Group Members:

Shaskia, Mingrui, Lia and Shreya

Chosen Artists: Ren Hang and Felix Gonzalez-Torres

Discussing in our group, we have decided to use Felix Gonzalez-Torres’ concept from his Candy Installation and remake Ren Hang’s photographs.

The concept and idea: The concept was derived from Felix Gonzalez-Torres candy series, in this series he put candies in a pile to the exact weight of his now deceased lover (who died from AIDs). He portrayed how HIV/AIDs slowly wastes the infected until they are no more. With this, his endless sadness of losing his lover with the immortalization of him, done beautifully. We wanted to make our remakes personal like Torres and Ren Hang who based his photography about his depression and sadness. So we decided to choose photos from Hang that we had a strong connection and flowers that we collectively reflect ourselves. With these flowers, to make a video documentation of us plucking away the petals into a pile, which is supposed to represent life and death. In the end, we are all going to die and be no more, so why not appreciate the beauty in front.

Our version and original side by side:

Final presentation layout:

Our version:

Reflection: Our first discussion as a group we had a clear vision of what we wanted to do, there was no need for adjustment. We followed through on our initial plan, however, if we had unlimited resources we would’ve done some of the photos more accurate (ex. 2 butts and 1 face on a balcony).  Ideally, we would all be nude for the photos. Also, the photos would be printed on a larger scale and framed like a gallery, if we had more money we would have also bought more flowers to make a bigger pile as well. The nature scenes could be more developed using an actual pond in the background and/or rent a pool to mimic it.