Now You See Me | Aria Bowes
Video
Description
In the position of power that media holds in society, perception is incredibly important. If those in control of media perceive Black people as inherently criminal, they will portray Black people as such on a huge scale. This then comes full circle, affecting perception all over again. The more people see Black criminals in the news and on tv shows, the more people associate crime with this demographic. For police officers, judges and politicians, this can mean hypervigilance often resulting in police brutality, unfair sentencing and racially charged policy. For Black people, this can mean either internalisation of these roles or a feeling of isolation and detachment from society.
Now You See Me is a tribute to the side of Black culture that the media often fails to represent: love and tenderness. On New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day, the screens of Times Square will be flooded with videos of black and white videos of Black people showing each other love and tenderness. A sister doing her brothers hair, lovers holding hands, a child sitting on their parent’s lap, friends laughing and dancing together. I want the main attraction of this piece to be the level of comfort and joy people feel around it. I want the effect of viewing these videos to come before the realization that only Black people are featured. Non-Black viewers should feel remarkably comfortable and then recognize the Black people on screens as the source of that feeling. Hopefully, I can help people to question some stereotypes they may harbor. Black people should view these videos and identify, bringing about a different kind of comfort. For the Black community, this is about representation and being seen for what we really are: humans.
Process and Research
In brainstorming, I came up with two ideas. The original still would’ve been videos in Times Square displaying moments of tenderness and love, but across all races. The second was a more targeted version of my original concept. It would’ve been a series of murals in primarily Black and Latino communities with the same intent as my current memorial: to highlight the tenderness and reality of demonized demographics. In order to decide which memorial to pursue, I merged the intent of my first idea with the visibility of my second and was left with Now You See Me. Even after resolving to unite the pieces, I was still focusing on both Blacks and Latinos, but in the presentation of my model it became clear that I should focus on the audience that I connect with most. That’s how it became centered around the Black community alone.The research I did helped me to create with more conviction. Without research, even with the knowledge that representation of the Black community is an actual issue, I still felt like I could be seen as just another angry Black person screaming about things that don’t matter. The research empowered me to create with even more intent and to speak about my work intelligently and with less bias.
Reflection
I’m really happy with my concept. I think it’s both meaningful in that it has an important reason to exist and practical in that it makes Times Square less overwhelming for lots of folks. I think it could accomplish a lot without being too complicated. A next iteration could be an idea someone in my critique proposed. A series of these events by different people of different backgrounds, because Latinos and Muslims are also highly demonized in the media. It could be really nice if they too could be represented in this way by someone with whom they can identify.
