Minimum wage

Amongst today's manny controversial  issues, minimum wage increase has been a very popular topic. Society is demanding a fair minimum wage increase from big industries. I strongly support this issue because with out their employees they wouldn't be where they are. The perfect Monument/artwork would be a sculpture. Made up of real items collected from different jobs to represent all. The sculpture will depict , the employee as the support system of all these wealthy but low paying jobs.
My sculpture will consist of a person
Holding up a bunch of items from different types of jobs like, brooms, mops, pans , utensils , cups, papers, gloves , and many more items. My sculpture will represent the strength, support, and hard work that the employees  do. These industries don't value their workers and don't realize they are the reason their businesses are up and running.  I personally have worked for some of the widely  popular  industries and for the amount of work they expect they don't pay enough. For example i was put to do the work of a manager while being paid for my position as a cashier. My sculpture will be located everywhere, I would like it to be move around spreading the message through out society. This monument is meant for society and for the BIG INDUSTRIES.

                            

THE TORCH OF EQUALITY

An issue that I see in this world is that there isn't equality. There isn't equality in race, politics, and especially in sexual orientation. That’s why my cause is equal rights and to stop stereotypes. As my monument I want it to be a torch made out of black and white arms and instead of flames I want it to be a flamboyant rainbow of different arms as you see in the image. The message that I am trying to portray is that we all come from the same roots it’s just that people adapted better to different things and no matter what we like we should be free to express our thoughts. This is why I replaced the flames with a rainbow because a flame burns freely and beautifully and I believe that our minds as human beings should burn like the flame and not be contained by society. I would like my monument to be huge so that people can admire it and stand under it, so they can feel a connection to it. The torch itself I would like it to be made out of metal but the rainbow arms which represent the flame I would like them to be made of  different colors of glass and a special fabric that would make the flames look like they are lit up when the wind blows. I would also like to put a light beam so that in the night time it looks like a rainbow in the sky. I want my monument to be for all those teens that committed suicide just because they felt neglected by society, I want it to be for the people that embrace who they are, and most importantly I want it to be for the ignorant people that just don’t understand the struggles that certain human beings have to face just to try to fit in. I would like to open people’s eyes with a beautiful monument that illustrates the beautiful colors that we all have, but in order to see it we need to get out of this fog we call society and look for the light we call acceptance and equality.

The Torch of Equality 

Blog #5, 6? Idk

The literacy rate in America has not raised in a decade. The ability to read and write is paramount and surprisingly elusive to many Americans in an age when new information is steadily fed to the masses.  I have very deep roots in this issue because I love to write, I feel writing has a power to sway the soul if put together well. But how can we advance as people when proficiency in writing, reading, and essentially conveying ideals is become increasingly rare?

My painting would consist of two equal halves, the top half consisting of men, women, and children of all ages, creeds and colors trampling on books. Pencils askew and broken with blank sheets of paper tattered and thrown away. However, they would be upside down. The bottom half would consist of improvised men, women, and children of all ages, creeds, and colors reaching for the books Americans have laid to waste.

My message is simple and oft told. There are nations that truly understand the value of education and the options it brings. We take for granted the comfort of our situations, whatever they are. The housing projects in America would be heaven sent for the genocide ravaged countries of the Sudan. The books we discard for simpler iPhone pleasures and Facebook interactions are worth their weight in gold in other countries. We have to take back a sense of pride in bettering our minds because they are infinitely the most powerful weapons one can conceive.

My painting would be placed in the doorway of every public school in America to be seen by all the minds still capable of molding, hopefully it lights a spark in the leader that will light a fire in their generation.

Blog post

In 2012, the NYPD took over the duties of the ASPCA humane law enforcement unit. Any and every NYPD police office must respond to any animal related call.  Many NYPD officers were totally unaware of this, and some simply didn’t care. Many officers are upset that taxpayer’s dollars are being spent on the enforcement of humane (animal) laws. Some feel that they have better things to do than rescuing sick and neglected animals. My question is if the NYPD doesn’t want to do it, who will?

If I could make artwork representing my cause I would make a sculpture of a NYPD officer riding a horse. My sculpture would be located in Wall Street. I would remove the bronze bull from Wall Street and replace it with my horse. The artwork would be also made of bronze. The sculpture would have text carved into its base, stating, “Well horsey, now that the NYPD is taking over for the ASPCA we gotta go save some animals. So now we’ll just work you guys twice as hard.” The sculpture would have an NYPD officer riding a thin emaciated horse. The horse would have a tight harness around its head used to lead it in the right direction. The officer would have sharp spurs used to stab the horse in the side to speed it up.

This sculpture would directly represent the NYPD’s lack of interest in taking over for the ASPCA. My sculpture would be a slightly humorous and hypocritical artwork. This NYPD officer would be hypocritical because he would be committing animal cruelty by overworking the horse, in his battle of animal cruelty. The officer’s use of a harness and spurs shows the officer who taxpayers pay to protect animals, committing animal cruelty.

This artwork would be for the people who don’t believe in using tax dollar to effectively fight animal cruelty and inform pet owner on how to properly care for their pets. This artwork would also be for the police officers who believe they have more important things to do. This monument would have a simple message. Its message would be that the people/officers who should be in charge of fighting animal cruelty, should be people/officer who want to help animals. 

Cruel Slaughter Practices

My Two Statues; Draft 

 

I believe that the topic of cruel animal slaughter practices would make a really great statue, or if the idea could be depicted in statue form that would be great. Monuments of common inhumanely slaughtered animals would be a great reminder to the general public that it is not okay to do that. I am already completely opposed to the idea of depending on animals as a food source. My message is simple, that if people have to depend on animal meat, at least do right by it, the animals have emotions that you can see in their eyes. I feel that if people find this necessary then there are better ways of practicing the slaughtering of animals. They’re many humane ways of doing this, rather then hanging cows upside down and cutting their throats. Cows and all animals have minds; they are cognate of what is happening. They suffer what must feel like hours to them, for what? So a family can digest the meat in three days. The current practices that take place are cruel and inhumane. There are many solutions to this problem, as well as many arguments to these practices. One of the more common counter arguments is money; the more humane approach is the most expensive approach as well.

        My statue(s) are about fifty feet tall, big enough to notice but not overly outdone, to avoid cost and looking ridiculous. I’ve noticed through some research that some statues in different cultures are colored, but I would like to stick with the idea of keeping my statue(s) bronze. This keeps the serious tone of the topic; I don’t want people distracted by the color. My statue design is of a cow and/or animals with a look of fear. The plaque would information about better ways to approach cruel slaughter practices and quotes from Temple Grandin: “Grandin explains that going through life as an autistic person —feeling anxious and threatened by unfamiliar surroundings—is not unlike what cows feel when passing through handling facilities” Temple Grandin is a animal welfare advocate who arrived to standardize humane slaughter practices in the United States. I feel with quotes and backed up research from a highly respected advocate, the monuments can make a difference and grab the attention of people, perhaps enforcing more Humane Slaughter Acts, the goal being what Grandin advocates, helping the animals we can’t save.  My monument(s) would be located in states or cities that ignore these laws, so that the attention can be shined upon these companies.

Forest Fire Prevention Service Department (F.F.P.S.D)

   
       The cause of forest fires in dry lands are very dangerous to the ecosystem of animals and humans. Forest fires should be taken into serious duty the fact it can happen in spontaneous times. The longer the fire catches something to burn the faster it spreads. The key is preventing forest fires and using safe and efficient methods to extinguish a forest fire. However to initiate this plan, recruiting team members are important for a trusted and knowledgeable forest fire prevention service. Bringing awareness to people using novelties is one of the first process by acquiring students, technicians, Doctors of earth science and biology, and other required members to start. The novelty I’m creating will be sculpted as an icon of a simple ground sprinkler as it sprinkles blue water droplets. The natural flow of the sprinkles arch’s like a flower’s curvy petal. This will be constructed out of non- hardening clay. The ground will be realistic in away as if the portion of the land where the sprinkler was on has been perfectly pulled out in a square shape. In addition the ground will have grass and pebbles and more realistic features to signify the serious effort the Forest Fire Prevention service can offer. When these novelty are photographed and mass manufactured as novelty products, may be then people will care enough to take action.

Urban Cycling Awareness

Urban Cycling is growing more and more everyday.

Bicycle awareness and fair bike laws should be emitted to everyone who live in populated city areas. Ridiculous ticketing from NYPD should come to a sensible decline. The road should be for everyone to share. Drivers need to become more aware of cyclists around them. Constant dooring incidents, cut-offs (I experienced one of these, the driver did not use turn signals and made a sharp turn right into me), and cars parking in bike lines occur much too often. A protest on smoother roads with no potholes or cracks can make cyclists feel a lot safer riding around NYC. I will propose a monument to ensure bicycle safety, and to give other pedestrians and drivers more awareness of non-motored vehicles on the road.

Here is a link of a man who got ticketed for not riding his bike on the bike lane, and this is how he responded. http://thefreethoughtproject.com/nypd-gave-wrong-guy-ticket-this-awesome-response/

A monument idea would be a cyclist and a driver on top of a big apple shaped like a heart and the message is to propose peace to one another, and not the constant taxi vs cyclist war. (they are true enemies for decades).

It would be made out of gold to show that it should stand out and to show the importance because it will save lives (bicyclist deaths grow every year) and would be about 20 feet high preferably in union square. (cyclist central)

This monument would be for all the cyclists and drivers that had their deep hatred for one another and will remind each other that we should share the road, keep our cools, and avoid being enemies.

(something like this, tried my best lol)

Pacification in Rio

Gabriela Caceres

Art & Society

                 The pacification occurring in Rio de Janeiro’s favelas in Brazil is a risky event happening right now. The purpose of pacification is the Brazilian government’s attempt to remove the drug lords, armed drug traffickers and murderers from the slums to make it a safe place for Brazilian people. They’re also working on reducing crime rates before the world cup begins in June. Although it seems that the government is trying to replenish Rio, they’re using a controversial technique. If the Brazilian military catches you selling drugs in the favelas, or if they see you with a leader they’ll instantly kill you. I chose this particular event because I was recently watching a documentary on it and I have a lot of family and friends attending the world cup next month so it instantly concerned me. The corrupt part about this issue is that drug traffickers have been controlling favelas for years now and the government decided to deal with this ongoing problem recently. The government is spending so much money on new roads, the stadiums, clubs to attract tourists for the world cup but they’re barely helping the residents of the favelas, thus they feel neglected. The message of my drawing is to make people realize especially tourists visiting Brazil in June that drug traffickers are still controlling favelas and that pacification isn’t really effective and instead of the government focusing on spending money on buildings and on the world cup they should focus on doing that for the favelas. The location of this drawing would be in the entrance of the airport in Brazil or before entering the world cup stadium in Rio to capture peoples attention and to make them aware of what’s going on. 

Blog Post #6

Patient Care or Dollar Bills?

What does your physician really see?

       The message behind this monument is to bring awareness to health care fraud. Some patients are victims of insurance fraud and they aren’t even aware of it. Some (not all) doctors will run test on patients which are not medically necessary just so they can go ahead and bill the insurance company and receive more money. Doctors will simplify tell the patients that the test being performed are routine exams but in reality they are not or they will tell the patient that they believe they have “something” but they first need to have the exam before the doctor can rule it out. Some of the times the doctors will just say this to get the patient to do the exam. .The doctor will simply falsify the patients diagnostic to “justify” the exam being performed when they bill the health care insurance. I have been witnessed to this being done, and I noticed that Hispanics were mostly targeted.

My monument is one of where a doctor is examining his patient with his stethoscope, listening to the patient’s heartbeat, but in reality all that the doctor see’s on his examination table is a patient with money. I would place my monument somewhere in New York City and the reason why would be because many people work in the city and many tourist go there as well. I think it would be a perfect place to have a monument because many people would pass by it and look at it everyday. This monument would be for almost everyone, I would want this monument to open peoples eyes to the reality out there. Not all physicians have your best interest at heart, I would want people to be aware and to choose their physicians with care. Not only for themselves but also for their family members. Many times I would see elderly patients coming in by themselves or with an aid to their doctors appointments and because of the conditions they were in they were unable to comprehend what was really going on. The monument would be made out of black ceramic but inside the patients chest would be a clear wall to so show the money inside lit with lights around it(of course the money would be fake). By having the money showing I believe people will be drawn to the monument because of course when people see money on the floor they stop, so that would be by mission with this monument, to make people stop and look! 

Blog post #6

Ricardo Castro

Art

05/19/14

At least once a day a traveling New Yorker has an encounter with a homeless person. Whether it is on the train or on the street, however most people never stop and think about how bad they must have it at the moment, or let alone acknowledge them. I feel as if when homeless people ask for some help or try and explain their situation many people just turn a blind eye. Leaving the homeless person to feel like a ghost in a train cart or on the street. I strongly believe homeless people should be recognized more, because they’ve endured more then many people can begin to believe. Whether they were former soldiers for the military, or someone who has succumbed into the grasp of drug addiction, they all have a story to tell. If I were to dedicate a monument to homeless people I would design it to be several hands that are high reaching out for a hand that is on the low. To symbolize that if people took time in their day to help others then the world wouldn’t be such a bad place. That one person can make a difference, but a group of people can make change.

The monument would be made of melted change to symbolize that a little bit of change could help someone in that dilemma out by tenfolds, and also to literally represent change. If I had to choose where this monument would be placed I would pick a wealthy neighborhood in hopes that it would impact those people and maybe inspire them to actually want to make change. I truly believe everyone should be entitled to food and a place to stay no matter what their situation is.

Blog HW #6

The cause of my choice is the Wildlife Preservation. A fitting monument for this cause is a two-headed animal that are endangered in two different sides of the world, the head of a wolf representing their endangerment in North America and the second head; a tiger, which are highly endangered in Asia. The message this monument shows is that animals, just like humans co-own the planet. They live here. And the reality is, we're living in THEIR planet, not the other way around. And the only way for us to co-exist with such exotic animals is to leave them be. The way I view it, if we can hunt them, then they can hunt us. So the monument shows as if the wolf and tiger are scaring away any intruders of their territories, and the intruders are humans. Both ferociously growling/roaring. The wolf faces forward, his paw dominantly standing on one part of the globe that is beneath them, with endangered species written on it from around the world, not all correctly placed. Meanwhile, the tiger faces towards his left, roaring. It'd be made of bronze or something that could make it last a long time. I feel a statue like this should be placed in a popular place like in NYC, so I suppose Manhattan would be a nice choice for it's placement, mostly for the tourists to see. This monument is for those that support the Wildlife Preservation Organizations and just about anything that goes against the slaughter of wild animals for whatever reason.

(Chose not to color it in, didn't want to ruin this with my horrible coloring, also the drawing was far too big to fit in the lower half. Not entirely good at drawing the rest of the animals written on the globe so I decided to write their names so that it's known that the wolf and tiger are not the only endangered species that are to be concerned about. And also some species are misplaced because I could not draw in the rest of the earth to put them in the places that they are known for becoming endangered.)

Daniel F. Ambia
Art and Society
Blog Post #6
05/20/2014

          At this particular juncture of my life, the most noteworthy cause for me would have to be Veteran's Rights. But in particular I would have to say I support the full withdrawal of troops from Afghanistan, a war that has dragged on for too long and cost too many lives on all sides of the conflict. I would like to create a memorial to the servicemen and women who died overseas but I wanted it to be a little different from previous memorial sculptures. I like the idea of a sculpture made out of bronze of a young person, not necessarily a male or female, but they would be wearing business casual attire and have a small child holding them around their ankle. The sculpture would be located near the Capitol Building in Washington DC, close enough for the congressmen who vote to send our young men and women to war to see the statue on their way to work. The caption on the base of the sculpture would read "FOR ALL THE YOUTH WHO WANTED TO BE SALESMEN, DOCTORS, LAWYERS, MOTHERS AND FATHERS, WE ARE FOREVER IN YOUR DEBT."
People forget that most Soldiers are pretty young and most of them do not have plans to retire from the military. A lot have dreams of attending college or going to work for the city/government in other departments or becoming professionals. I wanted this sculpture to play on the idea that sending young people to war robs them of their opportunity to lead full lives, even if they do come home in one piece many will suffer from the emotional scars of the conflict until they die. I would dedicate it to my 24 year old friend Jose who was killed in Afghanistan because I know he had other plans for his life that did not include the military. 

presentation

lauren melendez
blog presentation
may-20-2014

For this assignment i've chosen the abuse against circus Animal mainly the elephants . what would make a good monument ?  the monument i've chosen to design would  be a big build board show casing the abuse the elephants face while "learning" there tricks  for the circus. The message i want to send out to the public is that  while we all sit their in amazement at what this beautiful creatures have been taught. we fail to know  the truth behind the curtains and what i mean by this is every day  animal hunters go and snatch elephants away have from the wild and they have deigned special traps to capture baby elephants as soon as they are born  and any elephants they capture they are brought to what they call a elephant taring camp.The way i want to design the build board would be and all black poster with white lettering that would say welcome to the worlds saddest show on earth and than it would display a picture of an elephant all tied up with marks and bruises all around its body.The materials i would use are want and a brick wall (poster board). The place i would like to display my poster would be right in the heart of the city time square so i would be able to bring attention to an issue so few people even think about.This poster would be dedicated to all the elephants that didn't make it out of the circus.