Response to an contemporary artist ; Sophie Calle

Sophie Calle is a French writer, photographer, installation artist, and conceptual artist. Her work mainly depicts human vulnerability and examines personal identity and intimacy. She's known for following strangers like a detective to investigate their private lives for her artwork.

One of Calle's first public projects that sparked a tremendous amount of controversy was titled the "Address Book." Calle found an address book in the street, which she photographed and returned to the owner. Calle decided to call some of the numbers in the book and ask questions about the book's owner. Calle added photos of the owner's favorite hobbies and pastimes to these transcripts, creating a portrait of a man who she had never met. The transcripts were published in a French newspaper and the owner of the address book threatened to sue Calle for invasion of privacy.

Another project by Calle was titled "The Sleepers," where Calle invited 24 friends, friends of friends, and strangers to occupy her bed for 24 hours. Calle served them food and photographed them every hour.

research of personal intrest

Artist Francois Robert created artwork out of real human bones to remind people about the consequences of violence.

Robert is quoted as saying "The human skeleton is a strong visual symbol that represents what is left after life has ended, after the flesh and mind cease to function."

The assembled symbols of war above made me realize that art doesn't have to always be stuck together, it doesn't have to be a solid figure or piece. Robert used the same pieces to create multiple works and just took pictures of them to document the artwork.

Robert's shock factor with the real human bones, hopefully achieves his goal of getting people to realize how terrible violence and war is for the world.

Response to an artist ; Han van Meegeren

Meegeren was a dutch painter and art forger that lived from 1889 - 1947. Mainly a painter and a portraitist, Meegeren is known as one of the most ingenious art forgers of the 20th century.

During WWII a wealthy dutchmen who wanted to prevent a sell out of dutch art to the Nazi party, rapidly bought Meegeren's forgeries. The forged "Vermeer" wound up getting Meegeren arrested, and Meegeren confessed to the forgery. He was sentenced to one year in prison but died of a heart attack before he could serve his time. It's estimated that Meegeren duped buyers, including the government of the Netherlands, out of more than thirty million dollars in today's money.

To create the "Perfect Forgery" Meegeren bought authentic 17th century canvas, mixed his own paints using old formulas, used badger-hair brushes, and used phenol formaldehyde to cause the paints to harden after application which made the paintings appear that they were 300 years old. After completing a painting, Meegeren would bake the painting to harden it, then roll the painting over a cylinder to increase the cracks. Later he would wash the painting with black india ink to fill the cracks.

In the picture on the right, Meegeren demonstrated his forgery techniques in front of an expert panel, painting his last forgery "Jesus Among the Doctors."

Meegeren's career as a legitimate painter consisted of sketching pictures and painting posters for the commercial art trade.