Dave Chapelle's Block Party

Dave Chapelle' documentary Block Party, is all about how he brings together people from his neighborhood, old friends and people of different races inviting them to a rap concert. Presenting to them the hip-hop culture in a sense to make them enjoy it. Show that it's not just for one race to enjoy but anyone can be apart of. To have fun and enjoy yourself, uniting. Dave goes to his home town in Ohio first and finds random people off the street giving them passes to the concert. He makes a Willy Wonka reference giving out his golden tickets. He didn't limit himself to the race, he asked blacks whites, people he knew growing up, even a Central State University's drum line marching band was off to the concert, they're excitement as well as all the others who got to go really gave you giving Chappelle some credit in showing his passionate side. The block party consisted of popular hip-hop artists such as Kanye West, Erykah Badu, Mos Def, Talib Kweli, Jill Scott, The Roots as well as the Fugees to end the party with a big bang. He even invited The Central State University Marching Band to come along and play during this major event. Throughout this Mr. Chappelle of coursed performed his comedy monologues and little sketches during the film.

The majority of the people invited went to the party, yet there were some people who didn't jump at the chance. They believed that rap music relates to just inappropriate language and is not intended for kids or even adults. I strongly do agree with what they say, as I am not a big fan of rap in general. However I don't believe that its fully true. Most do go towards violence, sex etc. but after watching this you can quickly learn from many of the performances that it isn't all that bad. Most believe that rap is sending a message about abuse, how poor they are, sexism, drugs, murder rape etc. This block party contained artists of different backgrounds and beliefs, showing a different side and somewhat relates to the audience. They take their talent and skills, giving it their all in the show.

Most of the back stories from these music artists, before they were well known and had any sort of record of being famous were running around in the streets. Doing the right thing, something to do thats fun by playing music together in clubs and not bumming around doing nothing with their lives. They all have interesting, unforgettable and warming pasts that is shared. Just by watching the performances they displayed, everyone was comfortable with one another, they were all good friends, everyone enjoyed each other's company. They really knew how to work well with great respect from one person to the other. Behind the scenes you see them with Dave, having a great time, playing around, goofing off. Even when Dave was on stage you saw how he interacted with the performers, doing the funny things he does.

The power of this film is all from the music that plays. The environment very welcoming to all who came. Everyone just wanting to have a good time. A sense of over joy that you really don't see in any kind of rap concert with a hint of Dave Chappelle giving in his two sense of humorous jokes and character into it that held strong in this movie. He mocks the rap battle, throwing out random one-liners, whatever he could do to slow things down. This concert shows the great strong message of unity of people and having one big party. Interviewing each artists as you listen to their music, what they believe and what they have to say about how music has inspired them, where they got it all and what they want to do with it sharing it with others. It was like chapters of a book of back stories that gave you the real life and meaning.

Dave Chapelle' documentary Block Party seemed to be a real big success after the uproar of the media and fans talking about how he is insane for walking away from a lot of money for his show, roughly a $50 million contract deal. He walked away from it, his determination and dedication to himself as a person showing the world and not giving a damn on what they thought. Being true to himself, his own person. This block party was something that really made him shine. It was his opportunity to shine and be real with the world, and I think he pulled it off tremendously. This documentary showing the power of diversity and changes, presenting it in a positive way. He didn't sell out on the contract, he showed what a real comedian, artist, person can do, a rue side.

Dragonball Evolution

Dragonball Evolution is a 2009 American live-action film adaptation based upon the Japanese Dragonball media franchise, directed by James Wong, produced by Stephen Chow and distributed by 20th Century Fox. The story centers around the adventures of the lead character, Goku, (Justin Chatwin) who on his 18th birthday, is asked to gather the seven Dragonballs in order to save the world from the evil alien Piccolo (James Marsters). On his journey, he meets several other characters that aid him in his quest. From the release of the very first trailer, all indications were that the movie was going to be horrible, and despite a decent basic premise, it is. From the murky art direction to the jumbled mess of a script, poor acting and hopeless directing, this movie is a beyond terrible.

One of the most striking aspects of the movie is how inappropiately casted most of the characters are. Goku is the most notable example. You do not expect the transition from a cartoon to a live-action movie to be without major changes, but the Goku in Dragonball Evolution shares nothing in common with his anime counterpart. In the cartoon, he is a young, happy, energetic boy who rides across the land on his magical cloud, full of self-belief and spirit. Justin Chatwin's Goku is a miserable emo who rides a bike to school and gets picked on by the 'cooler' kids. Other characters are similarly miscasted, Marster's Piccolo is perhaps being the closest to resemble the character from the cartoon, but seeing as how he gets roughly 10 minutes of screen time in the whole movie, you're never given the chance to appreciate any aspect of his performance.

The down right god awful acting. The movie features some of the poorest performances I've ever seen. Chatwin chops through the clunky badly written script, in a performance so wooden it would embarrass most items of furniture. Emmy Rossum (Bulma), Jamie Chung (Chi Chi) and Eriko Tamura (Mai) establish little if any personality for their respective characters, and Joon Park's Yamcha is a disaster. Even the talented Chow Yun Fat fails to restore any credibility to it, he just smiles as he walks away with his fat paycheck.

I personally see few if any redeemable features to this movie, but I can understand why some might enjoy it, particularly a younger audience. At 90-minutes, the pain is short, and one can't accuse the movie of dragging, there's always *something* happening, regardless of whether it's good quality entertainment or not. Some may see it in the special effects, I personally think, like the rest of the movie they're awful, but the sheer brightness and flashiness may be enough to wow some viewers ( known as 12 year olds). The fight scenes as well, while undeniably cheesy are not terribly executed, just a little cliché.

In the end of it all, this movie basically is for no one, I really don't understand how someone can like this, it honestly doesn't appeal to anyone. This movie was made for nothing but the money. The people who will go and watch this movie and have no knowledge of the Dragon Ball story will be so confused by what there watching, they will most likely tell everyone it is one of the worst movies.

Living Out Loud

Living Out Loud was created in 1998 directed by Richard LaGravenese. Holly Hunter stars as Judith Ne

lson, a middle-age, feisty woman who's marriage fell short after her husband left her for a younger woman. She's going through her mid-life crisis, This has deeply depressed her causing her to stop and think about her life ahead.

Trying to see that now being single yet again, what were the right and wrong choices she took in that time period. Where does she go from here? Her voice runs through her mind all over the place. Saying one thing then another thing pop ups right after. There were more than one

occasion where you saw what Judith wanted to see happen in her life, until reality hits and you see what really happens.

On the other side you meet Pat Francato, played by Danny DeVito, a single father due to his addiction to gambling his money away. His daughter passed away just recently and now has job is being the elevator operator of the building Judith lives and the two form a friendship. Together they talk about their pasts and the difficult obstacles they both have faced in their families befo

re meeting and how they will have to forget and move on.

Queen Latifah plays Judith's singer idol Liz Bailey and befriends her at the Jazz club. They share their relationship issues and become rather close, going to a gay club but not before taking drugs and having a random musical dance number happens.

They hint that Pat and Judith might be together but throughout the whole movie you get a feeling that Judith and Pat might become even closer than friends. Pat admits his love to Judith several times throughout the film but she always said no and wanted nothing more than to be friends. He seems more like a father figure to her. She leaves him and several months later after she finally decided she wanted to go back to school to finish up being a nurse, she was too late. Pat had found his voice and began singing at the Jaspers Jazz club.

The performance these characters show are quite rememberable. The film kept moving despite there was no story line to push forward. Judith seemed to be the one character that developed the most and got a lot out of it. Her new experience helped her gain what she was missing.

This movie shows the hardships one can have in their lifetime, showing relationships you can have with a complete stranger, how hard life is and this film has a point in making us stop and think that life isn't always going to happen how you want it, everything can change in an instant when you least expect it. Whether or not you want it, try and make the best of what you have.

A Dragon ball World

There is one massive art form that has been apart of my personal life as an artist and also a fan. It surrounds my personal guilty pleasure but also links to my way of how I see art the way I enjoy it. My personal appreciation comes from a manga series created in 1984 named Dragon ball created by Akira Toriyama. Finding out about the franchise at the age of 10 I first became a fan of the anime series and watched it religiously after school on the cartoon network channel. So obsessed I had to buy empty tapes and record all the episodes every day as well until it came out on VHS.

Some few years passed and the series finally was released on DVD. Searching online to find out more episodes that weren't released in America I browsed and became more involved on the art style. I used reference from the manga books and copied the style over and over, wanting to be able to learn how to draw the character's from memory. I become heavily interested in comic books and manga was highly being noticeable in America more through the years. I started collecting the entire Dragon ball Z manga series.

I remember spending hours on end drawing the characters that I tend to love and grow up with over the years. The back stories, character development, theme, everything that this series had, this world was the one I wanted to be in when I wanted to get away from the real world around me. In the situations the series had, it made me really think about life and also helped me relate when I had my own problems I had during my childhood with friends and family. If something happened I knew I would always turn to this series and expressed myself by drawing out my frustration making the characters in a situation I was just in.

To many people I’ve talked to, they say this is just another typical fighting ‘cartoon’, however I see it as something much more deep. Currently I am now a fan of this series for 12 years and still to this day I go back to that art style, admiration and understanding that only a hand full of people get. I had the opportunity to talked to other artists online all over the world and some I had the pleasure of meeting, sharing the same similarities and gratitude. I couldn’t stand here and tell you if Dragon Ball Z weren’t in my life I would be still drawing and wanting to be an Illustrator.

Shoes

Your foot includes more bones than any other section of your body. You rely on your feet every day, shoes at first were created to protect your feet from rocks, burning sands, natural hazards of the weather/climate, the rough ground that we walk and anything that would danger them. Only until recent years, the shoe wasn’t even worn by most of the world’s population. There of course still to this day where people walk barefoot who can’t afford any. Shoe prices can be one extreme to the next. Flip flops at Kmart can go for only $1.00 while at the Nike’s basketball shoes can go as high as $150.00.

Shoes are an item of decoration to the middle and upper class, they seem to be more focused on how the shoe looks rather than if it’s comfortable. Woman complaining constantly how at the end of the night they get blisters all over their aching feet. Some sort of silly fashion statement, or you can tell how a person is by the type of shoes they ware. Some people just buy shoes to match with other groups, to be with the in, not caring about price. Some want to be noticed on what their wearing by showing it off, bragging that they got some high expensive pair that no one can afford.

Depending on where you’re from there is a certain brand people wear. There’s so many examples so the best one I always find that stand out mostly from many are the group of boys who are skater. You can tell by the most popular skater name brand shoes they ware. They all look flat and somewhat similar. Brand names such as Vans, CD, Etnies, Osiris is most popular when riding a skateboard showing off your moves on the half pipe.

The variety of shoes one can go through in someone’s closet can be an alarming number. You need different types of shoes that accommodate the time of the year, snow boots during winter, flip-flops during the summer, but that’s not all. They types have many categories in itself. You need shoes for sports such as running, tennis, basketball, ice-skating, skateboarding, dancing. You need dressy shoes to go out to a special event and the list just goes on and on to how much shoes are a big importance.

Shoes can be worn by anyone, no matter what sex you are; anyone can pretty much get away with wearing whatever. Doesn’t matter if you buy shoes for men, woman or a unisex pair. In this generation there really isn’t any order to what you wear or how you wear your shoes.

Framed: The World Of Comics

Comics are a focus here however there are other very big displays in the open areas. The displays really don’t connect with the comics at all and seems somewhat very random. The atmosphere is welcoming yet congested; there are few less seats for students, which is bothersome and harder to get a seat. Everything in display makes it look like there is so much going on.

Angeline mascarenas "A day in the life of a snowman" pen and ink on board, 2009 This cute little snowman comic is somewhat very amusing, its simple though tells you a story that makes you ask a lot of questions, who throw the snow at him, why did he make a snowgirl and ripped out her heart. The comic is plain, nothing in the background, which was a good choice since there is not needed to be anything more. The artist didn't put any words, just pictures to let the readers mind only guess. The color is plain as well; nothing bright, mostly cool light purple, grey colors to match the snow and sky. Usually simple is the best kind of message for a viewer. Gets them to look when walking by and makes them want to stop and notice what is going on in the image.

Joyce Rice "My last winter in grawn, MI" Digital Print 2009. Her comic was on one side and on the other they picked her biggest panel from her comic and enlarged it redoing it, painting on the wall itself. The art style is very interesting and sticks out a lot compared to some; it’s her own style. Colored in only blue tones and one light brown color it looks well made and completes the image, she not even needed to put any other colors looks well. The text is easy to read and clear, cell shading, a clean piece of work. The story is compelling to make you want to view the full comic page to start from the beginning to find out what’s going on.

Stephanie wegryzn and john coxworth hellgeezer' digital print 2009 has only text on this piece is the title in English and Japanese, looks heavily shaded, tones, black and white, the mood feels serious and some sort of mystery to it. Blood in each individual panel. Detailed smoke making it confusing to the characters, black to white fading setting a mood, lighting very important hitting the characters and objects. The comic pages makes you wish there was more, or turned into a comic or a manga book.

This gallery really is a comic book artists’ treat. Seeing such variety of work from the student body, it’s really an eye opener to view and understand the talent others show and their knowledge of the style of comic books. The different styles, techniques, rendering one can do when making a comic, the feelings and ways that get the reader to get a much better understanding of what the artist is trying to bring forth in their work.

Location: 623 S Wabash Ave, first floor. Gallery Hours: Monday through Thursday, 9am–7 pm, Friday, 9 am–5 pm

Phone: 312.369.8177

Columbia College: At Close Distance: Labyrinth Of Self Exhibition Gallery

Walking in the gallery for the first time I noticed the atmosphere, it was pretty cold, a lot of open space for people to walk around, white walls and a dull looking brown painted on the pillars. The benches had pillows that were random colors and way to big placed on top. The lighting hitting only on the objects, paintings. The first body of work I came across was Jennifer Hines three paintings/photographs. The artwork to me feels somewhat weird and disturbing. Photographic images of naked women sitting holding themselves wrapped up and covered in some sort of plant liked rooted figure. The colors to me were somewhat random, as an artist myself I couldn't even relate to something like this. The pieces of personal growth, oddly shaped branches coming out of her, it just seemed generic. Another piece of work I stopped to look at was Colleen Mcgrann's of mine. 'A triptych of herself photography'. The three pictures looked rather creepy with the blurriness/mystery look to it. The pale yellow scheme, girl in white night dress looks like something out of a cheesy horror film. The process of her planting something isn't appealing since there is no visual of where she is, the background being emptiness. I couldn't feel really anything at her piece. Walking around the gallery I did seem to pause at the video clip created by Victoria Bradford called 'Blue focus'. I'm at a daze seeing images shoot out on the screen at random. The text looked like font from a typewriter, it moved at an awkward rate then disappears and reappears, background is always white, photos of a girl constantly being repeated. It looks like a complete mess and I was getting a slight headache. At first glance it just looks like a weird video to me, possibly if I had met the creator of this I would get a much better understanding. The most related piece of artwork I found out was to be a simple notebook. Kelly Parsell's my 'Spanish book revisited' was this piece. She used this book when she was a child learning Spanish but also had pictures of drawings she did and little notes. It was her personal little book that she did whatever she wanted to. I've also kept many journals, notebooks and sketchbooks from when I was younger and I can never seem to get rid of them. It's the stuff in the past I just don't want to forget or let go. A personal Journal.