Outcome

The Work

Bruce Nauman’s Having Fun/Good Life, Symptoms, found at the Carnegie Mellon Museum of Art, is characterized by two large spirals made up of flashing neon words. The right spiral asserts: “I Live the Good Life. I’m Having Fun. You Live the Good Life. You’re Having Fun. We Live the Good Life. We’re Having Fun. This is the Good Life. This is Fun.” And the left one reads a list of opposites: “Fever and Chills, Dryness and Sweating, North and South, East and West, Over and Under, Front and Back, Up and Down, In and Out.” Each phrase has its own color and is made up of two layers of neon lights. I chose this work because its color and neon-ness seemed playful and drew my gaze. 

My Response

This piece is bold; it loudly marks its presence with an eerie, hypnotic stare. Its bright neon colors overwhelm the senses, and its words pulsate to a pounding rhythm that is only overshadowed in its ability to cause discomfort by the buzz of the neon lights. The ‘good life’ spiral with its vibrant, fun colors insists that everyone is having a good life and having fun, but the circular pattern in which the words turn on and off and the repetitive nature of the phrases makes this message feel mechanical and indoctrinating. After watching this exhibit, I am left with the feeling that everything is all but good and fun. It reminded me of the cursed theme park in the movie Pinocchio in which boys are lured by the promise of fun only to be transformed into donkeys and sold. The left spiral’s antonyms seem to highlight the idea of a dichotomy between the fantasy that the spirals attempt to sell and reality. The on-and-off lighting of the phrases creates a contrast that conveys the physical and symbolic difference between light and dark. I do not like this piece because I succumb to the effects it aims to express.

My Product

I first wanted to express the sense of playfulness that initially drew my to the artwork. Thus, I began experimenting with colors and filters on Photoshop. Due to the nature of the piece, I also wanted to include a spiral of some sort. I feel that the hypnotic quality of the work can be mostly attributed to the repetitiveness and the spiral, and I figured that a psychedelic image would best convey the emotions I experienced while viewing the piece. I first came up with the following:

This image is best able to express the discomfort I felt. The colors, pattern, and disguised spiral actually repulse me slightly. However, the image is not playful and thus misses out on the sugarcoated reality component of Nauman’s piece. I kept experimenting and finally arrived at this:

I think the colors closely reflect Nauman’s neon lights. I first created a psychedelic pattern and then turned it into a spiral using the tool ‘liquify’. It was too merry, however, and so I decided to add a patch of contrasting black, that after some morphing resembled a human figure. If I had more time I would try to add more of the darker side to my piece, in order to better capture the hypnotic effect. 

Reflection

The site for the Carnegie Museum of Art asserts that in this piece of art, “ Nauman insists that we all live "the good life," yet implies the dichotomous price for such luxury”. It is interesting to compare the "actual" meaning with my response to and interpretation of the piece. The two differ (unsurprisingly as I am new to art analysis) but I am pleased to have also noticed a dichotomy. As mentioned above, I wish I could have included more of the repetitive qualities that I found made the piece displeasing to look at for long.