MARIA COHEN
UNIT 3
Since Unit 2, Isabella and I have continued collaborative practice based on a topic of embarrassment. We met every week and organized reading groups to discuss the idea. We learn so much about ourselves during these conversations and our personal views on themes, such as sexuality, expression, and oppression, etc. We documented the intimate process as audio, photos, and video: walks in parks, dinners, and casual strolls. This practice helped summarize the core sense of the context; to narrow the discourse behind the topic. During meetings, we recorded every session.
Finally, we realized that the feeling of embarrassment unfolds the weakest sides, make us fragile and insecure. Isabella and I believe that embarrassment does not necessarily make us vulnerable, opposite empowers personality, makes it unique. And it is never about gender because fear itself makes folks equal. We point it out as a natural animal instinct that forces us to be aware of our identity and come out of our comfort zone by challenging ourselves.
Bellow I documented the script from the recordings. I made it unreadable to show the secrecy and privacy of this conversation.
Collaboration Maria&IsabellaReflections on a book "Wet"Chapters "The Erotics of Visuality", "Researching Visual Pleasure" Identitygender paintingPainting is a prerogativity of men. I was struggling sustainably dealing with from the judgemental society and capability of producing something as batling. I can be a female artist and The success does not necessarily comes from people think is successful, it is more about your personal understanding of the success. I am a machine. Concern is very personal. Being a woman always dealing with monsters of beauty inside and embarrassment is a way to provoke the society through the embarrassment to use sexuality as a tool. Prevocational use of theUgly can be beautiful Beautiful ugliness Being a woman always considering I was always punished by society because I am a woman which makes me feel empowered and pushing me to fight through the practice with confrontation between social attitudes, and me as a human being who just using sexuality as a part of a practice. Is I successfully transmitted Embarrassment coming out from the oppression behind the topic of using a women's body as I I feel myself as a man when I paint. it is empowering.woman is a pattern lesbian shows the masculinity because it is a habitual pattern how a lesbian should look lesbian is challenging society show an opposite perspective of view feminity. The extrem is challenging stereotypes and expectations. People have more self-awareness that need to challenge themselves in comparison with them who does not question themselves and feeling comfortable living in stereotypical reality. Our project is about finding your own voice through the embarrassment to express yourself differently to socially acceptable patterns. Minorities trapping themselves because even small groups create society with rules to comparison independency. Indepency empowers a human being because it is only one way to keeping control fragility, vulnerability and fear. Self-awareness which comes through deep digging into yourself pushing you facing fears and own negligibility increases self-awareness, and pushing to coming cross the embarrassment as an uncomfortable feeling. Sexuality in terms of female voice is the male. The body and male. it's more about men and women.
Embarrassment is coming from struggles from society, expectations, traditions, culture, religion andThrough embarrassment to express sexuality Bella and I raise a question WHERE IS THE BOARDER TO BE A WOMAN AND A RIGHT TO USE SEXUALITY AND BODY FOR FREE, AND NOT BEING JUDGED because OF A GENDER. The purpose of us to show personally how difficult it is to show it's difficult to fight only experiencing with diverse media expect a body as a tool. Because only the body is able to express and show the real truth about sufferings, and real struggles from life, which everyone of us dealing with in everyday life. It take efforts and courage to take responsibility using your body as a tool. Although, I am questioning myself should I take responsibility for using my body as a brush or the tool or as an artist, I can use it for free. Perhaps, the society and social norms and dogmas make me feel responsible for using my body because it always a risk to face with neglect and judgmental reaction. The body is the real taboo even if a woman feels real comfort with the body and sexuality and being open about it, but she understands when a nudity involved she will have critics and hate. it's the provocation to use your body as a tease. Being yourself having courage and self-confidence to use your sexuality as a part an women's identity, and still exists successfully in social life, and not being judged from family, friends and neighbours. Personal experience makes the practice towards a real life. following to this guilt trap when I starting feeling guilty about self-confident to use the body as a tool. Embarrassment in a social aspect to use sexuality as a tool and not being judged.
Documentation of our conversations. Script from the recordings
Books that we used for reading groups
Documentation of the process
UNIT 2
Extending of my research
The decision to create Battersea Park happened just in time to save the whole of Thames-side Battersea from being engulfed by industrial building.
The Grand Vista and Fountain Lake
Installation Rabbits love in the Battersea Park
The installation represents an animation which is projected on the pond in The Battersea Park. The original history of this place is controversial as the idea of the animation. The decision to create Battersea Park happened just in time to save the whole of Thames-side Battersea from being engulfed by industrial building. I was hooked this fact and decided to embed my artwork in the precisely balanced and geometrical exterior of Battersea’s park. It seems me interesting to research an idea behind the relationship between the static of the pond and sharp, snatchy, anxious movement of the video. Also. The contrast between naturally green flavouring plants and synthetic luminescent palette of green in the animation as an inevitable and obvious penetration of industrial technological life to real nature. The sound also plays the ambiguous role between nature and frustrating, irritating sound of animation. Which should give noticeable impact on environment around. The fluctuation and shaking of water and plants will be changed depends on the decibel level which is might be interesting for consideration from the side of the technological impact on the environmental ecological aspect of contemporary life.
Performance
Bella and I have been talking about a collaborative project for the past few weeks. We have noticed, since last year, that we engage with similar topic sand concerns, share a variety of opinions about identity, especially surrounding themes of womanhood and sexuality, yet we also have interesting moments where we are different which is impacting in terms of expressing these.
We have been discussing, especially from the side of embarrassment: where we both understand it shining through our practice, for instance, I am much more open to the idea of embracing and confronting it, publicly, through self-humiliation and putting myself in the spotlight even under an ideal situations, although Isabella in contrast much more stubborn to the idea of hiding behind it and make it a personal struggle. Thus, Bella enjoys working on the same project through a long process and period of time in the attempt to obscure these feelings and make them difficult for the reader to understand, and I am differently, approaching my work through multitudes of practices (be it painting, photography, performance etc) and makes them all open to the viewer’s inspection through the engagement with environment. For Bella, these practices are a part of the private process of creating and rarely become exposed in full, for me, it is a way to engage with environment publicly using a symbolic image of a rabbit which becomes an alter-ego of an artist in this performative way of the representation.Bella tends to subject herself to exposure when she has control of the situation and is comfortable with it’s result (for example, when photographing herself, she is very comfortable with nudity, posing, expressing sexuality, but most of the times she is in control - photographing herself - and when it’s not, she tends to step back and feels timid and would rarely treat it as a personal project). I am in opposite feeling more publicly performative in that sense. Embarrassment pushes me to come out of the comfort zone, to defeat my own fears, to scream, to paralyse personal feeling of anxiety, other words keeping it under control using natural instincts of self-preservation.
We have decided to embrace these differences and have been trying to explore this topic of identity together. Since Bella's practice is heavily rooted in writing of her feelings and emotions and me is a lot to do with video and self expression through performance, we discussed merging these together in a way that feels very truthful and real, to really document our way of thinking which becomes so evident when we are casually discussing it. We learn so much about ourselves during these conversations and our personal views on themes such as sexuality, expression, etc through our walks in parks, dinners and casual strolls that we decided to have me document the whole process as audio. From such footage, Bella will engage with her normal private working-process: sit with these thoughts for a while, whilst listening to the tape, and try to condense them into personal discourse that is very truthful to how she feels about it. She will mix these both of our thoughts, though obscure them in a way that becomes hard for the viewer to actually understand the full picture - as to continue to explore this idea of her private space. This will be her comfort zone, since she wants to embrace, hiding behind embarrassment, yet still in a confidential tone, unfiltered thoughts - just more obscured. Bella wouldnʼt necessarily classify this practice as hiding embarrassment even though it can be viewed as this, because for her it is just more about being selective and private and really filtering what becomes revealed. Maybe through enjoying mystery.
I will then engage with this text, in type, very publicly and almost through self-humiliation. This will be a public performance where I will walk around, dressing up like a rabbit or wearing a rabbit mask with latex very tied clothes, playing it loud and behave like I am engaging in conversation with it. The viewer will probably feel confused about such behaviour, but I will have to be confident enough to keep going and ignore criticism or judgement - or not even ignore, I might be engaged with it, but will still carry on and engage with it.
This process will be in the video (weʼre still trying to figure out who will do it) and the performance will be a test to my way of approaching art - in an obsessive and addictive process of taking myself out of the comfort zone a trying out as many possibilities of testing my identity. Noticeably that, we both will be testing our boundaries and, even if Bella will not necessarily perform, the idea of working collaboratively is challenging for her because it means sharing control, and having voice in tape is also something that makes her practice more obviously public. I will also, have to truly understand my boundary with public embarrassment and testing my comfort zone and how far I can stretch it, to fully understand how broad my way of approaching my art practice in terms of identity can be considered.