A Critical Appraisal of Heather Philipson's 'A is to D what E is to H'

A Critical Appraisal

A is to D what E is to H (Excerpt) from the exhibtion - ‘Yes, surprising is existence in the post-vegetal cosmorama’
21 June 2013 - 13 October 2013
Heather Phillipson


Heather Phillipson is both a contemporary poet and artist. I first came across her work in The Baltic’s ground floor gallery in the summer of 2013.

 Her exhibition, ‘Yes, surprising is existence in the post-vegetal cosmorama ‘ , was creative, and exuded a physicality and sense of play I was immediately drawn to.  A set up of three separate rooms allowed the viewer to navigate their way through mulch-faceted environment in order to watch a selection of 3 videos, each framed in their own peculiar scenario. Each room had been laid out meticulously and the structures on which the films were adhered to ( a car, speed boat) were mounted in such a way that the viewer simply had to climb inside and become part of an ever changing art project. The videos consist of a female omnipresent narrator (Phillipson) who talks directly if not often distractedly to the individual.
Personally ‘A is to D what E is to H’, Is a favorite out of the trio. Phillipson’s vocabulary combined with the jazz music and incidental footstep echoes creates a lush and distorted sound-scape for the imagery to play against. The visuals themselves could be said to appear brash and simply edited but that is the reason I enjoy it so much - It’s a personal, step by step thought process.  For instance moments of human error or desire ‘’… And who doesn’t like French kissing (CUISINE) ..’’Simply achieved by layering vocals together. Editing jump cuts, and using conversant images to familiarize the viewer. 
The current narrative project I’m working on at the moment exists as a group effort, but it shouldn't noticeably be about particular individuals involved. Just a how phililipson never directly shows her identity.  Although it is based on our collective experience of dreams, it will be displayed rather as a mesh of different sensations and film recordings. My reasoning for presenting it in this way is because I enjoyed the interactive quality of Phillipsons work. To send an invitation to the audience bringing them into it, should contextualize it into something relatable and memorable.  Her work is vivid and only understandable in the minute. As though she were reading from a diary, background information isn't given in her scenarios and so it’s less important. That of course in no way means that her work isn’t introspective and well thought out.
To conclude, From her work I will take specific filming techniques, appreciation on space – the interlocking of an audience and the installation, and further explore the spoken word used in film.


From watching this, i want to examine the feeling of travel and use a personal monolgue to lead the viewer around my mind while making my route around my home town. I will use a fusion of art, writing and situational images to distill this in to my audience. 


http://vimeo.com/54438084

In the train i gather my thoughts, and this seemed to me so wistful and lonely. The longing becomes unendurable.  I want a healer for all wounds. Held back with fear, abruptly i begin talking to you - its terrifying all year.

How The Public Reacts?

Around my home town, there are now several 'I Have Now' posters tacked to walls bollards. I selected the ones i found most interesting. I want to go back in 24 hours and see what is left of them, it could  easily be that they have been removed completely. 

I liked this sign, as its ambiguous when combined with the premise of my project. 

What will happen on the train? Why must i worry?

Artist Research In Terms Of Style, Theory And Aesthetic

Rebecca Fin Simonetti

"Vancouver born visual artist and photographer Rebecca Fin Simonetti does not convey a sense of narrative within her work but instead tries to create an ambiguous psychological state for her viewer, and chooses not to work within the framework of ‘fictional reality.’ As a modern day Surrealist, she often shies away from the banal and boring, describing her own heavily graphic themed work as “schizophrenic.” Fin Simonetti’s photography often leans in the direction of being girl centered, but definitely on the darker side of things."  - FCP Photography blog.

With Simonettis more oil paint based work, theres are definite feel for gestural painting implemented with the delicate strokes. From this picture alone you can see that Simonetti has gone into depth with the central figure whereas the lamp, bedding, and background are largely made from grand sweeps of colour, the tone is set but unimportant and the viewer is drawn into the mysterious white haired woman's  world.  This style of painting encouraged me to look at lapses in detail when painting, to extensive use a certain colour palette that is something other than realistic.  

Jemima Kirke 

MONOLITT

Imagine if the the marble statues of Ancient Rome spurted out paint like a fountain, but the colors reflected the general mood of the empire's populace. MONOLITT, an interactive installation created by Syver Lauritzen and Eirik Haugen Murvol at the Oslo School of Architecture and Design, experiments with a similar idea, as a miniature pedestal takes crowdsourced "sentiment analytics" and turns them into physical paint data visualizations.

In a video detailing the project, above, we see users tweet messages like "Annoyed" or "Feeling good," which triggers certain paint colors that then dribble out of the top of a white statue to make a "procedurally generated three-dimensional painting." Though the clip doesn't explain the technology, we'd guess that MONOLITT is equipped with Raspberry Pi and an API that turns the social media data into physical manifestations. 

Though the Oslo-based MONOLITT sculpture trickled out vibrant globs of pink and blue (presumably associated with positive tweets), we wonder what an NYC rendition of the installation would look like. If we had to guess, there'd be so many opinionated, impatient tweets that a Manhattan MONOLITT would look like a messy spray of bleak goop. 

http://thecreatorsproject.vice.com/en_uk/blog/emotional-tweets-make-this-sculpture-leak-colorful-paint

Transportation Of Alienation And Intimacy.

Oil on Canvas. 3 people seated on train in close physical proximity, each is privately reading the metro newspaper and unaware of the others located close by. I chose to use a mixture of garish and anemic colour tones to promote the eerie artificial lighting on the train at that time of night. This should exaggerate claustrophobic atmosphere, and personal isolation of their segmented lives.

  

A series of posters from my self chosen summer project, 'Transportation of Alienation and Intimacy'. Dealing with how people are affected by the social sanctions which are set up to induce conversation through the necessity of travel and minimal space. Friendliness is immediate, but what do we know of these strangers we meet? For an allotment of time we are caught in each others lives. It may mean uncomfortable introductions followed by a monologue of over sharing  all under the allusion that this must be better than the feared awkward silence.  Or the unthinking primal desire to be polite - the united shuffle of positions to make way for an aged man, or a woman maneuvering a small child and buggy.

I am intrigued by the way we appear in these scenarios. Inadvertently people are momentarily bonded together in these situations. Although a license to talk isn't always found and people may often be packed in closely sitting in silence waiting for their destination. This for me is a perfect disillusioned juxtaposition, physical proximity presides anything personal.

"Heartbreakingly Intimate Whilst Being Entirely Distant" - Jemima Kirke

I feel like this quote encapsulates what am am trying to examine in our ever  evolving society.  In "Can I Sit here?" a series of repeating images taken from my original train painting. I put forward a patten of vulnerability, an almost child like fear of rejection directed at someone who has neither personal relevance nor emotional hold. Naturally it can be interpreted numerous ways, but the layout is always the same, formulaic and as simple as a bus ticket.                                                                                                                               

                            

I wanted to further examine this sense of intimate alienation by making a poster that would directly and unambiguously look at how often we barley notice another living person, even when they are sat oppersite us. We may gaze emptily through them, pondering our own private thoughts. But never do we make eye contact or commit their face to memory.

 This mock up of a 'Missing Person Poster', to me seemed to provoke a feeling of self awareness. Naturally its unrealistic to assume any person would have a connection to everyone they encountered in such a transitory place, but with this work I invite the viewer reflect on something they have been present for but not witnessed.

My intention is to leave this poster up on bus timetables, in order for the viewer to remove a tab from the latter half of the poster which reads 'I have now'. 3 powerful words. Similarly as with 'Can I Sit Here'' i wanted there to be a remnant of the interaction of viewer and art, akin to a bus ticket. I imagine that it would be taken primarily for its novelty and stashed in the persons pocket, only to be rediscovered later when it has lost context. The start and end of a journey.

1st Year Exhibition

Whilst walking around the 1^st year exhibition, it’s easy to be unassuming of the actual thought processes that went behind the finished work. Especially when the context is left to the viewers interpretation. With Hazel’s work however, the immediate impact made sure you understood the notion and thought about it just as much.

The set up appeared as 3 integral sections. Primarily the provocative carnival cut-out, of a faceless bikini clad woman. She was a little larger than life, kneeling, neck turned toward the camera. An openly voyeuristic mentality is set up for the viewer. This in its self is explored as friends take it in turns to be the model and the photographer, this switch between the two vastly different persona starts to break down these poles, prey and predator,  object and objectifier. The people themselves are the last and most crucial component in the piece. Without them it loses its potency as a political statement if the viewers don’t interact, playing with the devices learning through this simplistic childlike education onto something much grander. You catch yourself out doing something that perhaps by unconscious  thought you would presume wrong  but only by involving yourself in it do you reassess it with any sense of feeling.

The Opposite side of the carnival cut out is filled with black writing scrawled in lines across a white background. Its covered predominantly with cat calls, ranging from the run of the mill generic misogynistic phrases to more aggressive, sexually hostile  and threatening.

Baltic Gallery Group Project

A group project created on the premise of feeding a man cake. Advertisements were posted around Newcastle, so we did not personally know this individual before he arrived in the studio. There is a interesting tension set up between the camera/us and the man.

''A woman needs a man like a fish needs a bicycle''  - Feminist Slogan, drawn onto the cake. We loved the idea that the patriarchy were eating/accepting this premise as a normal thing. Something as normal as eating a piece of cake.