Project 4 Becoming Pretty

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Becoming Pretty

                For my performance art, I decided to disregard my discomfort with myself and take a huge step by filming a video with me as the focus. Normally, I could never even think about posing as a subject in a video because of my low self-confidence, especially in a performance piece where all eyes would be concentrated on me. Before, I could not tolerate performance art because I thought it was strange, not even considering it to be real art. Most pieces that I had seen of performance art was outlandish and eccentric, where I could not derive any meaning or concept from the act. After viewing Abramovic, I realized that once a person knows the concept or artist statement behind a piece, then the performance is not subjugated to negativity; the audience can fully appreciate the unique way of presenting an issue through performance. However, after watching The Artist is Present by Marina Abramovic, I was overwhelmed with the excitement of her performance and concepts. I was instantly ignited with enthusiasm for performance art and decided I wanted to break through my comfort zone and make a video focused on myself somehow. I created several ideas for project four, but finally chose to make a performance about societal beauty and makeup.

                My concept for the project talks about how important beauty and makeup is valued in society toward girls and women. I wanted to take this issue and ask my two younger girl cousins about their perception of beauty. Because of our ages, it would make an interesting conversation between a seven year old, fourteen year old, and 20 year old. During the interview, I asked both girls questions that included “who is the most beautiful person in the world?”, “do you have to wear a lot of makeup to be pretty?”, and “do men like women better with makeup on?”.  I wanted the interview to be natural, so I filmed it in a children’s play area at my grandparents’ house. I allowed my two younger male cousins, six and thirteen, to be included in the background of the interview because I believed it would be interesting to get their insert of answers. I did get a couple reactions from them but it mostly turned out to be background noises of them goofing off. As I was editing my performance, I realized how important this insignificant act was toward my project; I was asking the girls how to achieve beauty, when the gender who women do this for could care less.

                The second part was a performance of my seven year old cousin applying my makeup and me returning the action. Her idea of makeup wasn’t quite the thought process of an older woman’s concept because she wanted to turn me into a blue fairy. The makeup to her was a way of putting art on one’s face to play dress-up. However with my older cousin, she used makeup as a way to perfect her face and hide embarrassing blemishes. When it was my turn to doll my younger cousin up, she wanted to become a garden fairy. During my questioning of her in the interview and the makeup part, she was very unsure about my questions and how to answer them; she seemed like they were indifferent to the point of makeup. In her eyes, makeup is supposed to make one feel happy about themselves without the opinion of others deciding their beauty.

After finishing my project, I realized that this film wasn’t solely about me; it included personal thoughts and feelings from my cousins. This project, even though it included three young women, covers many similar opinions about beauty in general from many different women around the world. I did overcome a fear about drawing attention to myself. Ultimately, I discovered how, even at a young age, girls learn makeup can transform a face into something better than the original, whether it being just for fun or for presenting one’s self to the world.

12/3 In-Class Performance Exercise

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        For this piece, I chose to do a re-enactment of Marina Abramovic and Ulay’s original piece of Abramovic’s, The Artist is Present, in the MoMA. I wanted to use her same concept of staring into the eyes of another while sitting down at a table, doing nothing. However, in my version I am staring into the eyes of my favorite stuff animal, a Beanie-Baby cat, for five minutes. The idea behind my performance is that I am staring into the eyes of my friend and childhood, remembering all the memories I had with it. During the filming, I found myself looking into the eyes I saw so many times before and I couldn’t help but smile. I remembered all the adventures I went on with my cat. I tried to imagine what he would look like if he were a real person, what he would act like. At the start of the film, I didn’t know if the five minutes would pass by fast or seem to take forever. I thought that since I knew my friend very well, the time would go by pretty fast. In the end, time did go by quickly. However, the longer I stared into its eyes, the more I realized how dead the eyes were. This symbolizes how my childhood is, in essence, dead and gone. The eyes were lifeless and it was hard not to zone out because of the lack of human connection, other than fond memories, the eyes were giving me. I realized I was the one bringing life into his eyes as a child. Now, I can no longer see his light. This piece has made me cherish my childhood and hope it will always live on in my memories.

Project 4 Draft Clips

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Project 4 Plan/Proposal

            For Project 4, I was originally very anxious about what to do. I didn’t want to use myself as an actor or record my voice. I thought performance art was ridiculous, too weird and actually not really art. However, after watching the documentary about Marina Abramovic and how amazing she was, I rethought my negative opinion about performance art. I enjoyed how even though most of her work was strange, they all had meaningful concept behind them. If you understood her work and the reason behind it, then you wouldn’t dislike it so much. Because of the document, I was inspired and am more willingly to do a performance piece. I have decided to use myself and not focus on my camera shyness.

            For my first idea, I am going to ask my two little cousins to create a play, make the props, and then preform it. I will be involved with the three tasks they do and will film everything. The first part will have the quality of an interview. I will ask them questions about what they want to do and help come up with the story. The environment will be at a table with all of us sitting down. For the second part, I will film us making the props and puppets for the story. The environment will be in the same place, at the table. For the last part, my cousins and I will act out the play. It will probably be behind a couch or sofa, where we will be hiding while performing. The play will be performed in front of an audience, my family.

            My second idea consist of my girl cousin and me performing a piece about beauty. I will ask her some questions related to beauty, with myself off camera. She will be the focus of the camera and will answer my questions on screen. Some of the questions may include: “What makes a pretty girl?” and “what does she have to look like?”. There will also be some personal questions about my own beauty including: “am I pretty?” and “would I look better without glass and why?”. I will ask her these questions at a table, sitting down. Then, I will use my camera to shoot an introductory scene of a bunch of makeup materials lined up. I will give my cousin free range to use any tools to make my face pretty. In this way, what she does and how my face ends up will show either how warped her idea of beauty is due to society or how society hasn’t changed her opinion at all. I will show a before and after clip of my face and play the sound of our conversational interview while she is putting on the makeup. There will be no audience except for me and her throughout the whole performance.

            For my last idea, I will choose two very famous pieces of contemporary art, like Duchamp’s Toilet piece and a famous master’s painting, and present it individually to my family members. The age range will consist of young children and teenagers, to adults and seniors. Individually, I will sit down with each person and show them a picture of the famous art pieces. I will ask them a series of questions about the pieces and what they think of them without knowing the facts about it. They will consist of “what do you think of this piece?” and “Do you think it’s art?”. I will then tell them the information about the pieces and why it is considered art. Then I will ask them if the new information given has changed their opinion of the pieces. I may play the voices of their answers over some sort of video, but I’m not sure. It could be a video of each person looking at the art piece and capturing their reactions. The whole concept of this idea is to help people understand contemporary art instead of casting it off as weird. I want them to understand how art has changed and gone through many ideas to end up like it is now.

            Out of all the ideas I’ve listed, my favorite is the second idea. I like the concept about feminism and societal beauty. I think it could lead to some interesting discoveries.

11/19/14 Homework Acconci Reading/Questions

What are the different voices that Acconci uses when speaking in the work and to what means? What characters does he embody/perform?

Acconci uses many different voices and tones to evoke different emotions from the viewers. In the beginning, he uses a deep, monotonous voice, giving off the feeling of an intro narration. Afterwards, he breaks into a whispering voice, where he repeats different words of emotions in a rhythmic pattern. Later on, he hums, which reminds me of patriotism or the humming of a tune while laboring. In another part, he makes car noises and describes numerous vehicle movements. Towards the ending, Acconci says a bunch of statements beginning with “remember to”, which gives off the feeling of a leader or dictator reminding his subjects to love their country for all it does for them.

Locate instances of nationalism as well as lone individuality in the work. What do references to nationalism “do” or emphasize with respect to our understanding of the story.

One reference to nationalism is when Acconci is talking about physical attributes of America, like the Statue of Liberty, then moves on to other stuff about the land in a negative tone. Also, another instance is when he is talking about the specific places where someone’s son and daughter died due to a battle. The voice is talking quickly and is ushering on the parents in a hurried manner. One instance of lone individuality in the work is when he is talking about solving a murder or mystery. He speaks about not being able to understand the clues and why he never realized what had happened at the time in hindsight. All these references tell a story about the many factors of nationalism and how it effects everyone. There are some against it, some who hate the nation, some who want the revolution and independence and still others who aren’t affected by any of it.

How do the formal strategies (the look and how different elements are put together) of video, still  photos, painting, film, and performance contribute to the content of the work? Provide specific examples.

Acconci uses a variety of different materials, including pages of a book, his voice, his face, numerous single photographs, and the panning of his camera. These all contribute to his work. For example, when he is filming the part about cars, he is using the camera to spin quickly between each car photo while making noises with his voice. The cars somehow change to different models even though he is filming back and forth in a straight line of pictures. Another example is when he is repeating “we are the people” and then slamming down pictures of different people on a surface and sliding them off camera. This represents how the chanting, “we are the people” corresponds with each person he is showing, stating that all those people are part of the nation. They make up the nation of America, even though they are from different ethnicities, ages, and genders.

How do you ultimately understand the narrative or story of this work? Please describe.

I believe this narrative is about American nationalism, starting from that revolution from Britain, to the growth of the city and landscape, to nationalism and war. At the start of his piece, Acconci is talking about revolution while being blindfolded. This could be interpreted as soldiers being blindly lead by the majority or leaders to do stuff they don’t fully understand or want. Then he goes on to talked about the lands and attributes of America, like the Statue of Liberty, until his statements become darker and unflattering toward the USA. He shows cars “zooming” by and tall skyscrapers to represent the growth of the industries and cities. During one part, he disgraces JFK death with inappropriate imagery because it represents the people without nationalism, who hate America because of its inequality. At the end, Acconci is sarcastically chanting the motto of what America was built on, equality, while forcefully showing pictures of numerous people from different ethnicities, ages, and genders; people who weren’t interpreted in the beginning of America as equal and free.