We were given the task to visit a few exhibitions that were created by the 2nd year students around Swansea. I began to look in Peppermint where I didn't really understand what was going on. I didn't see much in the space and there was no clear indication on what this specific exhibition was about. However I still did find this piece interesting. Just across from this, there was a laptop displaying a video of a time lapse where two clips of wind street were overlapping each other, from different times of the day. I liked this piece because I find the contrast in day time, to night time in wind street very fascinating and found myself watching it for a while. I thought that maybe this plasic/rubbish man was displaying the contrast in nnight and day time also but in sculpture form.Other than that, I didn't think much more of this particular site.
I then visited the Grand Theatre site exhibition where, if I can remember correctly, was a piece that was focused on the first ever female to perform at the Grand. I found the layout of this very intriguing as I loved the old style that is displayed. The clothes were shown out on the table with some interesting objects and facts about this. I'm very interesting in this subject, women in history and old fashioned items.
I didn't really find out much about the other works within this area but I did enjoy this specific exhibition overall.
I then travelled to two other locations around Swansea and unfortunately could not find any of these exhibitions. I was then later told we were given the wrong locations! Very disappointing but I still got to experience some work that I may have to compelete in the near future.
While browsing through Tumblr I found this artist, Enrico Ferrarini. His sculptures captured my attention immediately as I had never seen sculptures quite like this before. The juxtaposing elements of the solid figures and the smooth movements creates a very unusual look and kind of distorts my vision. I was drawn to these sculptures for their use of movement
and how they flow, creating a very lifelike presence. For my current project, Fugitive Testimony, I'm focusing on the use of movement and how capturing this through photography can produce very fascinating, varied results. I'm also researching Hypnagogia, which is a state of dreaming and Consciousness, often captured using this technique of morphing objects or facial features through movement.
These
sculptures have inspired an idea I had of mine to create visual distortions
with my face, and create this very blurred effect, as if I have more than one face to capture the result of reality and state of dreaming, Hypnagogia.
For my current project, Fugitive Testimony, I have decided
to carry on with my concept that came from the Dream Task. I found this
research incredibly interesting and found it very fitting to what my ideas of
fugitive testimony are. To begin this project, I initially started to research the
meaning ‘Fugitive Testimony’, and what the words meant separately. Fugitive
means ‘Fleeting, Brief’ whereas Testimony is ‘Truth, Evidential’. These two juxtaposing
phrases reminded me of a project I was currently working on in my visual
studies sessions. This was called the Dream task, where we randomly picked out
a dream from a hat and had to produce a piece of work in response to the dream.
During this task I came across some interesting research about dreams, and the
barrier between reality and dreaming, and the vagueness of truth and fiction. This
is what I wanted to express for my concept of Fugitive Testimony. Related posts to this project Enrico Ferrarini Dark Room Experiments
I was shown this film during a few hours during university. Talk to her is a Spanish drama written and produced by Pedro Almodovar. The style of the movie is set between two story-lines that collide, and these were the stories of Benigno Martin and Alica, and Lydia Gonzalez and Marco. Marco and Lydia Gonzalez met through the Marco's job, which was a journalist. He found Lydia to be a very interesting person, who lead an interesting life as a famous bullfighter so wants to write an article about her. They eventually fall in love, however Lydia came out of a fight very critically injured, which led to her become comatose. This is when Benigno's story fully collides with Marco's. As Benigno was a nurse who specializes in caring for those in comas, and where he is caring for his patient Alica, he met Marco and told him to take care of Lydia, who eventually dies. They then both care for Alica, and from the flashbacks throughout the film, we see how Benigno met Alica before her being comatose. He had stalked for a long while, and became a nurse to care for her. However, during the film we see his relationship as nurse being abused and Benigno rapes Alica, and she become pregnant. Her giving birth to her child is what eventually woke her from her coma, but her child did not survive. I personally didn't enjoy this film for a few reasons. From what others have said about this film, I felt that they felt sympathetic toward Benigno, the complete opposite of what I did. I felt slighly distressed by the film afterward and didn't have a positive viewing experience.The bullfighting aspect of this film was also off putting, personally.
I was given task to complete during
the summer which was to read the book written by John Berger, originally a TV series,
called Ways Of Seeing. I will admit when beginning to read this book, I found
it pretty difficult as I found it very unnecessarily ‘wordy’,shall we say. I’m
not a big reader myself, but I thought it was just a
little too much personally, which initially put me off reading. But it was on my list of things to do before I started University, and so I had to continue. However, I did eventually become familiar with the
writing style and actually found the book incredibly interesting and very important.
I wrote notes about the book as I went along, half to decipher the very wordy explanations in my own words, and because I wanted to remember my thoughts and what was
actually being said. I could then read my notes if I ever want to refer back to
the book, like I am doing now.
My
thoughts of the beginning of the book were quite fascinating, as I have never
actually taken the time to discover my thoughts on certain topics, and how I view reality, which is essentially
my way of seeing. It gave me a sense of what to expect from this book and got
me thinking of how I perceive things, is my own reality.
Every image embodies
a way of seeing, yet our perception or appreciation of an image depends on our
own way of seeing.
The
section that most stood out to me, as a woman, was the interesting concepts
regarding prejudice of women in art history. This is something I am very passionate about
and this book made me recognise something I had never really perceived
as bigotry beforehand. Probably because I’ve never looked into it before.John Berger speaks of the way women are seen by others and themselves, and how they were a reacurring subject in one particular painting category, the nude. He questions 'the nude' and proposes a different way of seeing to the normal concept that a nude is a form of art as one is simply just naked. He suggests that being naked is being onseself, but to be nude is to be seen as an object. The awareness of being seen by a spectator is often depicted in european art, and always as a woman. "Nakedness is seen in the eye of the beholder....They are not naked as they are, they are naked as you see them." Women are taught to see themselves as sights before anything else from the day they are born. They see themselves as sights to others, men, with everything they do. As a woman, I know this to be true and John Berger explains this very well. He takes the example of paintings that depict women looking at themselves in a mirror. This mirror became a symbol of women's 'vanity', and yet it is the male who paints the women naked and gives her a mirror.
Overall, I think it's worth watching these episodes or reading the book as the concepts are still very relevant in today's society.
