'Free Art Booth,' Curated by Peacock, for (e)merge Art Fair, DC
This spanking new series of custom video containers is specially made for the Free Art Booth project. The thought process of evaluating the worth of our own artwork has opened up the discourse with conceptual video art and its relationship to the art market. For an emerging artist that works with this new media, one can’t help but notice that this medium is a hard sell. It’s not exactly a tangible object that can be hung on a wall or displayed on a pedestal. In fact, it’s a highly archival and easily re-produced medium that begs the question, ‘so how much is this worth anyways?’ Unless a collector really wants to spend bank on a limited edition DVD, pay you to create a personal installation, or have a gallery backing you, etc… how do we really value video art? One might note that it hangs in the balance of its conceptual intent or the artists themselves, but in this instance, it seems like almost a necessity to create a tangible case of some sort to create the mindset of actually taking something solid home.
These portable video cases contain one piece of video art with extra info on an SD card. One can expect the SD card to just be re-formatted and recycled for personal use. Even so, these videos are on my online portfolio (video stills can only do so much). If we look at the issue of posting work online, we can already see that images and video are shared, linked, embedded and simply copied all over the interwebs. So we hit the wall again, where’s the value in something so heavily reproduced? Where is the work if a video artist cannot share their art online to a broader audience because it might infringe on its value? Would only being able to view it in an exhibition make it worth more?
Furthermore, inside of each case is a QR code that contains the artists’ name. Anyone with a smartphone and a barcode scanner app can scan this and discover the artists’ name, or a secret message in other editions to this series. This was an intentional choice; to represent the nature of the Free Art Booth in this work and to tie in the digital relationship of the interwebs and digital works. Simply titled, ‘Value Video: A Portable Nothingness,’ I believe that embodies my love with video art and my frustration with this digital medium in the art market.
'Time for a Talk with Mommy & Daddy' / 2007
This
project
was my BFA Thesis and it touches on certain feminine issues. For
the resulting installation, I delved into most feminist movement
‘waves.’ I
particularly touched base on the topics of: gender equality, exploited
past
conventions with sarcasm and showed how the family plays host to
teaching assigned
roles to impressionable boys and girls. I also recorded television
commercials to show my audience the conditioned roles women play in
promoting certain products, hence it's a woman's job, etc...
Audio
is placed inside of each chair, which demands interaction from the audience.
This is a 3 channel video / found object installation… resembling a family’s
living room. When a guest sits in the ‘blue chair,’ the opposing video is a
generic father figure explaining to his son what role he will play in marriage.
Vice-versa regarding the ‘pink chair.’ The third video is a compilation of
appropriated commercials and movies that further explore gender roles in the
context of marriage.
(detail from installation)
Inspired from the 'Wiggs' project, this installation further explored stereotypes in society; particularly women.
'The Wiggs are Coming' / 2006
(DV stills from the 3 channel video installation)
the different wigs is a metaphor for trying a new lipstick, haircut, or defining oneself with a
different social group. It is the suggestion of “trying on” different stereotypes or categories in a
poetic yet literal way, which is acted out in these videos.
Microscopy was an exploration in anything and everything 'micro.' I collected water samples and used a microscope that took images of the samples. I then discovered that I had collected microscopic clams. I animated the images to create 3 videos. I then constructed 3 casings that would house my projectors. Each casing had a hole cut on the top, where a vase with water was placed above. Each vase also had one goldfish inside. The premise of this piece was to utilize my microscopic images to organically and technologically play with light.