tom friedman

Thursday, May 12, 2005

I started this post on 4/13 and haven't managed to finish it still. I don't want to just throw a bunch of images out there and say "here," i'd figure i should at least try to articulate what it is about Friedman's work that i like, but i don't want to turn it into a full blown essay. His work isn't so easy to explain, in part because it is somewhat aesthetically and artistically questionable. (i may not have done a good job of displaying the questionable side of his work here...)

In searching for images of his work, i found this essay by "Columbine" describing why he doesn't consider Tom's works art, but ironically, over the course of his describing the work (to prove his point), i still find it all quite interesting.

One important test, I believe, is that (although I have chosen to show you some of these pieces to illustrate their visual wow-factor) you do not need to actually see any of them to get their one joke. It's all in the description.

It is a valid point that Friedman's work has this somewhat shallow "wow" factor, but really, the wow factor plays a pretty big role in marketing in our capitalist society. But i think that seeing the art does lend more legitimacy to it because they're often very big WOWs. It's not just the fact that he threw a bunch of pick-up-stix on the ground and replicated the random pattern in mirror image by hand... It's the preciseness and the magnitude of the pattern that he is duplicating that you need to see to appreciate.

How do you crumple two pieces of paper exactly the same way?

I personally find a lot of his work visually striking, but what's more than what it looks like are the processes involved. Many of the descriptions of the pieces aren't so much jokes with punchlines as they are descriptions of the creative process involved in making the piece. And sometimes his creative processes are pretty funny, at least unbelievable in an "i can't believe he spent that much time doing that."

I didn't get exact names for most of these, so i'll do what i can: