Wesley LeBaron

Humanities blog post

Utopia/Dystopia

            The book I decided to read was Tunnels written by Roderick Gordon and Brian Williams, whom were both born and raised in London, England. The society in the book is a race of humans who have lived underground for many ages. The city is based under London. The characteristics of the people are mainly pasty white skin, on the taller side, and super skinny. The society is ran by a race or group of people known as Styx. These people are very human like, but have some slight differences such as they have no pupil’s just straight black eyes. They talk in a snake type manner rolling their S’s as they speak. They are super skinny and have very small sharp noses. They use fear, along with their sickles, as a method to run the underground city. The Styx one main rule, or law, is to never go to the outside world without permission first. Family units are the same as they are in modern day society; there is a mother, father, and children and the occasional house pet. The Styx have a religion ceremony every week teaching the people how their ancestors have plotted to take over the outside world starting with London and moving outward to create a perfect society ran by the Styx. If anybody disobeys the rules they are subject to “the black light” which drains all life out of somebody and makes them miserable usually through bringing up bad past memories.

            The story goes a boy named Will Burrows and his friend Chester Rawls try to find Wills dad who went missing on his last digging excavation. As they dig up clues of where Wills dad disappeared to they discover a secret hidden city deep underneath modern day London, England. They soon find out that this city is not a great place to be for a person from the outside world. A very interesting plot twist happen in the middle of the book when Will finds out he is adopted and his birth parents, or at least his father, live in the underground city. His mother took him to the surface to get away from all of the Styx madness. They Styx knew this and Will eventually got captured and was then sentenced to life in “The Deeps” which leads into the second book in the series.

            I would have to say this book is a Dystopia because the Styx are trying to strive for a world that is practically impossible to have. They have a system where they are trying to get everybody in their city to hate everybody in the outside world so they can one day raid and take over the outside world. They don’t really believe in God they think they are Gods for the war they are about to start. Some of the similarities I see in the society is that they do in fact have art which they keep very sacred to them. They have a book similar to the bible which supposedly has sacred writing in it telling Styx how to successfully live.

            I do not agree with the society in the book. I can see that the Styx race are a blood thirsty group of individuals who want all the power in the world. They would kill anybody in their way to obtain what they are after. I am not that type of person, I am a more laid back go with the flow type of person. I would not want to be a ruler of the world I think it would be too much of a responsibility. 

Wesley LeBaron
4/12/14
Cultural review blog post
Matthew Brandt Lecture Review
Matthew Brandt was a very inspiring artist who knew how to connect with the audience no matter who was in the crowd. So many people were talking about his artwork afterwards that at that moment I knew he not only inspired me, but also many others in the crowd. When I went to his lecture I was not expecting what he showed us. He inspired me, who is not a slight bit interested or wanting to know more about art, to want to know more about his art and how it all works. Most of his art work had me wooing and wowing. Some of it though I was thinking to myself, “this is kind of weird…” In the end though I thought it was a very well structured and I actually took something out of what he was trying to tell us. Art can be in many shapes and forms inspiring, whether it takes five minutes to create, or many days. No matter what the art is made of, in some way it will inspire at least one person.
The technique that Brandt used was very unusual to me. I did not know that someone could finish an artwork piece by dipping them in items such as condiments: ketchup, mustard, mayonnaise, and relish. To capture a shot and then finish it by giving it a hint of color from a condiment to me sounded absurd until I actually seen the finished product myself hanging in a gallery. I was blown away at how something as simple as ketchup could be used to give an artist’s shot so much more depth to it. The colors changed significantly, mostly the color of the condiment, but at the same time a lot of the shadows and shading were much different.
On the more unusual side of Brandt’s technique was the human bodily fluids he used to finish his artworks. He told us that salt is very important when developing an art piece. So I thought to myself well I know that sweat and tears contain quite a bit of salt in them. Those are a given that he was going to use them to develop his artwork. What I did not realize that when he said bodily fluids he meant almost all of them such as: puss, urine, blood, semen, women’s ejaculation fluid, breast milk, fathers’ sperm, vomit, ear wax, and bile. I found this method very unusual, but after I thought about it for quite a while I finally came to a conclusion that I found his art form very interesting and even though it may be a little strange, it totally works out in the end.
In closing, I want to say that I am glad that I found the time to go listen to Matthew Brandt and see some of his amazing, but crazy artworks. I would have not went if it was for this assignment so I will have to say this is one assignment that I am glad to complete. I went thinking to myself well all I have to do is pay attention and take some great notes and I should be able to get a good grade. To my amazement I found it very easy to pay attention because most of his artwork stood out way more than most any others that I have seen. The way that he put his artwork together blows me away. For example, the bees on bees artwork that he showed us must have taken so long not only to collect the dead bees, but to put them on canvas in a certain order looking like the shape of an actual bee. The salt water sketches of the oceans were really cool knowing that they were developed in the water where they were taken. He inspired me to look more into this field of artwork and I am glad I attended his lecture.