Date of Award

Spring 5-2015

Author's School

Sam Fox School of Design & Visual Arts

Author Department/Program

Graduate School of Art

Degree Name

Master of Fine Arts (MFA) in Visual Art

Degree Type

Thesis

Abstract

I make objects that behave like bodies—graceful hybrids that are effortlessly cultural and natural, masculine and feminine, plant and animal. Shifting and slipping between unfixed identities, they exist as multiplicities. When these bodies touch, power and pleasure are fluidly exchanged. However, power is not structured here as a binary and pleasure is not finite; both have the potential to flow between bodies, blurring boundaries and rendering individuality delicate.

My work is primarily rooted in the relationship between desire, intimacy, and control, with the body acting as a site of power play. This body may be plant, animal, sculpture, or material. I am especially concerned with material relationships as materials have performative agency. Their physics and chemistry must be negotiated with. Using sensual materials like sex-safe silicone, salt, and seeds, my studio practice itself is an exercise in dominance and submission.

This thesis explores how my objects, processes, and strategies of display trouble the binary and render familiar signifiers strange. It focuses on bodies placed in tension - penetrated and suspended just at the point of touch. However, it also imagines the possibility of bodies coming together through physical and psychoemotional fusion using consumption and love as moments in which the autonomous self is breached.

Language

English (en)

Program Director

Patricia Olynyk

Program Director's Department

Graduate School of Art

Committee Member

Cheryl Wassenaar

Committee Member

Cheryl Wassenaar

Committee Member

Jessica Baran

Committee Member

Joan Hall

Committee Member

Amber Jamilla Musser

Artist's Statement

Permanent URL: https://doi.org/10.7936/K74J0C9K

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