Category: Concealed Illusions

“Time for reflection part two: The future for the project…”

Tom Baines / / Concealed Illusions, Evaluation

 

Our project will not die. The openness of our project has allowed for major development of our piece.

From feedback, it was apparent that the link between the video and the live performance was not clear. This then poses the question – does it need to be?

 

Let us look at how this project could be taken further:

First the Video: (Here is a smaller version)

 

 

There are many connotations with this. Firstly the image is being digitally manipulated or if you like ‘hacked’. The video is hacking a Victorian painting. It is almost as if a Victorian painting is getting a computer virus.  With this in mind I will now mention an earlier post.

 

bob

 

What if this was to happen but instead of it being different pieces of art, what if it was part of the performance. And what looks like a mobile phone getting ‘hacked’ would show a video of idealisation or to avoid the general term art that is more honest. What if the video was to show loads of different images? For example if the project was done again over a series of days and taking a picture on each day and composting those into a video.

 

Now to the live art. What were people’s reactions? From what I could see there was a range of different reactions. Some entered and looked at the performance for a while and left. Others came in looked at the performance and did not enter as there was ‘something different’ on. Others came in and looked around the performance and the room as if we were part of the room.   These responses link back to our original idea of art watching and people watching art. As the site was open to the public it also gives us a power in the room, as we are forcing members of the public to watch.  We were also creating art. (Obviously the drawings and the application of make-up) but the make-up wipes as well. When they were discarded they were a piece of art themselves almost like a painting. As it was paint on paper (sort of).  What if we photographed them and hanged them up in a gallery as a permanent memento to what we did?

Mirror, Mirror on the wall – Reflective Blog

Jessica Jarvis / / Concealed Illusions

Our performance today has been an overall success! From a good sized audience to a well rehearsed structured performance. Setting up today was a lengthly time due to the technical requirements needed for the performance. Ashleigh provided us with the projector for us to use for the John Charmicheal painting which slowly fades into a realistic, harsh, gritty picture of the Brayford water front. The reasoning behind us having this painting still projected on the wall above Venus de Milo drawing is because it reiterates the idealized society that we are in today.

The preparation behind this performance has been well rehearsed. Technology is used through out performance with the use of projection and sound both of which are on a loop. We had plenty of time to set up to make sure the volume of the recording was a good volume so that the audience could hear it. The sound scape was a recording of Kirsty, Sam and me  reading out make-up techniques found of the internet on make-up websites telling you how to apply make up in the perfect way. There is also a combination of painting techniques which interlinks make-up and art becoming a combined piece of masking. These recordings was to highlight the technique of how women are TOLD  to look their best emphasizing on key features in their face giving an extra definition of their face. The impact of these recordings were to show the difference between how we apply the make up in the beginning of our piece, neat, tidy, the “normal” way but the piece develops and how we apply the make up becomes abstract, which contrast with the recording. This heightens the effect of make up technique as what we are doing contradicts to what is being said. The use of understanding where the sheet (a white sheet that is draped along the top of the surface to give a simplistic and neat look) goes is vital for us so that no make up touches the surfaces in the usher gallery, the sheet gave a nice finished touch to the finalized image.

Having the clock in our performance was not only used for the timing and structure for our piece, it was also there to show the durational time of the on-going idealized effort that women/ artists go to make a perfect image of themselves or something else.  The ending of our piece is when the alarm goes off all of us just stand up and leave the room. Towards the ending the make-up is just all over our body, making a masking of ourselves so when the alarm goes its ironic that we just leave, allowing members of public to give their own interpretation of the piece very similar to how they would interetate a painting.

The connection between us and Tom was significant as we was showing the relationship between men and women. The idea of men watching women and women impressing men, power, status, which becomes a cycle just like our movement within the performance. His drawings draw upon the importance of the theme within our piece, as he is making ‘copies’ of us, again reiterating what we are doing, making an idealized copy of ourselves. Where Tom is sat throughout the piece is substantial  because he is sat in front of drawings that are idealized copies of faces, body and Lincoln which shows a strong correlation between the site and our theme.

I am very happy with the development of piece which has created a important, meaningful performance which can only be specifically performed in the Usher gallery. The process of this finalized performance has been a learning experience which has helped me understand the importance and reasoning behind the minor details of our piece.

 

Feminisim

Jessica Jarvis / / Concealed Illusions, Research

‘Feminism is the radical notion that women are human beings’

Fisanick, Christina (2007) Feminism Opposing Viewpoints Series, Greenhaven Press

Our piece developed when we performed it to our fellow peers and Dan. The general feedback we had was questioning the relationship between us (Sam, Kirsty and myself) and Tom. The use of Tom sketching and making copies of us and him being makes him become a superior and the observer, watching the minor details that us (women) do to make ourselves look good.

The link between Tom and us in our performance shows the status and power that Tom has, him sitting on a chair watching us, implying the status that ‘men’ have on women. He is observing us, creating pictures and images of us with make up on, suggesting the illusion and the beauty that men see on women. Identifying the key features that women highlight when wearing make up, particularly when going on a night out, most women ‘dress to impress‘ making the opposite sex become attracted to them.

With us applying make up on, it suggests that we are applying a mask to make an idyllic representation of ourselves to be observed by other men. This is why we stand up and walk to the Venus de Milo drawing, and remove our mask highlighting that we are just copies of ourselves when we have make-up on, removing the make-up shows the true beauty and the naturalistic face, creating a honest picture of ourselves.

 The image of women to look good is pressurized by society through the use of magazines, television, radio etc. It becomes the ‘norm’ for women to to wear make-up. If a woman doesn’t wear make-up you tend to get the questions like ‘why are you not wearing make-up?‘. Why should we be questioned? Why is it, when we don’t wear make-up we feel naked? Because of the pressure to look good and to be an exhibition of ourselves we are creating the concealed illusion copies of ourselves.

 

 

 

“Time for reflection part one…”

Tom Baines / / Concealed Illusions, Evaluation

On the 4th May 2013, at 1pm, ‘The Collection of Concealed Illusions’ was unveiled to the public within the Usher gallery. So now that performance is over it is time for reflection, on how it went and tie up any lose ends and ideas.

 

The performance started with the projection of the ‘Brayford pool and cathedral’ painting, which transformed over the course of a 20 minute loop between this and the digitalised one that I created, which showed the same image only not as aesthetically pleasing. The reason for this was, when the original painting was on the wall in the gallery the small piece of text next to it had said that the painting was ‘idealised’. So as I have said before no swans, no fisherman and no artistic mist. This was the base for our performance. Therefore we intended to reveal to the public, that many paintings are idealised.

 

From this we looked at the modern equivalent of idealisation. ‘Instagram’ a modern iPhone ‘app’ has to ability to add a ‘filter’ to a picture which will leave it blemish free – if you like, a modern idealisation. We then decided to take a picture of the present day Brayford and apply every filter in instagram to it and use them as a link between the video and the rest of the performance, I shall return to this link later. Then of course, the painting of the Brayford was removed and replaced by a local artist’s depiction of the ‘Venus de Milo’ drawn on paper by pencil. At this point we were lost but made this negative into a positive.

 

To our amazement the artist was born around the same time as the painting of the Brayford was done and the ‘Venus de Milo’ drawings were pencil on paper – exactly what I was doing in the performance. To link this in further and without completely scrapping the video and the other instagram images we had printed we decided to instagram a picture of the Venus de Milo and apply every filter and interspersed them amongst the Brayford pictures that would be on the floor.

 

Now to the live aspect of the performance. The girls in the group were applying and removing layers of make up for the duration of our piece – a live representation of idealised paintings.; and of course the similarity between make up application and painting. Here I should return to the link stated earlier. With the video and the photos on the floor it is showing a visual representation of idealised images both modern and past and how idealisation or if you like masking or hiding a ‘true identity’ is still around. I would also seem ridiculous to leave out the fact that this is a gallery. So by having me draw the girls, it is exhibiting the live art similarly to the paintings being exhibited around the gallery.  I am making copies of beauty, just like the local Lincolnshire artist is making copies of the statue of Aphrodite the ancient Greek goddess of love and beauty – the Venus de Milo.

 

Another small theme from our piece is society’s view on idealisation or rather men’s view. I am a male, drawing females. Here there is a sense of men’s view on women when they go out and of course the patriarchal society. But also, with no thought of better word, women exploiting their role to get men to do what they want. In our performance when the girls got up to take off their make-up in front of the projection and the Venus de Milo I turned and watch and continued to draw.

 

A late addition to the piece was the addition of sound which consisted of the girls speaking ‘make-up’ tips which would play on loop throughout and was interspersed with tips on painting. Again this was to reinforce the similarities between the application of paint and make-up.

 

Finally I believe our performance went well and reinforced our key theme of idealisation. Having spoken to some people after about it, it was clear some links they had figured out themselves and once told what the project was about was very clear to them and they understood more.  On reflection I think next time if this piece was to go on or just to develop it further I would like to think about ways in which the performance could reinforce our theme more clearly, however the element of uncertainty made the audience think about the performance more. Next time I would like to experiment the way we could have used the whole Usher gallery and maybe even the grounds.

“The world of Film…”

Tom Baines / / Concealed Illusions, Development, Research, Video Research

Multimedia or video is being more widely used as an art form. As Lori Zippay says in Artists’ Video, “Video may be the emblematic art – making form for the late twentieth century” (1991 p3). And now in the early twenty-first century a media form that is still greatly used if not more. You need only to step from the room our performance is in, to see two video art pieces. Hopefully our video, along with our ‘Instagram’ pictures, and now our Instagram pictures of the Venus de Milo, will hopefully make this connection and enlighten the public. Would this add to the culture of Lincoln? Zippay states that the result of a video in an artistic context is “a singularly dynamic engagement with issues of subjectivity, culture and image making” (Zippay 1991 p3). This is exactly what we hope to achieve by having this video on-going through our performance.

 

Usually video is associated with contemporary art but would it make a difference having a video in a less contemporary environment highlighting some core art values?

 

All art is idealised. It is painted or drawn to make a ‘copy’ of the original, sometimes or rather more likely with artistic merit. With the Brayford painting the information by the side of the painting said that it had been idealised. So, no, the swans weren’t swimming exactly there and they may well have not been a lovely artistic mist consuming the cathedral in the distance. It may not have even been a bright day. Therefore, the reason behind the video is to transform form this image:

To this:

worse

 

This will hopefully make our audience think, or make them aware of this idealistic approach to art.

However as we said before, this very painting was removed and the gallery where the performance will be based has been changed. However the replacement paintings as stated before couldn’t be more relevant. They are copies or ‘idealised drawings’ of the Venus de Milo by a local Lincolnshire artist born at around the same time as the Brayford Pool and Cathedral painting was produced.

 

Hopefully this collaboration between our live art and the video can enlighten the audience.

“museums are invested in challenging those heretofore unexamined principles of organization, shifting from display to experience and inviting a more collaborative process with visitors.” (Bennett p4, 2013). And indeed galleries. Especially the Usher. This point here by Bennett really grounds where our inspiration comes from. Why sit back and just enjoy art? Let’s make everyone think about what they are looking at and what it means. There is even another provocation as to what people would think by having that picture back in the gallery when it has been removed for so long.

 

 

Works cited

Bennett, Susan (2013) Theatre and Museums, Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan

Zippay, Lori et al. (1991) Artists’ Video: An international guide, New York: Abbeville Press, Inc.