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The Face: Strangers on a Pier
The Face: Strangers on a Pier - Tash Aw
14/5/2023
In this book Tash Aw uses his own complex family's tale of migration and adaptation, which is reflected in his own face, to examine the diverse social and cultural landscape in modern Asia.
He conveys a picture of a place caught between a fast-approaching future and a past that's hard to let go of.
Aw tell stories from insiders and outsiders, references photos taken from rural villages to urban cities.
He writes about a variety of languages, dialects, and slang terms to explore different cultures. Looking at both similarities and differences.
What I liked about the book:
Soul-searching
Short memoirs
Personal
Humorous
Political
Poetic
Philosophical
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End of year install MFA part 2 (year 1)
Statement:
Desperate for a blessing
Mali, a Jasmine flower.
Mali, the symbol of femininity and motherhood.
Mali, the scent of น้ำมนต์ (Thai holy water).
Mali, reminds me of my home.
Shhh… Mali is awake now…
Allow me to gift you with sweet blessings,
Please accept the sounds of my wishes,
I wish you a beautiful body and a beautiful face,
I wish you happiness and peaceful mood,
A life free from sadness and sickness,
I wish for your ambitions to be true,
With luck and abundance on your side,
Prosperity and respect will come your way.
I started to stray from my regular rituals as my health declined. I would pray, be conscious of the moon and stars, express gratitude for the small things in life, and remember to give thanks to the spirits, Buddha, the universe, and all else that exists. Medication, injections, colostomy bags, and routine operations are now my regular ritual, so I make sure to thank the surgeons and science.
All I seek is protection, is that too much to ask? Apparently so. After all, I suppose I don’t have enough faith or could never turn myself into a believer. How much, though, is too little or too much?
Mali seems tired now, let’s leave her be and we can only hope her blessings come true.
Please! I’m desperate!
STATEMENT FINAL EDIT:
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Plan for EOY exhibition space
26 Oct 23
Desperate for a blessing, consists of 3 video works.
Mali's Shrine - CRT monitor, Main shrine.
GrwMali - Projection, Projector shrine, "Star" house (wall mounted structure).
1 Like = 1 Prayer - IPhone screen, IPhone shrine.
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Get Ready with Mali (GrwMali)
26 Oct 23
Re-working presentation of the GrwMali projection. Rather than projection + fabric + "looking box", the video will be projected on a wall mounted structure that resembles the interior of Mali's shrine. The video will be played using a small projector which will be placed in a small shrine. The shrine can be disassembled for easy transport!
Making of the projector shrine, pictured below:
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1 Like = 1 Prayer
26 Oct 23
Process of making the janky digital prayer + IPhone shrine
IPhone Shrine pictured below:
To be placed on wall mounted shelf. With space beside the shrine for offerings.
The first export was reworked. Changing the portrait into a 3D animation. This was edited because the self portrait is too similar to the character Mali, who appears in the other two works (Mali's Shrine, GrwMali). I wanted the 3D animation to resemble myself, I used the original self portrait and turned it into a illustrated animated.
1 like = 1 prayer Remade, Stills below:
Top left: Medical supplies as offerings
Top right: 1 Like = 1 Prayer
Bottom: Buddha of Medicine
Concept:
Myself as an illustrated animation, spinning around herself, showing the ins and outs of herself. The pretty angles and the ugly ones. My thought process behind this movement was to express how I feel about making work about my internal conflict about religion and spirituality while dealing with a severe form of Crohn's disease.
As my health declined, I found myself straying away from my usual rituals, which was nothing crazy. I was intune with the moon and the stars, I would pray, I was grateful and I made sure to thank "god" for the little things. My current rituals are now meds, injections, colostomy bags, routine surgeries, and now I make sure I thank science and surgeons.
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Notes to expand on for assignment.
6 Oct 23 (will continue to edit this)
500 words (3-4 paragraphs) due 16th October
Reflect on issues implicated contextually through what is emerging in your practice.
Develop key questions.
- Sketching out a space for myself by exploring and expanding with my writing -
Field - other works that remind me of my own. Other writers, politics, theories, cultural implications.
Nam June Paik - use of technology, video art, sculpture and installation methods to question religion and culture.
Hito Steyerl - the use of the poor image.
Martha Rosler - public sphere, investigating topics such as daily life, the media, architecture, and the physical environment, particularly as they apply to women.
Method - Why are these methods and materials used?
Using older technology as an ode to my school years in Thailand, having demonstration videos shown to students from a young age. Eg. How to correctly bow to royals, monks, buddha statues, etc. How to be respectful to elders and what level of language to use with elders, monks, royals, etc.
Using mini architectural sculpture to accommodate video work. Recreating Thai buddhist shrines in a western-esque architectural style which is also void of colour as a way to communicate my uncertainty with religion and believing and finding it hard to fit in a culture being mixed race.
Ideas - What does the work physically indicate, visually represent, symbolise culturally.
Trying to claim a space in a culture, feeling more comfortable claiming that space as a character.
Finding it hard to pray and wish for a blessing, but desperately needing one due to on-going health issues.
Religion as a last resort, religion as a spiritual anchor.
Key questions - What is the work opening up in this conversation? How does it add, enforce, contrast, establish discourse? How do I and my work add to this investigation and conversation?
I think it opens up space for those who are confused and don’t know where they fit in or where they stand. And it’s okay to be in that space for however long you need or forever.
I started this exploration trying to answer these questions I had in my mind, however working through the questions I realised not every question needs or has an answer. Being able to be content with this is the main thing that my work enforces.
Wanting to discover a space where I could fit in comfortably, and I did. The space is a perfect little nook between everything. Not everything is black and white. Just like my ethnicity and my religious beliefs, I sit in the middle. I know there are many others who feel just like I do but it’s not really a topic of discussion. So here I am with my work hoping others will be able to relate, even if they don’t I hope they can understand what I am conveying with my art.
22 Oct 23 -
Using older technology as an ode to my school years in Thailand, having demonstration videos shown to students from a young age. For example, how to correctly bow to royals, monks, buddha statues, and how to be respectful to elders and what level of language to use with elders, monks, royals, etc.
A couple of Thai artists that have influenced my work are Sakkarin Suttisarn and Kamonlak Sukchai. Sakkarin Suttisarn and his series of digital collages that, Transformation of Object to Worshipping, makes light of the possibility that Thai-style rituals exist and are practised elsewhere. Kamonlak Sukchai analyses South-east Asian folklore and its influences on history, national identity, religious belief, and sexual mythology. She frequently uses collage and photography techniques in her work.
I have been using small scale architectural sculpture to accommodate video work. Recreating Thai buddhist shrines in a western-esque architectural style, as well as referencing artists and writers such as Nam June Paik, Hito Steyerl, and Martha Rosler by combining elements of video art, technology, performance, and the poor image, as well as my interest of the act of performing to an audience, theatre and stage design.
By doing this I believe my work touches on the delicate topic and the action of trying to claim a space within two cultures and trying to become more comfortable expressing confusion about religion and spirituality. Whilst referencing my experience growing up in a country where religion is heavily intertwined within culture. Also, the sculptures being void of colour as a way to communicate my uncertainty with religion and believing. Whilst also finding it hard to fit in a culture that sometimes doesn’t feel like it fully accepts me because I am mixed race.
It opens up space for those who are confused and don’t know where they fit in or where they stand. And discovering that it is not a big deal to be in that space for however long you need or even forever. It’s about being able to find comfort in the grey area.
I started this exploration trying to answer these questions I had in my mind, however working through the questions I realised not every question needs or has an answer. Being able to be content with this is the main thing that my work enforces.
Wanting to discover a space where I could fit in comfortably, and I did. The space is a perfect little nook between everything. Not everything is black and white. Just like my ethnicity, I sit in the middle, although not perfectly right down the middle, it’s still an in-between. I know there are many others who feel just like I do but it’s not really a topic of discussion. So here I am with my work hoping other will be able to relate, even if they don’t I hope they can understand what I am conveying with my art.
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Next Video work.
23 Sep 23
Janky digital video prayer. This work is inspired by YouTube shorts I have attached in the previous post.
Above: Sketch of plan from notebook.
Above: Stills from 1 Like 1 Prayer.
Visual: Rather than objects of worship, the video includes medical ritualistic objects. These objects have become part of my daily and weekly rituals.
Audio: The audio consists of blessing used with the buddha of medicine prayer coming from the left and from the right the audio is of a common audio used with online buddhist videos, which are used to spread blessings and prayers.
youtube
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What next? ... Plans for EOY exhibition!
20 Sep 23
To do list:
Re shoot in lighting studio: Mali's Shrine and Get ready with Mali
New shoot - Portraits? Mali as deity, Mali as buddha of medicine.
It's time to do a wrap up moment and bring this back to where it started. I want to bring in the reason why I decided to explore the idea of prayers and religion. Which is my health journey! I have looked into the deity of health and healing, Buddha of Medicine. I plan on possibly using audio of the prayer to accompany a portrait of Mali. The portrait will be in video form: tacky, lo-fi, and lame. Including objects that are part of my own rituals that I have had to adapt to, these objects include: pill containers, colostomy bags, sharps disposable container, alcohol wipes ,skin barrier wipes, tweezers, saline, etc.
I have become fasinated with the act of worship in the digital age.
Below: Youtube shorts of buddhist prayers made with the app CapCut.
Below: Screenshots of pinterest feed after searching in Thai, "Hello Mon/Tues/Wed/Thurs/Fri/Sat/Sun". These are very commonly sent in family groupchats by parents and grandparents. They have become a meme in Thai pop culture. All of the feeds are colour coordinated to match the assigned colour of each day. (The days have their own colours in Thailand)
What makes these YouTube prayer shorts and the daily affirmations so appealing to me is the use of unapogetically bright colours, tacky typefaces, silly transitions, etc. They are so bad and janky but I love it.
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Spring seminar notes.
13 Sep 23
Things to look at:
David Batchelor - Chromophobia
(The western worlds fear of colour)
Marie Shannon - How to construct a picture.
Notes from critiques:
Someone had mentioned that they felt like they had to be respectful as they entered the space. I wanted to achieve a sense of holiness with the space, and I think that if someone had felt like this as they entered the space, I might have achieved the feeling of a ‘numinous space’.
Mali occupies the space well with the placement of the shrine and projection.
Being ladylike? What is it? In a way it feels performative, not only to outsiders but also myself. Get ready with Mali demonstrates the performative nature of being a woman in current times. It is a play on current internet pop culture trends, specifically TikTok and YouTube videos called GRWMs (Get ready with me). The ritual and routine of getting ready to go outside and wanting to look your best to be treated well.
One thing that has been mentioned multiple times is the use of gallery furniture. It's distracting and doesn't fit within the space and context of the work. I will be working on figuring out what can be used instead.
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Things I have been thinking about/looking at.
6 Sep 23
While I perform to the camera/viewer, I can't help but to think of being a women and how it feels almost performative at times.
Mali knows she is there to be watched and worshipped. She doesn't mind interacting with the viewer, almost taunting the viewer with a wide smile in Mali's Shrine. However in Get ready with Mali, she is inside her home getting ready to perform she doesn't want to be watched so she just makes eye contact from time to time and shows the viewer what they are there to see, Mali's hair and makeup routine. GRWM (get ready with me) is a popular internet trend!!! will expand on this trend later.
youtube
Martha Rosler - Semiotics of the Kitchen 1975
Rosler takes on the role of a housewife as she parodies the television cooking demonstrations. Which were popularized by Julia Child in the 1960s. She moves through the alphabet from A to Z, as she stands in a kitchen. She assigns a letter to the various tools found in this domestic space. Her gestures demonstrate the silent rage and frustration of oppressive women's roles. Rosler has said of this work, "I was concerned with something like the notion of 'language speaking the subject,' and with the transformation of the woman herself into a sign in a system of signs that represent a system of food production, a system of harnessed subjectivity."
NUMINOUS SPACE
How to create this space? Came across this term in On the Strange Place of Religion in Contemporary Art by James Elkins.
Numinous (coined by Protestant theologian Rudolf Otto, The Idea of the Holy)
The sudden, overwhelming, and nonverbal presence of the godhead, surpassing all comprehension or understanding: the immediate revelation of holiness.
This is what inspired me to create a "looking box" as a portal to look into Mali's home.
The way the light from the projection relects off of the wall back into the box.
The way the LED candles casts a warm glow on the white walls of the box.
I think these aspects add a slight numinous effect to the work.
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Install day 2
4 Sep 23
Photographs of install.
Panoramic view of installation.
Works:
Left - Mali's Shrine (reworked). Right - Get ready with Mali.
Below is a draft statement for Get ready with Mali.
Get ready with Mali
Projection, 12 minutes 30 seconds.
Another day, another blessing to give.
No time to waste!
Come join Mali as she goes through her hair and makeup routine.
Her home is wrapped in ผ้าสามสี pa-saam-sii (3 colour fabric) a sacred Buddhist fabric which is used to wrap around objects where angels and sacred entities live. Usually found wrapped around shrines and trees in Thailand.
Maybe it keeps her warm in her plain and cold home. Maybe it gives her privacy. Maybe it just keeps her from leaving.
Either way it seems like Mali is there to stay.
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Installing... September/Spring Seminar
3 Sep 23
ผ้าสามสี Pa-Saam-Sii (3 colour fabric) - You will find these fabrics where people believe that there are angels or sacred beings living there.
Here are photos I took earlier this year of the fabrics. Most commonly found wrapped around shrines and trees.
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Video Making
31 Aug 23
I think this piece will be called GRWMali (get ready with Mali). GRWM's are a very popular video trend online. The creator will film themselves getting ready, showing the audience their skincare routine, make up routine, outfit choice, etc.
In this video Mali is getting ready for another day in the shrine. She puts her dress on, does her hair, and her makeup.
I used my phone to film this. I chose to use a greenscreen effect which was available on TikTok (where most GRWM's are found). In post production I put the videos together and placed Mali inside her shrine. It's a plain white interior with a window behind her that she can't see out of.
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Bob the builder mode.
23 Aug 23
Below: Plan for the "window looking box" which will consist of four panels. Top, Sides, Front. The window will be open with window panes attached with hinges so that they can be opened and closed.
Below: Set design model. Interior of Mali's shrine. From here the model will be photographed and greenscreened for another Mali apperance.
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Family Portraits
18 Aug 2023
When I see my parents again I will photograph them. Below is my inspiration. Images sourced online.
I love that no one is smiling (except for the first monk), I love the stiff poses, I love love love the bulky gold borders. Almost reminds me of the border I put around Mali's fun little picture. I subconsiouly did that and wondered why it worked so well.
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