Monday, March 21, 2011

Whale heart and artist fields



The heart in the picture above is obviously a replica, but a real blue whale heart weighs roughly 1,300 pounds; its heartbeat can be detected from two miles away and a human can fit in its arteries.
Intense. 

What does this have to do with anything.  Well I ran into an old professor recently (Michael Oliveri) who has an interesting story of how he got into the Art world.  He used to be an elevator welder and then got into a job as a fabricator for Hollywood sets. He did all the vehicles for the Batman forever movie.  How fun would it be to have on your resume that you built the Batmobile and the armor for Arnold Schwarzenegger.  One of the other most fascinating things he did he designed and built a super bowl halftime show stage.  That doesn't sound so amazing until you hear that it had to be in over 35 pieces and assembled in under a minute for the show to happen and then dissemble in under 2 minutes.  Anyhow I always use him as an example of what people do other than gallery work if they are interested in what an art degree can do for you.  I just thought of him as I came across this image above and thought about all the people it took to design and fabricate the replica.

2 comments:

Earl Grey said...

Ohhh. That heart makes me queasy, even though I know it's not real.

Thanks for the post about what an art degree can do for you. Great example!

art gal said...

People who have earned art degrees can think critically and creatively. Plus, there's some great research out there about the value of arts integrated education and how it applies to 21st century workplace skills. Employers please take note.

Thanks for the post, and may we all strive to have hearts as big as a whale's!