, human speak aspects, lines of audio control, and ambient oscillation curate an immersive and stimulating experience. While she has no artist abstract on the piece to my knowledge- I can't help but draw a parallel to the Edgar Allan Poe poem of the same title. The poet explores themes of melancholic hopelessness, mood, loss, and motivation. These feelings translate to the atmosphere C. Lavender creates within her live oscillation.

Overall, I find Lavender's pieces to provide clarity, connectivity, and insight on the shared human experience. Her audio blends thoughtful and unconventional oscillations- elevating the concept of unique sound art.