IS THIS ART? Emerging Writers Program hosted by DLuxMedia Arts and Artereal Gallery June 2015

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The scope and range for artists to explore identity is endless. Searching for an identity within the modern world and its fast-paced demands is something that all audiences can relate to. As a facet of our lives that is at once communal in nature is also expressly unique for each individual. It is shaped by places, family, friends, life events, and is constantly evolving, making it difficult to articulate succinctly. Video artists Rose Jurd, Angus Ware, Simon Baré, and Brooke Carlson, have all chosen to tackle the issue of identity in their works. Each artist explores the concept differently however poses similar questions to audiences through their media works that focuses on the importance of identity in a shared contemporary culture.

In Sparks fly Rose Jurd considers female identity. In it, female figures in pink glitter body paint, move freely to a techno soundtrack, mimicking a club dance-floor. Their movements present a dichotomy between aggression and seduction, despite their vulnerability through the gaze of the viewer. Jurd states that their movements reflect the instinctive nature of night club crowds, where men and women alike dance between power and vulnerability. Jurd’s work challenges the social normalise and their impact on female identity. The fact that the figures subvert the viewers gaze feeds further demonstrates the lack of identity that the figures have and in turn promotes their objectification. 
 

Simon Baré’s video TIMMH study (phase 2) is at first chilling and isolating to watch. We see faces that emerge from darkness, melding in and out of focus as they turn to meet the gaze of the viewer. The sound of church bells, water, and wind, plays in montage throughout the piece. On closer inspection we begin to feel empathy for the empty faces inside and our understanding of the work shifts from aversion to compassion: we identity with them. Baré’s very intention in this work is to consider the concept of identity within the broad context of the world we live in. Evolution is the only constant and all that revolves around it is in a state of continual flux. TIMMH study (phase 2) successfully articulates our human attempts to make sense of space, time, memory, and place. 

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Angus Ware cleverly portrays the consumerism of online culture in his captivating film Print media, in which a male and female figure eat printed photographs of themselves. The figures are tightly framed which creates the illusion of sitting directly opposite them. Their gaze stays constant and the accompanying soundtrack is built around of the sound of paper tearing and mouths chewing, with whirs of the outside urban street occasionally breaking through. Without speaking, the figures question the viewers constructed identity: is what we ingest online impacting how we present ourselves in our everyday lives? Ware’s video challenges the tangible concept identity in the ‘real world’ in addition to online profiles. He asks us to consider how quickly we consume culture and media with modern technology and examine how this translates to our real life. 

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Brooke Carlson’s Read me presents the theme of identity in considering the relationship between writing and the body. Through a tight and detailed frame we see a hand use charcoal to move quickly across a large page, transcribing what appears to be cursive script, although no words can be made out. Increasingly, more glimpses of flesh make their way into the frame; a hand turns into an arm, which then turns into a knee, and a thigh, and then finally we see fragments of the torso and back moving across the page with the same cursive movement as the charcoal. Charcoal residue imprints itself onto the flesh and as the work draws to a close, we can see that the flesh and page are the same, therefore blurring the lines between the writing and the body. The act of writing through the body articulates a literal impression of identity. The fact that Carlson’s written movements focuses on the act rather than the words demonstrates the therapeutic nature of writing and how this comes to impact our physical, as well as mental state. 

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