1KM Submission; A simulation of my heart walking 1km

For my 1KM submission I decided to make a visual simulation of my heart beat walking 1km around campus. The full simulation is 11 minutes 17 seconds which is the exact amount of time that it took me to walk the 1KM distance. Through the whole simulation the “heart” beats a total of 1336.61 times at a rate of 118 beats per minute. To determine this I tracked my heart rate on my smart watch and created the simulation based on the results. The main idea when creating this was one day when I was walking and noticed my heart rate was higher than normal, but on the outside I look as if everything was normal. This had me thinking about the interesting contrast between what we see on the outside, versus what is really happening on the inside; so I created this simulation of exactly what my heart looks like on the inside as I walk around for 1KM.

Video Project: Loop

Video Project: One Take

Video Project: Edited Video

For my video project submissions I decided to focus on the simple task of “focus”. In saying this, I wanted to look at the objective of this “performance” piece from a different lens, instead of performing the simple task myself, I decided to give the simple task of “focus” to the camera. The intention for this project was for the camera to perform the act of “focus”. Additionally, to further demonstrate the act of focus performed by the camera I had decided to include the Lumetri Scopes of each video to show what is happening internally within the camera when focusing/un-focusing on a subject. The first looped video is a short clip that starts off with the camera un-focused, when a subject walks in you see the camera perform the act of focusing, and then you see the camera perform the act of un-focusing as the subject walks away to allow for a perfect looping video when repeated. Secondly, the one take video submission is a minute long video of a still subject focusing intensely on the camera while the camera itself performs the act of focusing / un-focusing on the subject; demonstrated by the Lumetri Scopes. Lastly, the edited video plays on the concept derived from the state of “focus”. When I was working with this concept I often found myself going in and out of a “dream-like” reality as the focus changes. In saying this, I wanted this edited video to play on the concept of the focus changing in and out of a dream state, as demonstrated by the faux reflection in the mirror showing the lack of reality caused by the current state of focus / un-focus as performed by the camera.

Audio Project: The war that never warmed

” Neither the United States of America nor the world community of nations can tolerate deliberate deception and offensive threats on the part of any nation, large or small.

We no longer live in a world where only the actual firing of weapons represents a sufficient challenge to a nation’s security to constitute maximum peril.

Nuclear weapons are so destructive and ballistic missiles are so swift, that any substantially increased possibility of their use or any sudden change in their deployment may well be regarded as a definite threat to peace.

Our policy has been one of patience and restraint, as befits a peaceful and powerful nation, which leads a worldwide alliance.

We have been determined not to be diverted from our central concerns by mere irritants and fanatics. But now further action is required–and it is under way; and these actions may only be the beginning.

We will not prematurely or unnecessarily risk the costs of worldwide nuclear war in which even the fruits of victory would be ashes in our mouth–but neither will we shrink from that risk at any time it must be faced. “

16 Reference Track – Kendrick Lamar

” My Mama mad at me, I know I fucked up big.

My Grandma mad at me, I know I fucked up big.

Boss love, I guess I never understand.

Every-time I say that I’m sorry, I do that shit again.

Chill, Chill, Chill

I made a promise.

That I would never leave you stressed.

I made a promise.

That I would never send that text.

I made a promise.

And if I ever felt this way.

I would be honest.

Shawty bought me nooses and a rolls, I live that fast life.

Got all my nooses in a row, yea they tied tight.

Big fat thoughts, bumping my head like my dad right.

Popping these bars on the road, we got the tabs right.

And when you say, say.

Hide my drugs, smoke — “

Button Project Submission

For my button project submission I decided to continue with my experimentation of how new forms of technology can be used within art. For this project specifically, I created 15 buttons that all feature unique QR codes. The QR codes are used as a gateway to an audio file from Old Man by Neil Young that I deconstructed into 4 unique parts; Vocals, Bass, Drums, Instrumentals. Each QR code takes you to one of these unique audio files with the goal that when enough people participate in this work, that the full song will be uncovered with each persons phone playing a unique part of the song that then comes together in this shared space in which the buttons are displayed. I chose the song Old Man by Neil Young specifically because over this semester I tasked myself with experimenting with technology within my art, I realized that there is always a large disconnect within the generation differences of the art world and the viewpoint placed on “technological art”, the song speaks a lot about the disconnect of two generations and how these wavering viewpoints are actually more similar when you look closer at it. In the future I would love to continue experimenting with this concept, and I would love to experiment with displaying this work with a full orchestra of instruments, with each button laid out in it’s proper section of the orchestra, which would link each unique instrument to its own QR code. The goal would be to have viewers scan these QR codes, and being left with a fully put together symphony being played from each unique phone.

Before you judge a person, walk a kilometer in their shoes.

When I was thinking about how to recreate a kilometer, I kept thinking about the classic idiom. I decided it would be fun to explore a literal approach to the concept of; can I learn about someone and become more empathetic towards them by actually walking in their shoes? I decided to set up this piece as a report, which shows my observations of every step in the kilometer. It was a fun experiment, taking my time during the walk to pay more attention to how I felt, and how the subject must feel while walking in the same shoes. It inspires me to continue this project, and I want to walk in other people’s shoes and see where it leads me. I think it would be fun to have a collection of shared experiences with random people, and it might be a unique way to make more intentional connections.

For this sequence piece, Quinn and I brainstormed as many different ways that we could execute the action of drawing a circle. We chose the circle because it has the reputation of being a difficult shape to create. We wanted to see how the shape would differ when trying out different ways to perform this action. This video highlights the variety of ways in which someone could draw a circle, if they felt up to the challenge. We decided to have a slight narrative throughout the piece, checking in on the nested hierarchy circles as they continue to grow throughout the video, while the other techniques jump into view to try and keep the audience engaged. We decided not to have transitions because we wanted to contrast between the scenes to be sudden.

For this one-shot piece, we wanted to challenge ourselves by drawing out the circle as slowly as possible. Our aim was to create anticipation for the viewer, as they stand to watch Quinn draw this circle. Bit by bit, the shape comes into form… only for the video to end abruptly without the circle ever being fully completed. We made this choice because we wanted to create a sense of frustration in our audience. This replicates how I personally feel whenever I try to draw the perfect circle, that is, I can never quite get it ‘right’. But, who is to say that an uncompleted circle is not a circle?

For this loop piece, Quinn and I thought it would be a cool idea to play around with something that could go on forever. The nice thing about circles is that they are infinite. So we decided to create a shot where we drew and erased the circle at the same time, requiring a repeated action for infinity.

After the critique, we edited the video to be more smooth between the loops, slightly fading between the end to the start again.

I have always been told I am a loud chewer. For this piece, I was inspired by the artist Kelly Mark’s piece, HUM, who recorded an annoying tune to implant in people’s heads. I wanted to play with the idea of how a short audio clip can create emotions in people. I know that a lot of people in my life find the sound of someone chewing to be quite obnoxious, and I am very self-conscious whenever I eat crunchy items like a carrot. So this piece is a bit tongue-in-cheek with confronting the reality that I am a loud chewer, especially next to the microphone. May these sounds resonate loud for all to hear.

All of the windows I look through…

The house I live in has a lot of personality, I wanted to represent that for this contemporary portrait. The house and windows are very old, and I am sure they have witnessed a lot in their time. I like to look at the windows, and out through them. All of the fine cracks, designs and distortions make the view of the outside world much more interesting.

For my buttons, I had too many ideas, and I found it difficult to narrow them down to one for this project. For my first button collection attempt, I made a series of images depicting taxidermied gopher dioramas from the world Famous Gopher Hole Museum in Torrington, Alberta. (https://worldfamousgopherholemuseum.ca/) I decided this might be a fun idea to play around with because buttons, just like taxidermy, it is a way of keeping something alive and having an image on display to the world. Also like buttons, one has to first gather a collection of the gophers to create a whole museum. It also might allude to a contemporary take on vanitas art. I also thought it would be fun to make a collection on this collection, and have it be a niche, ambiguous image and message that only people who have been to, or heard about the museum would really understand. I am curious to see how they will be interpreted in the real world. My favorite button from this collection was the two gophers sitting at the dinner table, saying “Oh boy am I ever stuffed”… because who doesn’t want a punny taxidermied gopher button right?!

For my second collection, I was wanting to play around with the materials that compose the buttons. I thought it would be an interesting idea to intentionally not use a plastic slip, and have the paper material eventually break down as it is worn in the world. I used phrases like “everything is temporary” and “nothing is forever” which too will disintegrate away, making the button self-aware of its own mortality. I also made a few “this is not original” buttons, which I thought might be thought-provoking to those who came across the message in the real world.

Kilometer Assignment

Ricky’s Journey

For my kilometer project I decided to show the effect of traveling one kilometer. I started by thinking of how we can travel a kilometer. We can walk it, run it, bike it, drive it, fly it, etc. Then I started to think of how small 1 single kilometer really is. In my eyes a kilometer isn’t very intimidating, but this is not the case for everyone. Others struggle a lot more with a kilometer and this is the idea I settled on for this project.

I painted a rock, and gave it a name to make it almost human. I then walked a kilometer around campus, kicking Ricky (the rock) in front of me. He had some rough patches; where he rolled into things such as sticks, pebbles, cracks in the pavement. He also had some easy patches in his journey; these were the snowy spots, where he simply kept rolling. When I painted him I put 2 different colored layers around him, one green, the other blue. Where we see green is where only one layer of paint was rubbed off. This is where he only had slight damage. Where we see stone however, is where his main impact points were during his journey.

The damage Ricky took was contingent on where I rolled him. If I had rolled him back and forth down my road (where it isn’t as plowed, and still has a layer of snow), he would have come out of this looking much better. However if I had done this before it snowed he wouldn’t have had the small breaks from pavement, and he would have looked worse in the end. 

I have included Ricky’s before and after pictures, as well as a before and after picture of my shoes. You’ll notice that Ricky has a lot more damage than my shoes. Even though both items traveled the same distance, they didn’t have the exact same journey. This kilometer was way harder on Ricky than it was on my shoes, because my shoes were more prepared. Since I painted the rock and gave it a name we suddenly feel how hard this kilometer was on poor Ricky.

Video Art

Partners with Renee

Art Is Hard (Loop)

Taking inspiration from John Baldessari’s “I will not make anymore boring art”. Our video calls out those who look at art as easy. We chose to fill a page with ‘Art is hard’, contradicting the overall simple feeling of the video itself. While filling up the page I found I zoned out completely. I was expecting for my hand to hurt about half way through and then be uncomfortable writing the second half. However this wasn’t the case. It was hard to get started with the writing, but once I was a few lines in I started to distract myself looking at the columns each word was creating. You can see I made a few mistakes, but we took them as they came. The mistakes demonstrated how even a simple task like this is difficult, adding to our overall idea of art being hard. Some words were written too close, or I wrote the wrong word and had to fix it. I also take a second to look back at the work I have done a few times. In the video we have enough time to take in all aspects of it. I found that I was immediately drawn to how I was holding my pencil, it looked so weird. Something like holding a pencil comes so naturally, it is second nature, so I had never thought about how I held my pencil until now. A small challenge we had while making this was how we would make the loop because we had to get our blank page back seamlessly. We decided to start with a blank table, then bring in our paper to begin the writing. In the end we take the filled page away so our loop can start again with us bringing in a new blank page, starting fresh.

A Paper’s Strength Against A… (One Shot Video)

We tested the limits of paper (with respect to our studio space), using the same repetitive feat over and over, only changing the object. We didn’t want to be in this video ourselves, taking away from the paper’s presence, so we decided to do a close up style. Only showing Renee’s arms, we angled the paper in a way that we could see the face of it, but also see the incoming objects. This lets the viewer only focus on the object’s impact on the paper. It was interesting to watch how some of the items (ex. The clip or the server card), were held by the paper for a brief moment on impact. It gave us a chance to look at how the paper supported the object before gravity took over. When Renee and I watched the video we knew what each object was, making it easier for us to take in the whole video. However, our audience wouldn’t be able to view it the same way we did. We could have left the video and objects as a mystery, but some went by so fast and were too hard to see, making the video less enjoyable. So we had to think of a way to inform the audience, without disrupting our video. We originally tried to add a small title in the corner, saying what was being thrown, but this made the video feel busy though. Our eyes were going from the corner, to the paper, to the corner, back to the paper. It was taken away from our video. So we used a voiceover in between the items hitting the paper. This kept our video easy to watch. It also gave the viewer context, so they could think of what was being thrown rather than just watching and taking in whatever they could. 

James Price and Lenka Clayton created a cut video of drums being played by different people, ages 1-100. This was a fun video to watch, you could visibly see the overall change everyone goes through in life. They kept drums as their constant. Renee and I kept our sheet of paper as our constant, while each object changed. We also tried to line everything up before we started the video. We wanted to have the objects with the least amount of impact go first, and we would slowly work up to the object we thought could break the paper.

Different Ways To Share Paper (Cut)

This piece was inspired by Kelly Mark’s ‘Hello Goodbye’. She shows the viewer simple, silent gestures for us to understand. In her work she wore all black with a black background. Her goal was to isolate her hand gestures and facial expressions, this is how we got the feeling of her video. Renee and I instead wore the same lighter neutral clothing so our body movements would be visible instead of just our hands. We then had to decide on our overall feeling: did we want to be having fun, smiling and looking at each other? Or did we want to stay calm and serious? Harrison and Wood made a similar video that I was very drawn to. I like the way their video was ‘quiet’, giving you one simple movement at a time to take in. Renee and I kept straight faces, making only one movement per clip, this keeps the video ‘quiet’, giving our viewers only our movements to consider. We also muted the sound on the video so there wouldn’t be anything small to distract you from our movements.

We originally had a lot more clips, but cut it down to our favourites. We experimented with many poses, some worked very well, others didn’t. We also had smaller issues, for example: When we lean back, supporting ourselves with the paper, the paper would occasionally rip. Or sometimes when we were trying different ways to hold the paper it would drop. We felt that the paper dropping did not fit the feeling we were going for, so those fails were cut out. 

Watching our video back I wish we had only made one moving gesture video. We could have the inserted clips of us holding a paper, still, in different positions in between. So it would have shown us progressing through the one video, with the different ways to hold a paper in between.

Field Trip to Toronto : Wednesday, February 15^th, 2023

The Power Plant

Our first stop of the day was at The Power Plant. There are many pieces there at the moment, however, I am only posting my two favorite exhibitions.

IN THE COMFORT OF EMBERS by Amartey Golding. The pieces were centered around fire and chainmail, looking back at the past compared to the present. There were 3 videos playing on loop in the room: Bring Me to Heal 1, Bring Me to Heal 2, and Chainmail 3. The suit (made of human hair) in the first two pictures was worn in the videos. The puffer jacket made of chainmail, stuffed with horse hair, was worn in the videos as well by his brother. It was used to portray his time in the army. This was a very interesting exhibit, I felt completely consumed by the work as I stood in the room.

Brenda Draney, my favorite of the two shown. This is her first solo exhibition at the Power Plant. Her work is formed around memories, all pieces appearing to be unfinished. This is done on purpose. She is painting her own specific memories, but does so in a way where we can all relate to the final piece. Picture 3 is named ‘Tent City’, and we all look at it different because we all have different relationships with a tent, it sparks a different memory within every viewer. For example, when looking at the bruised legs piece (pic 5), I immediately think of snowmobiling. While riding my knees and shins hit off the vents and foot pockets on my sled, resulting in a lot of bruises up my legs. She painted the piece from one of her own personal memories, but I as a viewer can still relate to it in my own way. The exhibit room itself is also a piece. Shown in the first picture, we can see a brown line painted around the top of the room, this represents a flood line. Her basement, where many of her treasured memories took place, was flooded.

Kensington Market

During our break in Kensington market Renee and I walked down the street to Graffiti Alley. This is a ‘street art gallery’, and we thought it fit the theme of the trip well.

TPW and Daniel Faria Gallery

The TWP gallery was my favorite place we stopped. We got to sit in a comfy, inviting room, and listen to 9 soundtracks on a loop. We didn’t get to listen to the whole loop, but we did hear two different tracks. I believe the full loop is about 9 hours long. It was extremely mesmerizing, and peaceful. The walls were covered in large speakers so you were only able to hear the soundtrack from all sides around you, the work consumed you completely.

Our next stop was at the Daniel Faria gallery, not even a minutes walk away. We got to look at his looped video pieces.

Conceptual Portrait

What’s she thinking?

Inspired by Kelly Marks cat video, my piece shows a ‘portrait’ of Paris through her reactions. When it comes to fight or flight horses are a flight animal. They can have big reactions to small things, then no reaction at all to something that you would expect to scare them. Using Paris for this idea works perfectly because she won’t be acting. If I were to have done this with one of my friends, wether they realize it or not, their reactions would be fake or exaggerated because they know I want a reaction from them. Whereas my horse doesn’t understand what is happening. If she is scared she will run, and if she doesn’t care about what I have to show her she will just stare at me or walk away. So by using her I am able to capture a genuine reaction every time. I am happy to say I have a very curious and brave horse, which is shown through the video. It is interesting how we can get a sense of her goofy personality through watching what she thinks of something like an umbrella, or a flag. While watching you can also get a sense of our relationship. I have owned Paris for three and a half years now, overtime gaining her trust and forming a bond. Her reactions are contingent on that trust.

*****No one was in danger during this video*****

Artist Multiple

Tastefully Hating These Thought Police

Each of my buttons show a song lyric on a black background. The simplicity of the design allows the viewer to only focus on what is being said. The lyrics are centred around the idea of power, and how blinded the public is. The single line is thought provoking. Government and religion shape the world as we know it, these buttons are statements/questions regarding this power dynamic. Much like buttons, music is a good way to subtly spread a message. Using lyrics allowed each button to be quick, poetic and to the point.

The buttons are intended to be worn as an individual rather than as a group. Their intention is for the one line to be thought of, rather than multiple. It could be worn on a bag so others can read it at ease. Spreading the message while waiting in line or walking down the street.

Where the lines came from:

• “I’ve got blood on my hands, no guilt on my conscience”- Brand New Numb by Motionless In White
• “It’s the false sense of authority that’ll tear us apart” – SO WHAT? by While She Sleeps
• “Imagine all the people, living life in peace”- Imagine by John Lennon
• “And now you do what they told ya (you’re under control)”- Killing in the Name by Rage Against the Machine
• “Didn’t you hear? The war’s over. Just don’t look behind that closed door”- Welcome to Paradise// Outro by Grandson
• “And now we get front row seats, watch the system fall, ’cause look who’s in control”- Rock Bottom by Grandson
• “I’m going blind but one thing’s clear. Death is the only salvation you’ll feel”- House of Wolves by Bring Me The Horizon
• “Social status won’t change the fact that we all share the same grave”- Same Graves by The Ghost Club
• “No thoughts, no prayers, will bring back what’s no longer there”- Thoughts and Prayers by Grandson
• “So how’d we get this stressed out? Paranoid? Everything is going dark”- Teardrops by Bring Me The Horizon
• “Lie about some greater good when you ship me off to war”- War by Grandson
• “Give me liberty or death, charge me more and pay me less”- Brand New Numb by Motionless In White
• “Tastefully hating these thought police”- Hate Me by DED
• “One nation controlled by the media”- American Idiot by Green Day
• “Your future dream is a shopping scheme”- Anarchy in the UK by Sex Pistols
• “Make a move and you pay for it, pick a lord and you pray to it”- Unsainted by Slipknot
• “They’re gonna propagate the killer, eliminate the youth”- Digital Silence by Peter McPoland
• “Do we feel safe?”- Go To War by NOTHING MORE
• “And on the day that I lie still, oh I’ll still have taxes and I’ll still have bills”- Bills by Grandson
• “Government leaving the youth on the shelf”- Ghost Town by The Specials
• “The revolution will not be televised”- The evolution Will Not Be Televised by Gil Scott-Heron

My Kilometre

My kilometer is the smallest distance between my first home and where I call home now. Usually when you hear a kilometer you think about a long distance, maybe a long walk or at least a couple minutes of driving, but for me a kilometer is actually really really tiny, compared to how far I’ve come, how far I’ve traveled. I wrote this little thing in my notebook the other day: I’ve taken millions of steps, from east, to west, from south, to north. I feel the wounds, I’m walking on them. I think in that moment, I felt all the pain that comes from being away. Away to me means that I can’t go back. That even if I do, I can’t call it home anymore. I wonder where my home is now. Like a traveller that never finds home.

I wasn’t allowed to go and visit my family, my friends and my home for the past holidays. All I had left was to visit my neighbourhood on google maps, try to remember what it looked like before I left a year and a half ago.

My kilometer is 1 out of 9932.

For my video projects, I had tons of ideas, and as I was discussing it with my boyfriend, we kept thinking of more and more ideas. One of the first Ideas I had, especially for the One Shot video, was to start painting myself a certain color, and don’t stop until I have covered all of my body. And of course the color that I was imagining was red, just because life feels that way. I don’t know if it’s the experience of living as a woman, or a human, or even an animal or something else, but red has always illustrated my emotions very well. I don’t know how to exactly put it, but red has pain, but also persistence, and strength. Red reminds me of the exact moment when I feel the first drop of period blood. And what a beautiful, majestic experience it is. I’m just realizing as I’m writing this, how amazing of an experience it is, even the pain. In my experience, I have the worst pain right before my blood flows out. It feels powerful, to be able to stand up, go out, work, study, create while I’m going through this pain. And there comes the persistence, it’s just so beautiful how humans can adapt and fight through every obstacle that comes their way, just to stay alive. It’s all just animal instinct, but we humans bleed and break and fall and drown, but find the way out. At least most of the time.
Red reminds me of blood, of anger, of passion, and of love.

But unfortunately that idea was just a bit too messy, so we started trying different ideas we had. One of the ideas I liked to look into was peeling fruit. Especially for my Sequence video, I wanted to start from an easy fruit to peel, like a banana or a clementine, and maybe work my way up to a watermelon , or even a coconut. Of course all of them were supposed to be peeled with bare hands.
I also thought about filming the movement of specific parts of my body when I’m breathing, like my shoulders, or my stomach, or my chest. Breathing is an interesting exercise, and we do it without even thinking too much of it. We inhale, separate and absorb some little thing called oxygen, turn it to a useless (to us) other little thing and send it on its way. It all happens in a couple seconds, and so we have done that billions and billions of times without even acknowledging it. Again, animal instincts that come without even thinking or noticing are just fascinating.

As my loop video, we have this little quirky thing we do when there’s a tiny bit of a joint left. We put it backwards in our mouth, so the lit part is actually super close to our tongue, and then blow it through our mouth and the other person gets really close and inhales the smoke we just blew. Anyway, that was a funny thing to do as a loop. It’s also kinda awkward to get that close to someone if you’re not really close to them, emotionally, but that’s kind of a party trick for me. Always breaks the ice when your nose is almost touching a stranger nose while you’re blowing smoke in their face.

all of these ideas are something I will definitely pursue, but we had an enlightenment when we saw this fox trap my boyfriend had hung up on his wall. We grabbed the fruits and started experimenting this little old trap.

Then we found the chest.

How To Not Set A Trap (One Shot)

Peel My Banana (A Loop)

Snapping Turtle (A Sequence)

On September 16th, 2022, while traveling with family to visit Tehran, a girl named Mahsa Amini was brutally beaten to death by the morality police. What’s that, you ask? They are a group of police that their job is to kidnap women in daylight and take them to this building, and keeping them hostage until their dads, or husbands, or honestly any man show up and bring the woman “proper clothes” and then the woman sign some papers against herself like she’s a dangerous criminal, and hopefully then she can leave.

It wasn’t an overnight accident that got people angry, in fact for around 45 years, people have been silenced, especially women, and if they spoke up they were brutally killed. In 2019, in a span of 3 days, the government of Iran killed more than 1500 people, because they were protesting. How did nobody hear about it? They shut down the internet for a whole week. Imagine not even being able to use google. Anyway, after Mahsa Amini was killed, people, especially women once again became furious. They started protesting, and of course, the government started killing people again.

This piece is called 190 days, because in the past 190 days, women stood up and men, finally stood beside them. But unfortunately, we lost so many brave souls. The first part of the audio is an edited version of the siren that was played when Iran and Iraq were in a war and Iran was under attack. The woman says: “This is a red status warning, it is time for revolution.”

The crying, mourning voices that come after are all from women who experienced the loss of their loved ones, because the government killed them. In the past 190 days, this is how every person has felt.

190 Days (audio project)

This is my cigarette project. As soon as I heard about the project and watched the videos and pictures with the class, I knew exactly what I wanted to do.
As you can probably tell, I smoke, and I smoke a lot, at least more than a non-smoker. Each cigarette I smoke has a story behind it, a character. There are a few things that a cigarette shows me about myself. When did I smoke that cigarette? How did I light it up? Where were I when I smoked it? How many cigarettes did I smoke yesterday? Is it getting more everyday? Were I wearing lipstick? How did I put it out? And considering that I wrote the date and the time on the cigarette, how was I feeling physically? Were I cold and is my handwriting all shaky? Or were I too focused and my handwriting is clean and neat? How long did it take for me to smoke this one? How much was left of my cigarette? These are all questions that lead to at least one answer about me, and I believe it is the most successful self portrait I have created.
I documented 30 cigarettes in 8 days, although I thought it would take me 30 days to smoke it. Each cigarette comes with the date and the time I put it out. Ideally this project was just a demo of a project I will pursue later, and the goal of that project is to document each cigarette I smoke until I quit smoking.

Which one us would go first?

For the Artist’s Button project, I went with a very simple idea. At first I tried to keep all of my buttons together on a long piece of yarn, but the button maker kept cutting my yarn. On the buttons, I spelled out “زن، زندگی، آزادی” which means “Woman, Life, Freedom”. Like the self portrait project, this was a demo of a project I have in mind. To make many sets of this buttons, and to give them away if I travel back to Iran. One button on its own is meaningless and confusing, but if they all come together, they make a powerful connection. Which is very much what we need as Iranians if we want to change the system.

Solidarity

Kilometre (Jan 12, 2023)

Really inspired by Erwin Wurm’s OHNE TITEL (RED SWEATERS FROM ONE MINUTE SCULPTURES), 2000–2003.

Also really enjoyed the irony that I could see in a lot of works, or how they acknowledge what they are in some way. As well, I took note of the importance that simplicity and deduction can play in conceptual works. Of course, the idea being the main focus of what the art is, there was a lot that I had not considered to be a part of the idea, like the words/definition that make up an object, or even a photo of an object, rather than just an object itself. To try and make my work align with what we learned about conceptual art, I want to have my work be titled in a way that bluntly, but possibly humorously, says exactly what is happening. As well, I want the work to have a sense of irony, or totally play around with how I can actually represent a kilometre in the most obvious yet non-obvious way. I like that this kind of art seems to push any boundary set upon it. In being inspired by the layout of Wurm’s work, I want to use a sequence of photos to represent a kilometre. I somehow would like to incorporate mycelium into this, as mycelium can span MANY kilometres but all without being seen. If not mycelium, I am also thinking of using math and sizing of images to be my kilometre. In this, I mean walking a kilometre without walking a kilometre at all. 1 kilometre is 1000 metres, and I was originally thinking that maybe I would use a bunch of pictures for each metre, but taking 1000 photos, or even compiling 1000 photos, doesn’t seem like a feasible task. I was also thinking about stop motion animation in this, and thought maybe instead of actual stop motion, I could just repeat 3-4 photos of me walking (a photo of each part of walking, one leg stepping, then up, next leg stepping, then up… etc). trying to figure out the math in how to do this. I feel like by making this math based, it simplifies the idea down into simple numbers but also still is a representation of the kilometre to an exact.

(Jan 13, 2023)

Could not figure out how to execute anything with mycelium, especially since it’s the winter. As well, I realized I was trying to create my work that it is too math oriented for me to properly figure out how to execute it, so in trying to figure out how to portray a kilometre, I thought more about how I can provide evidence of a walked kilometre. Then started thinking about how walking a kilometre is measured, and how a driven kilometre is way different in timing than a walked one. I realized that kilometres always stay the same in terms of distance but the time it takes to travel that distance can change based on many different things, even the person who is walking. Even the way you feel or the weather outside can make you walk faster or slower, and this is what allowed me come to the thought of how music often influences how I feel and how quickly I walk too. With this, I decided to record how long it took me to walk a kilometre listening to music I wanted to listen to in that time. The music I listened to was much more upbeat but also very fun for me to move around to, so I definitely walked a kilometre longer than the average person would. I also happen to be a very slow walker so that added onto my time. To take elements of what we have learned about conceptual works, I decided to use a very obvious, telling, and simple title for my work. I also chose to use a layout of collaged photos as I was still inspired by Erwin Wurm and wanted to see how I could depict things through photo still.

(Jan 16, 2023)

This is my kilometre that I presented in class (edit: now to be remade) ^^^. You can see that I described my thought process about it above the photo. Somethnig I spoke about in class which i thought would be an interesting addition here is that it can be interesting to use music to track how long something takes or use it as a part of travel and timing. When I was in middle school I would see how many times it would take me to listen to “Money” by Pink Floyd on repeat until I got home, and then in the future I would know it would take me a certain amount of times of listening to get back, and would just count how many times it would repeat, or even then in the last repeat, where in the song my walk would end.

(Jan 18, 2023)

After the critique, I have taken on the task of figuring out how I can make my work more physical and a more tangible, felt kilometre. I am thinking I will either record my feet walking for the amount of time it takes me to walk a kilometre with the music I listen to layered over top, maybe with screenshots of each song edited into the video? Or I may just have the music laid over the video because it is still obvious what I’m telling. Was really excited to see how Chelsea did her kilometre, I’ll be taking a look at everyone’s blog pages to see what others did since I missed the rest of class sadly :(.

“…idea determines the work”… how can I make my kilometre actually be determined by my idea? If I were to put my idea very simply, it would be how music can track time.

For our one-shot video, we wanted to do something that somewhat told a story. We also thought it would be fun for the sound to get very aggressive, and then slow down, to help create some interest and tension.

We were not quite sure how we wanted to approach this video as the footage we had captured did not seem like they would have easy cut scenes, but when we realized we could do this, we were very excited. We loved the idea of being able to create tension, and we were happy to hear the little residual strums that lingered in the video.

For this loop video, we also made the choice to consistently play the same note, rather than get aggressive and quite over and over, as so to really hammer in the monotony of the gesture and sound, but also because it would be good footage for a loop. In this video, we have looped the scene multiple times so you basically cant tell where the loop starts and stops. We were lucky to find a beginning and end that meshed perfectly to seem like it was a constant video rather than a loop.

Overall: For this project, Beck and I wanted to do something with an instrument and did our best to reduce down our gesture into something incredibly simple yet fun. We immediately knew what kind of footage to film for each video, except for the second video (the cut video), as it wasn’t as obvious as the other two videos were. In the end, we thought it would be fun to only include all of the moments before we strum the Guqin to create as much tension as possible to make it a constant build-up with no release. We enjoyed how our idea was a duet, which is also why we chose to name all of our videos “___ duet”, except for our sequence video which we thought the title was fitting for. We also really enjoyed that both of us were needed for the duet, it made it feel like a story or like a conversation between eachother. We took inspiration from Marina Abramovic especially.

(Feb 17th)

I loved going on our field trip on the 15th!!! At the Powerplant, by far, my favourite work was the installation by Amartey Golding “In the comfort of embers”. Immediately, I was shocked by how interestingly it was set up, with the dark entryway, deep red room, and low booming looping video, all brought it together to be both comfortable and enclosed yet daunting. Specifically, I loved one of the pieces hung on the walls, which I did not get the title of (below).

Beyond this installation, I also loved the interactive installation we went to at TPW. This was probably my favourite thing we saw throughout the whole fieldtrip. It was so meditative which I loved, and the environment was so perfectly curated to add to it feeling like it was a calm, comforting space. The music played was moving, and stuck in my head for a couple days after the field trip actually. I thought it was neat how if you could both pick apart each song from eachother as they played at the same time but also meshed together perfectly. I really value collectiveness, community, and connection, so this installation also made me feel really whole and happy. I did not get a single picture of this sadly, as I was too deeply immersed in the sound bath of it all to take my phone out.

(March 1st)

For my audio project, I have had two ideas circulating. I was inspired on our class on Feb 13, where we looked at some different examples of audio works, and noted John Cage and Janet Cardiff.

John Cage: sound gives us deep pleasure, music and laughter are only sounds of true pleasure

Janet Cardiff: music’s effect on us emotionally

I also took from our painting II class, where we have been looking at how technology can affect art, where I have used this idea mixed with what I took from Cage and Cardiff to create the idea to look at how technology both ruins and makes music better. With that, I came up with my first idea to play a song out loud, record that, and then play that recording out loud and record that, and so on. I wanted to do this 8 or so times, then splitting the song up into 8 different sections, and playing the part of each recording to line up with each eighth of the song, to become the song playing one time that slowly becomes further distorted and deteriorated as the song goes on.

This idea made me think about using music in a way that juxtaposes the point of music, where music is usually made to sound better, not worse, and that started me thinking about how I can create contrast in the sound I’m making vs the idea. Then, I remembered that I always carry a kazoo around in my jacket pocket, and thought it would be funny to see how i can integrate that. The kazoo has a terrible sound that is also quite distinct, and if I played something or said something serious using it, it would create a very funny juxtaposition. Talking mote about it with others, Oh Canada became the best song I could play that would not only be serious, recognizable, and funny, but also comment on having to sing Oh Canada every day through the first 18 years of your life, do playing it on the kazoo gets to make fun of it. No one likes to sing Oh Canada, and most people find it weird that you have to stand for it, take your hat off, and pause everything you’re doing for it.

(March 6th, 2023) O’ Canada Kazoo’d

In the end, I did end up deciding on the the kazoo, which I think was a great idea. I really wanted to play into it being really silly and weird and I felt like the best way I could do that without being able to see me (since it is only audio) was by playing the kazoo terribly. I made it super screechy and almost like I was screaming into it, allowing for notes to be wrong or off, and just super out of key and awful sounding. This combined with the very serious Oh Canada that we’re supposed to have respect and seriousness for created the exact juxtaposition I was hoping for. The recording was actually so loud that the mic couldn’t properly pick up the sound so it was clipped, making the sound very abrasive. Im not quite sure if this is bad, but for the piece specifically, I actually do like it because I feel like it adds to how unserious it is, because any serious or good piece of music, including all of the Oh Canadas we hear in school, are all nicely recorded and have much better sound. I wanted my Oh Canada to be nothing like those that we listen to in school and I don’t think this will ever be played on any schools morning announcements.

(March 13th, 2023)

For my self-portrait, I have a couple of ideas I am considering. First, is to create a sculpture or take a photo of a bunch of Jewish related objects that are arranged to look like a face. These items are those I’ve collected over the years and represents my partaking in the culture and how it is a part of my identity that is always growing. Also represents how I am very cluttered and sentimental, I keep everything, even if I may never use it again. Next idea is to record myself singing my Parsha from my Bat Mitzvah. I don’t remember the whole thing very well but I remember a lot of it, and I want to capture what of it that I do remember. this also represents my jewish identity and that it is ingrained in who I am and will always be a part of me and my memory, and that regardless of how much or little of my parsha I remember, I am always still jewish. Remembering less of my parsha the fact that I have a Canadian accent while singing it I also want to speak to my being reform Jewish. Further, another idea I have is to have a jar of my thoughts, or something that represents me. I often view my thoughts as a scrambling massive chaotic space of screaming flying thoughts racing around, and when I am trying to sleep at night and they get in my way, I try to visualize taking all of those thoughts and shoving them in a jar. I want to somehow represent myself in a contained space, maybe consider how I can also represent the difficulty I have in containing my thoughts. I also like the idea of containment because I tend to suppress and mask parts of myself, like thoughts or actions or parts of how I behave, so maybe I could use the jar as both representation of myself and the things in me but also of how I choose to keep parts of myself contained. Thinking of maybe filling a tomato pasta jar filled with my rooms garbage. Garbage is a physical display of a bunch of different things about me.

(March 15th, 2023)

I am still cycling through ideas for my conceptual portrait. While I like a lot of my ideas, I don’t feel like I like them enough to really solidify any plans. I want to do something I feel connected to, especially because its a self portrait. I think this assignment is kind of hard for me because I never know how to depict myself to others. I said previously that I often find myself suppressing or hiding aspects of myself, and doing that for my whole life has made it hard to really know who I am. Things I am currently liking from each idea is doing a task on video, speaking over the video somehow, and using a jar to represent my mind. The more I think about it, the more I feel like Id like to take a video of myself putting a bunch of my own garbage, trash, and scraps from my bedroom into a jar while speaking over the video either saying what item I’m putting in, or maybe Id speak over it and just say a string of my racing thoughts. Ive been thinking about representing my racing thoughts, so I could do it like that, and maybe I could put in specific pieces of trash I can find of mine that really say something about who I am. and somehow put in items that connect to each other in the same way my thoughts somehow connect to each other. for example, if I said to someone that I liked their shirt and they said thanks I got it from Florida, and then the next thing I say is “I love plane food for some reason its so good”. that seems like it came from nowhere, but in my head, since my thoughts are going so fast, ill have 3 different connected thoughts to the original thought, and then will carry on with one of those 3 to then have another 3 and so on. so in that example, what went through my head between shirt from Florida and I love plane food would be something like “yeah that’s a great colour and ooh I love going to Florida. I really miss Florida. I haven’t been there for years actually wow. I haven’t travelled much since covid. I haven’t even been on a plane actually. I love planes. I loves planes especially for plane food idk why but I always like it even though its gross”, and somehow Id think all of that in the amount of time it would take for me to respond to the person. even the way I write is incredibly similar to how I think, I write way too much and usually go on tangents. if I spoke over the video I think it would also speak to how I have multiple things going on in my head at the same time. while I’m having those quick thoughts, I also have other thoughts that respond to the original thoughts, and also usually have a song playing in my head behind everything else. sometimes there are so many thoughts I can’t hear any of them. maybe I could do an audio piece where I start talking like I think and then start responding to that with another voice that keeps talking over the other and then another voice and another until you can’t hear anyone or anything almost at all and its just clutter. my self portrait could just be that, and then I could even play a song lightly in the background too. or I could make that audio and then put a speaker that plays it inside of a jar. again, I still can just record myself putting specific trash into a jar, and then speaking over it just saying my racing string of thoughts, maybe info dumping about a topic I like? or maybe just talking a string of thoughts that are exactly like how I think. if I do that ill need to try to take note of what the actual processes of thoughts I am having are. anyways, sorry for the spelling and grammatical errors, I’m just using this to help me brainstorm and put my thoughts outside my head so I don’t forget them before I think of the next thing.

(March 27th) Conceptual Portrait

For my self-portrait, I decided the best way to show off my brain is by showing my many racing thoughts. I feel like racing thoughts and the clutter of thoughts is something many people experience, but these thoughts are representative of my brain and how my brain makes connections and strings things together. I was heavily inspired by 40 Part Motet, by Jane Cardiff, for the way in which I wanted to present this to people, where I am having 1 of 3 different audios play on all of our computers in the experimental studio lab. I want people to be able to hear all the clutter of my different thought strings while also being able to hear specific things in each audio, which is why being able to move around from sound to sound is how I want people interacting with this piece. I was considering finding some kind of vessel to represent my head or brain but this was so much more relatable and universal and interesting, and honestly, even more true to me because I am always moving around so having the chaos of everyone moving around through the noise is accurate to my brain’s chaos. Moreover, I have always been someone to be easily distracted, so much so that I cant even hear people over my focus, so this work being very loud and making it hard to hear anything other than the clutter also speaks to my inability to quite hear people when Im thinking or focused. I am unsure how to upload the piece to here, but I will once I figure out the best way to do so, maybe using my original audio I wanted to put in a vessel. The name of this work is “Sorry, I cant hear you, I’m thinking”.

(March 27th, 2023) “Sorry, I can’t hear you, I’m thinking”

This first audio is a mishmash of all 3 audios, with a bit of editing. This was my original audio before I decided to make it more interactive.

This second audio is one of three layers I wrote and recorded.

This third audio is the second of three layers I wrote and recorded.

This fourth, and final, audio is the third of three layers I wrote and recorded.

(April 3rd, 2023)

For my artist buttons, I have a few ideas circulating. The first idea is to make buttons that tell what you’re feeling, so you can change the button as you feel differently so people know you’re going to be really angry when they start talking to you maybe lol – or maybe you change your button when someone says something sad and makes you feel sad. Next, I was thinking of doing buttons with images of mushrooms of my favourite mushrooms, just because it would be a cool collection of a specific pin. Maybe I could just do pins of mushrooms in the Amanita family specifically, rather than all of my favourite specific ones. Another idea I was thinking of doing just a collage of images of either a literal heart or hearts like <3 and then wear it on my sleeve just to play on the “wear my heart on my sleeve” saying. Also, I was thinking of doing really self-aware buttons that question their own characteristics that don’t need to be the way they are, sort of a commentary of being aware of parts of yourself that are forcefully put into types of categories. It’s kind of like an indirect comment on how we are put into categories and given labels, and what the experience is like to have the awareness that you exist outside of these standards even though you aren’t viewed that way. This can apply to so many things too. Examples of what the buttons could say are “Why am I a round button?”, “I am a button to wear on the chest”, “I am a button to put on a bag”, “I am made of plastic, metal, and paper”, and “Why am I a button?”. Or could be a self-aware button by just saying “button”, or maybe it’s a button that is aware of its told purpose “Why are buttons only meant to be worn?”. I also had the idea of having a button that has a picture of a button you would sew onto clothing so it just looks like a big button. Looks at how a button is more than one thing. Also maybe buttons with an instruction like “wear me on your leg” “wear me on your chest” “give me to someone else”. Maybe it’s a pin that says give me to someone else and they just continue to float around as people pass them around.

Artist Buttons – Instructional Buttons

For my buttons, I ended up deciding on instructional buttons. I chose to make the button talk about the instructions like the button was sentient, saying “wear me”, “give me”, etc. This felt like the button became personified, so it literally was telling wearers/hager’s what to do. The main and first button I wanted to create was “give me to someone else”, as I was considering how a button can be shared and passed on, and kind of came from my thinking about the sister hood of the travelling pants. I then decided that instructional pins on HOW to wear them would be interesting, as we usually don’t think about other ways to wear a pin other than on your chest or on a bag.. but the limits of how you can wear them are massive and we never consider that. I was lucky to get some photos of fellow classmates wearing my buttons!

^^ it was in fact Wednesday when this pin was worn.

^^me and Johanna with all of our pins from classmates

One Kilometre

For my 1km assignment my roommates and I geared up in some accessories to make this walk a little different/more fun than our regular walks and went on a 1 km walk with our dog Willow. This was at the end of the first week of classes and was a great way for us to decompress after a long first week back to school after the break and a chance to get some fresh air. This walk was great for both our mental and physical health and was also a way to help get some energy out of our hyper dog. During our walk we talked about ways we could be more successful this semester and ways to help manage our stress as a household. We monitored our distance on my phone’s health app to ensure our walk was exactly 1 kilometre.

Heading off:

On the walk:

Home:

Three feats, Three ways:

one shot:

Loop:

Sequence:

Audio Assignment- Drowned Out Thoughts

For my audio assignment I made a piece about my anxiety. I struggle with a lot of anxiety, especially social anxiety and low self esteem. My audio recording includes a list of anxious and negative thoughts that loop through my head throughout the day. I included an overlay of the voices to resemble the feeling when your thoughts feel like they are crowded and jumbled in your brain. As a way to calm my anxiety down I find the sound of water in many different forms soothing. When I couldn’t settle as a baby my mom would put me on top of the washing machine and run it and I would immediately calm down. Although I no longer get on top of my washing machine when I am anxious, a different form of water I find very soothing for my anxiety is the shower. Whether I actually get in the shower or just listen to the sound of the running water it helps me ground myself and quiet my negative thoughts. The sound of the shower running in my piece gets louder to over power the thoughts and literally drown them out so you can no longer hear them.

Conceptual Portrait- A life Description in Prescriptions

For my conceptual portrait I created a portrait of what it is like to be chronically ill by creating a presentation of all the medications I have been prescribed. I have various health conditions, I have had five surgeries, many different treatments and many different infections from having a weakened immune system. From those reasons I have been prescribed a lot of medications throughout my health journey so I created a list of all the medications I’ve been prescribed with their uses. I also included the medications’ side effects as I find it interesting that something that is used to help your body can also cause harm to it in a different regard. I also find it interesting how there is a lot of overlap between the use of one medication, is the side effect of another. 

Button Project – Trapped in a Button

For my button assignment I was inspired by the practice buttons I created of Ana Mendieta. The photos I used for the practice buttons are photos where she is pressed up against glass and once I turned the photos into buttons it made it look like she was trapped in the button. For my assignment I used photos of my friends and family where they are pressed up against windows with their hands pressed up against the window (or their faces as well in some cases). This makes it seem as though my friends and family are also trapped in the buttons. For presenting these buttons I’d like to put them in a frame or shadow box as a way to trap the buttons as well and in doing so the buttons can no longer be used as their function and are more put on display. It makes it feel as though the people in the buttons as well as the buttons themselves are a spectacle on display. For the sake of presenting the buttons today and wanting to portray that idea I placed the buttons in a tool box. 

*Trial buttons