#1002assessment2

Close ups of 2nd work titled: $30500

Artwork #1

Absorb and Aspire

Packing tape, cling wrap, video

Dimensions: 1.5m x 1.7m

Artwork #2

$30500

Paper, plastic, 21 x 21 cm each

This is the full view of work number two, titled $30500. The adhesive plastic covering was wrinkled on the code of Set 1, adding to the “worthless effect”.

Row 1 - Set 1 (Before surgical adjustments)

Glitch as being divine: http://theendofbeing.com/2012/04/19/errormancy-glitch-as-divination-a-new-essay-by-kim-cascone/

About Glitch Art: http://motherboard.vice.com/blog/theres-not-much-glitch-in-glitch-art

Jamie Boulton Projecting onto bodies: http://www.amusement.net/2013/07/09/the-glitch-body-art-of-jamie-boulton-human-fragility-and-digital-projections/

Jamie Boulton Projecting onto bodies: http://www.fastcodesign.com/1672753/fascinating-glitch-art-made-with-a-human-canvas#15

Glitch, Gender and Feminism: http://firstmonday.org/ojs/index.php/fm/article/view/5895/4416

Glitch Feminism: http://thesocietypages.org/cyborgology/2012/12/10/digital-dualism-and-the-glitch-feminism-manifesto/

Legacy Russell: http://www.legacyrussell.com/GLITCHFEMINISM

Legacy Russell: http://rhizome.org/editorial/2013/mar/12/glitch-body-politic/

Feminism and Glitch: https://shaunajeandoherty.wordpress.com/2013/11/03/the-cyborg-manifesto-glitch-art/

Forum whether or not photoshopping is good: https://www.quora.com/Why-do-feminists-complain-of-photoshopped-pictures-of-models-in-advertising-and-magazines-when-the-alternative-is-much-worse

http://www.alternet.org/story/153392/unreal_faces_and_bodies%3A_should_the_truth_about_photoshopped_fashion_photos_be_exposed

H&M body issues: http://jezebel.com/5865114/hm-puts-real-model-heads-on-fake-bodies

http://clementvalla.com/

http://leonardodavinci.stanford.edu/submissions/clabaugh/history/leonardo.html

http://www.theguardian.com/news/datablog/2014/feb/03/uk-plastic-surgery-2013-most-popular

https://phillipstearns.wordpress.com/glitch-art-resources/

Also countless images from Women’s Weekly magazine, OK magazine, New Idea Magazine, Google Images Search Engine, Instagram.

Thanks Wikipedia.

For my last assessment, I talked about the inherent sexualisation of women for exploitive uses other than the self-empowerment of the models. Following on from there, I decided that I wanted to focus on how the media industry alters (not just edits) the bodies of the women they take photos of because they believe that the models are worth more and are more beautiful when they weigh less. My works are to be ideally displayed in a gallery.

In my first piece, Absorb and Aspire, I created an installation piece with a 3D sculpture of a child’s body with a video projected over it. The video is fast paced, with a collage of glitched limbs and body parts to create a “perfect body” in each frame. The projection is larger than the sculpture itself to represent how the child’s body has the potential to grow and that the child may grow to aspire to have the body like that of their idols. The large and overwhelming projection also conveys the power and influence that these well-known figures or media outlets have on their viewers and what their viewers perceive to be beautiful. I wanted to remind the audience of how impressionable innocent children may be through the clear sculpture with hollowed out insides. Through glitching the images of the altered limbs of celebrities, I was able to emphasise the hidden error in these images - that they are not real and are digitally created and altered - and really invite the audience to look closer to what actually makes up these “perfect figures”. The high contrast colours of some of the glitched images also attracts attention, hopefully especially those of children and teenagers. I was inspired by how Jamie Boulton projected images onto his own body, as well as how Samantha Monarch projected images onto a plaster sculpture of a torso in her artwork and so I decided instead to make a clear full body sculpture. The sculpture was made by wrapping cling wrap and then multiple layers of clear colourless packing tape around a body to create the shape. The limbs of the sculpture are outstretched, inspired by the aspect of vulnerability inherent in Da Vinci’s Vitruvian Man. The sculpture was then hung onto the wall using clear fishing wire and packing tape. This way, the sculpture is unable to move freely, helpless and susceptible to the powerful forces of media.

My second work, $30500, follows the expenses and worth of a woman and the comments she may experience if she were to undergo procedures to obtain the “perfect” body. Upon reflecting from my last assessment, I realised that language was an extremely important, powerful and useful tool, and through experimentation, I discovered that by displaying the edited code as part of the artwork, it could be a way for me to display words and allow the audience to question, consider and perhaps connect to the artwork better. The work features two sets, each with two images. In the first set, the first photo is that of the glitched version of the un-altered photo. The code editing done to produce this glitched work is displayed next to it. In the second set, the first photo is that of the glitched version of the altered and “slimmed down” photo, and next to it is the edited code to achieve that glitch. I glitched both the before and after photos as I thought that it’d provoke thought among the audience members as they question why both the supposedly harmful altered photos and the natural original photos are glitched. I glitched the original photo as I believe it’d represent how we feel like our bodies are full of faults and imperfections, as compared to the perfect figures on magazine spreads. By also glitching the Photoshopped altered photo, I wanted to allude to the unavoidable fact that the perfect body does not exist and that the goals of many people after seeing these perfect photos are unattainable. The images are cropped to squares with a small white border to reflect the impact and influence that social media outlets, such as Instagram, can have on its followers. In addition, the prints are covered in shiny self-adhesive book cover to make them look stronger and to resemble that of a glossy magazine cover.

Testing out how to display my work:

Glitched image is suspended away from the wall by using small blocks of balsa wood. It was supposed to be printed out on shiny cardboard but my laser printer wouldn’t cooperate.