Eli Miller

Posts

Appleton bar crawl

November 14, 2023

For my final project I wanted to do an investigative photography series about something I had been thinking about alot. I had been thinking mostly about the immense presence of alcohol in Appleton Wisconsin as the country's most drunk city. More specifically, I wanted to look at college avenue which is the main drag of bars that leads right up to the college Lawrence University. Over three sessions at different times of day, I walked down college avenue taking pictures of bar signs and intense displays of alcohol for sale as a way of collecting the evidence of this presence of alcohol. I am not making a moral statement here, instead I am showing the viewer a visceral retelling of Appleton's drinking culture. I have two parts to this project, the main part is called bar crawl where I experimented with the shutter speed of my camera to give the intoxicated, blurry look to the bars I passed. I also took pictures from a low and intimidating angle for thematic emphasis. My second p...

Something Happened Exhibition Reflection (Including Inkjet printing and blurb photobook making)

November 07, 2023

My time preparing and experiencing my classes art exhibit was experientially very new and exciting for me. We framed our works and showed initiative by all volunteering to do different things in order to see our exhibit up and running. I got to make the vinyl letters for the exhibition sign and see what goes into placing the different works appropriately on the wall. Inviting my friends to see the works as well as looking at everyone's photobook design choices was a big full circle moment for me. Looking at my two main photography inkjet prints in frames with their own labels next to them took them out of the hypothetical and into the art world which is the kind of thing you need to see as an amateur to start trusting your gut on artistic choices in the future. Overall, outside of my new media in art class I would love to finish projects to this same level even if I don't choose to present them in the end at all. In preparation for t...

Cold Milk

October 23, 2023

"...The highest purpose is to have no purpose at all. This puts one in accord with nature, in her manner of operation." "Everyone is in the best seat." "Everything we do is music." (John Cage quoted in McLuhan pp.118) McLuhan and John Cage both understand the importance of sound as a medium we can't escape in life. "Cold Milk" Original photograph "We simply are not equipped with earlids." (McLuhan 111). Importantly, since visual art has the capacity to be abstract or even non representational, sound is allowed to be dissonant or even exploratory in a way where the main take away is how the listener feels. Taking my inspiration from John Cage's "Water Walk" I decided to use strange liquid sounds as a way to challenge the listener while also leaving the door open for them to laugh if they can't listen past the strangeness. Where my project differs is that I wanted to trigger an intense feeling in my listeners. I ...

Out of Place Photography Project

October 08, 2023

Photo titled "Eat your Words" We were asked to shoot 100 photographs on a Sony NEX-5 with a thematic attachment to McLuhan's "The Medium is the Massage". We chose and edited the most representative 20 photographs of our vision and presented them digitally on an Instagram account. I chose to take photos of things that seemed starkly out of place in the city of Appleton Wisconsin. I was pleasantly surprised with my ability to pick photography back up like riding a bike and am extremely happy with the outcome of my vision and selection. From garbage and metropolitan nuisances out of place amongst nature, to candid shots that feel unsettling in an indescribable way, I am helping the viewer feel a part of themselves that is disturbed by striation from the norm. As McLuhan puts this phenomenon: "The poet, the artist, the sleuth —whoever sharpens our perception tends to be antisocial; rarely "well adjusted," he cannot go along with currents and tr...

In With The New

September 25, 2023

Time and space today mean something completely different to what they did before. Our new technological age has trampled the truths we held as gospel regarding the connections we can make as humans from any point on earth to another. Long gone is the perilous voyage across the sea with the airplane, long gone is the delayed message by snail mail thanks to email and instant messenger services. As McLuhan puts it, "Ours is a brand-new world of allatonceness. "Time" has ceased, "space" has vanished. We now live in a global village...a simultaneous happening." (Pg. 63). My project titled "In With The New" is a representation of the generational disconnect that illustrates McLuhan's insights on our new experience of time and space. The main focus is a rainy scene where a large sundial casts no shadow due to the overcast weather as preoccupied students walk past it giving it no regard and treating it like an antiquated symb...

My Introduction

September 12, 2023

My name is Eli Miller. I am studying Psychology to become a sex therapist in the future. I find the impact of mental issues like trauma on physical things like sex and interpersonal relationships to be fascinating and it makes me feel called to action. Scarred Man Playing Basketball -thephoblographer.com I think "art" is a title for any type of medium we can use to encourage someone to feel something, anything, as long as it provokes some sort of thought or emotion. This is why art that is subversive or unsettling has a strong impact and is what stands the test of time. When a work of art leaves a scar on you that won't heal, it changes you and becomes a part of you, making it tougher to forget. "Innumerable confusions and a profound feeling of despair invariably emerge in periods of great technological and cultural transitions. Our "Age of Anxiety" is, in great part, the result of trying to do today's job with yesterday's tools-with yesterday's...