Shooting "Why are black people so loud"

The following were all shot on 2/28 with a Canon 30D

400 asa (which I think is a little grainy. I should have shot at a lower ASA considering I was shooting primarily outside.)

Why are black people so loud? (Business owner)

Why are black people so loud? (Business owner)

Why are black people so loud (when waiting for the bus)?

Why are black people so loud (when working)?

Why are black people so loud (when not working)?

Why are black people so loud (and fashionable)?

Why are black people so loud (when getting arrested)?

New Directions - Why are black people so loud?

Another thing that I discussed in crit was my growing interest in the single search suggestion "why are black people so loud?"

I feel like this question shows the racism in people using Google. It is a great social commentary.

I am going to spend the rest of my time working on this particular prompt phrase. The series I present will be five or more works displaying various photographs dealing with and addressing this question. They will all be displayed with the Google Screen Shot Label displayed in my previous post.

I am contemplating presenting my images in diptychs. One side of the diptych will be of a person of one race doing something. The other side of the diptych will be a person of another race doing the same thing. I feel like this is a simple way of showing that we are all just people.

I did a little bit more research on Google to see what kinds of results I got with the following two prompts:

Why are black:

people so loud

people so ugly

people better athletes

people so racist

people so violent

people so dumb

people black

people faster than white people

people so lazy

women so fat

WOW

and now for

Why are white:

people so racist

people called crackers

women attracted to black men

people smarter than black people

lighters bad luck

people afraid of black people

people so ugly

people called honkies

people so evil

people called caucasian

I'll leave you to chew on that. More photos focusing on this question soon.

New Work

Why are people posting colors on facebook?

Possible Image 1

Possible Image 2

The answer to this question happens to do with breast cancer awareness. Women are posting their bra colors as their status' on Facebook as a way to remind other women to do self breast exams.

As an answer to these questions I photographed a couple images of actual bras. Another way of addressing this question was to take images of items that filled the entire frame with one color. I was the most intrigued with white. There are so many various shades and hues that still read as "white". I also considered the idea that the majority of bras are sold in white.

After WIP 2 Review

I presented my new work along with various presentation styles at critique. I came to the decision after some suggestions by my class to present the work as follows:

Here you can see the google screen shot is presented as a label or title of the artwork. I will now be working on making my own google label since the actual screen shot is too small and extremely hard to read because it is so busy. I want it to look like google classic (unfortunately right now Google classic has a strange olympic themed logo instead of its original.)

Presentation Styles

For midterm I am planning on having a couple different presentation styles ready to show to have my peers comment on. During my last review it was suggested that I show the work in a diptych style with the google screen capture on the left side and my image/answer on the right side. I have made a digital mock up of what that will look like.

This image on the left is the largest size my screen shot can print in its highest quality. I wonder if i should shrink the answer image on the right to be the same size. I could potentially enlarge the screen shot to the answer images size and have a loss of quality- which might enhance the digital/ electronic-ness of the entire project. I also considering creating a website for the project as the main way of presenting it.

New Work

Why did I get married too?

Possible Image 1

Possible Image 2

New Work

Why are black people so loud?

Possible Image 1

Possible Image 2

Changes

So as it turns out the top ten search phrases for "Why" has changed since I began my project. After my last critique my class suggested displaying the photograph as a diptych with the a Google screen shot on one side and the photograph on the other.

Considering doing this I am going to change my list of titles to accommodate the new search phrases. The list in order is now as follows:

why do men have nipples

why is the sky blue

why is my poop green

why are black people so loud

why did i get married too

why can't i own a canadian

why do dogs eat poop

why are people posting colors on facebook (new)

why do cats purr

why did the chicken cross the road

Artist Doing Relevant Things

I just found another artist working with the web. This guys name is Joel Holmberg and he just kinda collects cool stuff from the internet.

In this video Holmberg works with Google suggestions. He uses the prompt word "slam" then types each letter of the alphabet to see what Google suggests to him. He reads each of the Google suggestions in a rhythmic pattern alluding to slam poetry maybe?

Regardless, It's awesome.

Check it out.

He is a part of an artist group that collect and compile interesting things from the web. They post about it all on this website. Definitely worth browsing through guys.

After Midterm Review

The review.

Well I was a little disappointed in how little most people were paying attention to each others blogs and general progress.

We were told to pin up some questions we had about our work next to our photos on the wall. Then we walked around and posted questions we had about other peoples work.

Most of the questions I received asked what the concept of my series was. Or they asked how on earth the images related to one another. I suppose if everyone came into the crit a bit more informed I would have felt like I received better feedback. Regardless this gave me a lot of time to think about how I am going to give an artist statement and also how I am going to display the titles of my images.

It was suggested in critique that I explore using a diptych. One side would ask the question and the other side would answer it. I will post soon some samples of the work being displayed in such a manner.

More photos about other questions

why do cats purr?

I'm not sure what the answer is to this. My cat purrs all the time. Sometimes it when she's happy or comfortable. Then again some cats never purr. Regardless I felt that this photo has a soft comfortable feel that reminds me of a purr.

why is the sky blue?

the sky isn't always just blue.

why do dogs eat poop?

I think my answer has something to do with the fact that is basically tastes the same or is the same thing.

Change of Approach

I am trying to intentionally answer the Google prompt questions now.

The other night I shot "why is my poop green?"

After Small Group Review

I met with a small group of my peers today to discuss the progress of my project. I was given the suggestion to try to answer the questions with my photographs. I am not sure how to do this seriously considering that some of the questions are things like "why is my poop green?"

So here are my first few thoughts as far as answers go.

"why do men have nipples?" - to give each other titty twisters

"why is the sky blue?" -

"why is my poop green?" - something to do with being irish. or drinking green beer.

"why did i get married too?" - you didn't know what else was next.

"why can't I own a canadian?" - canadians are people too

"why are black people so loud?" - they're not...?

"why do dogs eat poop?" - cuz it's basically the same thing as dog food

"why do cats purr?" -

"why did the chicken cross the road?" - he never really made it

I obviously don't have all the answers figured out, and I definitely don't have all the visuals yet. I'm just going to need to start shooting and see what I come up with.

Research Plan

I have been having a little bit of trouble deciding how I want to visually represent the google search phrases I have chosen.

I have been thinking a lot about Judith Baumann's Google Air Guitar (2004). In this work she too used technology like Google as a part of her work. She visually represented the essay "Air Guitar" by writer and art critic Dave Hickey, by entering each word of the essay into Google image search. She then chose one of the first three image results to represent that word in the essay. The end result was a multipage document/series of photographs with images appearing like lines across a page representing each and every word of "Air Guitar". To learn more go here.

Taking a page from her book I am going to research the google image results for my google search phrases.

why do men have nipples

why is the sky blue

why is my poop green

why does my vag smell

why do cats purr

why did I get married too

why do dogs eat poop

why cant I own a Canadian

why did the chicken cross the road

why are black people so loud

First Couple of Photos

I'm not sure what question this photo has to do with but it was part of how I initially approached the project. I was trying to take photos constantly- everywhere I went. I was then planning on pairing the photos with certain questions that I felt worked well with the image. I do not feel like this approach is producing relevant photographs.

Research

I have begun my research of common Google search phrases.

The following lists are the suggested searches Google provides when given a prompts word.

who:

who is

who want to be a millionaire online game

who says lyrics

who wants to be a millionaire

who dat

who says john mayer lyrics

who invented the internet

who is lady gaga

who won dancing with the stars 2009

who is my congressman

who is:

lady gaga

my congressman

big poppa

ip

john galt

the richest person in the world

the richest man in the world

big papa

on the dime

taylor swift dating

what:

does my name mean

is my ip

to do when your bored

is my ip address

time is it

not to wear

is love

to expect when you're expecting

is google wave

is a good credit score

what are:

the symptoms of the swine flu

the seven deadly sins

the seven wonders of the world

capers

the 7 wonders of the world

the symptoms of h1n1

symptoms of swine flu

carbohydrates

stem cells

the ten commandments

what are these:

bumps on my balls

bumps on my nipples

called

bumps on my arms

s

lyrics

pills

bumps on my tongue

bumps on my face

symptoms

when:

is daylight savings 200

thanksgivingday in 2009

is easter 2010

will i die

will the wolrd end

was jesus born

i look at you lyrics

in rome

does morning sickness start

im gone lyrics

where:

the wild things are

where the wild things are trailer

where the wild things are soundtrack

where the wild things are book
where the wild things are movie
where the wild things are review

is haiti

where the wild things are costume

is santa right now

where the wild things are quotes

where is:

haiti

santa right now

chuck norris

is the love lyrics

santa

haiti in the world

my mind lyrics

haiti located on the map

santa rght now 2009

tiger woods

why:

do men have nipples

is the sky blue

is my poop green

does my vag smell

do cats purr

did i get married too

do dogs eat poop

can't i own a canadian

did the chicken cross the road

are black people so loud

why is:

the sky blue

my poop green

it called black friday

is a raven like a writing desk

yawning contagious

my computer so slow

pepto bismol pink

the world going to end in 2012

pluto not a planet

the ocean salty

why do:

men have nipples

cats purr

dogs eat poop

dogs eat grass

men cheat

we dream

leaves change color

cats knead

we yawn

dogs lick people

why are:

black people so loud

yawns contagious

michael jacksons kids white

we in afghanistan

the kardashians famous

there schools

barns red

flamingos pink

cells so small

we here

how:

to tie a tie

i met your mother

to kiss

get pregnant

to lose weight

to cook a turkey

stuff works

to solve a rubix cube

to

long to cook a turkey

how to:

tie a tie

kiss

get regnant

lose weight fast

cook a turkey

solve a rubix cube

make a website

write a resume

download youtube videos

lose weight

why you should:

recycle

be and organ donor

eat breakfast

go to college

donate blood

wear your seatbet

exercise

vote

not smoke

wash your hands

why your shouldn't:

smoke

eat your boogers

get the swine flu vaccine

drink and rive

text while driving

eat fast food

smoke weed

do drugs

have kids

text and drive

smoke cigarettes

I know this is a long list but I am the most interested thus far in the "why" questions people ask.

How this is relevant

In the past I have created works using pre-made titles. A pre-made title is a title I create before I go out to shoot. When taking photographs I am searching for the image to fit the title. Working this way brings a new exciting element to the photography table. It also helps me keep a coherent theme throughout a series of photographs.

The first project I instituted the idea of pre-made titles, the titles were based upon thoughts, questions, and sentences floating around i

n my mind through out the course of a day.

The second use of pre-made titles was a work where the titles were some of my favorite song lyrics. I took images of people singing and paired the images with song lyrics that seemed to match the tone of the image.

For this project (yet to be named) I will use pre-made titles from Google search prompts as described in my prior post.

The images here are examples from my second pre-made titles project. The top right is titled 513 down his arm, deez nutz across his knuckles and Willy Wonka on his calf (2006)

When you're poor everywhere you go is the ghetto (2006)

Jim Leopold can't stop thinking about Rinnie Modzelewski

on motorcycle trips with his wife (2006)

I know a guy paralyzed from the waist down that drives a hand controlled car (2006)

Red vs. Green (the great debate) (2006)

Revelry, revelry! Wake up young campers. (2006)

Photography Winter Quarter Project Synopsis

I want to explore the idea of creating images for specific titles. I want to use pre-set, pre-made, pre-determined titles as the basis of a photography project.

I plan on recreating common google search phrases as photographs. The search phrase will start out with a prompt word like:

"who"

"what"

"when"

"where"

"why"

or "how."

I will choose one of these prompt phrases and upon typing it into google, google will provide the end of the sentence for the most commonly searched phrases.

For example if I type in "why " into google's search field the following phrases appear from a drop down list:

"why do men have nipples"

"why is the sky blue"

"why is my poop green" etc.

I will then create a series of photographs based on these search phrases. Each search phrase will be the photographs title.