For this round of assignments, Babli and Cyn started collaborating on writing text for UNFINISHED, ITERATION III, Babli’s recent project inspired by painter Amrita Sher-Gil.
For this assignment, Cyn and Babli looked at two different portraits painted by Sher-Gil (at this point we won’t say which ones-sorry)
We created 2 rounds of freewrites for each portrait, i.e. looking at each portrait from 2 different perspectives.
We ask for feedback on the freewrites, and there is a video pasted below that plays with putting some of the text over movement (from Iteration II)- HOWEVER; we ask that you watch the video AFTER having responded to the text.
Our feedback questions are:
1) What do you get from the writings? Are there any imagery, ideas, and/or phrases that stand out to you as compelling?
2) How do these writings relate to the performance, UNFINISHED? How might you imagine them being integrated into the performance?
3) How do these writings relate to some of our explorations regarding the queer female desiring gaze?
4) Would you imagine combining these writings into one or two pieces, or do you like them as multiple perspectives on the same thing?
5) We pasted below an experiment of overlaying the text with movement (please only watch it after responding to the above questions)
a) How does watching the text with movement change the text- AND the movement for you?
b) What do you get from the combination?
c) How would you like the text to be delivered (i.e. voice over, Sandra speaking, text projection, another person speaking live - e.g. an audience member)
6) Any other thoughts?
Painting 1
Freewrites round 1
Your eyes, they look sultry, almond shaped
your gaze stern and self conscious,
indirect, since you are facing the diagonal
your prominent eyebrows appear close together
your lips deep red serious, no smile
they give your look a strictness and determination that exudes confidence
your hair is thick and very very long
I imagine it is very heavy
tied deep in the neck
Not open
Your face and hair look very Indian to me
Your shoulders stoop forward ever so slightly
On your diagonal the side of your upper body that is closer to me- it is your left side-
is light more brightly
Around your waist you are wearing a light blue pareo of which I can only see the top part
Your hands are clasped in front of your hips
Your indirect facing
Your closed posture
your serious, confident, self conscious face
seem to contradict the openness and lusciousness of your bare upper body
The shadow of a man in a hat towers behind you
All in front of the backdrop of a - is it a Japanese- scene where there are three figures
two female- they seem to be talking to each other
and one male
---
You are vulnerable, brown, thoughtful, hands folded protectively over your crotch. My eyes skate between your face and your bare torso. You face the corner with fathomless black black eyes, brows drawn together slightly, large sloping nose contrasting with your narrow jaw and round heart-shaped lips, slightly pursed, unavailable. look don't look. Your breasts and nipples, full with a slight sag, delicately modeled. Your
arms browner than the rest of you -- a shirt sleeve tan? Your chest relaxed, despite it all. The strangest thing is the figures in the background, faint, a Japanese imperial painting, a male official with a long moustache, ladies in waiting. An ominous shadow between you and this underpainting, a shadow which could not have been cast by you, ominous and frontal and male.
______
freewrites round 2
Your eyes- my gaze is drawn to your eyes most of all-- they are almond shaped. You are looking out into the distance, but not with your eyes wide open -- your look/your gaze into the distance- may I call it sultry?
your hair lusciously cascades down your back.
Your lips are full
deep red
serious, sensuous, earnest
contemplative
Your torso is shaped by curves-
the slight droop of your shoulders close your body
just like the protective clasp of your hands
your full breasts are marked by what looks like a tanline- leaving your arms darker than the fullness of your breast
your hips are covered snugly by a light blue, thin pareo
it is tied very low below your bellybutton
just like we were told to wear it for dance class
_______
in van gogh, whom you loved as well, brilliance and movement and color and hope. you drew yourself against his hope, his romance-faded vision of a japanese monastic artistic community, his dark shadow looming behind you. Amrita, how did you occupy this legacy, luxuriating in and rejecting these western eyes, so exotic, so different! black crows of eyebrows furrowed, thick cascading hair, you paint yourself into the primitive colonial object, using the tools of your colonizers your teachers. what a peculiar gesture, the self-portrait, to treat oneself as visual object, to be inside and outside. as you paint your body you paint truth and flaw and desire, lushness and discomfort. a celebration, yes, of lush brown openness and femininity, gauguin, but where you keep yourself, your secrets, is in your eyes, black, unavailable, aware of being seen. you feel my gaze upon you, you feel the entire history of western viewers gazing upon you.
Painting 2
freewrites round 1
You are sitting
relaxed
Your left elbow supported on something (dark)
Your right hand placed on your knee
You are putting weight on your hand, it seems
Your right shoulder gets pushed up
Your posture turns out slightly skewed
But in a relaxed, provocative way
Your eyes are piercing
Your red lips match the pattern on your blouse
I ask myself if you are- or maybe want to- lift your eyebrow
to enhance the challenging, is it playful, look you are returning to the person painting you
You are playing back the gaze
Your right hand
the one on your knee
appears huge
____
You summon me to look at you, quizzical and confrontational, your shoulder jutting askew all bones and lips, hand gripping your knee like a man, the foreshortening making your hand even larger. Your clothes scrubbed with rough strokes, black on black, energetically worked from the background, the strokes fat, undelicate, moving. all elbows and jawline. your face, though, is lit, cream and ivory glowing translucent in incandescent light, striking your left cheekbone, forehead. a glint in your gray green eyes, so clear and far-seeing, your strong dark eyebrows arched expressive, your huge orange red pouty grim stubborn lips, so kissable. your hair, bobbed, curves into your jaw and disappears into the background. you are manly and womanly, confrontational all boney angles and yet unreadable, waiting and looking back at the one who paints you.
___________________
Freewrites round 2:
your shoulders and hair cut, your fingers and joints - their angularity exudes strength
your eyes are piercing
so striking
your gaze direct
your lips so curved
so full so striking
The folds of your dress trace the shape of your body
your left hand tucked in as if prodded on your hips
makes your right hand even larger
- protruding out
grasping your own knee
instead of reaching out
_____
Brazen and full-lipped, you thrust your elbow, shoulder, hips at me, looking at me through me beyond me. Unreadable. I model your face, delicate porcelain translucent eggshell, tinged with cream and shell and yolk. The rest is the constant mystery of mixing blacks grays browns, purple shadows enriching the mahogany gleam of your hair, your clothing emerging in blacks and olives and yellow gray greens. After all this time sharing space, I still cannot read you, a puzzle how you thrust yourself against me and retract, one key two keys, how you found us in the sheets, your green eyes and mannish hands, surveying us with amusement. I work that drama into the drip and swirl and fold of cloth and brush, energetically moving cloth against your skin, so delicate, your stubborn lips, so kissable.
VIDEO:
UNFINISHED ITERATION III, Text, PNC Assigment Aug 2014 from Unfinished on Vimeo.
PW: iteration 3 exploration
1) What do you get from the writings? Are there any imagery, ideas, and/or phrases that stand out to you as compelling?
ReplyDeletePAINTING 1
Round 1:
I enjoy that the descriptions are addressed to the person who is the subject of the painting. Instead of describing the subject as if she is an object, directly addressing her creates a dialogue loop between the one who is looking and the one who is being looked at (if my guess is right about which painting is being described, it is further complicated that the one being looked at is representing herself in a self portrait).
Compelling phrases: “My eyes skate between your face and your bare torso.” “look don't look” To me these two phrases capture the tension between seeing her as a subject and an object.
Round 2:
Compelling phrases: “may I call it sultry?”
“just like we were told to wear it for dance class”
I feel both of these situates the viewer in a more friendly way to the subject of the painting. They create a relationship, and the second one creates a similarity to the subject, creating a we instead of the viewer separated from the “other.”
--------------------------
“you drew yourself against his hope”
“truth and flaw and desire, lushness and discomfort.”
“but where you keep yourself, your secrets, is in your eyes, black, unavailable, aware of being seen”
“you feel my gaze upon you, you feel the entire history of western viewers gazing upon you.”
From these and this section, I get the recognition of this portrait as a part of a canon of exotified others in the western gaze. And yet, I also get the glimmer of, or possibility of, self-conscious resistance through the discomfort and awareness of being looked at, and the indiscernible eyes.
PAINTING 2
Round 1:
Compelling phrases:
“I ask myself if you are- or maybe want to- lift your eyebrow to enhance the challenging, is it playful, look you are returning to the person painting you”
“playing back the gaze”
I feel these make me aware of the personality behind the image, rather then just what the image looks like.
Compelling phrases:
“You summon me to look at you, quizzical and confrontational”
“all bones and lips”
“Your clothes scrubbed with rough strokes”
“all elbows and jawline.”
“you are manly and womanly, confrontational all boney angles and yet unreadable”
I feel here the power of the subject of the painting is emphasized. The viewer is not looking upon something passive, the viewer is summoned to look and a strong personality looks back, with quirky, boney, gender fluidity.
Round 2:
Compelling phrases: “After all this time sharing space, I still cannot read you, a puzzle how you thrust yourself against me and retract,”
“your stubborn lips, so kissable”
I start to imagine a relationship, a desire of the viewer for the subject, and a cool, distant attitude of the subject toward the viewer.
2) How do these writings relate to the performance, UNFINISHED? How might you imagine them being integrated into the performance?
I think these can be interesting tools to complicate the audience’s view of the dancing body, especially in sections where I remember Tahitian movement references where your hips and torso sway in what might be considered sensual or “exotic” ways. The implication of the painter and her subjects’ awareness and resistance can add to the awareness and resistance of the choreographer and dancer.
3) How do these writings relate to some of our explorations regarding the queer female desiring gaze?
They most remind me Cyn's assignment working with the writings of Maude Allen and of the resulting trio that you all were working on of Meena filming Babli in that loop of watching each other, appreciating each other, moving each other.
4) Would you imagine combining these writings into one or two pieces, or do you like them as multiple perspectives on the same thing?
I could see them combined but it depends on context.
5) We pasted below an experiment of overlaying the text with movement (please only watch it after responding to the above questions)
ReplyDeletea) How does watching the text with movement change the text- AND the movement for you?
First section, rather then watching Babli lie on the floor as an image, I see her as a viewer. This starts almost immediately when I hear something different described then what I’m seeing. Then the talk about looking and looking away is done by the dancer, and so I interpret her as watching someone else and responding to a shadow as she turns away. As the movements continue without the text I see her as contemplating while rocking, thinking about what she is watching, her attention sometimes going more inward to the red cloth as an additional element to contemplate, but I am not sure why. The text makes me identify with her more, rather then just watching her as an object. As the second part of the text starts I am not sure if the text is now about Babli instead of from her perspective. At first it is still about someone else, but then I start to imagine it being about her. But her back is to me, not allowing me to confirm the description. When it starts talking about the pareo tied low, she start swrapping more and more of the sari around her torso and waist, as if, perhaps to shield the bare body being described from my site and block my gaze. The Japanese figures in the background seem irrelevant to me at this point as I am caught up in the relationship between my gaze and her, her awareness of me, and perhaps her gaze on someone else earlier.
b) What do you get from the combination?
I think I answered this in the last question already.
c) How would you like the text to be delivered (i.e. voice over, Sandra speaking, text projection, another person speaking live - e.g. an audience member)
As a voice over, it has a little bit of ambiguity, so that sometimes I read the viewer as dancer and sometimes I read the dancer as the object of the viewing. I found both interesting.
If Sandra was speaking, I might more identify her as the viewer, reacting to and sometimes showing what she is seeing.
If the text was projected I think it would compete with my being able to watch the movement and it would read as a more “official” point of view or perhaps a historical writing such as a memoir or journal.
If it was another person speaking live I might tend to read Sandra more as the object of the viewing, especially if that person is in the audience. If that person is on the stage and wearing something similar or related to Sandra, I might relate it to her inner voice.
Having thought through all of these, I’m currently a fan of the voice- over, which allows for some ambiguity, or of Sandra speaking live so that I objectify her less. I am curious and open though to different experiments.
6) Any other thoughts?
I appreciate that the text was not there throughout, so it gave a chance to color the movement, but also a chance to see the movement separately. It also allowed time for me to take in one text in before a different text came (especially because for me, the second text shifted my perspective from seeing Sandra as the describer/watcher, to more as the person being described). To me this transition was quite interesting and makes sense because I believe the second text is about a self portrait. Her movements during the second text emphasize the elements of resistance I picked up in the writings on their own but perhaps even stronger: not letting us see her front for a while, and then wrapping up her torso and waist so there was less to see as well.
1) What do you get from the writings? Are there any imagery, ideas, and/or phrases that stand out to you as compelling?
ReplyDeleteThere is a specificity in the writing that I find grounding, informative. I like to hear how someone else sees, interprets. Sometimes I might not know how to so I feel supported. Even though I cannot actually see what the author is actually seeing, I enjoy imagining what they are seeing. The detailed visual descriptions evoke glimpses, fragments of a whole. This brings to the surface a certain kind of transparency - that I can only ever receive the author's interpretation and perspective. That what I see or read is being mediated.
phrases that stand out:
indirect, since you are facing the diagonal
Your face and hair look very Indian to me
your serious, confident, self conscious face
seem to contradict the openness and lusciousness of your bare upper body
You are vulnerable, brown, thoughtful, hands folded protectively over your crotch.
look don't look.
Your eyes- my gaze is drawn to your eyes most of all--
may I call it sultry?
just like we were told to wear it for dance class
you drew yourself against his hope
Amrita, how did you occupy this legacy, luxuriating in and rejecting these western eyes, so exotic, so different! black crows of eyebrows furrowed, thick cascading hair, you paint yourself into the primitive colonial object, using the tools of your colonizers your teachers. what a peculiar gesture, the self-portrait, to treat oneself as visual object, to be inside and outside. as you paint your body you paint truth and flaw and desire, lushness and discomfort. a celebration, yes, of lush brown openness and femininity, gauguin, but where you keep yourself, your secrets, is in your eyes, black, unavailable, aware of being seen. you feel my gaze upon you, you feel the entire history of western viewers gazing upon you.
lift your eyebrow
to enhance the challenging, is it playful, look you are returning to the person painting you
hand gripping your knee like a man
your huge orange red pouty grim stubborn lips, so kissable.
you are manly and womanly,
2) How do these writings relate to the performance, UNFINISHED? How might you imagine them being integrated into the performance?
I think some of the things I mentioned above - grounding, differently informing UNFINISHED. Can give another perspective. More information. The question of who is watching whom becomes layered in a way that interests me between the writing and then the live performance.
3) How do these writings relate to some of our explorations regarding the queer female desiring gaze?
ReplyDeleteI cut and paste below the ones that I felt were the most female desiring perspective because to me it seems to say "I want to kiss you." All the other writings have some elements of what seems to me to be queer female desire - sensuality, erotic.
You summon me to look at you, quizzical and confrontational, your shoulder jutting askew all bones and lips, hand gripping your knee like a man, the foreshortening making your hand even larger. Your clothes scrubbed with rough strokes, black on black, energetically worked from the background, the strokes fat, undelicate, moving. all elbows and jawline. your face, though, is lit, cream and ivory glowing translucent in incandescent light, striking your left cheekbone, forehead. a glint in your gray green eyes, so clear and far-seeing, your strong dark eyebrows arched expressive, your huge orange red pouty grim stubborn lips, so kissable. your hair, bobbed, curves into your jaw and disappears into the background. you are manly and womanly, confrontational all boney angles and yet unreadable, waiting and looking back at the one who paints you.
___________________
Freewrites round 2:
your shoulders and hair cut, your fingers and joints - their angularity exudes strength
your eyes are piercing
so striking
your gaze direct
your lips so curved
so full so striking
The folds of your dress trace the shape of your body
your left hand tucked in as if prodded on your hips
makes your right hand even larger
- protruding out
grasping your own knee
instead of reaching out
_____
Brazen and full-lipped, you thrust your elbow, shoulder, hips at me, looking at me through me beyond me. Unreadable. I model your face, delicate porcelain translucent eggshell, tinged with cream and shell and yolk. The rest is the constant mystery of mixing blacks grays browns, purple shadows enriching the mahogany gleam of your hair, your clothing emerging in blacks and olives and yellow gray greens. After all this time sharing space, I still cannot read you, a puzzle how you thrust yourself against me and retract, one key two keys, how you found us in the sheets, your green eyes and mannish hands, surveying us with amusement. I work that drama into the drip and swirl and fold of cloth and brush, energetically moving cloth against your skin, so delicate, your stubborn lips, so kissable.
4) Would you imagine combining these writings into one or two pieces, or do you like them as multiple perspectives on the same thing?
I feel like it could go either way. Depending on what you would like to accomplish. Maybe there are these multiple perspectives - multiple ways of seeing that can be clarified (one seemingly 'matter of fact' physical description, another one more sensual, another one more desiring or sexualized).
5) We pasted below an experiment of overlaying the text with movement (please only watch it after responding to the above questions)
a) How does watching the text with movement change the text- AND the movement for you?
The first sequence feels like you are watching the painting. Because your focus is so specific. Once you don't seem to be looking at something specific I get confused. Potentially interesting confusion.
b) What do you get from the combination?
Confirms answers 1 - 2.
c) How would you like the text to be delivered (i.e. voice over, Sandra speaking, text projection, another person speaking live - e.g. an audience member)
I like the text as a voice over with Sandra's voice. Maybe you even speak it live sometimes? This way you seem like you are being seen (painting and/or dancer)' and you are watching. You can do both. If an audience member were to speak it I might interpret the audience member as watching the painting/Sandra. With projected text, I feel like maybe Sunoh writing kind of style could be really rich (projected on body?)