Week 8 - Artist – Addario-Cardiff-Miller

    When I look up Addario works online, her most prominent or known works seems to be photographs of war. She photographs war from both sides as a soldier and as a citizen of the country it's happening in. But it seems like she doesn't only just show the brutal aspects of war, she also shows what civilian life is like during the war and after the war. Her work humanizes the other side and it makes you think about how when we hear about war and other countries, we don't think about the civilians on the other side and how they're fairing. 

    Cardiff and Miller make multisensory exhibitions that people can walk through. In these exhibitions, visitors experience an exhibition that is described as unsettling. From what I've seen, the exhibitions make it seem like you're entering an empty room with dark lighting. They use audio and lighting to make you feel and experience what they want when you walk through the exhibition. For example, one of them is a desk and chair with speakers around it while another is a dark and empty movie theatre. I guess this is what the article means when they describe their exhibitions as unsettling. I would be pretty unsettled if I went in them alone. 

    I think they're similar in the sense that they both make you feel things when you look at it or walk through the exhibition. In Addario's case, you can sense the civilian's and soldier's feelings when you look at it, while for Cardiff and Miller, you get the unsettling feeling when you walk through their exhibition. I suppose you get an unsettling experience from both, but for different reasons. 

    Besides the feelings they give off, they're both very different from each other. Addario's work is photography of real life situations which shed light on what his happening in this world while Cardiff-Miller's work is exhibitions based on their own creativity and not necessarily real life situations. 

    I think importance depends on what you want and how you're looking at an artwork. I think for modern day applications and for knowledge, real life stories are more important because we can see many of what Addario photographs today. I think this is more important because it forces us to look at other people's perspective and think of them as actual humans with emotions and not just as countries, which I think is a problem when reporting about wars. We fail to recognize that other countries such as Iraq or even Russia also have civilians that are suffering from the hands of powerful people. I don't think whimsical mind explorations are a need, I think it's something that could maybe make us better people and more open to experiencing new things but it's not necessarily a need. 

    I think I would choose an artform like Addario mostly because I don't think I am creative enough to do something like Cardiff and Miller's work. I also like the aspect of being able to explore new countries and seeing everything I photograph with my own eyes first.