ANNE-LOUISE PILBEAM
ELEMENTS Final Year Blog for PHVP3409
Sunday, 5 December 2010
PROCESS
SHOOT 5 - METHOD AND IMAGES
I think as I am this close to what I really want I need to step back and figure out what I want to capture. Do I want the reaction or do I want the affter effect as a portrait... I am going to now explore both, separating them so they are confusing and not easy to tell what they are. Doing the whole process and describing that process but putting it with a photograph of the after effect on emotions. Or having the moment of panic photograph with all the other ones I capture from other shoots? I'm going to try it all out, then to move onto a new location and method.
SHOOT 4 - METHOD AND IMAGES
Duration - 30 minutes
Location - Bath
Conditions - Warm Water, Full bath.
Uniform - White tank top and black/dark bottoms.
First 10 minutes - relax
10 minutes in - ask them to slowly lower themselves underwater and stay as long as they can.
Recover from panic.
20 minutes in - ask them to do the same as before.
Recover again.
This method worked well... I have now been able to capture that panic and disress I wanted to before. I was strict with how I controlled my subject. I noticed that the first lowering had a much more extreme reaction to the second. In the first one they would not know what to expect. So when the water shoots up their nose and they get the panic of thinking they are going to drown they react dramatically. But for the second lowering they know what to expect and prepare themselves a little more. I tested this method out before I did it for the shoot because I didn't want to put them through something that I didn't understand or feel. By the second time of lowering you know what to expect so you know what to do to try and prevent the water going up your nose... breathe out through your nose. But you can only do this for a short period of time and then you come up in a panic again. By the end of the process your body is confused, and your mind feels like mush. Its an intense method but it worked well. I am going to do another shoot for this on another subject, to see if they produce a different reaction. I'm getting closer to what im trying to explore and discover.
SHOOT 3 - METHOD AND IMAGES
SHOOT 2 - METHOD AND IMAGES
Duration = 30 minutes
Location - Bath
Conditions - Warm water, half full.
Uniform - White tank top and black/dark bottoms.
Ask the subject to be serious and then whatever they say I will dismiss.
Ask them to relax.
10 minutes in - pour warm water over them.
20 minutes in - pour cold water over them.
25 minutes in - 5 minutes to relax and recover.
I chose this method in reaction to my trial method, I took the duration down to 30 minutes because I could still get the emotion and tension through a shorter time that 1 hour. I had the same location of the bath for convenience as I am still at the experimental stage. I kept the water luke warm so it would still get colder - especially when the cold water was poured over their head. I chose equal intervals for pouring the water so they would get a chance to slightly recover but still provoke that nervous feeling of what will happen next.
Overall this second shoot was very interesting, this time a male subject, his reactions got very extreme, he got distressed, upset and confused. I documented this and I have cut it down to 10 images for the process. These images are very interesting. I want to try this method on a female subject to see how diffrernt the reactions are.
FRANKO B
Ultimately, what matters is how these two works provoke us to scrutinize the image, looking for signs of sincerity – in doing so, they court our attention and force us to draw near. That ambiguity is the very thing that seduces us – in our hearts we hold onto the possibility that someone might be crying for us. (“I miss you.”) This is what is disturbing about Franko B’s performance – not that he bleeds, but that in doing so he crosses a boundary, and carries us with him as he does so. He shifts questions about art and emotion to the audience, moving away from the self-reflexive representation of the artist’s emotional state, to the production of feelings themselves – a risky move if ever there was one, if only because he asks us directly if, and how, we plan to love him back. - Jennifer Doyle
Franko B - 'I'm essentially a painter who also works in performance. I come from a visual art background and not 'live art' or theatre, and this is very important to me as it informs the way my work is read. In the last 20 years or so I have developed ways of working to suit my need at that particular time, in terms of strategy and context, by using painting, installation, sculpture, video and sound.'
Franko B performance from Tim Ashton on Vimeo.
Franko B is best known for his live performances, which he began to make in the mid-nineties. He has described these acts as focusing on the visceral “where the body is a canvas and an unmediated site for representation of the sacred, the beautiful, the untouchable, the unspeakable and for the pain, the love, the hate, the loss, the power and the fears of the human condition.” In Franko B’s performances, he uses his own body as a site for the expressive representation of the visceral acts catalogued above. He exposes his own need and vulnerability in a starkly exposed manner that usually incorporates his physical nakedness, and the controlled shedding of his own blood. - David Thorp
Franko B's performance art is so similar to Bruce Nauman, both using themselves as the subject of performance, expressing their passions and beliefs through shocking and interesting work. Franko B's work is so incredibly personal, he exposes himself and his vulnerable qualities in an honest way. I love his use of paint to create himself as a canvas, this could be interesting to use in my own work combining with the water. Like the ideas I had before about having coloured water to see if the reaction is different.
Saturday, 4 December 2010
BRUCE NAUMAN
Bruce Nauman works with sculpture, photography, neon, video, drawing, printmaking and performance art. He has a mathematics and physics background. His work focuses around his interest in language - often playful but he has very serious concerns at the heart of his practice, he is fascinated by the nature of communication.
Frustrated by the human condition, he approaches art making as if creating an ongoing series of experiments in which all the diverse areas of human activity - including written and spoken language, and physical behaviour - are tested.
'my work comes out of being frustrated about the human condition. And about how people refuse to understand other people. Its not that I think I can change that, but its just such a frustrating part of human history'
This video - 'Walking in an Exaggerated Manner Around the Perimeter of a Square' - 1967-68 asks the question - is he doing this to amuse or trying to communicate the mundane aspects of everyday life?
Martin Creed(Turner Prize Winner 2001) about Nauman - 'I think h'es the King, basically - Elvis!'
I find his work fascinating especially his performance art work, using himself as a subject expresses exactly what he wants it to show. This is the way I worked last year, using yourself to create and show an opinion and narrate it through photography and video. This time I am creating a feeling or opinion through another (my sitter) and getting them to express it.