For our one-shot, we started by brainstorming something around a “bang” or a “splatter”. Our first attempt was to manipulate the lens of the camera, which then turned into the main subject for this project. What we did was add some colourful paint, reds yellows and blues, to one of our hands and while one of us help a pane of glad, acting as a camera lens, the other hit the pane and splattered the paint. After talking it out we decided to use just black and white paint instead, creating our overall piece.
LOOP-
Next, we did our loop. We quite enjoyed the idea of having one person apply paint and have the other scrape that paint away, creating a constant loop. In our first attempts, we again set up the glass to act as the lens, and used our hands to apply and scrape away the paint. However we ran into some trouble because our hands were not scraping away the paint efficient enough, making the paint harder to see when it was applied again due to all the residue being left over. So we looked around the painting class and found this giant brush to scrape.
EDITED Sequence –
Our initial idea the first few times filming was to have the camera pointed at us, as one person held a canvas, the other would have just their arm in frame, painting with different objects, and we would switch off between who was painting and who was holding the canvas. However, it was too messy in the end and we needed to come up with another alternative. Instead, we used different objects to paint, and made reference to Pipilotti Rist as Marina smooshed her face against the pane of glass, painting with her face.
The trip to Toronto was really cool and getting to see all different kinds of art was awesome! The one that I wanted to share was this cool sound proof little room and within was a glass display of all these little seemingly ordinary artifacts. I took a picture of this because it spoke to me for a couple reasons. Photographed you can see there is an original edition of Midnight Sun a Twilight book written from Edward’s point of view. I found myself drawn to this area because I was actually reading Midnight Sun on the bus on the way to this trip! Also right next to the novel are these 2 cat bottles and I find them quite special because when I was little I was given a cat bottle just like those ones except mine was purple and I always loved it so much. So this area within the gallery really drew me in. I loved the way everything was chaotically arranged and it was a really immersive piece since you actually had to walk within it to experience it!
Rist performing “Open My Glade (flatten)” for times square.
I found this quite cool because the framing and everything with the way she is pushing herself against glass has a really interesting effect on the audience. It makes us feel as though she is truly stuck in there demanding to be watched by everyone that passes by. The work definitely strikes me as it forces the audience to look up from their lives and see something so out of the ordinary.
I think her video art is relative to the kinds of videos that we consume on the internet everyday because they are performances that at first glance might hardly mean much but when you sit with it you can attribute true deeper meaning. I think her ideas come through in seemingly subtle ways but with something like Open My Glade (flatten), I can feel the vulnerability and rawness of pushing herself up against the glass. It could represent the ways in which women have to push themselves everyday, and the aggressive tone could seem strange and it is meant to. When we are watching videos everyday at a rapid pace we usually do not take things in, with this being perfomed at a large scale in a very public place it forces one to take it all in.
With wearing my shirt inside out felt strange… It is a weird thing to do and definitely a performance but I would say this performance went unnoticed by the peers around me on campus. Everyone is focused on themselves, wearing my shirt inside out just made me more conscious of this. I definitely felt a little embarrassed but that was fleeting when I really realized everyone is too focused on their own lives to even bat an eye.
According to an equation I found, at 120 beats per minute, each beat of a song is 44 feet apart (or 13.4112 metres). Multiplying that by the total number of beats in the music, get the song length in metres. Divided by 1000, we get kilometres. With this in mind, at 75 bpm, one minute of Karma Police by Radiohead has frequencies equal to 1.0 km in distance.
With that in mind, since our critique I have chosen a different song to represent my kilometre of sound wave frequencies. So Much I by the Red Hot Chili Peppers, though a song that is 149 beats per minute, when played at half-time, is the equivalent of 75 bpm, meaning 30 seconds is 1 km! I chose this song specifically because not only do I have a deep appreciation for Red Hot Chili Peppers, but my dad and I went on a 510.7 km drive from Toronto to Pittsburgh this summer to see them perform, a road trip on which we listened to copious amounts of RHCP. Not only does 30 seconds of the song represent a km in distance, but the band as a whole is a reflection of the distance I (and my father) will go to see something as special as live music. Here are my favourite 30 seconds from So Much I, the part where I can best envision differing sound waves:
I chose Pippa’s “Open My Glade (Flatten)”, projected in New York’s Time Square. She created a video series of sixteen one-minute videos of her face and body being pressed against glass. For the majority of the display, the framing she used was close-up, unflattering angles of her squashed face against glass, with plenty of unusual facial expressions. She shoots the videos to demonstrate vulnerability amongst unflattering angles and closeup filming of her body, with the intention of bringing to light some of the issues surrounding the way women are perceived and sexualized in modern media. The chosen framing lets the viewer get closer to her than one would normally get to a stranger, focusing primarily on her mouth, nose, and eyes, highlighting some of the most commonly sexualized features of a woman, and emphasizing said features even more so through the use of smeared makeup.
This installation is less about the sound and more about visual appeal, as well as shock value, specifically with its later installation as a part of the Midnight Minute project in Times Square. Though this was not the original installation for this piece, it aids in the strikingness of the work. It does so as a result of the scale. Because of the magnitude of the scale of the screens in Times Square, the piece is that much more shocking. There is a high degree of vulnerability associated with this piece, which is only enhanced by the enlargement of Pippa’s features and facial distortion. I appreciate her work and the ideas it represents surrounding the portrayal of women in media, and have much respect for her as an artist as well as her ability to expose herself in the name of her art.
I think that for the most part, TikTok is a bit of a step backwards, in the sense that it only aids in reinforcing the idea that we must portray perfection in the media. We emphasize the importance of acknowledging a digital footprint, which is consequential to a degree – but this idea has been taken to the far end of the spectrum and encourages the need for perfection. I agree that it is a platform that aids in creator success and promoting small businesses as well as new artists. That being said, I think if there were more creators with Pippa’s ideals and disregard for what is deemed “acceptable” as far as the portrayal of oneself in the media, then it would become a different platform, likely one less focused on creating the perfect aesthetically pleasing existence.
With that in mind, this is not to take away from those who have pushed away this narrative regardless of its hold on the rest of the generation. Have I ever seen a close-up of someone’s running makeup and squashed face against glass? Or watched someone walk down the street and smash others’ belongings in the name of art (as opposed to being a prank)? No. However, what I have seen is many people try and disassemble this generational need for perceived perfection through their own forms of art, some more sophisticated than others. For that I would say with the right creators gaining notability, the app could make a reasonably drastic shift, one that facilitates an online environment that values challenging those ideas of feminine sexuality, perfectionism, and the female body in media.
I accidentally wore my shirt inside out the other day, and admittedly I did not notice much of a difference in how I was being perceived until I was made aware that my shirt was inside out. That being said, even then there was a very minimal shift in attitudes towards me. Perhaps the odd second look, but aside from that, I was treated as if nothing was the matter. I would argue that there would need to be an underlying purpose fueling my actions for this to be a performance. I believe that most things can be given artistic license in the right content, as long as there is meaning or significance to their artistic display. I don’t think everything is art, I think art is intentional. I think art is what the artist wants it to be and how the viewer perceives it. That being said, I feel there is reason in every act of artistic display.
Field trip!
I attended the Binomial of Art a week after the class, as I was unavailable for the first trip.
IKUMAGIALIIT (Translated to Those that Need Fire) is a beautiful performance displayed at the TMU Image Arts Centre in one of their studios. It is a series of performances created by a quartet of Indigenous women from Nunavut and Toronto. This display, named “Full Blood” focused more specifically on a video from 2021 with emphasis on elements of land, body, and womanhood. It was an intricate and beautiful performance, performed in Kalaallisut, a Greenlandic language, the tongue of one of the artists Laakkuluk.
Video Assignment
Sequence
This sequence is about playing with hair and hair care. Everyone has their little ticks and habits when it comes to hair, and here, we decided to document each of our habits, reflected in our different hair textures. From cutting to chewing to twisting and tangling, sometimes we don’t even notice these habits. They are so mundane that we don’t notice them or their significance, except they are a part of who we are. With that in mind, we broke down each habit and turned the spotlight to highlight each movement.
One Shot
With our one shot, we chose to break down the idea of hair care, specifically with the hair mask. With unlimited access to the internet, ideas of what is good and “healthy” for us are easily perpetuated, regardless of the credibility of the source. With that in mind, according to the internet, a credible source of course, mayonnaise, eggs, and oil are key components of any good hair mask, and hair masks are crucial in maintaining healthy hair. Hair masks are hydrating, and keep your hair luscious and long while maintaining its bounce and lustre.
Loop
Lastly, we have the loop. The loop is about hair care and playing with hair, specifically through a hair train. Growing up, playing with each other’s hair was a way of bonding. Creating hair trains at recess was a way to connect regardless of hair type, colour, or texture, coming together with the shared interest in braiding and hair twisting. Some people knew what they were doing, while others just enjoyed being a part of it.
Pauline Oliveros’ Sonic Meditations is a collection of text-based compositions published in the early 1970s. The goal for these mediations is to reimagine traditional music, by focusing on sound as an experiential and communal interaction, creating space for active listening and mindfulness. The work was influenced by the countercultural movements of the 70s, an era of change in identity and art, which emphasized aspects of human life such as mindfulness, self-awareness, and collective experience. One of the purposes of this piece is to open up listening to anyone with ears, meaning as opposed to technical, heavily structured sound, Sonic Meditations is accessible to anyone willing to listen, taking away from some of the pretension in the music industry.
The specific text of Sonic Meditations consists of simple instructions that are meant to guide individuals and groups through auditory and sensory exercises. The goal is for these instructions to be open-ended, allowing each participant to interpret and experience them uniquely. An example would be one set of instructions telling participants to “Take a walk at night. Walk so silently that the bottoms of your feet become ears,” thus encouraging a heightened awareness of surroundings, something that we may not typically consider. As we know, we don’t always see/hear what we’re not looking for.
These pieces utilize the practice of deep listening. Deep listening is allowing oneself the time and space to fully absorb what they’re hearing. Oliveros’ approach was deeply influenced by this concept. It involves a level of attentiveness to both the external sounds as well as the internal responses, the goal being to forge a deeper connection with one’s environment, others, and even oneself. With that in mind, through Sonic Meditations, participants are encouraged to fully immerse themselves in the act of listening. This entails focusing on minuscule responses, things we wouldn’t normally consider, such as heartbeats, breathing rate, and pulse.
Aside from the physical practice of deep listening, communal aspects are present in Sonic Meditations that are arguably more important. Mostly, these meditations are designed for group participation, with each member contributing (not only through voice!) to the soundscape. The purpose of this is to reinforce a sense of collaboration, while still giving participants a chance to shine individually. This is in line with your typical soundscape, the group becoming an ensemble of sound. Through this act of centering the experience around communal participation, Oliveros challenges the traditional narrative of music presentation and the dynamic of performer versus audience, facilitating an experience of co-creation.
With all that in mind, the feature that sets these pieces apart from the rest is the emphasis on the creative process, as opposed to the finished work. As a result, there are no correct methods of interaction regarding the mediation, simply self-expression. As with a viewer’s interpretation of any art piece, each participant’s interpretation contributes to the ever-evolving soundscape, making each meditation unrepeatable, and therefore unique, an approach not unlike those of the avant-guard movement.
Audio Assignment – Rewind the Tape
Update: Having trouble uploading, being fixed as we speak
For this assignment, I chose to demonstrate voice maturation by overlapping my childhood voice with my voice now. I repeated my side of the conversation, only the parts I thought I would repeat now as an adult with my updated answer, and overlayed/delayed them. I had originally thought to incorporate my dad’s current voice into this assignment, except he lives across the country, and phone recordings weren’t working the way I wanted them to. This brought me to the conclusion that the lack of his presence is indicative of how our relationship has changed as a result of growing up, and it would thus be more effective if adult me was having this conversation with my dad from fifteen years ago.
Photos For Conceptual Portrait – To Be Hung
This photo series is a conceptual portrait of my home, and life with four other roommates. This is done by way of photographing some of our foods – foods we all have in different variations, that fight over space in our small kitchen. I considered doing this through objects such as toiletries or the contents of our bags, but decided that this would be more telling of who we are, as we have to be selective about what gets to take up space on each of our shelves.
Conceptual Buttons
My buttons are based on Kim Gordon of Sonic Youth, and her green “Girls Invented Punk Rock (Not England)” t-shirt. With that, I created a series titled “Punk Rock”. The words Punk Rock have held negative connotations in some circles, though the current scene is full of positivity and acceptance amongst alternative people. With that in mind, “Punk Rock” is used as a positive in this series, naming the good as Punk Rock, and the bad as NOT Punk Rock. Women are Punk Rock, periods are Punk Rock and Mother Nature? Punk Rock. Things that oppose these forces? NOT Punk Rock.
For my artist buttons, I decided to focus on Kendrick Lamar’s song “Reincarnated” and the themes within it, such as reincarnation feeling conflicted. Kendrick shifts perspectives in the song, first telling stories from other artists’ viewpoints and then reflecting on his own career and his relationship with God. There are many biblical references and imagery in the song, particularly the connection to the story of Lucifer’s descent from heaven in the book of Isaiah. Kendrick’s back-and-forth conversation with God and growing frustration in the third verse made me reflect on my own beliefs and how I feel conflicted at times. I think the message in this song speaks to how a lot of people feel and the thoughts that cross their minds on a daily basis.
A Conceptual Portrait of Grief
This is a conceptual portrait of grief. Above are two letters and an audio recording of a conversation between my grandma and grandpa shortly before my grandpa passed away. My grandfather Jim wrote one of the letters to my grandmother in 1978 when they first met. At the time, due to some complications, my grandmother wasn’t sure if she would be able to have any children. My grandfather wrote to my grandma, consoling her and telling her that even if she couldn’t have any children, that wouldn’t affect their relationship already.
Fast forward to the future, I wrote a letter responding to my grandfather. My grandfather was a massive part of my life and raised me to be who I am today. These two letters are a portrait of two individuals grieving. The first letter is about my grandmother grieving, and the other is about myself grieving. I will never be able to get over the loss of my grandfather, but I am starting to learn how to live my life without him. When he wrote that letter to my grandmother, he said, “Our future.” He is writing from the past, talking about the future, and I am the present, talking about the past. Not only is this a reflection on the impact of grief, but it is also a reflection of the interconnectedness of time.
Horror Sounds
For my audio piece, I combined clips from famous horror movies with other terrifying sounds. It begins with slow, ominous creaking noises that gradually intensify, resulting in an abrupt stop. My goal was to evoke the emotion of fear through the overwhelming sounds of screams that consume your ears.
One Feat, Three Ways: Ice Cream
The experimental videos Matei and I created were inspired by the Burger King video featuring American artist Andy Warhol. In that video, Warhol sits awkwardly alone, eating a Whopper. I felt uncomfortable when I first watched it, yet I also thought I was sharing that moment of awkwardness with him. We also wanted to incorporate food into our video, so we chose ice cream. Initially, we planned to record the ice cream melting in our hands. Before we even started filming, I wanted to capture moments of awkwardness similar to Warhol’s burger video while allowing for unpredictability in my movements and decision-making.
Some people may watch our videos and find them boring because we don’t do much, and there isn’t much happening, but I believe that’s the point. Nowadays, people are so accustomed to constant external stimulation that we often forget what it’s like to be fully present in the moment. I’ll admit it can be uncomfortable to sit still and do nothing, but those moments of boredom and stillness are important. Life goes by in the blink of an eye, and I’m still learning to appreciate those moments of being still.
The unpredictable movements in the video, where I interrupt Matei’s stillness, are a metaphor for the unexpected events in our lives. The ice cream looks delicious, innocent, and beautiful in a sense, yet as shown in the video, what is beautiful can quickly and unexpectedly be disturbed. Our videos are compelling artistically because they are almost interactive pieces. The viewer experiences this absurd moment and shares it with us.
A thoughtful reckoning.
Toronto Field Trip Blog Post
The exhibit that caught my attention during our field trip was Ear Worm (2024-2025) by Alex Da Corte. The room’s ominous red and green lighting made the whole experience feel surreal and mesmerizing. There were objects, videos, and images from pop culture that I recognized right away. The main idea of De Corte’s exhibit was to use these familiar objects and visuals, imagine them in new and innovative ways, and repurpose them into their cultural significance. One of the videos projected showed a person drawing a scary pumpkin face on the back of what appeared to be a Charlie Brown figure. This was striking for me because I remember watching Charlie Brown as a kid, and the design of his character has always stood out to me as unique. To see a different face drawn onto the iconic character adds a new layer of uniqueness, which made me think about the significance of the character. Charlie Brown is one of the most recognizable characters in cartoon history. He’s even been around since my grandma was a kid (a very long time). It’s refreshing to see how the character is still relevant today and how others add their creative touch to create a new layer of meaning. Alex De Corte’s exhibit is impactful because people resonate with his iconic visuals/images. How Charlie Brown is personal is also personal for somebody else because they hold a memory of it that brings back feelings of nostalgia and timelessness. Timeless is the word I would use to describe this exhibit because these iconic scenes live on, and people will continue to talk about them for a long time.
Hold Up- Beyonce vs Rist
“Hold Up”
In the video titled “Hold Up – Beyonce Vs Pipilotti Rist,” singer-songwriter Beyoncé and Swiss artist Pipilotti Rist are performing in a mash-up of Beyonce’s music video and Rist’s 1997 performance “Ever is All Over.” The video opens with the first frame, with Rist’s walking down the street wearing a blue dress and holding a long wooden object in her hand. The footage is shot on an older camera, which looks grainy and has a lower resolution. The scene then transitions to Beyonce walking down steps fully submerged in water. You cannot see her face until she steps onto the sidewalk, where her face is revealed. The colours in Beyonce’s music video are warm and saturated yellows and gold, contrasting with Rist’s performance, where the colours are cooler, with the blue and grey hues evident throughout her segment. Beyonce and Rist’s movements are almost identical as they walk up the street, holding objects in their hand. Beyonce is having, and Rist’s is holding what appears to be a long stick. The most apparent action both artists perform is using their objects and smashing the windows of the parked cars on the street. When Beyonce smashes the car window, her facial expressions and body language appear more powerful and intense, whereas in Rist’s performance, she is smiling and seems more light-hearted. Beyonce’s video uses a variety of angles to show her actions and facial expressions, which, in my opinion, tells more of the story compared to Rist’s performance, which only shows two different angles, one of her side profile and the other from the front.
Rist’s Ideas
Pipilotti Rist’s performances and ideas, specifically about women’s bodies, sexuality, and exposure, add to the peculiarity and strangeness of her art innovatively and boldly. Her performance ‘Ever is Over All” Shows her as the subject happily smashing car windows, which adds to the boldness of her ideas and transforms this performance in a strangely beautiful way. There are certain expectations and norms for people to act a certain way in public. Rist challenges that notion in her performance, particularly the expectations of women’s behaviour. I forgot to mention this in the first part, but her performance is surreal, and the stark blue hues feel pretty dreamy. This quality adds to the ideas of beauty and femininity portrayed and expressed in her work.
Inside Out
Wearing my shirt inside out school made me more self-conscious and awkward because I usually do it unless I am rushing out of the house at 7:30 in the morning, half asleep. It’s funny because you think that people will care or notice that your shirt is inside out, but the truth is that nobody notices, and if they do notice, they will not say anything because they don’t care as much as you might. I don’t think it changed how other people treat me that much. Yeah, it was awkward, and I got a few looks, but like I said, people don’t care as much as you do. That goes for almost everything in life. I am not just wearing a piece of clothing the “wrong” way. Sure, it’s a performance if you say it’s a performance. Everything I do is a performance. I am performing all the time.
For my kilometre, I used a thousand photos from my digital camera from the past two years and projected them onto my wall at home. I represented one kilometre to equal 1000 photos instead of one kilometre being equal to 1000 metres. The meaning behind this idea was to show how fast time goes by, the distance between the past and the present, and the present and the future. Scrolling through the photos quickly tied into this core idea. Each image was a special moment in my life, and I wanted to capture how fast time goes by and look into the parallels of time and space and how the two work together in our lives. It is fascinating that when I revisit the past, in my mind, the distance from now to then seems so far away. Similar to how one kilometre is far once you start walking it. Looking back on these core memories from the past couple of years has given me the time and space to look forward to many more beautiful moments in the future.
For my Artist Button piece, Warning Girls…, I wanted to convey the frustration girls and women feel having to follow safety precautions just to stay safe in their day to day life. I’ve been angry at the world more recently for the need for women to be told these kinds of common phrases since youth. So, I made these buttons intentionally confronting through the bold text and warning-like style to protest that society should instead be teaching their boys and men to be respectful and not violent towards women instead of teaching girls to always have these precautions at the back of their mind. Especially since even when all these precautions are met, violence against women still occurs.
Conceptual Portrait – Our Nannu
My piece, Our Nannu, is a conceptual portrait of my Nannu (grandfather). Those who knew my Nannu associated him with plaid flannels because he wore one every day. Since his passing almost 2 years ago, my Nanna (grandmother) kept his clothing, including all the flannels he used to wear daily. So, I photographed each of his flannels individually to be a conceptual portrait of my Nannu since they were the pieces of clothing he chose to wear every day. Also, since his flannels are recognized in my family as being an important part of him, my Nanna gave the opportunity to our family members to pick one of his flannels to keep. So, then I photographed each of my family members wearing his flannels to even further this portrait of our Nannu since my family was both a result of him and very important to him.
Conceptual Portrait Idea
conceptual portrait of my grandfather
he would wear flannels every day, it’s the piece of clothing that my family associates with him, since his passing my grandmother gave out his flannels to my family members
so, portrait of my grandfather through a series of photos of his many flannels and/or my family members wearing all of his flannels
displayed all together in a grid format
Audio Assignment- Pick A Song
For my audio piece, Pick a Song, I assigned myself the conceptual feat of listening to music while driving in the way that my brother uniquely listens to music in the car. Throughout the many drives I have taken with my brother when he has control of the music being played, it is apparent that this is the only way he listens to music in the car. Even through learning from conversations with my brother’s friends, this is a consistent process of his whenever he is assigned to be the one who controls the music. He simply cannot choose a song or let a song play all the way through. He hears the intro of a song or up until what he wants to hear and skips it. What makes his process of listening to music in the car even more interesting is that he has a very wide range of music taste which expands many genres. So, for this feat I went onto my brother’s Spotify account and shuffled one of his playlists to further convey this authentic experience. As well as skipping each song at different points to portray the frustration of thinking he will finally let a song play through but then him still skipping it. This resulted in hearing a multitude of music genres and not once getting close to completing a song on the drive.
One Feat, Three Ways Video Assignment
Feat : Playing With Hair
HAIR CARE
One of the ways hair is played with is by taking care of it. Such as experimenting with different routines, hair serums, hair oils and hair masks. Further, many experiment with hair by believing what they hear about whats good for hair and playing with what works for them. So, we deconstructed a homemade hair mask by putting household ingredients into hair that are known on the internet for their “hair benefits”. This includes raw egg, olive oil, mayonnaise and natural oils.
PLAYING WITH HAIR
One of the ways hair is played with is by fidgeting with it. Fidgeting with one’s own hair is a typical thing to do when someone is nervous, bored or anxious. So, we compiled the many hair fidgets that we are aware we do with our own hair or that we have seen others do. This includes pulling curls, twirling, finger combing, volumizing, readjusting, trying multiple styles, picking split ends, eating, playing with loose hair, cutting and shaking it out.
HAIR TRAIN
One of the ways hair is played with is by playing with another’s hair. It is enjoyable to play with another’s hair and to have another play with our hair. This may include braiding, styling or simply finger combing through it. So, we mimicked the nostalgic hair braiding train to demonstrate. For some, it was a commence occurrence to either view or be involved in a “hair train” in our youth. Additionally, the act of playing or styling another’s hair is commonly seen as nurturing and comforting. Further, we demonstrated how these experiences could be never ending through mindlessly playing with hair strands and restarting braids over and over again.
Toronto Field Trip Blog Post
The art piece from our Toronto field trip that stood out to me the most was “Passing” (2022) by Maria Ezcurra. This piece consists of recovered/recycled shoes of various sizes and styles that are deconstructed and propelled in the sky to resemble birds. The artist’s intention of the installation of bird silhouettes is to symbolize the vulnerability and strength of migrant populations as they become accustomed to all the changes and difficulties that come along with living in a new country. She highlights the connections between the migrant journey of birds during winter and how her migrant family had to get used to waking up to the quiet mornings of winter without the sounds of birds since her family is initially from a country that has warm winters, meaning the birds don’t leave in the winter. Therefore, this piece stood out to me the most because it made me think about how my grandparents on my mother’s side had to get used to all the differences of life in Canada when they immigrated here from Malta in the 1960’s. Further, I immediately related “Passing” to the stories my grandmother has shared about her journey to Canada with my grandfather and their first few years of getting accustomed to the various changes. Such as the differences of language, politics, society, cold weather, food, career options and education possibilities.
Pipilotti Rist Blog Post
Ever Is Over All by Pipilotti Rist (1997)
1. In Pipilotti Rist’s “Ever Is Over All”, a woman is excitedly walking down a city street while smashing the window’s of parked cars with a bat that resembles a flower. During this action, other pedestrians don’t seem to pay her much mind, offer smiles and a woman police officer cheers her on. Also, on the right of this video, another video blends into it that showcases soft movements of flowers and other vegetation. The woman who performs in this video is named Silvana Ceschi who is a Swiss documentary filmmaker and she performs the video in a graceful strut, gleeful facial expression and with powerful swings of her flower bat. Further, the walking video includes cool tones, slow motion and includes both wide shots and close ups. On the other hand, the floral video includes more warm tones, a lot of movement of the camera, many different angles and also is in slow motion. The sound in the video includes rhythmic drumming while a woman softly hums. It also enhances the performance by complementing the slow motion videos and adds to the ideas of femininity. This work strikes me because of the bold portrayal of breaking feminine stereotypes. These kinds of portrayals of woman are not the social norm and I find this performance to be a refreshing reminder that being “lady-like” is merely an unimportant social concept.
2. Throughout Rist’s video art career, she has explored ideas of women’s bodies, exposure, proper vs. strange behaviour and defying gender stereotypes. These kinds of concepts continue to be explored today. Her ideas relate to content that is being made on social media and these topics are still very much relevant. Currently on social media platforms, there are women of all ages posting content that wouldn’t be considered “lady-like” or “proper”. Such as women creating comedic videos of themselves acting hyper and strange to simply make others laugh or to make statements against social norms. As well as women posting videos talking about sexual topics becoming much more normalized and some even make careers out of sexual education on social media. I would say these ideas play out in Rist’s “Ever Is Over All” and “Open My Glade (Flatten)” because the women are both performing strange behaviour that would not be seen as socially acceptable. This is because a woman expressing aggressive behaviour by breaking car windows and a woman forcefully smushing her face against a window would not be considered “lady-like”.
3. The experiment of wearing my sweater on backwards at school changed how I felt by becoming quite uncomfortable since I was much more aware of what I was wearing and by paying more attention to those around me to see if anyone was looking at me. This didn’t necessarily make people treat me differently but I did notice those who passed me were looking at my sweater being on wrong for a slightly prolonged time. Also, I did this experiment while at the library and when I sat with my group of friends I found that each of them assumed that I had put it on backwards by mistake. Every friend that later joined our table continued to point out that I had it on backwards as if I wasn’t aware as well. I would say that this was a performance because this was an intentional act a purpose and had an audience that I intentionally wanted to view this experiment.
Kilometre Assignment
To document a kilometre, I calculated how many revolutions it would take for a 12in vinyl record to equal its length. Since records are circular, I found it’s circumference (C) through first finding its diameter (D) and radius (R). Then I calculated how many revolutions would be needed to equal a kilometre:
Therefore, a 12 in vinyl record must revolve 1057.53 times to equal the length of 1 kilometre.
I demonstrated this concept through counting how many revolutions were in the song Vienna by Billy Joel. I marked the edge of my record with a small piece of blue tape and a larger piece of blue tape on the surface of my record player to keep track of where I started my count. Then, I played the song and tallied how many times the record made a full revolution. The total number for this 3 minute 34 second song was 120 revolutions. Here is another way to view this concept through time:
Total revolutions of Vienna = 120 revolutions
Total time of Vienna = 3 minutes 34 seconds = 214 seconds
Total amount Vienna needs to play to be 1 km = 1057.53/120 = 8.81
Total time for Vienna to be 1 km = ((214)(8.81))/60 = 31.42 mins = 31 minutes 25 seconds
Therefore, Vienna by Billy Joel would need to play repeatedly for 31 minutes 25 seconds for its perimeter to revolve the length of a kilometre.
Adult film stars examines female autonomy – Breanna Clips from adult films are strung together to portray a feminist message.
spotifywrap – EJ A mixture of my liked Spotify songs which I listen to.
Tinnitus – Payton Tinnitus is a condition in which one hears ringing in the ears. There are varying degrees of tinnitus. It is estimated that 37% of Canadians have tinnitus.
Trip To Lake Huron – Jacob The audio of my road trip to Lake Huron during Autumn.
Lost in the Dryer – Abby This piece showcases what various objects sounds like in the dryer.
Audio Art – Kayla Price A sequence of voices, one after the other, reciting and repeating various terms historically and contemporarily used to label Black people in North America
Explosiveness – Matei A play on Hollywood’s idea of what explosions feel and sound like. All clips are from movies and mixed together to create a layered piece which works together from beginning to end.
My 1 Kilometre
For my kilometre, I first thought of breaking down the word kilometre and creating a video about it. After playing with that idea, I had nothing to prove or create a kilometre with and just that meaning of kilometre, I didn’t believe it was enough. So after remembering about a video I saw where a guy was taking one step and then taking a picture and making a really cool video afterwards with all the pictures combing to show this amazing trip he took, I decided to do something similar for this project. I took a picture for every metre, equaling 1000 pictures for 1km. As per the assignment criteria, I measured exactly one metre each time with a tape measure on the ground to have exactly 1km. I had my camera on a tripod and then would move it one metre forward based on the 1 metre measurement from the tape measure on the ground. It took me nearly 4 hours to do this because I had to setup the tripod/camera, take a clear photo, measure 1 metre forward exactly, move the tripod to that exact 1 metre distance forward and repeat. I repeated this process 1000 times to achieve 1000 pictures to ultimately get the goal of 1km. Halfway through doing this, I started getting tired and it was getting dark but I pushed through the doubts of leaving it for the next day to complete the exact kilometre and also pushed through my foot which was getting sore and got the job done. It was definitely exhausting, boring at times, worrying to get the measurement correct and the perfect shot, and much more but in the end as you watch this video you have gone a kilometre yourself and I have accomplished a kilometre in photos.
Pictures below display how I measured and took the photos.
Pipilotti Rist Blog Post
Pipilotti is shown performing various facial expressions behind a pane of glass with a camera in front recording herself doing these various motions. The piece is distributed as a video shown on advertisement boards in Times Square, NY. Of course this is very different than the typical advertisement that would take the screens place usually. It is very large. As the video progresses, which is shown on over 64 screens in Times Square, Pipilotti gets closer to the glass. This art piece hints on constraint and limit during a month when Trump became President. The limit that the government opposes on citizens, furthermore the limits and constraints women are put against. The work piece itself disgusts me because of all the smudging against the glass but I do understand the background idea behind it which makes sense and I believe this way promoting an idea is very clever.
I believe Rist’s work is very similar to the videos you see on various platforms like YouTube and Tik Tok. From a first glance, they all look like memes. They’re very weird and unique. The meaning of her videos have strong intent behind them which makes them different than the videos you see online. Videos on social media are mostly without a point and are just there to attract you. It’s a marketing gig. While, Rist’s work is more than trying to get your attention, it’s getting your attention and bringing importance to issues in relation women which are hidden or not talked about. She’s advocating for women in this sense through visual media. Rist’s work expresses heavy emotion and complements the ideas behind the video. The videos don’t push out the narratives behind it but keep them hidden, letting the video part go viral in a sense before the explanation is expressed. It allows for a lot more people to witness and hear her story and what she’s advocating more because with the strong rules and the shadowbanning that occurs on social media if she were to create a video that directly emphasizes the issues women face, it would typically not create such an impact and the companies that control what can be posted online or spread would regulate it like it is a protest video rather than a work of art.
Wearing my shirt inside out doesn’t really affect me. The feeling is no different than if it were to be worn normally. It would feel weird to wear it incorrectly from a sense that I wouldn’t typically do this or allow this and my brain wouldn’t justify why. Additionally, from the perspective of view of others seeing me wearing my shirt ‘incorrectly’, they’d wonder why. They may ask be a million questions which would be annoying. They may not take me seriously at all as there’s a dress code standard in society and anyone who doesn’t dress ‘properly’ is seen as different. So from my personal perspective, it wouldn’t really affect me at all other than the fact that it would feel weird doing something I am not used to and from the perspective of others, they’d probably end up just laughing. You could classify me, wearing my shirt backwards, as a performance but from my view it was just a social experiment at most. Your classification or idea to call this a performance is coming from you, from my perspective, I’m just trying something new. In the idea of art, this could definitely be considered a performance but if one asks why are you doing this, I wouldn’t have an answer. Having no answer would take out most of the meaning, the meaning that should’ve been the reason for the performance. Concluding, everyone has a different approach to considering what one is doing, what are they representing if they wear their shirt backwards. One could call it a performance, one would say he probably didn’t see how he put on the shirt, one would laugh and one wouldn’t care.
Field Trip Blog
Scent of Thunderbolts
The Scent of Thunderbolts by Karen Tam is a recreation of a Chinese location. Like many of Tam’s works where she recreates Chinese locations such as restaurants or curio shops. This setting, however, reflects on the Cantonese opera piece which you hear playing throughout the exhibit. The exhibit hits back to home as it involves all sorts of iconic emblems and items which associate with China. When you first enter you see a room where there are 2 chairs and a table in front of you. The furniture is decorated. You are also given a place to sit in front of these 2 chairs, although your seating is not as nice. This may be a hint to the queen/king… the emperor that would sit in front of you and you as the peasant receive whatever you can get. Like what you may see in a temple or at a government place within China. As you walk further in, the music takes away your senses of a world outside of this setting, you start walking through a bamboo forest, you witness a tiger upon your travels, you are in the middle of wilderness. Additionally, at the back of the exhibit, you see frames which hold historic photos of Chinese traditions and culture. You then circle back and arrive where you came from. The piece is set up to be a full circle which you must follow and each time you will discover further hidden details within the artwork.
The piece is remarkably interesting, it is creative. It is different from the other artworks we were able to see as you can involve yourself with the piece, you can touch, feel, see, and hear it all. You can go into this world and not only imagine but be present and perform your part within the piece. It gives different feelings (makes you scared because of the tiger, happy because of the colour and sound, lonely because of the heavy forested area, questionable because what does it mean-where are you supposed to go, etc.). It changes your perspective. To follow back on Roee’s point, it is like Kung Fu Panda, the movie. I enjoyed this piece as I could be a part of it and hands-on creativity is something I like, and I was able to touch and be involved with the artwork rather than stare and look at the same old typical “Do Not Touch”.
2. Acariciar el corazon del hueso (Caressing the heart of the bone)
Caressing the heart of the bone by Cristina Flores Pescoran incorporates wood, fabrics, and needles to create this large-long floating object. Pescoran created this artwork from a dream she had where she was having a tactile conversation with her bone marrow. The idea goes deeper as she had to do a bone marrow biopsy during a cancer diagnosis examination. The artwork reflects on Pescoran’s experiences with the process of being ill to recovering. The woven fabric with wood creates the shape of different body parts of the artist. From legs to the head. The work is considered a self-portrait. Alongside the main piece, there are subjects on the wall behind it like the woven fabric you see in the picture(s) above and additionally, a video playing from a TV highlighting this large woven piece and the artists playfulness with it to create what we saw in person that day.
This artwork was large at first glance but interesting when you got up close with it. You couldn’t certainly capture all of it in one shot but that is good because you are forced to take part at the same time. Each body part at a time. When looking closely and taking pictures from under, I really witnessed the different patterns and ideas throughout the piece. I saw on the TV, the artist separated some of the strands of fabric to create an opening for her mouth, which answered my question as to why there was a hole in the middle of a fabric so detailed in consistent woven patterns. I thought the subject looked like the digital graphic of how a DNA strand looks but presented in real life. I could also consider the designs to look consistent in the way the texture of a leaf leaves on paper. If you ever tried putting leaves in a book and the leaf reveals a texture on the sheet(s), I am comparing it to that. I couldn’t guess that the piece was connected to such an emotional story without reading about its background but whichever way you interpreted it, I would say the artwork brings various strong ideas as to what it represents and it definitely stops you in its track to look over all its curves, waves, patterns, and more.
Field Trip Video
The field trip definitely impacted me and it was a great social time alongside all my peers. I discovered new parts of Toronto I did not know existed, I met new people and had great conversations, I had many opportunities to use my camera for all sorts of things.
One Feat, Three Ways: Ice Cream
For our ‘One Feat, Three Ways’ project, our focus was the melting of ice cream.
Ice Cream
The cold, tasty treat we all have likely had. Our gesture focus was that of the average individual which holds their ice cream cone in their hand. We all have held our hand out like this while holding a cone, although it may look different for each person, we all have held a cone in a similar way. Especially during hot summer days when we try to eat it as fast as possible so it doesn’t make a mess all over us but also so it doesn’t cause a brain freeze. When you go to an ice cream truck/place, you are handed the ice cream in this way, and you yourself hold it this way as well. This gesture is relatable and a part of our life.
Manny and I, got the inspiration from Andy Warhol’s video where he eats a Whopper alone in silence. The awkwardness that brought out and the emotions we got out of it although it was simply just one eating, something we’ve done ourselves. We wanted to accomplish a similar idea.
Eating the ice cream wasn’t the most impactful gesture concept we could’ve done with it, it may have even looked like we just copy and pasted Andy Warhol’s concept. So we thought about not eating and letting time go by as the ice cream drips. A truly intense timeline as we waited for the ice cream to melt, as it was cold, as our arms got tired, as we couldn’t hold our face straight, and as unpredictable things occurred a long the way.
EXPERIMENTAL 1
Pauline’s article is not so much of an article. I see it as a guide or a list of auditory exercises that readers can practice getting into the art of audio. Away from audio that is made with a direct purpose like music or speech. These exercises/works/scores allow you to think and expand your knowledge. It asks you to do things you would not have done. To take a word and repeat over and over until the meaning of that word is gone and its rhythmic sound is created, and that word is now a beat, that word is now a noise, it creates a pattern, it is looked at differently and it sounds different from the original. It is created into something new. It is like taking an object and recreating it’s purpose like readymade art. Like Duchamp’s fountain. Pauline also offers other ideas like creating sound that is so real that a listener cannot distinguish between the real and the copy. All of these exercises help create a larger knowledge of audio art, it has helped me differentiate and understand what audio art is. We all hear sound and we have gotten accustomed to it and it is hard to take a part of what we’ve heard in our life and make it into art and these exercises have helped define what we can experiment with and how, to create artistic audio with meaning.
Moving forward, the idea of differentiating the sound we hear and the sound which is considered artistic audio by recreating the sound to a certain tonality has helped me break down my explosions. From a war field to explosions. Taking that initial war field sound of a variety of explosions and activity and breaking down to just explosions. Taking explosions and the sounds prior, the sounds after, and the sounds during like reactions or sustain to make a repetitive yet smooth outline of an explosive scene over time. Taking explosions and explosive audio to the next level. Using the explosions to form an idea, to create meaning through the various explosions heard. Breaking down the parts of an explosion and playing with it to make something that catches attention, that plays with dynamic audio, that creates a piece in itself just out of explosions that were separately taken from different scenes to make one unique artistic audio that you couldn’t guess wasn’t together initially and which worked together to bring out the artistic merit of explosive sound.
Audio Assignment – Answer
Above was practice. A truck bustling down a path midway through a war field. Take a trip through time, quite literally time passing by as 1 minute is reached and to remind yourself of how long a minute is within war, so much can happen and with each shot or explosion, one can no longer be alive, one is fighting for their life, one is going through it with their truck to reach their destination and one may be 1000km away relaxing and not even hearing about the situation on the news.
Audio Assignment – Final – Hollywood’s Removal From Explosion
My final audio project was a play on Hollywood’s idea of what explosions feel and sound like. All clips are from movies. That relates it to Hollywood’s idea because all explosions are the same. You cannot really change how an explosion sounds in movies because you want the viewer to understand what is going on and having familiarity within films helps those films become successful as the audience got the queue.
In art, we do not care about the commercial idea of creation, we want to explore and expand the idea and the thought on what something can be. By combining all these explosions, you move through layers of sound. It is like painting but in the sense of audio, you hear layers of variety, different scenes interacting with one another to create impactful audio. With a buildup and good finish, you are brought into the piece, and you exit it, the explosions die out and the scene is over, the audio is over. You can press repeat at any time to go through and explore more sounds which are hidden, which you may have not heard in the previous listen. Allow yourself to gain the full meaning that all these layers can bring to you. Create your own ideas, meanings, and thoughts on what may be going on and what you are hearing.
How does this piece resonate with you?
Conceptual Portrait
My conceptual portrait considers the relationship between individuals’ faces. The connection, the spiritual/emotional/physical connection, we make with each other that is so strong in meaning as we acknowledge someone’s presence but also so simple because we do it all the time, it is just normal. The portrait may be a physical portrait at first because my portrait is present. A photo taken of my face, a portrait. The meaning behind this conceptual portrait is not from a generic photographic portrait although many have enjoyed how I can keep a straight face for so long. The meaning comes from everyone’s portrait. Consider your face a footprint. You leave behind a feeling, a sign, a sense. If I’m upset, you can likely tell by my face, if I’m happy, you can tell that I am by my face. The same is for everyone. That connection we can make with a face.
If you have ever seen those videos or concepts that if someone is yawning or smiling, you end up doing the same. That connection. That is what I am after.
In Video #1, listed as Faces, it is all about the process in creating this idea, within Zavitz, and getting firsthand impressions from my peers and professors. It also stands alone as a performance of me and my face. This is similar to the artwork of the chair, the definition of a chair, and the picture of a chair. You get different forms of the same thing.
In Video #2, listed as Reactions, it shows the reactions I got as I setup cameras to film peoples reaction of my face. I had a wall camera to film reactions of people looking towards the main piece on the wall in the lobby of Zavitz. I had a tripod with my face on it at a different location, recording peoples reaction. You could see one person looking at the tripod, making the connection to the wall, which also had my face, they were kind of in a deja vu moment where they relived seeing this same thing. Camera #3 was setup on my backpack.
Camera #3 (backpack), was the most clever and got the best reactions. I had my face on the front of my jacket and as I was walking around people noticed me and my face doing the same impression. They only saw a glimpse of this performance so of course they would look back and question did I really see that?, let me take a second look, do I know him?, what is happening?
And so…
I had the idea to setup the camera in the back with my face again as well in the back, to capture people’s true reaction that they wouldn’t show to my face or that they didn’t show initially. You could say I caught them in 4k.
This conceptual portrait heavily relies on the relationship between viewer and face. Viewer and viewer. Face and face. Each person’s face is a portrait on its own, capturing their face creates a conceptual portrait of many people a part of our Guelph community when brought together. We rarely look at each other on the street and I think this brought people together although they may have first thought I was crazy having my face plastered on me. I made contact and looked at a bunch of people indirectly. I got asked a lot of questions, I got a lot of confused looks, I made people happy as they laughed, I made connections and talked with people I probably wouldn’t have if this didn’t happen.
Artist Multiple; Buttons
For the artist multiple we used buttons to create artistic matter that could be worn, shared, or posted around. For my buttons, I decided to use my face, not only because it continues this trend of using my face to create a message or meaning but that when I thought about buttons; thinking about buttons being round and buttons with smiley faces on them, it thought about putting my face within these buttons would make sense.
To provide variation from past projects using my face, I created a coloured version of it separate from the known black and white. However, I could not let you have a free real life version of my face. I decided to draw over my face by adding a full beard, an angry expression, or such with pen. Giving different emotions, blends, characteristics and themes with each image, separate from the rest. I relate this drawing over with a pen from moments in my childhood where I drew over faces in newspapers or magazines, making realtors have funny faces for example.
Having this duality between the classic face and this animated, coloured version has helped develop this project express itself.
Getting to share these buttons with those around, with those that have been involved in this journey of “the face”, was interesting as we got to share and keep other peoples ideas, other peoples art, other peoples multiples. Seeing connections between them, seeing the difference between them and seeing them all together mixed around into one big artist(s) multiple!
For my kilometer project I wanted to show the perspective of a kilometer. I chose to film two videos, on the right I walk a along a meter stick 1000 times and on the left I walk a normal kilometer down my street and back. The idea is to show the difference in perception, both videos are me walking a kilometer but one is much more tedious than the other and shows monotonous action while the other is a nice stroll down the street with different views and experiences.
PIPILOTTI RIST:
1)
Pippiloti Rist’s “Ever is over all” is the video that most caught my eye. The video features a female actress in a light blue dress with red high heels walking down a Zurich street holding a colorful stick that looks like a rose with a very long sturdy stem, with it she smashes three car windows while walking past strangers and even an officer. Meanwhile there is another video on the right playing slowed down close up footage of a flower garden, filled with lots of bright reds, greens, and yellows. The main performer in the video is not Pipiloti Rist but actually a friend of hers named Silvana Ceschi who performs with a gleeful stride as she happily smashes the cars freely. I would also argue that the strangers and officers in the video enact a sort of performance as well by trying to not really react to Ceschi’s actions, as the officer and strangers in the video ignore or politely smile at her but try not to actually interact with her. It is a dynamic performance that goes against the performance of the everyday as it embodies freedom and boldness over social normalities. The framing feels entrancing as the video feels as if it wraps around you occupying its space very well. The video on the right feels very large and close while the one on the left is more direct, having the figure centered (on the left). This makes the video on the right look like an angle from a different universe as the flower theme connects the two. The colors featured are bold and bright. While the left side has a light blue tint the right has a bright green tint but both videos feature emphasis on the color red representing the boldness that both films carry. Another thing adding to the feeling of the videos being intertwined is the slowed down and smooth movements of both the camera and figures present throughout the entirety of both videos leading to a very cohesive short loop. The camera work is smooth and fluid. While the camera constantly moves around to reveal new angles, both for the woman smashing the car and the angles of the “flower” she is smashing with. The video is edited in a way that keeps your attention throughout, never holding a shot for too long but instead exploring new and interesting angles to depict this performance. These quick chances in the editing also helps to make the loop more effective as it seamlessly seems like another camera cut when in fact the entire video had begun to loop. The sounds immediately re-contextualize the tones and mood of the film. As the film itself is very euphoric and joyful the music seems very melancholic and somber. The effects present in the sound such as the skewed piano notes, the drumming pattern, and the women humming all feel very haunting, as if trying to peel a darker side to the context and framework of the piece. The loud sounds of the windows being smashed also add to the boldness and abrasiveness of the women present in the piece. The presentation in the gallery looks highly immersive, as the viewer sits facing the corner of a giant two sided panel. Each side containing the side of the video gives the effect of the piece being all around you, as the viewer is literally in the middle of the piece themselves. This would add to the emotion of the film further putting the viewer into the perspective of both the women and the flower rod, while also enhancing the central themes of largeness and boldness the Pipioloti Rist wanted.
2)
The topic of shaming women for certain behaviors or the idea that there is a “proper” way for a woman to behave is one very much present in “Ever is Over all”. Rist challenges these normalities of society by showing a presentable female acting irrationally and radically, very “unlady like”. These types of ideas are still being challenged very much online on platforms like Tik Tok and Youtube to this day. For example female content creators posting themselves dressing in unconventional wacky ways and going outside or expressing interest in mostly male dominated spaces such as video games. Both these are instances of female boldness and freedom as these women express themselves without fear. Women are often told to be submissive or quiet. Not being listened to and respected they are conditioned to not speak out and say what they want or what is on their mind, as well as being told what to wear, how to act, and what to do. Pipilotti Rist flips this on its head by having a woman look like the “standard” from the surface as she is wearing a dress with a nice smile on, but behaving radically as she smashes cars in bright contrasting colors euphorically. This performance blends what is normalized with what is socially acceptable as it very much blurs the line between the two. It makes the argument of breaking out of the mold created by patriarchy and instead carving one that suits yourself
3)
I went to meet my friends in the Engineering building in the lounge area to study and decided to show up with my black shirt inside out. It made me feel very self conscious walking through the building with my shirt like this, many times I would feel as if people I walked past looked at my shirt although part of me believes I was just embellishing in my mind. When I walked up to my friends I kept thinking about what they were going to say or what they would comment, but instead nobody actually paid any attention or noticed. Nothing was said to me for the majority of the morning, to the point that I had basically forgotten I actually put my shirt inside out. Until one of my friends pointed it out and laughed, I embarrassingly changed my shirt back to normal, but outside of that nothing really happened or was said after. This makes me realize how much our own minds screw with our perceptions of the public. We think about ourselves and our flaws so much that we ascribe the idea that everyone else around us must have noticed already or must have the same thought about you. When in reality you do not know what they are thinking and whatever it is nine times out of ten it has nothing to do with you and something about themselves instead. After this I can see that I don’t have to be so worried about the flaws and insecurities I see in myself and that instead I should accept them and move on. This is a performance on top of a performance. The simple act of dressing up to go to school and study is a performance. By dressing and acting a certain way I am essentially creating a character for myself to present to the public and by wearing my shirt inside out I am taking that already made character and changing it to the public. Both cases are for some sort of reactionary emotion either being beneficial or negative; they both represent a performance of myself. So, yes this was a performance and one that both didn’t go how I expected to and also unexpectedly gave me a lot to think about my future presentation or performance to the public and how I carry myself here on out.
FEILD TRIP:
Alex Da Corte’s Ear Worm was my favourite installation I saw in the trip. It features a collection of films, characters, products, and toys that are heavily tied to pop culture. Many of these iconic figures are associated with fun and positive connotation and Alex Da Corte subverts these ideals by perverting them with imagery of every day life. Mixing aspects of pop culture with violence and sexuality while mutating the imagery itself. Da Corte playing characters like Mister Rogers, the Statue of Liberty, Marcel Duchamp, Eminem, and a whole slew of iconic characters Da Corte gives them a more complex and disturbing twist. The one that stood out the most to me was Charlie Brown, having Da Corte draw a twisted version of Charlie Browns face on a porcelain doll with marker.
ROCK PAPER SCISSORS:
Standard Rock Paper Scissors
Real Rock Paper Scissors
Forever tie
For our gesture we chose to focus on the game Rock Paper Scissors, A simple game usually played up to 3 with a winner and a loser. Our objective was to try and change the rules and standards of Rock Paper Scissors while keeping the core ideals and feeling of the game intact. The most obvious change was using literal objects instead of hand signs, this adds an element of realism and tension within a children’s game now incorporating preparation, setup, and possible danger. The game could end at any moment because the rock might just break/snap the scissors in half before getting to 3, this is an element we never considered as the game we twisted began to enforce its own rules upon us. Another subtle way we flipped the game is by negating the idea of a winner or loser. Rock paper scissors is a game played to 3 specifically to avoid a tie situation, Jacob wins the first game and I win the second, but nobody wins the third. Creating a scenario in which nobody wins or looses and there is essentially an infinite tie. The game to 3 was never played and hand signs were not used, but we definitely played on epic game of Rock Paper Scissors!
ROCKBAND:
For my audio project I decided to focus on Rockband a game where you play famous songs on toy guitars, drum, piano, and microphone. This idea began in my room while my friends were playing Rockband, I could here the clacking of the instruments together but I couldnt here the song itself. I would hear these sounds throughout the weeks and slowly begin to know which songs were being played depending on the clacking. I wanted to play one of my favourite Beatles songs in Rockband and reinterpret it with just the clacking. I added every instrument possible to Rockband having drums, piano, keys, guitar, bass, and finally vocals. I think this came out very good as you can tell the song being played while also feeling disconnected from the original audio which was my intention.
CONCEPTUAL PORTRAIT OF CHANGE:
For my conceptual portrait I decided to try and depict change in the natural world. The idea was to find a very big rock and take a photo of it every hour on the hour for 24 hours, afterwards printing the photos on paper and cutting the rocks out lastly arranging them into a circle ordered by time. The rock is a solid subject, one that will not change for days, years, maybe decades and yet it changes every hour. Every day on those hours this rock goes through those changes and so do we as people. The shape of a circle is to remind us of our own time and humanity, inspired by many sculptures of life and death made in the Neolithic period depicting time as a circle and connecting it to both a humans life and death. In the same way the rock shows that everything changes little by little every single hour, and all these small changes are the most important ones because together they make the overall transformation of a subject.
How are you feeling today? Buttons:
The buttons I decided to make were emoticon buttons that represent different emotional expressions that one could relate to. This was inspired by those “How do you feel?” posters you see in doctors offices but this way a person can pick out the emotion they are feeling and wear it. I am personally love to nap and instantly fell in love with the sleeping button because in some way it represented me and it was fun seeing others do the same and pick out the emotion they wanted to show.
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