Int. Seminar: Memory

  1. The Memory Made Visual assignment for Seminar was to create a passage along with our physical art pieces to add a narrative for our audience in case they miss the important message within our pieces. They added an intimate element to bring the viewers closer to our art work. We were able to create any style of writing using different styles of work that we learned in the beginning of the year up to now for our written piece for the Studio work. Not only did we work on the passage for class, but we also researched the theme of our work, allowing us to not only create this landscape for Studio, but also to connect with our own works on a deeper level. For Studio, the artists were supposed to choose a place in New York City and to create an installation on the land that we want to make our mark on as a memorial. After we chose our place, we were supposed to create proposals and details on how we would create the memorial and what materials we would use. Both projects were essential in completing the art work as a whole to explain the audience what our intention was in a written and a visual context.
  2. For my memorial piece, I decided to dedicate it to the third chair that sits in St. Joseph Village Hairstylist where I shaved my head to reclaim my non-binary identity. The concept of this memorial is to create an interactive experience of my journey of self-acceptance of my gender identity. I want the audience to feel the heaviness of the artwork, but also make it appealing at the same time to lure the viewers in before they realize the importance of the piece. I would recreate this environment as an installation piece inside St. Joseph’s Village Hairstyle barber shop in the chair that I sat in. By publicizing that very personal part of me, I will be making amends with all the years I had to suppress my fluid self and I will be proudly claiming my non-binary gender identity. My goal is to create an immersive environment for the audience to experience and feel like they are personally at the barber shop themselves too.

    The memorial will be located at St. Joseph’s Village Hairstylist barber shop and it will be placed at the third chair. The tiny shop is located at Greenwich Avenue and connected to a shoe repair shop, which is also quite quaint. The masculine environment would connect with my piece in wanting a more masculine side of myself, but also encourage men to create conversations about the phenomenon about gender. The audience that would see this piece are people who go in for a haircut, but I like to incorporate this part of myself into their hair cutting experience. I

    would imagine a plaque attached to the back of the chair to record the moment I got my haircut and discuss the significance of the chair, and how being a good ally to people within the LGBTQ+ community in this current political climate. They leave with more than a haircut and hopefully a more deeper understanding about the concept of gender and how it is not binary.

    For the materials of the piece, I wanted to create an immersive environment, so I used fabric to create a background, and spray paint to color code the entire piece to match the colors of the iconic barber shop pole. I want the audience to envision themselves at the barber shop as a customer getting ready to be seated and they see the bright red walls that are decorated with the word “dysphoria” in blue and white colors, the mirrors hanging around the wall in different colors, and the third seat covered with the striped cape. I want the audience to be able to soak in the colors while there are warm lights to give the piece a more warm glow to exaggerate the red, white, and blue in the art work.  If I was able to recreate the art work in the barber shop, I would redo the walls according to the art installation piece by painting it red and recreate an exact version like my model. For my memorial, I want the audience to enter the piece, and take pictures of the wall or of the photos and watch me as I have someone shave my head to add an intimate experience to the art work. Not only do I want to feel empowered, but I want the viewers to also feel a sense of empowerment and intimacy for themselves.

  3.  The failures in my vision in Studio was to create a piece that would fit under the deadline and the paint that would constantly chip off in my project. Additionally, to look out for the safety of my project. Someone touched my art work, but fortunately, they did not create a huge mess that I was able to make sure that the project was saved. However, for my art work, it was constantly chipping which I did not expect from the spray paint. I have worked with spray painting objects before, and I had no problems with the objects I used before. I was growing more frustrated that even the slightest of movement, it would chip. Additionally, I was worried that I was unable to finish the project in time and when I complete the project, that it would not look cohesive. However, the success in the project would be that I was able to complete the project before the deadline and finished all the pieces in time without having them be horribly chipped by the critique. Additionally, I was able to successfully complete my vision for this piece without having to compromise anything.
  4. The failures in Seminar for the research portion of the piece was to find reliable and adequate resources about the history of barber shops. There was no definitive information that was easily accessible about the history of barber shops, but only about the role of barber shops as a cultural staple in the Black community. It felt like I was running into a brick wall after another brick wall which made me feel more lost in my own writing. The success is birthed in this failure though, in which I was able to create a narrative about safe spaces in barber shops and like how the barber shops play a safe space for the Black community, I was able to create a safe space of my non-binary identity in my own barber shop. Additionally, from all the readings about the core history of barber shops for Black people, I was able to gain a more revolutionary viewpoint of the roles of Barbers and how they were a corner stone to Black culture. It definitely increased my understandings of the history of barber shops and gained a more empathetic view on the role of barbers.
  5. The strategy that I would like to build on in the process in Studio would be to understand the balance of art. From my critiques, it seemed like my piece was an overwhelming statement with a bunch of things happening all at once. I would like to develop a sense of understanding of balance and how to put that into practice because I am unaware of the limits that my audience can comprehend. For Seminar, I would like to build on my learning experience of using the library website on the New School website. This was extremely essential to my hunt of finding sources for my writing because it showed me to a diverse selection of reliable written work about barber shops. However, navigating it would have been more of a struggle had we not gone over it in class, but I would like to further my understanding of navigating through the Library log. For Seminar, I would also like to learn how to expand my writing, such as being able to be more articulate with the topics that I have chosen to write, and to execute it in a way where I am able to show my development of the research that I have done.
  6. If I could do this project again, I would have tried to make it a more intimate piece. One thing that stood out to me in Studio was that the audience felt disconnected to the piece because it almost looked too theatrical. They wanted substance to my piece that related to the intimate parts of myself in my non-binary identity. However, at the same time, I feel conflicted because I feel as if most pieces regarding gender identity has to be something deeply moving, a dark moment, and something to almost cry about. The point of the piece was to create a memorial dedicated to my gender-identity, but in a not so depressive state when you look at it because I wanted the audience to feel welcomed into the piece. Something that would be fun with a sad underlying tones that would be created on my terms. For Seminar, I would change the approach that I used for writing my pieces and depended on the library more than I did with Google. It is a nice reminder to not always depend on Google for all the reliable answers and that sometimes the old-school route is more reliable in research moments.
  7. My definition of memorial has evolved throughout the project, by expanding the idea of what a memorial is. Many people imagine memorials as something commemorating the death of a hero, but after doing this project, I learn that the memorial does not have to remember a death, but focuses on immortalizing a memory, or an event or person. I chose to immortalize a moment in my life where I abandoned my womanhood and reclaimed my non-binary identity. While memorials are often captured in a statue, I incorporated a transformation of space and creating that sense of moment in time, and using the audience’s emotion to really complete the piece. In a way, memorials also serve a perspective of the ending and beginning of that moment in time. To conclude, we create the memorial, but the audience complete the piece with their emotions and interaction with the piece.

 

HeeEun Chung is a Korean photographer based in Los Angeles. They are originally from Korea. They got their interest in photography when their father handed down his film camera and HeeEun wanted to revive the film movement. HeeEun's main focus was to incorporate intersectional feminism into photography because political activism is an essential part of their life and identity. They believe in teaching people about the complexities of political issues by connecting to them on an artistic, creative level.

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