Copper Bells

This is a new project I am working on.  These are raised copper breast bells.  The piece talks about beauty and objectification.  They are not presented formally yet, this is just a demonstration of how they sound.  When completed, there will be probably 4 more bells, each with its own stand and proper mallet.

Ave Regina

This is a piece that was up at Claremont Graduate University for the week of May 5-11, 2013.  The space is referred to as The Nook, or alternatively The Niche.  The title is Ave Regina (Hail Queen).  The piece is made of wood, with steel brackets, bolts, nuts, screws, and house paint.  The long painted 2x3's are hinged by the brackets to the wooden arches making them movable, so they could adjust to the space.  (I built this in the sculpture yard for the most part, and then assembled it in the nook.)  The space is about 20 ft deep, and 12 ft wide.  I took most of the pictures at night so there is this dramatic lighting effect going on.  

I should mention this is a vagina dentata, and the second one I have made, at that.

Feminization as Equalization, Installation at The Loft.

I have been invited to do an installation at The Loft in Downtown Pomona.  It will be up for one night only, this Saturday from 6-8pm.  My piece will be up alongside Dominique Ovalle's paintings.

  The piece is called Feminization as Equalization.  The piece explores the notion that a masculine environment can be balanced by adding the feminine.  The piece consists of a aluminum and steel frame with pink and blue thread tied to it like an excessive fringe.  These strings are then attached to the walls and floor to create various patterns, but are also at times overlapping and meshing together.

You can find out more about the space here:
http://lofton2nd.com/

Wax Paper Installation

The idea of feminizing space is the idea of seeking a more balanced equal world.  This piece is my first major attempt to study the "how" of feminizing, to see my ideas work on a physical and visual level.  I was lucky enough to gain access to one of the MFA thesis galleries at Claremont Graduate University (where I'm attending) during the off season (summer).  Its a big rectangle: 37.5 feet long by 25 ft wide by 16 feet high.  The space is gorgeous with blank white walls, white ceiling and white track lighting, and a used but wax cement floor.  The problem is the shape, which is a box. 

The rectangle, the cube, the box, the square are all the shapes we are exposed to with architecture.  There are reasons for this such as maximization of space, efficiency in building, ease of located/manufacturing building materials to name a few.  These are all concerns whenever building anything, but somehow they have won in the minds of designers and architects and those with approval stamps and gold start stickers.  My argument is that they are a masculine concern and there are a lot of social implications of a created environment that are neglected and ignored or even disbelieved because it can be detrimental to the male ego.  To say that a room would have influence over you is to say you are week.  To say that a social concern is your concern is to say that you are weak.  I don't exactly agree with gender roles or column A is female and column B is male, but when they are thrust upon society to a point that you are raised with a sense of these roles and standards through generations, they do mold your conversations and ideas.  Rectangular rooms are everywhere.  Most architecture created in the last 50 years gets innovative only when seeking to offer variation to the rectangle, and are hard pressed to throw it out completely.  We are surrounded by rooms, buildings, shed, bus stations, offices, telephone booths, bathroom stalls, etc. that conform to this shape. 

Feminization of Space, Wax Paper is me trying to examine the question of what kind of power does an environment's shape hold?  What happens when we leave those shapes behind.  Does changing material help?  This installation started with a solution of weaving material together as a quick and easy way to replace the straight walls an d corners with a rounded wall.  The material needed to be white so it blended in with the existing walls.  The goal was to change the shape of the room to something more organic and rounded, less symmetrical, and to a softer material.  The lighting was such that you could not see the actual walls of the room, just my alteration.  I chose basket weaving as the method to create this piece firstly because of its form building ability, and that it could use lightweight material and still work.  Secondly it does bring other feminine aspects to the room being a domestic/craft construction method.  Something on a roll seemed not only practical for the act of construction, but also would act like a fat string in weaving.  Wax paper wound up being the medium of choice, as it was very cheap and translucent white, so that it would still allow light to fill the space and the color would blend in with the wall so it would help create the feeling that it was part of the room or part of the wall.

Though I agree with the comments I received about the appearance of the outside (that the outside is just as interesting to see as the inside), the work is meant to be viewed from the interior only.  You walk into a room that possesses all these qualities that are lacking in the traditional box format.  The "walls" themselves glow because of the nature of wax and having to place lights outside the piece because of lack of track inside the piece.  The weaving added a (albeit unexpected) sense of movement which is not typical to architecture or rooms.  Weaving also brought about the association of fabric to the viewers which in turn reads as cozy and warm.  Socially I think the shape created provided more options for someone occupying the space:  I spent an afternoon in the space to try to pick up on nuances that I might have missed in making the piece, where I was mostly experiencing the outside.  the curves of the walls allow you to tuck yourself under the wall a little if you were so inclined.  The space did not feel overwhelmingly vast, empty and boring as the room normally feels.  Though the size of the room was shrunk in the creation of the piece, it still feels big because I left the top open exposing the ceiling.  As the AC kicked in the wax paper gently and delicately moved and covered the industrial hum of the ducts with a light crinkly sound.

I think I will definitely be examining this concept again, with this specific method of altering the shape of the predominantly masculine architecture.  With perhaps a grant I'd like to use fabric and weave more carefully to create a larger piece in a space where you can experience the inside and outside of it.  Something like a mall or office atrium, where the second floor would have a view of the exterior and the first floor could experience the inside.

Loose thoughts on Feminist Theory

Before I begin, let me just say that I have been thinking about feminism a lot as it pertains to art, my life, my art, and questioning it as a position, while trying to pin down the current wave of feminism in art and what this era of feminism is championing.  These questions and subsequent examination has been more heavily motivated by the recent bouts of sexism that has been experienced by American women from male political figures campaigning for presidency and in congress, along with conservative media and personalities, and the scores of crap on TV that present women as tits and ass, bitchy, and materialistic.  The conversation surrounding women's reproductive rights (specifically the right to affordable, effective birth control) has served as an impetus for a lot of women wonder where our equality has gone.  

I have an idea for an installation that involves bringing a curvy floral line along a flat wall.  Ideally this would be done in a hallway or alley, or even a room.  Beyond the normal concepts I have been exploring in my work, the thought occurred to me that this could apply as feminist. 

A room or alley or hallway, consists of flat, straight walls, a floor (also typically flat) and perhaps a ceiling.  It is the epitome of minimalist shapes (the square, or rather cube in three dimensions) and completely geometric at that.  Art History and current artist’s theory refer to minimalism as a male dominated movement, during a male dominated market.  Beyond that it was a man’s artist that created the work; minimalists were not touchy-feely artist types, too sensitive to do anything but paint.  Minimalists smoke and drank as they defended their canvases, the Ernest Hemingways of the art world. 

In both painting and sculpture the forms that dominated were heavy, base, and weighted, if not geometric.  I would argue that there is a masculine aesthetic in these chosen forms, the artists perhaps unaware or concerned with gender in their work.  In fact I would say that it wasn’t pointed out as masculine until some women came along declared it so.  (Maybe not declared, but these women offered something to compare it to that then created the notion of gender aesthetics and started to be applied to more historical artworks retroactively.)

The room, building, and other basic architectural forms are rather masculine in aesthetic by this argument.  They are simple, geometric, with no applied detail.  This is not an old way of building, either.  There are warehouses, commercial properties, and business parks rising up all over the place in my neighborhood and this is what they are: simple, giant cubes.  Colors are white, tan, beige, black.

To take this masculine form and to alter it, add to it, fill it would be changing it to feminine.  In my idea the walls would still be seen through the piece, so does that make it neutral in gender, or consist of both?  Is it now more overtly feminine because the female aesthetic is on top of the male?  The act of taking over –domination- is considered a masculine act… so can you really call the piece feminine? 

There are no real answers to these questions, unless you consider the work to which its applied (and only that work).  In that way, I would be curious to see how people would consider my work.  I don’t create with the idea of it being feminine or feminist.  I merely follow through with the images that appear in my head… cultivate them to a point of reality and send them through a course of fine tuning based on visual aesthetics of yours truly.  Though after writing this I am no longer able to say that I haven’t thought about it.  In which case I would defend my work as being gender androgynous.  I also do try to be mindful of the materials and construction of my work so that there is a balance presented.