Public and Theatrical space

Our initial idea of our purely physical exposure, meant our setting was crucial. We formulated the idea to present our forms of varied nudity in a very public transparent corridor. Its crucial setting was that it was non-framed by the theatrical, safety, provided by the LPAC. We felt to get a fully honest reaction and to be able to push ourselves into revealing, as much physically as we could that we had to be presented to not explicitly drama students and staff. The corridors setting in the middle of a university campus meant the observers would be from varying ages and from different departments. The corridor was based in a position that incorporated art and creativity, as it was located between the art and articheture building, but we began to see its limitation in its potential to present and more verbal exposure.

We found the studio setting began to become crucial logistically to the technical elements we needed to give the piece a soul, the barrier the corridor presented, created distance ourselves from the observers, and even though the glass windows framed us it blocked a connection and human reliability as we felt when stood in the space like a doll in a box, due to the frame and transparent barrier. When in the studio we wanted to create a space that allowed no room for the audience to shy away from the piece, the idea that the space was unnerving due to its intensity meant the only way to shelter themselves from the video and the physical exposure presented was to leave. The space created was a third of the studio black boxed by flats. The door way was a frame, its durational nature was reinforced through this accessibility to seaminglessly entering and leaving. The projections of the video and countdown clock were shown on a black wall opposite the framed entrance. A sofa was in the furthest corner placed facing the film. This suggestion of comfort was placed in the corner so the audience would have to move amongst the reminants of makeup whipes, shoes and removed articles or clothing. This teamed with the performers around the space, meant the desicion to reach the sofa involved feeling they could travel through levels of discomfort and an allusive space In which the lines between audience and performer had been heavily blurred.

The space became instrumental in our execution of the performance, highlighted notably of the physical protection we created around one of the performers when she was visibly upset and her video. The space enabled us to shelter her and block her from the video, which created a powerful visual aspect that the audience due to lighting and space could witness. This unplanned moment was formed in front of a black flat which created a strong performative aesthetic, it was framed in the use of the singular panel directly in front of the video, which meant we were framed lighting aspect even more so, from the light from the film.The exposure of this sheltering formation was key to the audience getting a deeper insight to the moments of pain felt by us as a group for other performers during this experience. It could not be escaped.

Therapy in a performative process

When looking at exposure as a theme, originally we saw a purely physical revelation was the best way to explore this. We began to discover than a mental vunreliabilty was something as complex and uncomfortable to be presented with and to personally expose. Through asking members of the public, the thing you would least last to be asked, we gathered a hundred questions, with content varying from sexual experiences, to physical insecurities and matters of the heart, that we opened and answered. By documenting this process, we began to find subject matters and themes in the questions that forced us to reveal something inner, to the camera, something we found uncomfortable or unsettling to answer, as well as hearing. This concept we took further, but writing questions that delved deeper into the emotions and stories provoked by the publics written questions. Over a period of time the documented change became evident, our answers became more thorough and emotive.The process presented several unexpected revelations, in the sense of learning about the other participants as well as the stream of thoughts I presented.

Our process began to become a therapeutic experience, revealing dark thoughts and experiences for the first time. The documentation of these questions were so organic and genuine, that we did not want to replicate them through a live medium. The security and acceptance installed within the group throughout the various experiments conducted throughout our process, created an environment in which we felt comfortable to release information that we felt we could never fully explore or reveal, in front of an audience.  When exploring a physiological perspective on creative setting used as self-exploration, Carl, R, Rogers emphasizes the explicit link for such therapeutic process to happen due to the setting created by the other participants.

‘The directional trend which is evident in all organic and human life – the urge to expand, extend, develop, mature – the tendency to express and activate all the capacities of the organism, or the self. This tendency may become deeply buried under layer after layer of encrusted psychological defenses; it may be hidden under elaborate facades, which deny its existence; it is my belief however, based on my experience, that it exists in every individual and awaits only the proper conditions to be released and expressed.’(Rogers, 1999, pg. 351) The core conditions that we had unknowingly created;

‘The core conditions are:

– Empathy

– Congruence or geniuses

– Unconditional Positive Regard or a Non-judgmental warmth or Acceptance.‘ (Rogers, 1991, pg.351)

We felt could not be replicated in the [performance by and unknown audience. These conditions, which through varying experiments, acts of acceptance and non-judgmental traits, enabled us all to push our own exposures out and be as honest as possible. Due to the environment we had created not being easily if at all replicated we found the medium of film was the best way of capturing the essence of our answers and truths that then could be in as a scopohilic form presented to and audience. Our honesty’s and reactions where them ‘subjected them to a controlling and curious gaze.’ (Mulvey,19765, pg.186)

We found when filming the answers the other group members observing and not speaking reactions were powerful in their own right. The sympathy or disgust or surprise provoked in itself, was a performative physicalization of our thoughts. It was the body language and facial reactions that we thought was important to incorporate into our performance. Theses reactions were not manufactured and varied dependent of the person witness to the answer. We decided due to authencity of emotion revealed from the speaker and the observer was something we needed to present in the space. The live per formative element in relation to the video of our answers, were no ‘acting’ but were the honest reactions of the audience and our own responses to what we were hearing and seeing. The idea of cringing or crying or turning away, presented us in the most broken down way. This was highlighted through the space in which the piece was presented in and the time it was held for.

1. Rogers, C (1991) Becoming A Person. London, Constable & Company Ltd.

2. Mulvey, L (1957) Visual Pleasure and Cinema. Screen 16/3 (Autum)

The Naked female body and its connotations

The Naked body in its barest form is something that when covered in varying materials can be tainted and viewed differently. Luce Irigaray states from a feminist perspective that womens bodies, are ‘Socially, they are ‘objects’ for and amongst men.’ (Irigaray, 2997, pg.2) This idea suggests the female form is something objectified purely on an image based value system by males. Irigang states that the matter of her beauty decides a woman’s value. Our presentation to the naked or partially clothed form was not something we wanted to be sexualized. The connotation and feminist themes, in which our piece evoked, were although not intentional, we were aware of their place in an all female performance. We know that if we were to have had a male performer it would have completely changed the meaning of the piece, it wouldn’t have been shaped by an equality framed by our gender and would have been much more sexually suggestive by the pairing of the female and male forms put together.

We in our process looked at adding something to varying forms of nudity, which would make it less sexual. We presented the body to a group of member of the public as a canvas, in which they could draw on the changes they felt would make our own forms better. The process of drawing on our flesh made presence of the nudity not crucial, as the changed drawn on became something imprinted on our egos and insecurities as much as on our skin. This plastic surgery based trial became a challenge to the participants and at times they stated they forgot we were in essence naked and viewed our bodies in a more clinical critical way.

Similarly in another experiment ‘The human plate’ We took a Japanese inspired tradition of Nyotaimori,’ Eating Sushi of a perfectly still, naked womens body’ otherwise known as human sushi’ (Bindel, 2010, pg.1) and placed innocence into the performance. Presented to small audience groups were three partially clothed- to fully naked performers, covered in sweets. After looking at forms and the principles between food and sexual fantasies being very much intertwined in the forms of, feederism and veroraphila, we decided the food placed on the body had to be something that had to have in its own right, non-sexual associations.  The direct comparison of themes were highlighted when the naked body presented so explicitly, laying on the floor of a lit studio, and covered with traces of innocent which triggers uncomfortable themes of childhood and indulgence.

1477673_10202832527001255_258972171_n Credit Lauren 11/11/13

‘The idea of placing food on the naked body is a process that is seen through varying cultures in history.’ (Bindel, 2010, pg.2) Both processes were steering away from a sexual nature by tainting the body with textures and patterns traditionally viewed as non sexual and the audiences all stated how they felt sympathy for me as I was always the least clothed. It then swayed their participants, i.e. in the human plate when given the choice to take a sweet of us, almost all the audience members went to me as they felt they wanted to ‘give something back’ in return for the bravery they felt went with the presentation of being naked. Because of the aesthetics of the human plate we began to find it hard for the naked form not to be framed sexually, as people took sweets from my body with their mouths. This sensual act highlighted how even when trying to diminish the sexual frame that we felt limited our exposure it was impossible.

When viewing Beacroft work, such as ‘Vogue’ and the instillation piece placed on the opening in the window of the Louis Vuitton on the Champs- Elysees in Paris, I felt the objectification of the female body scream out of her work. By placing naked models on shelves in windows next to luxury goods, the idea of a women being a desirable object, a possession framed in the window of such establishment was inescapable. The nudity against the leather good not only highlights the principle of ‘sex sells’ but also seems to try and frame women in the sense of perfection against such intricately designed goods. It reinstates the idea of unattainability for the average onlooker with economics, and the design and manipulation of beauty seemed intertwined when placed together. The textures of flesh and leather echoed the idea of the liquid sweet substances such as cream and chocolate placed on our own skin. The bags themselves became ‘sex fueled’ due to what they were placed on and around.

beetag_500-1 Beecroft, Espace Louis Vuitton, 2006

Lauran Mulvey stated this as she states that females ‘With their appearance coded for strong visual and erotic impact.’ (Mulvey, 1975, pg.8) Therefore the act of removing clothing and makeup used to make one more sexually appealing, such as red lipstick and high heels still became erotic. Although we wanted to break down ourselves to its most bare and human, the act of removing clothes with people watching in it is unavoidably a ‘visual pleasure and narrative cinema.’ (Mulvey 1975, pg.7)

1.  Irigaray, L (1997) From this sex Which is not one. Ithaca; University press

2. Bindel, J. (2010) ‘ Iam about to eat Sushi of a naked woman’s body’ The Guardian, 12th Feb, [Online] available from http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2010/feb/12/nyotaimori-eating-sushi-naked-woman accessed on the 7th of November

3. Mulvey, L (1975) Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema. Screen 16/3 (Autum)

Marina Abramovic- a pioneer on exposure

Marina Abramovic’s self-exposure in mental and physical forms is seen throughout her work. Her public relationship with artistic and romantic partner- Ulay, were crucial parts in many of her performances, which due to the nature of their fame evoked by their work were objectified and revealed in a lot of her work. She showed an example of de sexualizing the physical female form in a collaborative instillation piece presented in the opening of Onsolo park, in which bodies were painted silver and intertwined in the surrounding of the park. Many of her works such as ‘Nude with Skeleton’ (2002) and ‘Thomas lips’ (1975) she bares her self naked to an audience and shows her honest reactions to physical pain such as cutting herself with a scalpel and matters of the heart in her durational piece ‘ The Artist is Present’ performance in the New York Musem of Modern Art.

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Marina Abramovic, 2002, Nude with a Skeleton

She exposed herself to judgment as well as physical abuse and even a potential death, giving her audience member a suggestive use of the tools she had presented to them, such as scissors, cigarettes and a gun to inflict alteration to her, in some of her works. Artists such as Yoko Ono presented similar work in her piece ‘ Cut piece’ in which audience cut of her clothes.

Abramovic’s fame has lead her to have many curious fans, despite so much of her works honesty based on her own personal relationships and exploration, she conducted on Reddit an hour long‘ Ask me Anything’ session, in which she answered varying questions asked by her fans. The honesty presented in her answers we could not physically see her forum was much larger, but to me I felt it dehumanized her and her answers were not spoken by typed. This process I had found after we had edited our film and I found in principle it was intimate and truthful but due to the medium it was presented in, it became cold and distanced, the barrier between the audience and the performer was so distinct and strict that I found her answers were not relatable to me. This made me realize how the importance of exposure was in our performer, if were just to have shown the film, we could not have even been in the space or had to witness the judgment and empathy potentially felt by the audience. The idea that for 1 hour 50 minutes and 27 seconds we could not escape the secrets and truths we had revealed, or the looks and thoughts physicalized through human reactions became a daunting prospect. The reason for the medium of the film was to stream the honesty that we thought would have been clouded if we were to conduct the process live. We found by becoming an observer of the film we also were subject to our own live reactions being viewed by the audience.

 

 

We explored the groups inner self

The piece began at 6pm on the dot on Wednesday 11th December 2013. We all started fully clothed, dressed in all black wearing high heels and with a full face of make up. This is us in our most comfortable state. We decided that we would not stand in any order or have set positions, and we were free to move around the space freely.  As the clock began to countdown, members of the group began to break themselves down, stripping themselves of whatever they felt comfortable with, piece by piece. As ‘audience’ members started to enter the space, we could either strip ourselves of more, or put items of clothing back on.

We had hoped that the people viewing the piece would feel in a state where they could explore the space as we did, but in actuality, they decided to stick to the edges of the space, with only a few choosing to take advantage of the sofa. They did, however, interact with the group members through speech and touch, often whispering words of support, or embracing us throughout the piece.

I have never been more proud to be part of a creative process, and I feel we worked well as a group to achieve our aims set out at the beginning of the semester. If we were to re-do the piece, I would choose to make the piece more durational, so we could evaluate how the audience and performers reacted differently over time. I would also like to see how the piece, and the idea of vulnerability in general, would change had we been part of a mixed sex group.

I feel our use of experiments as part of the process has led to us having a better understanding of the concept of vulnerability in general, and the fact that the piece changed so dramatically over time shows that we put a great deal of thought into the most effective way of portraying our initial ideas