Manual FOR VISUAL STRATEGIES
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Introduction In the contemporary world we live in we receive a high amount of images every day. Do we take the time to reflect on what we are seeing? Do we look deep enough at the meaning of figures, symbols and colours around us? In this manual 3 distinct aspects of visual strategies are presented in 9 visual examples. Iconoclasm, Remix Culture and Panoptic Vision are explored and discussed, so that we understand a bit further some elements surround us.
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ghhgjfkukjhdsgtr “Invader” is a French anonymous urban artist. He states that his mission is to invade the planet with video game characters made with tiles that he puts on walls in big cities all around the world. “Like a mission, I really stay two or three weeks and I try to spread the invasion all around the city.” He has successfully monetized his artwork, selling his pieces through a website. Even though he uses characters of space invaders and other games he only seemed to have problems concerning the issue of putting his work in public or privet space. He was arrested after placing a mosaic on the Hollywood sign and had to pay a fine. Midway holds the copyrights of Space Invaders monsters, until now, they have not been bothered by the use of their characters by the artist Invader. Although he is making profit of the image of “Space Invaders” Midway Company hasn’t shown interests of suing Invader for copyrights.
Remix Culture The first topic of this Manual for Visual Strategies is “Remix Culture”. To remix means to combine or edit existing materials in order to produce something new. In a world that companies sue companies over the rights of their creations, copying is seen as something negative. But how do we create new things? Is it possible that a “new thing” can be truly original? Is it an illusion that ideas are created from nothing to something innovative?
My first image is “Venus with Drawers” (Salvador Dalí, 1988), a “pate-de-verre” and silver metal sculpture clearly based on the classical Greek Venus de Milo statue. Dalí added drawers to the figure, being inspired by Sigmund Freud psychoanalysis about the hidden areas of the unconscious. The drawers also emphasize the erotic and sexual aspect of the female body. Already with these references we can see that a creative work requires resources and references, Dali copied these ideas, transformed and combined them in a new way. Venus de Milo itself is believed to be a recreation of another statue of Aphrodite, “Aphrodite of Capua”, which in turn is derived from an original bronze statue from the late 4th century BC. So we can also see that remixing ideas and works is not a brand new act.
Venus de Milo, 100 BC Louvre, Paris. (self-taken photo)
Aphrodite of Capua, late 4th Century BC Muzeo Nationale, Napoli Venus with Drawers, Salvador Dalí, 1988 Dalí Espace Paris. (self-taken photo)
Space Invader Piece, Rue des Brasseurs, Brussels. (self-taken photo in 2014)
The artwork “Made in Vietnam” by Hanna Malallah consists in a found object, a converse trainer with the American flag. The artist is often dealing with social themes. She states "My work is about catastrophe. I am soaked in catastrophe like a sponge. I am stamped by Iraq's wars. During the Iran Iraq war I was 20. There has been war after war. My pen is a knife.” In this piece she presents us to a paradox, an everyday object with the American flag produced in Vietnam, country which the United States had a direct relation on the Second Indochina War or Vietnam War. This object represents the globalization in so many aspects, for example the high amount of goods consumed and produced in poor conditions. Focusing on the elements of the piece, the reproduction of the American flag is ineligible for copyright and therefore is in public domain. The “Converse All-Star” reproduction and use of image however is eligible for rights and the company has already sued other brands that reproduced and sold their trainers. The use of an everyday life ware in art is known as ready-made, Duchamp and Warhol are well known artists that were supporters of this idea.
Made in Vietnam, Hanna Malallah, 2013
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ghhgjfkukjhdsgtr Iconoclasm The 2nd theme is Iconoclasm. Defined as the practice of destroying religious objects. The reasons for that might be multiple: social conflicts, wars, economic interests, ideological beliefs and religious. No matter the diverse causes for Iconoclasm, this happening has to have a religious connotation. The conqueror may have no declared religion. To present this topic I’m going to talk about 3 different aspects of Iconoclasm. Presentation in the Temple, Canterbury Cathedral.
Presentation in the Temple, Canterbury Cathedral. (After renovation in 1660)
The glass window “Presentation in the Temple” in Canterbury’s Cathedral, has suffered an act of iconoclasm. In 1644 the Parliament had given an order to remove the image of born Jesus and his parents, this request was due to the fight of idols images and it also took place in other parts of the country. This event produced anger and the window was replaced after some years, in 1660. The occurred had clearly shown the conflict between catholicism and the authorities in Britain at the time.
The last image of this topic is The Great Sphinx of Tanis. A symbolic representation of the relationship of the Sun God (body) and the king (head), this guardian protects temples entrances and defending it from hostile forces. This piece, together with others Ancient Egyptian items that are now in the Louvre were acquired after the translation of Rosetta stone. Champollion the director of the Louvre at the time advised the purchase of 3 Egyptian pieces for the museum. Since the Sphinx had a religious connotation and was placed originally in this context, the act of taking it away and moving it into a museum can be addressed as icono-
The Vision of the Angel, Salvador Dalí, Espace Dali Paris. (self-taken photo)
In this Dalí piece, The Vision of the angel 1977, the artist twists christian iconography reinforcing the idea of one God and the trinity. A giant thumb has divine attributes, growing branches and creating life. At right, there is his son awakening to life and at left a winged character representing the holy spirit. Dalí’s relation with religion has changed thought time. Firstly his work was influenced by his atheist father who sent him to a state school with no catholic education. Dalí’s had corrupt and hypocritical priesthood and blasphemous images used in this period. He once blamed catholicism for his sense of guilt about sex. In the 40’s his attitude had a shift, he started to see the possibility of combining modern science and the mystery of religion. In “Vision of the angel” we can see some elements of fusion; this work can be considered to be Iconoclasm as it destroys the traditional images of the Trinity. Dalí announced himself as a catholic without faith and spent his last years producing works trying to reaffirm his beliefs.
Great Sphinx of Tanis, Louvre, Paris (self-taken photo)
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ghhgjfkukjhdsgtr Panoptic Visions The 3rd theme approached in this Manual is “Panoptic vision”. Panopticism is a social theory by the French philosopher Michel Foucault; this theory inspired later Jeremy Bentham, an English philosopher and social theorist to design an institutional building where one watchman could observe all inmates of an institution without them realizing if they are being observed or not, consequently controlling their behavior. Despite the fact that a single watchman could not observe all inmates at once, the idea is that the feeling that the inmates are being watched creates an environment of behavioral caution. Nowadays we find ourselves being watched by cameras on the streets, supermarkets, our internet navigation being controlled and our data being held by institutions and we have no idea why and where all this information is going. Should we be more careful and conscious of who is observing us and how all this data is being used?
One Nation Under CCTV Bansy, London. 2008
Banksy, the famous anonymous British street artist has painted, in 2008, just feet from a surveillance camera the phrase “One nation under CCTV”. He protests against the Britain’s surveillance system. Since 1990 these cameras have been installed, despite the discussion whether the use of this equipment infringe the right to privacy, 4 million CCTVs have been put on the streets since then. The fact that the installation was so close to a camera makes us wonder how they are helping security or how useful and effective they are. An interesting fact is that years later, in 2014, a CCTV supposedly caught Banksy revealing his identity when he was about to install his artwork, but the footage is so low on quality that you can’t barely recognize a face on it.
El Bocho Piece, Berlin Street. (self-taken photo in 2014)
El Bocho another street artist approaches surveillance cameras in his work. Kalle and Bernd are CCTV cameras that chat about the things they are observing like Kalle: Somebody is ripping of a poster! and Bernd says: “Call the cops Kalle!”, or sometimes they are just chatting about the problems in the everyday life of a CCTV: “One day Bernd, I would love to see the sky”, or Kalle tells of how she fell in love with a traffic light. El Bocho’s way of talking about being watched on the cities is rather humorous; he humanizes the cameras creating a controversial relationship between the watcher and the watched, the mechanical action and the free action.
In the song “The Message”, the British rapper M.I.A. sings “Hand bone connected to the internet connected to the Google, connected to the government”. In her instagram she posted this recent picture which relates to the song. This thought that every action you are doing is watched and connected to the government is pretty scary in many ways, even more scary because is very likely to be true. All the searches you have done in Google, all your emails, what you buy, with who you are speaking, where you are going can be easily traced through the internet. We don’t have a clear idea or a clarification on how this information is or can be used. We haven’t had the choice to discuss if we want to be watched or traced at every blink of an eye.
Instagram Picture by M.I.A., 2015
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References http://www.louvre.fr/en/oeuvre-notices/aphrodite-known-venus-de-milo http://cir.campania.beniculturali.it/museoarcheologiconazionale/thematic-views/image-gallery/RA72?set_language=en http://everythingisaremix.info/watch-the-series/ http://www.artic.edu/aic/collections/artwork/185184 http://www.stencilrevolution.com/profiles/space-invader/ http://artandpoliticsnow.blogspot.nl/2007/10/hana-mal-allah.html http://hanaa-malallah.com/works/object%20art/madeinvietnam.html http://www.trademarkologist.com/2014/10/converse-the-world-the-battle-for-chuck-taylor-all-stars/ http://americanflagfoundation.org/frequently-asked-questions/ http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2605959/Has-Banksy-finally-unmasked-CCTV-Elusive-graffiti-artist-filmed-installed-latest-artwork-removed-just-hours-later.html http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1895625/Banksy-pulls-off-daring-CCTV-protest-in-London.html http://www.surveillance-and-society.org/articles2(2)/regulation.pdf http://www.streetartbln.com/blog/street-artist-el-bocho/ http://www.ngv.vic.gov.au/dali/salvador/religion.html#id=DaliAndReligion&num=01 Kolrud K., Prusac M. (n.d.) Iconoclasm from Antiquity to Modernity, : http://www.tate.org.uk/context-comment/blogs/missing-figures-canterburys-stained-glass http://www.louvre.fr/en/oeuvre-notices/great-sphinx-tanis