Wednesday, May 19, 2010
Cynthia's Response to May 2010 Assignment
Feedback Questions:
(1) What is your response to the video – viscerally, emotionally, intellectually?
(2) Arc: Does your attention ever lag or are there places you would like to see for longer? What do you think of the video cuts?
(3) How does this piece dialogue, if at all, with Bollywood aesthetics and the genre of courtesan films?
(4) Do you see connections to other studies? Thoughts about how this could be used in our collaborative live performance?
This study, “skin,” uses music by Loren Nerell and text by Sumita Chakravarty. It integrates two techniques that have been used in other studies: the zooming into a woman’s body parts and the use of projection on the moving body. While my study did not end up being as closely linked to a particular Bollywood dance sequence as Sandra's assignment may have intended, it does draw on theory about Indian courtesan films. Several years ago I read Sumita Chakravarty’s book, National Identity in Indian Popular Cinema, 1947-1987, which has an entire chapter dedicated to courtesan films. I found her description of the courtesan’s place in Indian cultural memory particularly apt in its complex contradictions:
The courtesan, as historical character and cinematic spectacle, is one of the most enigmatic figures to haunt the margins of Indian cultural consciousness. Variously described as dancing girl, nautsch-girl, prostitute, or harlot, she appears again and again in Indian cultural texts, at once celebrated and shunned, used and abused, praised and condemned. Socially decentered, she is yet the object of respect and admiration because of her artistic training and musical accomplishments. The embodiment of a charged sexuality, she is as often associated in popular culture with the Madonna. A bazaar entertainer, she is paradoxically the repository of the traditions of a vanished age and a lost way of life. Economically independent, she is portrayed as yearning for the affections and protection of a man…Skirting the boundaries of the legitimate and the illegitimate, an intricate blend of Hindu and Muslim social graces, this ambiguous icon of Indian womanhood and female power-
cum-vulnerability serves as the analog of a national palimpsest inscribed with contradictory social meanings. (Chakravarty, 270)
At first, I had a performance art fantasy of having someone write Chakravarty’s words on an overhead projector. As they were being written, the words would be projected on my body. I would be initially dressed in the style of a tawaif from a courtesan film and would slowly remove my clothes while the words would appear on me -- the images and perceptions of the courtesan written on my body. But I had no overhead projector, no one to run the camera, and no one to write the text. So instead I went for a more stark, minimalist visual statement, projecting the text directly onto my neck, collar-bones, and shoulders. I found the image hard to control choreographically, as I could only vaguely see what was in the frame and had no idea that the text was even legible, let alone what words were appearing at what time, and so had to edit heavily later.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
1) The imagery draws me in immediately and it's intriguing and mysterious to see the words projected against your bare skin. I only caught glimpses of the words since they were so small and moving, but this also kept me searching and invested.
ReplyDelete2) I'd love to see the image of what looks like the text falling off of your body...almost melting off....for longer. I'd also love to eventually see the zoom in pan out to see your silhouette, which would be an added element of surprise. The cuts seemed to flow well, but there was a lag when we got to your shoulder
3) The text being projected upon your naked body is an extremely interesting place to visit. I like your performance art idea of starting off veiled and dressed like a courtesan and shedding the layers til we see only the text upon skin
4)Yes, I see a huge connection with our other studies of deconstructing the dancing body by zooming in on certain areas and utilizing video as a medium to do this. Very exciting study....can't wait to see where it might go....
(1) It is very mysterious, because at first viewing (on small screen) I just saw skin with words I hardly even know which part of the body it was on, it was more of a fascinating texure. The body became a landscape of curves, valleys and shadows that the words traveled across. The words are leaked out to cover the bare skin, like an ink stain, like a dark veil of meaning underscored by the ominous music.
ReplyDeleteOn second viewing (on big screen) I clearly saw the neck and shoulder and certain words stood out to me : "praised and condemned" came in the beginning and again toward the end. "dancing girl, nautsch-girl," was somewhere in the middle. My mind began to see the body as labeled and judged. At the very end my eyes rested on “socially decentered” - an interesting moment since it’s also showing a bit of armpit and the frame is not on the center of the body. Ending with the words covering the skin, more or less, leaves the body marked with names and interpretations.
(2) My attention lags a little bit on the shoulder where the words disappear for a bit. Generally the cuts are interesting. It is an amazing image when the words start dropping or sliding down your neck. I could see more of that!
(3) How does this piece dialogue, if at all, with Bollywood aesthetics and the genre of courtesan films?
The choice to show naked skin and then cover it with something is an interesting choice, especially since the Bollywood courtesans of old are often extremely covered and even sometimes veiled. The words marking the female body “praised and condemned” are definitely what I think of when I think of the Bollywood figure of the courtesan.
(4) Do you see connections to other studies? Thoughts about how this could be used in our collaborative live performance?
It’s nice that we both are using Loren’s music! He creates strong emotional states/moods/atmospheres. The idea of projections on bodies, costumes, and maybe props is expanding….and even a projection of a projection something (as it could be in this case). I wonder what the naked skin would look like if projected on a costume or an object. When I was using Anjali’s wrists I thought of them as my character’s inner journey. Could it be that projecting skin onto something clothed reveals the unspoken or insinuated thing that’s underneath?