Artist Statement (kind of?) by Halley

So I had a weird idea for an “artist statement” that kind of addresses the idea of a personal aesthetic. It’s kind of silly and I’m not really finished with it, but here it is!

I’m Not an Artist, I’m a Gardener

Don’t hand it to me on a plate.

Art isn’t a bowl of plain pasta.

Maybe it’s a salad with a bunch of stuff thrown together so you look at it and go “oh yeah, that’s a salad!” but you’re not exactly sure what’s in it, ya know?

Maybe it doesn’t matter what it is.

Maybe I’m just hungry?

I guess what I’m trying to say is that there’s a lot of stuff that tastes really gross.

Maybe those chips tasted really good fifty years ago, but now we know that they’re really bad for our bodies.

Plus, they’ve been in the pantry for fifty years!

A lot of stuff has been sitting in the pantry for so long that it’s starting to go stale. Some of it is starting to rot.

Listen, I’m not a chef.

(I cook 90% of my meals in a microwave.)

I’m learning how to cook, but right now every time I make something I think, gahhh this should taste better!*

Or maybe I think, this is a bowl of plain pasta.

Or I think, I honestly can’t even tell this is a salad.

Or, Oh no, this one is too obviously a salad.

Yesterday I made a salad with no dressing.

Who the *beeeep* would want to eat a salad without dressing?!

But, I do have a garden.

And I’m trying to grow something fresh.

Something that is good for us.

Something we can all eat.

Even if it’s scary—maybe it’s a fruit we’ve never seen before.

And I want other people to plant in my garden.

I want you to plant in my garden.

I want you to bring me seeds I’ve never heard of.

But I want all of the fruit and vegetables to be fresh and nourishing.

Oh yeah, and no one has to pay for any of it obviously.

We’ll just hang out in the garden and talk about the world outside the garden.

You’ll be happy to dig your hands into the dirt, feeling it cold against your fingers.

This is how you blow off steam. And you have to blow off steam.

Because on your walk over some asshole yelled something about your ass from his car.

But you know that no one needs to tell you anything about your ass.

We know that in the garden, our asses are awesome.

They help us bend down and plant beautiful tomatoes.

That are bright red like the lipstick I wear.

And when we’re tired we take a break, biting into the juicy tomatoes.

And my lipstick smears on my sweaty face and bits of tomato run down my chin as we all scream along to our favorite punk songs or pop songs or our own songs.

We all sing different songs at the same time but they all fit together in a beautiful medley.

And we shake our beautiful butts and eat our beautiful fruit until we are covered in sweat and a powerful red.

And then we continue to plant more seeds.

So yeah, I’m kind of at the point where I’m going to grow a bunch of stuff.

Stuff that is new and that replaces the stale chips at the back of the pantry.

The chips that make my stomach hurt.

The chips that hurt my body.

The bland chips that don’t have any color.

And when you eat them they sit in your stomach in a vile clump, not allowing room for anything else.

And I’m not sure how to cook anything I grow.

Hopefully I’ll meet other gardeners and chefs and they’ll help me figure it out.

But right now, I’m just a gardener.

*As usual, after making the meal you just ate, I thought, gahh this should taste better!

Aesthetics and More Aesthetics by Ebony

Theatre of the Oppressed NYC About Section:
"The troupes create and perform plays based on real-life struggles, which engage diverse audiences in theatrical brainstorming - or Forum Theatre - to activate communities and creatively challenge systems of oppression."

Alliance Theatre Mission Statement:
"...creating the powerful experience of shared theatre for diverse people. The Alliance values excellence, pursued with integrity and creativity, and achieved through collaboration. 

Progress Theatre About Section:
"...nationally and internationally-touring ensemble of multi-disciplined artists committed to using theatre as anti-racism engagement to encourage social consciousness, cross-community dialogue and cultural awareness. We believe in the power of art and community collaboration to advance efforts toward social equality and inclusiveness. PT considers all of our initiatives as community-engaged, community-invested and community-necessitated. We are, at once, performers/creators of ensemble-driven theatre works, presenters and supporters of artists who share our mission and creative collaborators with the communities we serve."

"...We build audiences by building relationships with communities. We are trained and experienced in diversity dialogues, group facilitation and in creating theatre with and for communities."

National Black Theater Company Mission Statement:
"To use theater arts as a means to educate, enrich, entertain, empower & inform the national conscience around current social issues impacting our communities..."

Carpetbag Theater Mission Statement:

"CBT serves communities by returning their stories to them with honesty, dignity, and concern for the aesthetic of that particular community, helping culturally specific communities to re-define how they organize."

Roadside Theater Mission Statement:
"Roadside Theater is dedicated to artistic excellence in pursuit of the proposition that the world is immeasurably enriched when people and cultures tell their own stories and listen to the unique stories of others."

I bolded parts that I felt resembled a pattern that I wanted to bring up from the reading as well as what I feel I also want to add as an element of my personal aesthetic. Throughout the reading, there was always the question of a community aesthetic and having the audience as a part of the artistic process in which a performer can share their experience, but not to  just perform for the audience, but for the audience to become a part of the story and experience that the performer is essentially giving the them when they set foot on stage. Mark from the transcript mentions that he is a playwright and that the plays themselves aren't the "thing" the "thing" for him, and what I also happen to agree with is "to stimulate this engagement in discussion and self-description, self-healing, tell your story." I like this because while a story is being told in the play, it's also created for the purpose of discussion and reflection; two things that I think are essential in a performance because you never know what you might spark in another individual that can create other types of art through the source of art and multiple experiences (ROOTS). 

One of the points I found interesting in the audience/community creating art was the social media aspect that could potentially inspire artistic value within a community as well as with an audience.  He brings up the question: "How can we, from the beginning of a work, if possible, have a visual record that’s not -- that complements whatever professional documentation has done? And then -- and I think this is where I’m so appreciative of a chance to talk about this word aesthetics, how can we use these resources, these tools, to understand how an audience responds to a performance, or a performative experience, or even a community meal." I think what's so great about this quote is the emphasis on the idea of morphing a tool that one uses to document art to be a tool into understanding and inviting the audience into developing their own creative aesthetic based on a form of media that was used in order to document a performance that was based on a creative process as well (ROOTS). I feel like it fuels an artistic cycle that can further itself out into the world and create long lasting artistic works instead of work that is done for a point in time and then is finished.


With the organizations that we have been able to work with so far, I have seen quite a bit of aesthetic choices with dancing in the Spirit.  Through talking with Dana, as well as listening to the dancers talk about each piece during the tech process, it seems like there is a strong focus on making sure that the dancers understand the story behind the pieces that they are performing giving the movement so much more meaning which I feel like can strengthen a dance because there is so much more intention behind each movement.  Also, within the choreography itself, it was nice to see a lot of lifts between the women which distinguishes the idea of women being lifted by men as a means of displaying the woman or strength of the man and instead, there's a feeling of community between the women because anyone could be and was lifted within the show and it gave off a sensation of support between these wonderful women dancers.  Also with Synchronicity and Play Making for girls, it was great when the teachers would constantly remind the girls to make sure to have confidence and stage presence.  I found that to be special because while it is important in many acting traditions to make sure you have a great stage presence, I feel like it's also important to help instill a sense of confidence in young girls both on and off the stage which was something that Synchronicity did well. 

Personal Aesthetic by Sophiyaa

We've spent the past week talking about the word "aesthetic" and how it applies to us. What's my personal aesthetic? Watching/working with Youth Creates and Moving in The Spirit to put on their show helped me understand the kinds of dances and exercises I am drawn towards. That helped me begin answering that question. I do believe that my aesthetic is in the making and is no where close to complete at this point. In reality, I think my art will begin to lose its purpose when I'm able to give my aesthetic one specific unchangeable definition. So I'm glad I'm still understanding who I am as an artist. I've divided my understanding of my aesthetic into several parts to help myself process it better.

The Indian:

I'be grown up in north and south India, watching a huge amount of traditional theatre and dances. My general take away from the dances are "expressions". Indian dances such as Bharatnatiyum and Kathakali tell stories through small hand gestures and incredibly expressive eyes. When I initially started researching Indian dances, I found myself uninterested in the dances I watched- potentially because I had seen them so often. Then I played a Bharatnatiyum video with Ethiopian music in the background- just out of curiosity. Suddenly, I was more interested in what I was watching because their was something unfamiliar about it. It also made me see the movements in a different manner. The music didn't necessarily fit the piece but it made me get rid of my boredom with the dance form.

This is an example of how important expressions are to Indian story (its also the video I watched with different music).

I definitely found myself thinking that the expressions were too dramatic at certain points, but i still think its an interesting way to tell a story- without saying a single word. 

I also found myself drawn towards dance forms that weren't necesarily 'traditional'. Yes, I'm talking about Bollywood. 

Please ignore the man sinking into water in the beginning, unless you think its choreographically interesting. 

I love a lot of the movements in this video and I think them combined with spoken word would be an interesting experiment. 

The Spoken Word Poet:

I'm new to spoken word poetry but am very interested in it. I've written two poems surrounding the idea of "home" and "where I come from" and hope to add movement to them. Maybe some taken from the videos above! I met a spoken word poet called Theresa Davis who's going to do a workshop with Youth Creates that I am very very excited for. 

Here are excerpts from my poems:

Where I Come From

When my grandmother was a little girl, she’d climb up to the roof every evening at exactly six pm. Holding on to her sisters’ hands

Ears strained,

barely paying attention to the glassy sweat scraping against her neck,

just to listen to that one word from a giant unseen megaphone

From a far away pedestrian God:

“Safe”.

Where I come from, trains move so fast that I have to force my eyes to stay open

Don’t blink

Necks extended beyond dreams

Dreams absorbing every bit of reality.

Where I come from, you have to breathe in more often than breathing out

freshly cut grass

rain on dirt

Monsoon sandstorms.

Home.

Every evening at six, my grandmother would stand on the roof with her sisters,

Toes curling up on the cold cracks of religious earthquakes.

Ears reaching beyond her imagination to hear that one word from a monotonous god

“Safe”

Gravity

I remember sitting there, holding on to the sides of seat 27D thinking about the newly made blisters on my hands that I was too afraid to look at.

The man next to me, held on to a newspaper with creases that screamed boredom.

I am terrified of flying.

Cold toast churning in my stomach

Holding on to my gravity

Floating

Evaporating

Locker 227. Overflowing with unfinished homework, unreadable sticky notes, expired food and expired tomorrows

Still working on them! These are just small parts of both. 

The Image-Maker/Director:

I am fascinated with making images that stick out to people, using materials and subverting the meaning that we typically associate with them. Here are some pictures that inspire me or trigger some thought me that I can only explain after making an entire performance thats completely different from the original photograph:

I am also working on "Anon(ymous)" written by Naomi Iizuka as a potential show to direct in the Spring semester, which allows me to experiment with a lot of images (eg. there's a scene where the lead is talking to a goddess while swimming in an ocean- yes, I love it very much). It also surrounds the idea of having your home taken away from you and having to rediscover what home means to you- along with the affects it has on your identity. 

That's all I've got for now! I'm going to keep adding different dimensions to help myself figure it out what this thing called "my aesthetic" is.