Malia Spencer

Maim Queen

[kayaschaap]

project 4: tic attack

artist statement

So, I have Tourette Syndrome, and multiple occasions I've been told by friends, an art professor or two, and my sister that I should do a video and/or art based on my tics. However, I have always disliked being in videos or taking photos because they almost always capture a tic or two and I hate the way they look. I avoided the idea of filming. my tics for a while because it felt weird and a bit personal, but I continued coming back to the idea and decided to go for it.

I placed myself in a white "box" that I created and dressed in black. I intended for the lighting to be more direct and shine mostly on my face, but I struggled to achieve this with the supplies I had at home. The goal of the white box, black clothes, and lighting was to capture how it feels for me to tic in public. Most of the time people hardly notice, but it feels like everyone saw or heard it. Now, I know about the spotlight effect where we have a tendency to overestimate how much other people notice about us, but tics take that awareness to the next level for me. As my tic disorder from elementary school developed into Tourettes my freshman year of college, I began to cope through humor (healthy humor!). It's made life with unintentional stretching and shaking, occasional cussing and random sounds much easier. Additionally, it always feels like a bit of a taboo subject for others to talk with me about, and I want to break that barrier. So in my performance piece, my goal was to not suppress my tics, and also not laugh at the bigger ones like I normally do (I slipped up a few times, but that's alright). I filmed myself for about 5 minutes, and then cut the video down to the "best" segments of my tics. (however, the video is sped up to get close to the 1 minute mark)

Although I only have a few at the moment that you can see in the video, I have a whole array of tics that aren't displayed here. In my attempt to become more comfortable with my tics and normalize talking about it, I'd like to share a few with you!

I used to click my tongue with my mouth closed

sometimes I pound my phone screen kind of hard with my fingers while I type

for a while there my right hand would shake like I was doing jazz hands

my vocal tics tend to circulate around words with the sounds "st" or "t" (hence the words in the video shit and just)

luckily, for the time being, my tics aren't hindering my day to day life, but I have one or two that makes eating very difficult

oftentimes, I'll copy a word or phrase that someone says to me after they say it (this one makes my sister mad lol)

The tics in my video include:

I'll clench my stomach a few times in a row

touching the tip of my nose

a weird throat sound?? (i hate this one!)

some words

stretching my neck

and blinking weird

Thanks for reading this far and watching my tic attack video :)

[tobeaschwa]

Dress Up, a performance

I was kind of lost as to where to go for this project, but I wanted to something about gender performance. I realized a really fun and simple way to talk about that was makeup. I am non-binary and I find a lot of joy in picking out where on the spectrum of gender I fit for the day, and really expressing that. I love putting on makeup when I’m feeling extra feminine and its a super fun practice for me. Makeup has turned into a lot of different things for a lot of different people, but to me it’s an incredibly useful tool to help me feel like myself sometimes. This is just me having fun with it!

[mahealaniart]

Project 4: Performance Art

“The Comfy”by Malia Spencer

It’s the end of the semester, and I’m quite tired.

I love art, but I’m so tired.

When I’m tired I like to go home and snuggle in my Comfy!

When I’m sad… I snuggle in my Comfy.

When I’m sick… I snuggle in my Comfy.

Getting in the shower to be renewed - and just feeling weighed down by what makes you comfortable. However silly, it’s relatable … we all know what mentally this spot feels like , even if we don’t actually perform this act.

What separates everyday performance art? Performing acts of grief, depression, happiness, and love all look so different.

Thinking of a performance in 1 minute, I almost went mad - so many possibilities of things to do. However that is where my comfort lies a lot of the time - talking , saying a lot. What if I just make myself more miserable on the outside? Then theres some kind of sense that whats on the inside will just be better than sopping wet clothes in the cold.

I took my comfort, I disregarded it, and in the process… I didn’t die! Not much happened either - and when it was done and I snuggled in bed I was able to reflect on how much we can grow by safely throwing away what makes us most comfortable in our own everyday performances.

[mahealaniart]

Technical Exercise #4: Verb List

To Maim - To Mend - To Break - To Bend - To Discover - To Resurrect - To Unwind - To Relax - To Create - To Patch - To See - To Fix - To Invent - To Live - To Exist - To Simplify - To Dream - To Try - To Fail - To Play

Song: Plantasia - Mort Garson

[mahealaniart]

Overview of Performing Arts and Reading #4

1. Roselee Goldenberg “Performance: a Hidden History”

This article makes me think a lot about what is means to be an artist. There are questions posed about how art may be a collage, or a form of mixed media. Everything is without a doubt recycled from something else! However... does this mean that art cannot be made different or original? Where do the differences lie? As far as performance art and digital media being so expansive- there is so much to do, yet how do we not repeat what has already been done?

2. Coco Fuslo “The Other History of Intellectual Performance”

A lot of this article centered in it’s accounts for the purpose of metaphor and symbolism in the act of performing. The questions that may be posed are; why do we perform and who are we performing? A lot about understanding audience, gaze, and medium in which we encapsulate meaning is detrimental to this. As artists it is important to evaluate the subject matter and message, to be able to create something unique and engaging for the audience. Even then, we must face the fact that they may not entirely get it.

[mahealaniart]

Project 3: The Supercut

https://youtu.be/erOwipg6-IU

For my supercut I wanted to observe time and how it relates to sanity. The White Rabbit , in this case, is in a constant rush against the clock. Nothing good comes from losing sight of the journey. Hard focus on destination or getting from point A to point B, causes the Rabbit to lose sight of what's going on around him. He pulls friends into bad situations. He follows people he shouldn’t and doesn't pay attention to others who have good intentions. If someone tells you something, listen. Don’t rush through the story. Choose who you put energy into wisely. Just maybe when we begin to think of deadlines as target points we can both keep our head and find stability. Maybe he should, that will make his life easier. The White Rabbit is so concerned about the Queen taking their head that they lose something more important, sanity. So by the time he ends up at his destination...it’s completely irrelevant. The thing is, when you have no patience for time, it's hard to find it and you lose sight of a bunch of other things.

works cited: Alice’s Adventures In Wonderland (1951)

Alice Meets the Rabbit: https://youtu.be/jHG2bMe9YxY

The White Rabbit’s Home: https://youtu.be/QAvPQaVoqGA

The Mad Hatter Destroys The Pocket Watch: https://youtu.be/N-lWbtYqZF4

[tobeaschwa]

Technical exercise 3: 傘がない (kasaga nai) trials of love music video

This song is a famous Japanese song (傘がない) about how strong a mans love is for his partner, and so by combining clips from movies and shows about the good and the bad of love, I aim to portray his devotion and passion through well known media. The lyrics are about how there are many problems in the world, but none of them matter because it's raining outside, he doesn't have an umbrella, and he needs to get to his partner. There have been many remasterings of this song, and covers by many artists, and it remains a song that is close to my heart.

[kayaschaap]

Technical Exercise 3: Music Video 

Clips from 101 Dalmatians accompanied by my all-time favorite artist, Bruno Major. However, due to the lyrics of the song, I decided to change the end of the story. 

(if that one was not the ending you wanted, here is a link to the happier version https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n8eBooN3W6I :))

[mahealaniart]

Technical Exercise #3: Queen of Disaster Music Video

For this technical exercise I used an unreleased Lana Del Rey song, my favorite is “Queen of Disaster”. Many people remake Lana Del Rey music videos for unreleased songs and ones that don't have music videos. I thought it would be intriguing to do that with kind of my own content collection from my “red archive”. I used my own ballerina jewelry box and old video diaries from a heartbreaking time, to contribute to a collisionary tale of, heartbreak, nostalgia, going mad and becoming a witch. I intended to emulate like a uncomfortably saccharine feeling for viewers, almost too sweet and scary.

[mahealaniart]

Reading Response #3 (Part 3)

(4/5) Tim Burton is a visual master who I have inspired to be like as in artist in many ways. He was one of the first directors to really dive into claymation completely in film and stop animation. He plays particular attention to every small movement to give clay figures lifelike expression. Every piece of his stop animation is seamless with a natural and un glitched flow. All of his work have a playfully dark edge. He makes childlike humor take thr mask of the scary creature under the bed with attention to texture, story, and detailed defined movements. Explosions and oddities are common in his work leaving an uncomfortable chill down audiences spines. His characters are defined by over exaggerated features which tend to hide their human sides. His style is both distinct and well known with distinct orgin points relative to the modern art movement.

(5/5) Jim Henson’s puppet play is another example of a detailed human abstracted art style. In the film “The Dark Crystal” Henson ceates a detailed and unbelievable land through thorough puppeteering and imagineering. Movements of smaller and softer characters (gelflings) are fidgety and swift making them come across as mobile, uncertain, and somewhat small. While the evil counterparts (skekis) take up entire frames with their awkward grotesqueness, moving with clumsy slow menacing authority and confidence. The in between of the two are the elder characters which we know are such because they move slowly with the importance of, “I will get there when I get there”. The personalization of every aspect of both the characters and the scenery (including animals) are what is special about Jim Hensons work. Every character moves, sounds, and is very much individual but working together like instruments in a symphony.

[mahealaniart]

Reading Response #3 (part 2)

(1/5) Wes Anderson is a very well known cinematographer- and one of my personal favorites. I love his attention to stillness and how the camera moves and into interesting transitions of narrative. Perfect precision is dedicated in every scene. His style is both unnatural and realistic in capturing mood. Vivid colorful aesthetic quality is a huge part of the breathtaking dreamlike quality in his films. I recently watched (just half) of “The French Dispatch” and have been blown away by his use of symmetry, line, motion, and time. As an artist you can tell he thinks out everything in the scope of the audience. This adds a humor and very intelligent style of play for his audiences.

(2/5) Paul Thomas Anderson another brilliant and prominent video artist. His most recent movie is one of my current favorites, “Licorice Pizza” encapsulates a awkward love story of youth in a really beautiful and convincing way. PTA’s focus is capturing people (even when they are not actors) does a really good job at capturing the awkward and gross in movement and timing. There is a very natural and nostalgic unaesthetic quality to his work unlike Anderson’s vivid dreamland. One of my favorite things he does is moving throughout scenes with character movement (running) and not returning to those narratives. Nothing builds in a very direct way. By letting the camera linger instead of cutting away, using complete stillness to amplify the actor’s movement and subtleties.

3/5 Terence Malick’s visual artistry focuses on naturalism accomplished by deep focus. The environments are foregrounded spreading the focus equally between environment and actors. Rather than having a focus on just the actor there is an importance in taking in the whole environment, evoking awe of the images he is able to capture. The environment is just as important to the scene as the actor is! He uses wide angle lenses and natural light which gives the work a real and spectacular quality. The camera wanders, spastically at times, which creates confusion and obscures focus for the viewer. (He fucks with you a little with where is is trying to get.)

[mahealaniart]

Reading Response #3

(1) Making Art Form and Meaning Chapter 6:

Truly diving in to the importance of time and motion and how that translates into art of all kinds is really impactful on how i will devote time to planning out my own art. I have explored ideas of implied time and decay primarily in 2d art, as well as using implied motion. It is obviously integral and must be made more intentional within video. One thing that got me thinking about this was when the book says, “we must understand mobility by discrete movements”. However obvious this may seem, this is also huge when it comes to creating loops or gifs. My own loops came out more on the choppy and broken up, because I wasn’t focusing on every small movement, rather bookmarking ones I thought were more important. This disrupted the flow in a sense but helped maintain a glitchy aesthetic I was striving for and which drove my meaning home. This chapter really dives into the specifics of media making and how something that may seem accidental can be very far from it which can uncover a whole new meaning for all audiences. I love how happy accidents can occur in media making and add to the work but it is also important to see how that effects works… does it distract from the meaning? I really want to focus on intentional camera movement on video going forward. I really like how the camera moves as someone walks and then when there is a new person added to the scene it can stop- the movement with perspective is very interesting and fun to me.

(2) Projection: Vanishing and Becoming

Honestly this next reading did have a very confuzzling (my own made up word) of getting to the point which distracted me a lot from what I think the writer was trying to say. What so really got from this is that as art is ever changing it all originates from light! This makes so much sense because of how color works with our eyes and all that sciencey stuff- how light and the brain work together to create beautiful images. It’s nice to think about how people have been able to capture these images in different mediums and how much it has developed. Looking at media add so much to the medium (so fun) ! Art is always changing and projection art and video is a very new kind of art, there are so many possibilities which also makes it a difficult realm to navigate. At least in my experience, I have had a hard time on drawing the line on what is and isn’t a healthy consumption of media, networking, and art. When it comes to tech my art the possibilities are endless which is hard to edit down and overwhelming to me as an artist almost! Too much freedom leads to me over complicating my work a lot and heavy handed work.

[mahealaniart]

The Loop: Girlish Garbage Noise

Somewhat shattering loss leads one on a quest to seek out the power within. There is a extremely powerful dark realm of girlish garbage noise, in which I have found myself to confront feelings I don't feel equipped to deal with. Through unique artistic expression female pop artists display arrays of emotions while holding onto a somewhat upbeat catchy rhythm. In this series of loops I wanted to challenge how girlish pop expresses powerful emotions, and engages audiences in video form. As much as breakup albums are made to help audiences move on, they are so truly apart of an artists process to dressing their own wounds. I have always found it interesting how artists decide to tell there story, and confront confusion and loss by throwing themselves into projects on pain.

- FKA Twigs, Tears in the Club (2022)

- FKA Twigs, Meta Angel (2022)

- Olivia O'Brien Sociopath (2021)

- No Doubt, Bathwater (2009)

- Christina Aguilera, Fighter (2009)

- Rihanna, Four Five Seconds (2015)

- Peach PRC, Josh (2021)

- Taylor Swift, Look What You Made Me Do (2017)

[cterrel3-deactivated20221224]

Eternal Moments in Labyrinth (2022)

animated gifs, series

Artist’s Statement

RIP David Bowie (1947-2016)

[julia-rocha]

Technical Exercise 2: Making Mini-Cinema

Blue - Keshi

I chose to make a gifs of Keshi’s music video for his song “Blue” because it’s my favorite song at the moment. I have known how to make gifs for a couple of years now, so I added a bit of coloring on these as well! 

[mahealaniart]

I love all the nostalgia you can associate with this and how you used multiple layers in this creation!

[mahealaniart]

Ex 2: Making (mini) cinema!!

Taylor Swift ft. Chris Stapleton - I Bet You Think About Me (Taylor's Version)

I grew up watching Youtube in my living room on a little tike table dancing around with my siblings, there's nothing I love more than a really great music video.

This one by Taylor Swift hit me in the right shade of crimson.

Taylor seems to have this renaissance talented ability to capture beautiful universal modes of what it means to love. For her, I wonder if there is a love sustainable to outlast the many tests life throws in the way?

I really wanted to capture the multi layered complicatedness of a lovely betrayal, which although not always understood is necessary to appreciate and understand to grow.

[mahealaniart]

This may be an extra I have ultimately lost count. (sorry for all of the late work)