Today, we're going to talk about Deb Sokolow's art
assignment, The Stakeout.
MAN: Yes.
Successful art!
If you haven't watched the assignment episode yet,
you probably should.
So, perhaps unwisely, I used the word "stalker-like"
in the original video.
I shouldn't have done that.
This assignment is not about stalking.
It's about people watching.
And people watching is not stalking.
From the many videos I've seen of people
doing their own assignments, I've
been really impressed by how people
have approached this challenge with thoughtfulness
and sensitivity.
I've concluded that The Stakeout is really about empathy,
and about figuring out ways to give gifts to strangers
without freaking them out.
As Deb put it, people watching is a way
to understand and relate to other human beings,
and to combat a sense of isolation.
So having said that, let's look at some more responses.
Like this Dutch stakeout by Magritte and Yoseen.
They made a box full of split peas, covered it in gift wrap,
and added signs that said, please touch our peas,
and dig in and find a surprise.
In the peas, they put little rolled up messages,
saying things like, have a great day.
It's exceedingly charming, and they seem
to have a really good time.
WOMAN: Oh.
[LAUGHING]
SARAH GREEN: Or there's this one by, Daisy May Smith in London.
Her object was a disposable camera asking people
to take selfies, an act that narrows the pool of respondents
to those would feel comfortable sharing
their image with a stranger.
She established trust in the light-hearted tenor
of the assignment with her notes-- hello, curious person,
take a selfie with me, I'm an art project-- and at the end,
included the handful of pictures she got out of the exercise.
Most of the responses creatively and sensitively
addressed the issue of whether or how
to show the people who participate in the stakeout,
like this college student, who also leaves out
a camera for people to take selfies.
You see the action from far away, but at the split second
a person takes the picture, she flashes the image
they took super quickly.
Or there's Jane83Doe, who also tries
to maintain the anonymity of the people she reports,
putting annotation fields over their faces
to try to obscure them.
And then there were people who decided to just document
themselves talking about their own stakeout,
like Julia Smith, who describes people instead of showing them.
And she had some really lovely thoughts about the process
as well.
It's not just about an art product.
It's not just about a painting or a thing.
I've always thought about art as experiences.
And I think Sarah's trying to teach us that.
Art is experience and how you react to things
and your thoughts on it.
Other people made sketches and drawings and notes
about their stakeout, like this guy,
who made these amazing drawings and notes about his stakeout,
wisely deciding not to make his object
a bag of mysterious powder, and even including documentation
of his stakeout outfit.
And when he does depict his subject,
he does so from behind.
AllieLucas99 made this great drawing, showing, step
by step, what happened with her stakeout,
including the all important last step-- make
sloppy poster of stakeout instead of doing calculus--
And these excellent notes by [INAUDIBLE], even
including that she was listening to Beyonce during her stakeout.
There were a number of people who
got caught in the middle of their stakeout,
like these three friends in Balboa Park in San Diego.
They left a box of fun stuff you can wear, like fake mustaches
and antler head bands, with a sign that said,
take one, have fun, #theartassignment.
One of the men they were observing turned on them,
and even takes their picture, in a marvelous reversal of watcher
and watched.
And there are these friends in Vienna,
who put out two books in the middle of a public square.
At one moment, a man comes up pretending
to be part of a criminal investigation unit.
And then the real police come and politely
end the stakeout because they're worried someone might trip.
People put quite a bit of thought
into what their intriguing object would be.
Jen and Sumaya, who you may remember
from their Meet in the Middle video,
decided to put out a big yellow tutu with a sign that says,
dance with me.
And then there was Harvey, a box offering dollars
in exchange for thoughts.
This woman left a frog sculpture filled with peppermints.
And this staker outer made a box with a mirror that
says you're beautiful inside.
Someone else leaves a bowl of pennies.
[INAUDIBLE] used a bubble gun as their object of choice,
and not only documented the stakeout,
but also did an interpretive dance based on the experience.
[INAUDIBLE] made in origami horse
folded out of his school newspaper.
He left it on top of a stack of the papers, but nobody took it.
He concluded that next time, maybe
he needs to be more explicit and leave a sign that says,
take my horse.
Others went with the tactic of making their object a present,
like this person, who wrote a blog
post about their experience of setting out a box of chocolates
wrapped like a gift, with a great tag that simply said,
for you.
And there were also less enticing objects,
like a golf ball and Homer Simpson
bookmark, made more enticing by being wrapped like a gift.
At first, I was disappointed the boy or lady
didn't open the present.
But then I realized, it was a good thing.
By not opening the present, they were able to creatively think
about what it may be.
Many of you were made to feel uncomfortable
by the experience, like Joy [INAUDIBLE],
who put a bear piggy bank with a note that said, be my friend,
on top of a trash can at a shopping mall.
A couple does end up taking the bear,
and although her feelings about the process are mixed,
she still seems to emerge from it with positivity.
That was pretty cool.
It's just something really different.
And it made me feel like the weirdest person ever.
There were many people whose projects
could have been considered failures,
like Jeffrey Lanzini, who put out
a book of selected writings on Kierkegaard with money in it.
He placed it on a beach during a kit contest,
and then, when that didn't work, on a ledge in a busy area
nearby.
But no one took it.
Now, if a person had taken, they
would have been a jerk face and probably added one more point
to my dislike for Homo sapiens.
But in a way, the people that didn't take the book
are just as big a jerk face as the people that
would have taken the book, because they're turning down
a whole world of knowledge, as well
as being bribed by the book to take that knowledge.
Even if they took the book home and then threw it away
without me knowing it, I probably
would have been much happier that there
was some sort of resolution.
And [INAUDIBLE] also had less than desired results.
MAN: Oh, are you kidding?
There is definitely loss that accompanies this assignment,
and commenters like Elise Roberts shared the following.
This reminds me of how I feel whenever I show someone
else any art I've made.
You don't know how they're going to respond to it.
You have your hopes and ideas of what
and how you want them to respond to your expression of ideas,
but you've got no control over them.
And that's why art is terrifying for the artist.
From the assignments I've seen so far,
this somewhat terrifying feeling is
what makes this assignment challenging and worthwhile.
It requires you to put something of yourself
out there to be embraced, ignored, or even thrown away.
Thanks to all of you for participating
in this challenge.
As I've said before, there are no due dates
for these assignments, so keep staking out and uploading
your responses with #theartassignment.
And once again, please don't break the law.
Maybe that should be the new Art Assignment sign off.
Sign