Alice Konitz

Recently, I went to artist, Alice Konitz's, lecture on her artwork. Her work mainly consisted of sculptures, but there were a few paintings and collages from magazines. Her sculptures, for the most part, were geometric and oftentimes heavily influenced by architecture and landscape, topics which she seemed to be very fond of.

Something very interesting about Alice was her love for LA; she admires the architecture and the desert and even the freeways and how her work stems from these things. Growing up in the suburbs and constantly seeing the buildings and freeways of LA, I definitely don't think I appreciate the landscape and engineering as much as Alice does. For me, a freeway is just a freeway, dirty and oftentimes blanketed with cars sitting bumper to bumper; but for Alice, a freeway is an "adventure park", something that she can create a piece of art from. What I like about Alice's work is that it makes the ordinary more exciting and interesting.

I also enjoyed Alice's use of geometric shapes. She oftentimes used hexagons in her work, using them to make large interactive sculptures and imitations of stores and store fronts. She also used hexagons in designing a decal pattern for a store, which I found particularly appealing. I think the balance of the hexagonal sculptures and the hexagons themselves made me attracted to those particular pieces. I think, also, that the practicality of her work, was an alluring aspect for me, perhaps suggesting that her "art" could at times be called "design."

All in all, I did enjoy Alice's work. Though some of it, like her movie, was hard for me to understand; I think that what she accomplishes is both thought-provoking and physically appealing.