lisamccambridgeart-blog
Art progress
Following the progression of my thoughts and processes mainly through images
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Artist Statement Lisa McCambridge 16-01-2017
Artist Statement Lisa McCambridge 16-01-2017
The main focus of my work had shifted at the start of this term. I started exploring female body image in today’s society. I based my dissertation on this; I thought it was a good direction to take my work, so that the research I do for my written work can help inform my practice.
In my work I want to display the female self and how they are sometimes made to feel unworthy in their natural form. The notion that layers of make-up and material has an impact of the self-worth of many individuals is put onto us from the media and many other sources. We use things like shape wear and different app on our phones to constantly edit ourselves. I had been playing around with the most popular editing App on my phone and it was quite eye opening, because it taught me how easy it is to get addicted to this type of technology. At first my editing skills were not very good, but with some time and practice I actually started to prefer the edited photos over the originals.
The one on the left are a few of my first attempts at editing and they look very unnatural and tampered with, but the one on the right is done much more subtly and so is hard to see the edits, unless accompanied by the original. Slimming the face, taking out blemished and whitening the teeth are some of the most easy tools to use, and they make you image look more attractive, but we have to ask ourselves, it this still us in the image? Or just a stranger that we’ve created. I feel it is easy to lose the truth with these technologies and we start believing our own lies. This is when I started getting interested in Charlie Brookers T.V series, ‘Black Mirror’. In this, Brooker display how easy it is for our society to get lost in the technology, how in the future, we most likely will be almost controlled by our obsession with needing the latest technologies and our addiction will be the end of us.
I feel there is a long way to go in my work as this is all very new to me. I want to do a lot more research and learn more about this subject. I have been looking at John Morris’ sculptures as a source of inspiration. John Morris’s striking sculptures give the viewer an insight into the human heart. Morris’s wooden works of art are a blend of contrasting viewpoints between darkness and light, magic and stark reality, and softness and strength. I’m also very influenced by Chang Lins work, his photography work is very graphic, shocking and sometimes hard to look at. But he displays these raw truths, that as a society we try and hide. Simple things like a woman’s menstruation, which somehow has become almost taboo, he displays confidently and for all to see. I love the brashness of Lin’s work, and want to encapsulate his blunt projections of the trust behind women’s beauty.
I want my work to make people think twice about how they judge others. I hope it inspires people to not rely so much on beauty products and feel more comfortable in their own skin. I also hope it carries a partial shock factor, due to the fact I believe when an audience is shocked by a piece of work, they are more likely to remember it and become interested in learning more about it and what it is trying to convey, rather than just walking straight past it and not giving it a second thought.
I am only focusing on female body image to start with as it has a more personal connection to myself. I might end up investigating the male image in media and how they feel they have to change themselves to make themselves feel better, later on in my work, but for now I plan to primarily look into the female side. I also feel that media and society target the female figure more than they do the male, but this is slowly becoming more equal and more pressure has being directed at males.
My work is going to be very close to home and I will be looking into myself and those close to me, to get a better perspective. My work is trying to uncover why people have such a hard time accepting their own body and what our obsession is in trying to constantly change and modify ourselves.
So I’ve been taking photos of myself and editing them, to enhance certain aspects, like say enlarging my lips, making my nose slimmer. Enhancing the cheek bones. I’m editing photos to look like what I feel the media is trying to enforce onto society. So my work is trying to point this out and then question it.
I’ve also been playing around with the idea of using children and editing them, because this self-obsession and self-hatred seems to start at a young age, so I plan to bring this to attention through my work also.
A new project that I have just started it a series of photography that I’ve been doing with Lauren Brown. This is an attempt to try and display my own insecurities and to play around with the idea of the constant need to edit ourselves.
I’m just starting this work and have no idea where I’m going with this. I just always wanted to explore my own body through art, as I, like so many others, have never felt at home in my own body and have had many body image issues in the past and present, this has led to some unhealthy life choices when I was in my teens.
Drawing these focus lines on sections of my body I have issues with now, or maybe have had in the past, are an attempt to display discomforts I have. I’m playing around with ideas on how to display these image issue through my art work. It is also a play on how we are constantly editing ourselves online and how this leads to many of us wanting to eventually edit our physical bodies through different means.
Next I’m planning on doing a series of photos on ways we cover up our insecurities like wearing body shape-wear, covering our faces in makeup and basically creating this other self for the outside world to see.
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Bibliography of research used during this project so far
Abramovic, M. (1974). Rhythm 0. Rhythm 0. Tate, London.
Apple. (2013). Perfect Ap 365. 6.34.16. World Wide: Apple.
Art, K. (2011, May). Baby. Bharuch, India. Retrieved from https://www.facebook.com/kanaiyaart
Bouguereau, W. A. (1879). The Birth of Venus
Bonnett, C. (2010). Basic Printing Methods. Outlines.
Brooker, C. (Director). (2011-2016). Black Mirror [Motion Picture].
Calvin Klein. (1993). Obsession. Calvin Klein Underwear. New York.
Eaton, A. W. (2012). Basic Formulation of the Feminist Critique. In H. M. Levinson, Art and Pornography: Philosophical Essays (pp. 5-6). Oxford: Oxford University Press Scholarship.
Eaton, A. W. (2012). The Male Gaze. In H. M. Levinson, Art and Pornography: Philosophical Essays (pp. 16-43). Oxford: Oxford University Press Scholarship
Gibson, C. D. (1894). The Weaker Sex. The Weaker Sex. Art Students League of New York, New York.
Gibson, C. D. (1901). The Crush. The Crush. Art Students League of New York, New York.
Jones, A. (n.d.). Welsh Cobs & Pobl. Wales. Retrieved from http://www.aneurinjones.co.uk/
Kanayia. (2011). Elder. Bharuch, India. Retrieved from http://www.desipainters.com/tag/kanaiya-art/
Lin, Y. C. (2015). 3 cm. Taiwan.
Oursler, T. (2012). Face to Face. Denmark.
OURSLER, T. (n.d.). Super Pop (and Not). New York.
Stearns, P. N. (2002). Fat History: Bodies and Beauty in the Modern West Paperback. New York: New York University Press; 2nd Edition.
Stice, J. K. (2004). Thin-Ideal Internalization: Mounting Evidence for a New Risk Factor for Body Image Disturbance and Eating Pathology. SAGE journal.
Wolfe, N. (1991). The Beauty Myth. London: Vintage.
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CHARLIE BROOKER- Black Mirror
Me and Tim discussed this in one of our tutorials and Brooker’s work is very influential to my practice at the moment. The way his series looks at our society and make a kind of prediction as to what it will be like in the future is very haunting. I feel the way he used technology to make remarks on society is kind of what I’m trying to do in my work. This selfie generation has created an obsession when it comes to self image, and the fact we can now photo shop our images to make ourselves appear ‘perfect’ has brainwashed our generation. I fear that we start to feel that the images we post online are our true selves and out physical bodies are a flawed version or what we could and should be. We deceive those around us and even more frighteningly, we deceive ourselves to the point that we are actually now kind of disjointed to see our real reflection, we would much rather see the fake image we have created online.
Black Mirror is a show that features speculative fiction with dark and satirical themes that examine modern society, particularly with regard to the unanticipated consequences of new technologies.
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My Body Issues displayed. Raw images that I want to work with further
I have been playing around with doing some photography work. This is an attempt to try and display my own insecurities and to play around with the idea of the constant need to edit ourselves.
I’m just starting this work and have no idea where I’m going with this. I just always wanted to explore my own body through art, as I, like so many others, have never felt at home in my own body and have had many body image issues in the past and present, this has led to some unhealthy life choices when I was in my teens.
Drawing these focus lines on sections of my body I have issues with now, or maybe have had in the past, are an attempt to display discomforts I have. I’m playing around with ideas on how to display these image issue through my art work. It is also a play on how we are constantly editing ourselves online and how this leads to many of us wanting to eventually edit our physical bodies through different means.
Next I’m planning on doing a series of photos on ways we cover up our insecurities like wearing body shape-wear, covering our faces in makeup and basically creating this other self for the outside world to see.
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Cheng Lin’s photography is unsettling and visceral, and each photograph provokes a reaction in it’s audience, often gut-wrenching or cringeworthy. Some of the photographs are obvious in how they’re harrowing, by distorting the human body or by forcing an uncomfortable perspective. Others just leave the narrative out completely, and rely on subtlety to tell their stories.
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Yung Cheng Lin
“The main appeal is to discuss the morality issue especially in women... the definition this society nowadays has given to women is quite narrow, judgmental, and unfree, and the media has great influence on it particularly,” - Yung Cheng Lin, ‘The Creative Project’, 13th July 2015
“When people don't follow the latest fashion trends, they are considered as out-of-fashion or black sheet. This phenomenon is obvious to see among women. For instance, women need to shave hair or lose weight to keep good shape.” - Yung Cheng Lin, ‘The Creative Project, 13th July 2015
It’s a widely-told tale that it takes a great amount of discomfort to bring about change. Yung Cheng Lin, under the name 3cm, is a Taiwanese artist who puts this concept behind his portraits of women, femininity, and women’s bodies.
Lin displays the discomforts women put themselves through on an everyday basis. He also plays around with taboos and pains we as a society try to hid, like a women's menstruation, which is one of the most natural things in the world, but we as a culture see it as an embarrassing inconvenience that should be hidden away and almost ashamed of.
He also plays around with body image ideals, and how many women feel the need to be increadibly thin and almost unhealthy just to fit in and be appealing to the public.
I've chosen to look at Lins work as I want to display some of these issues through my own work. Mainly the body image issues, but i have been thinking about going into the outfits we wear to impress those around us, and the sometimes dangerous shape wear women use that can put too much pressure on our internal organs.
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Marina Abramovic
Rhythm 0 by the Serbian artist Marina Abramovic comprises seventy-two objects set out on a long table covered with a white tablecloth, as well as sixty-nine slides. The slides are projected onto the gallery wall above the table from a projector which sits on a stand. Among the objects on the table is a framed description of a performance piece of the same name that took place at Studio Morra in Naples in 1974. The slides document this performance and the objects replicate the original props used. Many are perishable items, such as foodstuffs and flowers, which need to be replaced each time the work is displayed. The work was remade for exhibition purposes in 2009 as part of the Abramovic’s retrospective exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art, New York. It exists in an edition of three plus two artist’s proofs, and Tate’s copy is number one in the edition.
The list of props in the work is as follows:
1.gun. 2.bullet 3. blue paint 4. comb 5. bell 6. whip 7. lipstick 8. pocket knife 9. fork 10. perfume 11. spoon 12. cotton 13. flowers 14. matches 15. rose 16. candle 17. mirror 18. drinking glass 19. polaroid camera 20. feather 21. chains 22. nails 23. needle 24. safety pin 25. hairpin 26 .brush 27. bandage 28. red paint 29. white paint 30. scissors 31. pen 32. book 33. sheet of white paper 34. kitchen knife 35. hammer 36. saw 37. piece of wood 38. ax 39. stick 40. bone of lamb 41. newspaper 42. bread 43. wine. 44. honey 45. salt 46. sugar 47. soap 48. cake 49. metal spear 50. box of razor blades 51. dish 52. flute 53. Band Aid 54. Alcohol 55. medal 56. coat 57. shoes 58. chair 59. leather strings 60. yarn 61. wire 62. sulphur 63. grapes 64. olive oil 65. water 66. hat 67. metal pipe 68. rosemary branch 69. scarf 70 .handkerchief 71. scalpel. 72.apple
IMPORTANT
This performance piece is the bravest piece I have ever heard of, it takes incredible guts for anyone to leave oneself to vulnerable. It was amazing to see how the audience reacted and got involved with this piece and how cruel humans can be when they are allowed to. She allowed them to do whatever they like with the object on her, and this created a very shocking response from the audience. I feel no one could have anticipated what the public would do when they got set loose on an individual. It started off quite playful, tickling her with feather, then became like a form a torture as they started using some of the other object against her.
This is a vital piece for all artist to look into if they are ever planning on involving the public in any of their performance pieces, because it is vital to know that people can be cruel, so you have to think through all the outcomes and dangers, before you allow the public to involve themselves with you and your work.
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Naomi Wolf - ‘The Beauty Myth’
Blurb
In the struggle for women's equality, there is one subject still shrouded in silence - women's compulsive pursuit of beauty. The myth of female beauty challenges every woman, every day of her life.
Naomi Wolf exposes the tyranny of the beauty myth through the ages and its oppressive function today, in the home and at work, in literature and the media, in relationships between men and women, between women and women. With pertinent and intelligent examples, she confronts the beauty industry and its advertising and uncovers the reasons why women are consumed by this destructive obsession
I need to read this still, This is on my to do list!
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http://www.tonyoursler.com/
Tony Ousler
I looked into Ousler’s work, after Tim Davies suggested him as an artist that I might find interesting. His work is quite comical to look at and the way he distorts and selects sections of the human face is interesting and very eye catching. This art is my type of art as I like art that draws its audience in and makes them question the reason behind it.
Ouslers ‘Super Pop’ series was the most interesting to me, how he places the works in the Galleries makes his work very approachable. Using new image-processing technology, which at the time allowed for sophisticated photographic, high- resolution manipulation, such as stretching, bowing, and twisting, Oursler began to shape a cast of digital pets or companions. Based on the notion of a caricature, this series references a wide variety of sources, from Harvey Ball's 1969 smiley face, to the fertility goddess Venus of Wilendorff and Japanese manga. The often overtly humorous, somewhat grotesque characters attempt to seduce the viewer in various ways.
“[Oursler's] position on the exploratory edge was again evident... when he introduced a new brand of mutants. Stepping inside, viewers could imagine that the toons from Roger Rabbit had taken up residence in the gallery. Eight animated, phosphorescent, biomorphic creatures, varying in size and shape and displaying human characteristics like eyes, teeth, and mouths, occupied three rooms. Oursler used his own or friends' body parts for the projected human anatomy. At first glance, these bizarre alien beings might appear entertaining. However, one realizes all too soon that behind the blinking eyes, fluttering lashes, big beaming smiles, gleaming teeth, and puckering red lips, this pageant of projected images aglow with endearing virtual faces is not a funny affair." - Elaine King
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Tutorial with Tim Davies, Notes and thoughts. 19-10-2016
Tutorial with Tim Davies, Notes and thoughts
19-10-2016
Tims Notes –
Dissertation- Female Body Form. Does art influence female body image or does female body image influence art?
-Obsession with change of ourselves and how this is more accessible and excessive -> Selfie Generation -> ‘Perfect App 365’ -> media’s influence. “No Filter No Upload.” – Sam Taylor, Speech on Selfies, 22nd September, Camp Jones Gulch, California.
TONY OURSLER -> the outcome is less confidence; came reality doesn’t match image. Make believe becomes normalised, it’s as if a persons real image doesn’t count, and its all about the edited versions we put online.
“People Believe what they’ve created is real. They look in the mirror and are disappointed.” Lisa McCambridge, In the Studio, 19th October 2016.
NAOMI WOODS- ‘The Beauty Myth’
Subjectification of the Female Form
Consider creating a single series of selfies that are manipulated online, BUT then also get hands on with it – Scrunch/screw up/ tear/ photo copy the misshapen pictures.
CHARLIE BROOKOR- Black Mirror –> victims of Brookers imaginations and a mockery of our society and a predictions of how unmoral our world will become due to technology.
SOPHIE CALLE – The Letter -> (2010) it premiered unlike re: surveillance and creative alternative narratives.
JENNY SAVILLE – flesh. Female Images.
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I have always have had body image issues, but doing Pole fitness was interesting to me, because I no longer was just focusing on making my body look good, just for visual effect, I now had a purpose for my body to be more slight and toned.
Having to expose my body for this sport was a huge issue for my at the start because I was so self conscious about my body and I always felt so frumpy, but having done this for a while, I have gotten use to have my body out and accepting the belly rolls that are created when doing certain moves. This interested me and made me want to explore further, how exposing ones self can actually be more mentally healthy than covering up oneself with layer and layer to make yourself feel better and more secure.
It seems that once you have fully exposed your flaws to people there is less to fear as there is no longer anything to hide so in turn you in a way become more accepting of your own body.
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Exploring the female form in different materials, or different surfaces is a great start to this new movement in my project
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getting back into life drawing made me want to explore body image as a whole
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I thought it would be fun to play around with how we can manipulate our image, so I have been playing around with different types of makeup that wouldn't normally be used to change ones self. Normally one would use makeup to decrease ones age and make ones self more appealing, but I wanted to try the opposite to see the affect it would have
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