My cameraman and I braved poor weather conditions to get the footage we needed on location in Central Park today.
Tonight's performance How To Make Anyone Fall in Love With You at Microscope Gallery wouldn't be possible without the work of author and motivational speaker Leil Lowndes whose book changed my life.
Started shooting my new film finally. It's inspired by Suzanne Somer's self-help video Think Great, Feel Great.
On my way up to Nottingham on the day of The Do It All Dating Game my boyfriend pretended to interview me, asking about the intentions behind the work and how it relates to art. The simple answer is that the hosts of the show, John Kilduff and I, are both artists and this piece is a continuation of our creative collaboration. I’ve been told this answer isn’t good enough, so I’ll pad it out here.
John’s show Lets Paint TV, which originally aired on cable access TV in Los Angeles in 2005 and is now a weekday fixture on stickam.com, mimics tropes found within American daytime television – it is Bob Ross meets infomercial. John (a.k.a. Mr. Let’s Paint) ignites canvases with oil paint, jogs on his treadmill, prepares healthful blended drinks and occasionally stirs in a few extra elements such as ping pong or a game of chess, plus he takes calls, adding a layer of spontaneity to each episode. His show deals with the pressures of contemporary life – of ‘having it all’ and needing to excel in so many different areas. To me, John is the ultimate everyman and his message to ‘embrace failare’ [sic] is multifaceted – it’s about creativity and perseverance, allowing oneself to make mistakes and accepting or even embracing one’s fallibility as a human being. His show uses the frantic pace of life as an excuse to play, to blunder and to make a mess. To me, John’s treadmill-induced, phone call-stimulated approach to creativity is analogous to that of Salvador Dali who arrived at his surrealistic imagery by balancing a spoon over a glass as he was about to take a nap, the noise of the spoon waking him up so as to remember his dreamy visions.[1]
The Do It All Dating Game continues my habit of citing pop culture within the context of art. It is also a byproduct of my enquiry into how artistic strategies can help one to achieve wellbeing and self-actualisation. The notion that getting in touch with your creativity can lead to meaningful self-exploration and fulfillment is a cliché – but it is one that I hope John and I imbue with both sincerity and hilarity.[2] Not only do John and I (and in fact most artists) struggle with the creative process, but we fight to fit it into our busy lives. Artists, perhaps more than other professionals, really battle against time pressures – because so many of us have to have second or third jobs and the creative process has no clearly defined end-point. I like to invoke the British turn of phrase: ‘How long is a piece of string?’ If you want to pay your bills, have an active social life, keep up with the art scene and/or have a family on top of making art, it is a real challenge. That’s what The Do It All Dating Game is about – it’s a reflection on both the creative process and the mating rituals popularised by the great mythmaker that is TV.
I was hoping that The Do It All Dating Game would repeat the corny flirtations of the original gameshow, but differ from its predecessor in the representation of gender and sexuality. The implicit question in our version being: Are women really better at multitasking than men? It’s been stated as fact, but having done the research, I know there’s no scientific evidence to imply that women are in fact more capable than men at handling many tasks at once. The fact of the matter is, each human being has but two frontal lobes, which means taking on more than two tasks at a given time will exceed one’s natural capacities. My feeling is that the assumption that women are better multitaskers exists solely because it justifies the expectation that women should excel in a career, raise the kids, cook dinner and clean the house. Hence the punch-line: ‘Why not stick a broom up my ass so I can sweep the floor while I’m at it!?’ As I was stating this to my boyfriend, he objected that it was women who perpetuated and benefitted from this comparison; to him, this idea was a feminist ploy. When women are engaged in a couple of tasks and at the same time listening to their significant other talk – they can more easily get away with pretending to hear by invoking the idea that they are masters at multitasking. We had this conversation before the show aired, so I hoped that the show might shed some light on this difference of opinion. Having now been through it, I believe The Do It All Dating Game proves that the ability to multitask has nothing whatsoever to do with sex or gender.
[1] I read about Dali’s method in Richard Wiseman’s self-help book 59 Seconds which elaborates on scientifically proven methods for being more creative, most of which entail distracting the conscious mind so that unconscious thoughts and solutions can emerge. Wiseman, R. 59 Seconds: Think A Little, Change A Lot, New York: Borzoi Books, 2009.
[2] Interestingly, art critic Doug Harvey, who is a big fan of Mr. Let’s Paint, is scathingly critical of this concept about creativity and self-actualisation. Harvey states:
Among the most widely and openly despised paradigms for artmaking today is the process-based therapeutic approach to art, with its roots in the popular conflation of creativity with mental illness ... Basically, it suggests that the practice of artmaking has an inherent healing effect on psychological trauma, and that this practice is available to anyone. Furthermore, it claims that the practice of artmaking can guide already well-adjusted psyches along the path toward spiritual self-discovery. In fact, academia, the international art trade, art museums, and professional art criticism frequently may be seen defining themselves in opposition to this romantic and indiscriminate model.
Harvey, Doug, ‘Help!’, Art Issues, no. 66 (January/February 2001), p. 14-17. Harvey must read John’s work as employing these clichés in a wholly ironic way – whereas I read a layer of sincerity into it, perhaps because I know how much my work as an artist has transformed my identity in positive ways.
Just submitted this proposal to my colleagues in the Performance Matters research project who will be editing a special issue of Dance Theatre Journal. Hope I get selected and that I can make this happen...
How To Be Sexy: Cosey Fanni Tutti and Mouse on The O Show
My research explores the relationship between different generations of women who I would define as ‘feminist performance artists’, looking to their work as examples for how to be a happy woman. This entails grappling with the ways in which both feminist art and self-help respectively (and perhaps in collaboration) can create a “sense of belonging” and “refusal[s] or creative contravention[s] to feminine normativity”.[1] Following on from theorist Lauren Berlant’s statement that “the woman who was adequate to [women’s culture industry’s] version of normal femininity was as powerful as a feminist would aspire to be”, my question is: What relationship to power and/or happiness can I achieve by simultaneously embodying avant-garde and popular models for female agency?[2]
One outlet for this practice-based research is my new web-TV series The O Show which mimics the tropes of daytime television by incorporating interviews, how-to advice and makeovers, combining genuine storytelling with comical send-ups of the self-help industry. The chat-show format provides a framework in which to genuinely investigate questions at the heart of my doctoral research as well as to both critique and champion popular modes of knowledge dissemination and the confessional. For one episode I plan to interview performance artist Cosey Fanni Tutti and club performer Mouse, focusing on their respective experiences in the sex industry. The transcript and stills from the episode will form my contribution to the journal. Having these two artists on the show is an opportunity to explore the complexity of sex-positive feminism, specifically in light of the phenomenon of the prostitute-performance artist as well as to celebrate the legacy of historical figures such as Tutti and their impact on a contemporary generation of performers.
*Louise Lasser as quoted in Susan Sontag's "Death and Matriarchy"
What happened to punk rock, zines and gender with no name? Is camp dead or just haunting us in late-night re-runs, pee-wee herman and Justin Bieber's toupee?
TAPELESS MELODIESApril 23, 7pm, Microscope Gallery, Bushwick, Brooklyn, NYA night of psychedelic inversions, structural cuteness and the contestant of your dreams!These artist use audio-visual performance, filmic intervention and improvised play to re-invent the mediated image in the digital age.Including video and sound by Marianna Ellenberg, Laida Lertuxndi, Josh Mannis, Jayne Parker and Jessie Stead.Special Performance by London Based artist Oriana Fox.Hosted by Marianna Ellenberg and Melanie Neergard.
If you missed The Do It All Dating Game when it was live, you can watch it in Let's Paint TV's stickam archive embedded below.
Apologies for poor quality, but I will be editing a high resolution version from the DV tapes we recorded at the event asap.
I'm thrilled to report that last night's performance was a fantastic
success. It was an evening filled with laughter. I have loads to say about it, but unfortunately my only option to
write this blog this morning is through my cell phone. I'll report
back in much greater detail later tonight hopefully.
success. It was an evening filled with laughter. I have loads to say about it, but unfortunately my only option to
write this blog this morning is through my cell phone. I'll report
back in much greater detail later tonight hopefully.
