AM DREAMING by Tiffany Lin

AM DREAMING TIFFANY LIN

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AM DREAMING ONLY

TIFFANY LIN

A THESIS PROCESS BOOK FALL 2016 - SPRING 2017 MFA ILLUSTRATION PRACTICE MARYLAND INSTITUTE COLLEGE OF ART

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TABLE OF CONTENTS INTRODUCTION 7 BACKGROUND 12 PROPOSAL 19 RESEARCH, PROCESS, FAILURE 24 COME-TO-JESUS MOMENT 26 HERE GOES NOTHING 29 THE WORK 33 NEXT STEPS 69

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INTRODUCTION American Dreaming is an ongoing investigation of the American Dream as national mythology, with all the associated wanting, believing and belonging.

This project is an evolution of a longstanding interest with the concept as an ideology.

Though the Dream has proven itself as a failure time and time again, it continues to captivate the global imagination, compelling even the most pragmatic of souls to journey across difficult terrain in search of a second chance.

The American Dream, as I’ve come to know it, is the belief that any aspiration is possible in the United States so long as one invests hard work, sweat, blood, and tears into fighting for it. It is a test of will power, tenacity, and unyielding desire to succeed against impossible odds under the tenets of justice and liberty. It is placing faith in the promise of an egalitarian society. The Dream is a Promised Land, but one where somebody always finishes last.

My interest in this topic began in my family’s immigration story from Taiwan to the United States and their humble beginnings as Keno runners and custodial staff in the casinos of Reno, Nevada. After working there for seven years and going to school part time, my father earned his Bachelor’s degree from the University of Nevada, Reno, landing an engineering job in sunny California where I was later born and raised. I was born at the

geographic boundary of the American frontier – a beneficiary of its history and a recipient of the privileges this confers, yet I cannot buy into the Dream wholesale. Labor alone does not beget success; the element of chance always presides.

party affiliation, people feel their livelihood was being threatened in some capacity.

And it is this instinctive tendency toward self-preservation that reveals some rather unflattering attitudes. Why them, and not me? Why now, and not then?

So how does one choose to take the gamble?

Naturally, the cause and source of people’s unhappiness vary drastically depending on geopolitical and cultural alignments. But at the heart of it all is the universal desire to pursue life to its fullest, achieve freedom from want, be happy, and to simply belong somewhere, to live and let live.

Historically, gambling has played a fundamental role in the founding of the United States and has evolved into an all too appropriate metaphor for its undoing. The promise of success is reality and falsehood, a grand illusion of guaranteed riches predicated on hard work that is inevitably based on chance and circumstance.

Gambling imagery — slot machines, lotto tickets, and scratch-offs — provide a wealth of visual language to reframe the idea of want alongside notions of belonging and loss, particularly in the aftermath of the 2016 presidential election.

In a polarized political climate, it is difficult to engage in dialogue without resorting to incendiary, reactionary debate. Nativist attitudes, prejudice, and young naïveté are exposed raw. Though I consider my work political, I am not interested in unpacking or engaging the spectacle of political theater.

Leave politicians to lie, cheat, and steal – I am only in search of simple truths. The underlying sentiment coursing through the nation is one of anxiety. Regardless of

How, then, might we negotiate between these contending anxieties and aspirations under the broader idea of belonging? And ultimately, what bodies are American?

This book chronicles my creative process and development throughout the course of my final year in the MFA Illustration Program at MICA. American Dreaming is merely a repositioning. The Dream is no longer a mode of action but a persistent condition; a constant state of want.

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Bowing down at temple

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DEDICATION I am indebted to the following people for all their unyielding love, support, and feedback throughout thesis entire journey. Thank you for working with me through the anxiety, tears, and belligerence.

I hope I did you proud.

Mom, Dad, Jeay Jeay, Guh Guh Ed, Melissa Lucas & Mira Nicholas Keith Christian Whitney Sherman Kimberly Ellen Hall Fang Fu Jasjyot Singh Hans Emily Joynton Sena Kwon Mengyang Wang Diana Chu Olivia Fu ILP Family BARS Community Shaun Chang Yu-Hua Wu Shuna Lydon Charles Eladio Beronio Hope Nam Saskia Krafft

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BACKGROUND My explicit fixation with the American Dream arose during my brief stint in New York City. Not to say the idea didn’t carry any weight before I moved across the country, but it didn’t possess any gravitas. It was more or less a cliché hovering by, brushing against me occasionally but never capturing my entirety. I was too self-centered and preoccupied with my own navel-gazing. I had moved from sunny California to New York City in search of a bohemian art fantasy only to find myself working in food service jobs most of the time make ends meet. (I should note I wasn’t very good at it.) The city was a rude awakening and forced me to reframe my perception of labor, bodies, and and my parents’ journey to the United States.

In many ways, my parents’ achieved the Dream. They came here with $200 between them both, two suitcases, and blind ambition.

While my family’s situation illustrates upward mobility in action, my experiences in food service and observations of labor at large demonstrated to me that hard work was not enough. Circumstance was critical. In some ways, it was more important to be in the right place at the right time, to know or have the right people, and honestly be the right kind of person. Never mind pure perseverance – the balance between sheer persistence and dumb luck seemed to weigh heavy on the latter. How much did accumulation of wealth have to do with factors outside of one’s control? Skin, body, and the inheritance of [cultural] capital?

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With this ambivalence peppered with criticality, I made a series of scratch-off tickets in while attending Parsons the New School for Design in New York City. At the time, I was immersed in the world of printmaking and began experimenting with various lithographic techniques to achieve the scratch-off effect. The cards revealed well known photos that depicted different concepts associated with American nationhood. The intention was to demonstrate the sociocultural and historical factors that contributed to the accumulation of wealth. It was a heavy-handed indictment of America.

When I arrived at MICA, I decided to turn inward to investigate my personal relationship to the United States. Over the summer, I interviewed my parents about their journey to America. It was a story I had never heard in its entirety, having only absorbed it piecemeal throughout my childhood.

My father immigrated to the United States from Taiwan on August 26th, 1977 to Reno, Nevada. My mother would later join him in 1978. My uncle, an established doctor in Taiwan, had arrived earlier in 1972 to join the US Air Force during the Vietnam War. His enlistment had been part of an initiative put forth by President Nixon and Secretary of State Henry Kissinger to recruit people from nearby countries to assist in combat or medical aid. My uncle completed

training but never saw combat because the United States withdrew from the conflict in 1975. He was granted citizenship for his participation. He used this opportunity to sponsor his siblings, their spouses and children. My brother and sister later arrived in 1979.

My father’s primary reason for immigrating was to earn money. After high school, he tested into a dentistry program but did not have the funds to pay for it. At the time, Taiwan was under martial law, the economy was slow to stagnant, and my uncle had painted an enticing picture of America as a place to earn money quick. So with that, my father deferred his enrollment and set out for America to make a quick buck, his intention always to return to Taiwan to attend university. He began working three days after arriving to the United States.

He worked two jobs: one as a keno writer at the Fitzgerald Casino and the second as a janitor at the Ponderosa Hotel, earning $3.50 per hour plus tips. My mother also worked as a keno writer. They lived simply alongside four of my father’s siblings in a small apartment, biking to work and subsisting on small, cheap meals. My mother recalls eating a lot of cabbage.

Their co-workers were immigrants as well, mostly from Mexico and Vietnam.

There were many stories of employees squandering their wages on table games

after hours. My father, in his steely and unforgiving manner, has no sympathy. They let their greed get the better of them.

Later, my mother, father and his siblings purchased a 3-bedroom house on Center Street. It was at this point my father forsook his original plan of returning to Taiwan and instead decided to receive his education in the United States. He enrolled in the University of Nevada, Reno as a part time student. His manager Bob Nelson (who he speaks about fondly) gave my father very flexible hours, sympathetic of his status as a student and appreciative of his hard work and consistency.

After seven years, my father graduated with a Bachelor of Science degree in Applied Mathematics and quickly found work in California as a software engineer at IBM. My family moved to the Golden State and purchased a home in Santa Clara where I was later born and raised. Like any other adolescent, I had my angst and struggles, but overall I grew up comfortably. My parents’ story informs a lot of my perspective— they taught me the value of hard work and persistence and that there’s no such thing as a free lunch. However, I pause to think about other external factors that buoyed their success. My father had my mom and other family members to rely on while he went to school. They also came to the US voluntarily of sound body and mind.

They did not come to escape war.

It is not productive to compare their struggles and certainly not my place to invalidate anyone’s experience, least of all my own family. Personal responsibility and commitment to one’s goals is critical to individual success, regardless of background.

Likewise, timing and circumstance play a large influence. When, where, and why have you arrived? Who are you and what do you look like? What language do you speak?

How does your skillset translate into profit?

And will you ever belong?

Yet, even with these dark prospects, people come to the United States to seek their fortune, speculating that a secret billionaire resides within them all; the moment will come for them to strike it big.

health sector in addition to the harsh realities of New York City helped me to understand the privileges I possess as a college educated, American born citizen.

It also forced me to witness firsthand the way in which both global and domestic cycles of poverty and systemic inequality persist regardless of an individual’s motivation and hard work.

This process of observing, thinking, and reflecting truly put my parents’ struggles, sacrifices, and achievements in perspective and I am glad this project motivated me to speak to them in-depth about their experiences.

Amid my cynicism, I still consider myself a believer, even if I can’t buy into the Dream wholesale. As an Asian American born and raised by immigrant parents, I have benefited tremendously from the opportunities this country has to offer. How would my life be different if my parents had not engaged in this huge undertaking, leaving their home for a strange land across the sea? Abandoning everything they knew for an unknown promise 7,000 miles away?

My appreciation is woven into my ambivalence and apprehension. My prior work experience in the nonprofit and public

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excerpts from out of many, one. 2016.

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PROPOSAL In my first year at MICA, I composed a nonlinear, wordless narrative comic entitled out of many, one that explored the American Dream as a game of chance. I depicted various scenes in semi-chronological manner, featuring moments I consider quintessential to the American experience (from football games to owning a home) and juxtaposed those moments alongside images from the gambling industry. The main feedback I received during final critique was to continue digging deeper into my personal family history to imbibe my work with more meaning in order to fabricate better fictions.

This was one of the main catalysts for interviewing my parents.

Movement would largely tap into the history of immigration and displacement, illustrating a tapestry of intersecting narratives that reflected the multifaceted story of America through historical moments of mass migration and domestic conflict. I envisioned this book to be the most experimental in composition, relying only on collaging drawings and textures together to create a sense of movement across the horizon.

Geography was envisioned as a psychological exploration of the idealized American life as embodied by the built environment, chiefly through an examination of suburban architecture. For this piece, I wanted to focus on how the built environment directly contributes to malaise and restlessness, drawing inspiration from the angst I felt as an adolescent.

After speaking with them, I boiled down my strategy to a set of three books that would engage three themes: movement, geography, and faith. My goal was to deconstruct the American Dream into broad strokes that would provide a strategy for understanding fate, providence, and the relentless pursuit of happiness.

Immigrants at Locust Point, 1904. Maryland Historical Society.

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Geography was inspired by photographers like Ed Ruscha, Robert Adams, Lewis Baltz, Wim Wenders, Joel Sternfeld, and William Eggleston. I admired their haunting compositions that suggested something sinister hiding behind a pristine veneer.

Their portrayals of manmade structures against the natural landscape pointed to the seemingly endless possibilities of the United States, yet belied discomfort and anxiety within that interaction. The suburbs as an environment are explicit sites of want; the regimented, consumer driven, and mass-produced lifestyle was designed to manufacture desire.

The script for this story was a fictionalized account of a girl’s suicide told from the firstperson perspective of an acquaintance.

What actions do these beliefs inspire? And what happens when there is no apparent pay-off for your effort?

Faith centered around of belief, not specific to any spiritual or religious institution, but rather systems that emphasize providence.

In this sense, faith is a human conceit, devised to rationalize existence and purpose in the world. Conceptually, this piece was an expansion of my self-initiated project. If life is a gamble, how do Americans (and people in general) rationalize their quality of life as a consequence of their actions?

The foundation of the dream is intrinsically merit-based. Hard work is equated with success and subsequent happiness.

However, such conditions are never so clearcut, particularly in a nation rife with complex social problems that are by-products of legacies of slavery, discrimination, imperialism, grossly unequal distribution of wealth, and political corruption. I wanted to explore this inherent contradiction with simple imagery and sparse copy, using the piece as a semiotic exercise regarding fortune and desire. In a nation founded on principles of choice, I wanted to interrogate the tenuous difference between wants and dreams.

The last component, which I perceived as supplemental to the books were interactive installations that would allow viewers to literally play the game. Initially, I proposed to create a slot machine, game board, and a pack of cards.

Wim Wenders. Safeway, Corpus Christie, TX. 1983.

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Initial sketches & storyboards for Faith/If I Won.

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“Participant observation”

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RESEARCH, PROCESS, FAILURE When I returned to Baltimore, I looked outward again.

I put out an open call to BARS (Baltimore Asian Resistance in Solidarity), a loose community of API identified individuals interested in radical organizing and educational programming. BARS seeks to dismantle oppressive systems in solidarity with marginalized communities in Baltimore and beyond.

I received a positive feedback toward my project overall but a small response rate for the actual interviews. I managed to coordinate four interviews with people about their experiences as immigrants or as the children of immigrants. I concede that these interviews were by no means a comprehensive way of capturing diverse perspectives on American life, but it was a great opportunity to step outside of my personal experience and the MICA bubble.

Collecting stories is something I hope to do more of in the future.

Interviews were informal and generally selfdirected by the interviewee – my prompt was simple: Tell me about your American experience.

All interviewees identified as women of mixed and/or of Asian descent. I would say the general motivations were consistent: their families had all come to the United States in search for something better.

One woman came to the United States from the Philippines when she was 17.

Surprisingly, one of her main reasons for leaving was her father’s subscription to Reader’s Digest. Never mind political corruption and poverty, the stories and images held within that publication consumed her body and soul. She hasn’t gone back since.

Another interviewee spoke about her experience as a Korean-American born and raised in Sandtown, Baltimore. She spoke sensitively and critically about racial tensions in West Baltimore and her parents’ overall ambivalence toward coming to the United States. They own a liquor store nearby that was unfortunately vandalized during the 2015 protests surrounding the death of Freddie Gray. She views her parents as survivors who have worked hard their whole life.

Another part of my research process involved a few nights quietly sitting and observing people in casinos. I mostly went to Horseshoe though went to Live! Casino a few times. Walking past table games and the slot machines, I absorbed the sights, sounds, and atmosphere. Casino air is a funny mix of euphoria and desperation. I imagined what people would buy if they won. I didn’t speak to very many people, too afraid to interrupt their trance like states or somehow jinx their good luck strategies.

I sketched out a series of small objects that symbolized their aspirations and paired them with sentences beginning with “I would…”

The final drawings were made using charcoal and graphite and the text was composed by hand with physical vinyl type to preserve the imperfection of the hand.

Unfortunately, I was extremely behind at this point. I had had spent too much time researching (both observational, participatory, and academic) instead of engaging directly with the execution of my project. I became so entrenched in the theoretical analysis of the American Dream that I failed to dedicate the appropriate amount of time toward actual image making.

Because of this, the books Movement and Geography were severely underdeveloped.

Furthermore, the situation was exacerbated by lukewarm feedback during critiques.

Something wasn’t quite right. Art making was painful. I tried my best to eke something out, clinging tight my initial convictions even though I felt uneasy.

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Sample spreads from Movement

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Sample spreads from Geography

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COME-TO-JESUS MOMENT Fall semester was an uphill climb. While I maintained a stalwart conviction toward my concept, the actual art making process stopped coming naturally. Or perhaps, my inner doubts that I had suppressed deep into the darkest pockets of my mind had started to surface.

The final a-ha moment arrived (perhaps a little late) during my midyear critique in December with visiting critics Eun-Ha Paek, Ted McGrath, and Whitney. This is not to say my critique was bad. In fact, Eun-Ha, Ted, and Whitney all had very constructive things to say, but it confirmed many of my anxieties and concerns – I was trying too hard to be someone I was not. (I guess I’ve never outgrown my high school identity crisis!)

conventional creativity or saleable attributes.

In fact, Ted loudly declared, “Get rid of this shit!!” Though it caught me off guard, I will say that succinctly captured this moment in time – I had a lot of discovery left to do and needed to challenge myself in different directions instead of trying to stick to an overly planned method that caused me to overwork my art.

Whitney, who had seen me through the entire process, told me perhaps I was trying to assume a mantle that was not mine to wear. I had to find my own voice.

I spent most of Winter Break back in California with my family, stewing over my artistic crisis.

Together, the critics and I concluded that my proposal was generic and narrow for my concept. The book format was also too limiting. A lot of that stems from my biased perspective on what it meant to be an illustrator and self imposed barriers. These barriers prevented me from working and enjoying the creative process.

I was so concerned with not being taken seriously as an illustrator that I became attached to a book format in order to maintain a perceived semblance of

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Charles Eladio Beronio. (Hustle is Capital), 2008.

And in a quick minute, I decided to abandon my initial proposal. I had many ideas sitting idly in the parking lot of my brain and thought to myself, perhaps now is the time to finally pursue my wildest machinations instead of creating books I stopped caring for.

I wrote the following email to Charles Eladio Beronio, a dear friend and mentor I met in New York City. Charles is an artist, friend, and human being I admire a lot. Though I don’t always understand, his work is smart and sophisticated in the way that it displaces signs and imagery, forcing the viewer to reflect upon the spectacle of capitalism.

Though our correspondence was infrequent, he always provided insightful feedback.

Jan 13th, 2017 Hi Charles, I always enjoy receiving your emails, no matter how delayed they are! Shaun told me that Shuna is back - I hope the reunion is sweet and lovely. How did New Year’s go? Similar to your anti-Thanksgiving, I spent New Year’s/my birthday in a low key fashion - spent time with my family, had cake with my brother and his kids, then watched fireworks on TV by myself, haha!

Thank you for your feedback on my anthem piece. Subtlety is definitely something I have to think about and also overall audience legibility. The professor I TA for enjoyed the piece but said that she was unable to read it because of her poor eyesight, but it was rather nice because I ended up reading it out loud for her.

I’m trying my best not to freak out since it’s neither productive nor useful... but essentially I should have everything figured out by March 22nd... which is not a lot of time. I feel as if I have wasted the entire fall semester doing nothing!

My final critique panel was comprised of my director Whitney Sherman and two visiting artists - Eun-Ha Paek and Ted McGrath. Paek is an illustrator, designer, and art director and McGrath formerly worked as an illustrator/art director for MTV before transitioning into fine art/gallery work. I’ve attached my Fall term feedback compiled by Whitney.

I think my presentation went ok but the overall feedback was that my structure/plan was not serving me well and that my efforts would be better served through more personal, expressive, and experimental work. Paek urged me to push the notion of ‘experimental’ narrative and McGrath basically told me, in no uncertain terms, to “abandon all this shit” haha... Again, people enjoyed my sketchbook work more than the finished pieces.

Whitney, having seen me through most of this process, gave me the most clarifying comment. She said that while it’s great I’m drawing together all these influences, mostly from photographers a la New Topographics, I’m trying too hard to “assume a mantle that isn’t mine to wear” - that my thesis plays upon pre-existing ideas, tropes, and photographic compositions in a manner that has been overdone. What more needs to be said about the failed American Dream, of paradise lost? Of the immigrant experience? They were okay with the “If I Won” book but said it was too obvious and on-the-nose. I should clarify that the overall tone of the critique wasn’t that negative, it was actually very encouraging and full of accolades for my ideas/organization, but just that my final execution was not effective.

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At any rate, I gave it some thought over the holiday and I think I’m going to spend the next month-ish simply making random crap. There is a strong possibility I am overthinking everything. I think there comes a point when I have to let certain things go, even if I’m emotionally attached to it (that’s been the overarching theme of the past year... in every aspect of my life) - I’ve really tried to stick to my initial plan, of course with some tweaks here there in the research, sketch, and storyboarding process but I’m starting to see that it’s not very effective or compelling. Though people were not initially a huge fan of my ‘Anthem’ piece, I realized it’s the most interesting thing I’ve been working on... perhaps it was less contrived. But all art is kind of contrived.... anyway...

I have to create a revised thesis proposal and calendar this upcoming Thursday the 19th for our first meeting. I can send it along to you if you’d like! I don’t have anything written yet, but I’m probably going to continue doing graphite drawings alongside random paintings and collages. For my final installation, I’d like to recreate a small classroom environment to function as a reading room, though I’m still not sure where to acquire classroom desks/teacher desks for free and/or cheap. Current craigslist searches yield only small desks for people 8 years old or younger... I’m also probably going to mess with some game/toy ideas I’ve been thinking about, recreating versions of childhood games like MASH and Life, and hopefully messing with this toy slot machine bank I bought. I will still have ‘If I Won’ printed/ produced.

Apologies, that last portion was total stream of consciousness word vomit but I hope it made some sense!

I probably sound like a confused lost puppy, which isn’t too far from the truth, but I will finish..... something.... ?????

I applied for a Teaching Fellowship over the break that guarantees a one year teaching contract with full time pay/benefits. Wish me luck! I listed placement preferences but there’s no guarantee. I might be chosen for Kansas City! Or Detroit! I’m unsure if I want to go into teaching but I figured it wouldn’t hurt to apply. If that doesn’t work out, I might look for teaching gigs at MICA or try to see if there’s any gallery/museum work in DC. There’s also the possibility of going home to CA, but I’m afraid I’ll lose momentum.

I’ve been thinking after graduation I’d like to travel alone, for the first time in my life. I haven’t bought tickets or anything yet, but maybe 30 days in Europe, starting in Hamburg, Germany to see Saskia.

Nick, the guy I’m seeing, is not too happy about it but I don’t know when I will get the next opportunity to travel for an extended period of time. I think he understands that I could benefit from lessons in self-reliance.

Alright, I’ve rambled on enough! Hope your new year is off to a great start!

Best, Tiffany -And with that, I began making random crap.

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Thesis blues

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HERE GOES NOTHING I spazzed out but then dug deep, racking my brain for all the random projects I wanted to make but was always too scared to bring to life in fear of being too impractical or pretentious. I didn’t care anymore!

Something snapped in me. Now was the time! Carpe diem!

My next email to Charles laid out my game plan: February 18th, 2017 Hi Charles, Here’s a break down of the components and where I’m at with them.

I’ve attached images of each.

-IF I WON: This is the booklet/zine we looked over together at Roberta’s. I had it sent off to be printed to a small one-man press in Chicago. It’ll be printed in “federal blue” using a risograph printer. I should be getting them very soon! They’re smaller than the draft I gave you, measuring at 4x6” pocket sized. While I think they’re compact & coherent, my faculty have suggested that I also turn them into cards, with the text on one side and the corresponding image on the back.

The audience would then have to engage with the content as a “game” vs. a linear book/narrative. What are your thoughts on this? I think the book is good to have so I can sell them at comic book fairs and the like, but maybe this method would be more interesting in a gallery setting.

-SCHOOL DESKS: I found a very nice man on facebook marketplace who had hoarded a bunch of school desks from a nearby church that had closed down. I have four that I plan on placing in the space. My original intention was to place one “IF I WON” booklet on each one but that is now pending. It was suggested that I might think about placing my poetry/writing in a booklet instead.

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-”POETRY”: These are my random poems... I contacted one of the creative writing faculty here at MICA, I’m hoping she will come take a look at give me some suggestions. I’m still working my way through “Notes on Conceptualism,” trying my best to channel it... but do you have any initial thoughts?

-SLOT MACHINE: I’ve dismantled a slot machine bank and am reworking the reels to create “nonsense poems.” I would like the audience to crank and play with the machine - I’d like to change the audio too but not sure what sounds I’ll use. One of my professors Kim suggested that I reduce the entire structure to just the reels alone so that the audience will not be distracted. I enjoy the structure of the slot machine though - I painted it white, sanded it down so it feels like a real product. I think it looks like a house/coffin.

The machine will be placed in front of the desks, positioned as the “teacher.”

-FLAG I made a giant mess, dyed a bunch of fabric indigo, and then made this 2x3’ flag... I’m also hand embroidering the stars like a crazy person. I’m not sure how many to leave unfinished. Kim said it’s a bit too obvious as a concept, and if that I’m really referring to indigo/blue as a color of the working class, I should have used actual denim. There’s something about that feels a little too kitschy to me, but I understand her sentiment about it being a very literal symbol in the ‘classroom’ I’m creating. I wanted to reference indigo not only in its association with denim/jeans, but also as a longstanding global commodity and plantation history in the US. -XEROX TRANSFERS I made these using old family photos and iconography from lottery tickets and the like. I left a lot to chance when making these...

-GRAPHITE DRAWINGS I went a more abstract route and decided to portray the ocean out of focus. The middle drawing has a suggestion of land emerging from the water.

-INTERACTIVE GAMES I originally planned on having the back pedestal contain interactive games though at this point I think it might get too busy. The “Game of LIFE”’s game play might be a bit too involved for the gallery so I’m thinking of making it a side project. I still plan on creating my own “Prophesy Board” for people to take with them as a souvenir. I included one that I bought in Miami for reference. I’ll be drawing the icons myself, some of them may be very similar as icons of luck but I also want to feature icons of Americana.

The idea is you close your eyes, randomly point to one of the icons, then read your fortune on the back.

I will write weird fortunes on that back, like (1) SOMEBODY HAS TO BE LAST. or (2) BEWARE HORSES OF THE SAME COLOR and other equally mysterious things.

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-PERFORMANCE I also have been speaking to a composer from Peabody to create a piece to be performed in the space. I worked with him before on a percussive piece about Labor. I’m hoping we can create a fairly minimalist piece using motifs from American folk songs and/or the music of Stephen Foster, who composed “Oh Susanna” and many other songs performed by minstrels in the 19th century.

Okay!! Thank you for getting through all that, let me know if you need more documentation or have specific questions. I’ve basically gone off the deep end at this point, critiques are rather difficult with my work since I’ve strayed pretty far from the illustrative conventions of this program, but my director/faculty have been very supportive. On Monday I’ll be having a critique with a gallery curator so that’s exciting.

In other news, I bought a one way ticket to Berlin. I’m probably going to freak out about it in about a week but I’m glad I did it. I think if I didn’t buy it I would chicken out... again. I also was interviewed for a teaching position at a school called MECA in Portland, Maine. I don’t know anything about that city... but maybe it will be a good opportunity. It sounds promising though, they want to place me in 3 different departments: public engagement, foundation, and printmaking.

Anyway, I will visit Saskia in Berlin and hopefully travel around for a bit - Saskia said I might be able to attend a lithography residency with her in Sweden, I really hope that works out!! If so, I will be in Europe June 14th until July 30th.

Many thanks again for being my mentor through this process, I appreciate all your support and input (however sporadic, ha!) I hope you’re doing well! I will be making my way to NYC after the show, some time in April and then in June before my flight to Berlin from JFK (it was much cheaper). If you’re available, I’d love for you and Shuna to come see the thesis show. It runs March 27th to April 9th. I know you are both very busy people, but do let me know if it’s a possibility!

Say hi to Shuna and Suzie for me!!

Best, tafni

And with that email, I went forth to make.

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Installation, outer wall display

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THE WORK The final pieces varied drastically in media and theoretically could stand separately on their own.

However, my intention was to create an immersive space in which the following objects could be in conversation with each other. I chose to house the objects in a space reminiscent of a classroom, suggesting the pedagogical and institutional power of the Dream.

Whitney worked with me to find the ideal space in the Riggs & Leidy Gallery of the Lazarus Center to showcase my work. We decided on the ample real estate underneath the stairs.

Preliminary installation plan

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BETSY ROSS GOT THE BLUES Hand-dyed indigo muslin, embroidery.

I wanted to rework a recognizable icon to articulate new meaning. I carefully considered the rituals and taboos surrounding the presentation of the American flag, thinking about how other artists had handled the topic (like David Hammond’s African American Flag or Dread Scott’s What is the Proper Way to Display a US Flag?) I wanted to a platform to investigate American history and nationhood, particularly after the presidential election. What sentiments had the election of Donald Trump elicited? Had the election truly polarized the country or was it a catalyst for a much needed national reckoning?

With this in mind, I created Betsy Ross got the Blue, reimagining Old Glory in shades of indigo along with an unfinished field of stars. The use of indigo references its longstanding relationship to labor as a prized global commodity and its history as a lesser known plantation crop in the antebellum South. Indigo also bears significance in the production of denim – the fabric of the working class.

Playing seamstress

I hand-dyed the fabric in Nick’s bathtub (creating a royal mess) and after allowing the dye to set and dry, I sewed the pieces together and embroidered the stars. I left the union unfinished to imply imperfection and a nation in progress.

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PLAY

Altered slot machine.

COMPOSITION: NOT RULED Digitally printed zine with gold leaf.

I had been wanting to make a slot machine for quite some time. Inspired by a FAILE exhibit I had seen at the Brooklyn Museum that featured customized pinball machines, I wanted to fabricate a slot machine in a similar fashion, manipulating the flashy visual language into something more sarcastic in tone.

I was dissuaded from this initial plan by Kim but later returned to it with a more straightforward approach. I purchased a slot machine bank and stripped it down to understand its mechanisms and formal qualities. Instead of recreating my own visual icons, I chose to feature words as reel options. At this time, I had started to share more of my experimental writing so I felt it would be a good tie in.

The resulting product was a minimalist slot machine painted in white that offered stark, three word aphorisms generated by chance. The reel options are words that possess broad and monumental associations with American identity, resulting in curious combinations intended to provoke personal reflection. Be reconfiguring language through random systems, I wanted to incite new understanding concerning the state of the nation.

This feeling also carried itself into my writing, a mode of expression I was also too shy to share with others at first. I wrote most of the poems while in transit, daydreaming on the train or walking around the city. I won’t belabor this too much, but the past year was rough for my personal life so a lot of my writing invariably spoke about America as a lover.

The poems were further developed using a typewriter; I found that the loud, rhythmic violence of the keys helped me focus on the words at hand. I was lucky to have John Ira Ebersole (a connection from Kim) and faculty Amy Eisner review my work and provide feedback. This was a critical breakthrough for me because the words came naturally and quickly, opening up an entire new world of conceptual writing for me. I enjoyed playing and sketching with words.

I entitled the small collection of poems COMPOSITION: NOT RULED in reference to composition notebooks used by students.

I adhered a small dash of gold on the covers to reference the promise of material gain.

Again, Charles played a large role in asking me to critically examine the way words function as symbols in mass culture and public space.

Testing reel options with tape

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First pass of paint on slot machine face

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Gold leaf accent featured on cover

Diana let me borrow her typewriter. It was great.

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SUITCASE Xerox transfers

While I was back in California over the summer, I made sure to mine through all our family photos for inspiration. My mother is very fond of these photos and I’ve come to enjoy them too. There is something satisfying about the physical quality and texture of these images that makes them feel more precious, particularly in an age where digital images are being captured and reproduced at an exponential rate.

I combined excerpts of these photos with iconography from lottery tickets and scratchoffs using xerox transfer techniques. My hope was to capture the dream of upward mobility through my parents’ story and the loud, promise-filled rhetoric: CASH 4 LIFE, Power Ball, Jackpot, Wheel of Fortune, Gold Rush are all phrases that play upon human greed and our nation’s obsession with wealth. The greatest irony, of course, is that gambling directly contradicts the very tenets of the American Dream which predicates financial wealth as the result of hard work.

I also chose family photos that spoke to the story of assimilation and the process of absorbing cultural Americana, donning cowboy hats and shoes to demonstrate that we, too, were capable of claiming our stake in the frontier.

My brother, sister, and cousin playing Little House on the Prairie

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Suitcase (1). Xerox transfer, 2017.

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Suitcase (4). Xerox transfer, 2017.

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Suitcase (3). Xerox transfer, 2017.

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Suitcase (2). Xerox transfer, 2017.

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SEA TO SHINING SEA Graphite powder on paper

This series of drawings were a vestige of my previous proposal. They began as a series of small graphite powder exercises for my segment on Movement but after revising my entire proposal, I decided to work in a more abstract manner at a larger scale to establish more presence as an installation.

For my classroom, I wanted to the idea of land to be ever present, vast and dreamlike like an uncertain mirage onto which we project our innermost needs and wants. The smaller scale drawings were installed on the outer wall as a preview of the larger scale piece which depicts a landmass emerging from the haze. The final piece was 4x8 feet and ended up being one of the largest pieces I’ve ever worked on. I installed it next to the desks, allowing it to function as a window to the outside world, referencing both elements outside of our control and romanticized ideas of sublime nature.

Making a mess...

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IF I WON

HISTORY

This booklet was the only part of my initial proposal left intact.

In the spirit of further experimentation, I approached composer Gu Wei to collaborate on an audio component to go along with my installation. I had worked with him previously in a Peabody/MICA collaborative class on the piece 3:25pm – a performance and sound art piece focused on labor and the body.

Risographed booklet

Though I know it was identified as being too obvious and on the nose, I felt it was a very complete piece with a wide audience appeal.

I had it risograph printed by Matt Davis of Perfectly Acceptable Press in Chicago, IL. Whitney, Kim, and I had discussed turning the book into an interactive card game to add another element of surprise and chance within my installation, however, I ultimately decided against it because I felt loose cards would become unwieldy and would inevitably end up scattered across the gallery floor. The compact booklet form was neat and forced the narrative forward along with emotional build-up. I received a lot of positive feedback. A lot of people related to it, even when translated into a different language.

Digital audio Sound collaboration with Gu Wei (guweimusic.com) Audience members listened to the audio while reading through my poetry and booklet, fostering a trance-like immersive reading experience.

Wei was very receptive to my proposal and went along with my theme of chance in relationship to nationhood. We originally examined the work of Stephen Foster, a composer most known for “Oh Susannah!” and pieces performed by minstrels during the late 19th century. However, Foster’s work overall was a bit too esoteric for our purposes so we turned to the national anthem.

Wei randomized all 101 notes of “The Star-Spangled Banner” and performed the resulting sequence with piano, violin, saxophone, tuba, trumpet, banjo, and snare drum – all iconic instruments used in American folk songs and medleys. The recording was subsequently distorted to create a layered soundscape. Because of the general atmospheric din of the gallery and audio from neighboring installations, the piece was experienced with headphones attached to one of the school desks.

Mentors/friends Charles Beronio and Shuna Lydon reading and listening

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BOARD OF CHANCE Postcard

The Board of Chance was inspired by a “Prophesy Board” souvenir I picked up at Perez Art Museum in Miami, Florida. The board was a large grid with 96 slots filled with lucky and unlucky icons paired with a number. The game play was easy enough: pick a number between 1 to 96 or randomly point your finger at the board. The selected icon and number corresponded to a fortune listed on the back.

I had also picked up a couple American flag patches a few months ago and thought it would be a funny addition to the installation.

I smothered the flag in gold leaf and nailed it to the wall, hovering ominously over the postcards.

I produced my own version with 25 slots, using both vague and recognizable icons that would correlate to ambiguous fortunes on the back. The fortunes were appropriated from American folk songs, idioms, state mottos, and patriotic phrases which I manipulated to embed double meanings. These were then printed as 5x7” double sided postcards.

Whitney suggested featuring some of my favorite fortunes on customized pencils to fit in with my classroom installation. I chose my favorite three and left one on each desk.

WE BUY GOLD!

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INSTALLATION Last year’s MFA Illustration Practice show left a huge impression on me. I was inspired by the work of Meltem Sahin and George Wylesol. Their work was successful independently but made even better by the incredible gallery environments they fabricated. Immersion became key to my installation proposal. How would I get people to linger in the space? How would I direct their movement and force them to have a seat and engage my written material?

The show was installed over the course of four days. It was a lot of work but went pretty smoothly. The space under the stairs inherently fostered an intimate environment but I further transformed it by painting the inner wall blue to draw in audience members.

I held on tightly to my classroom environment proposal. I asked around various local schools and departments to see if they had any combination desks available for purchase or loan but most of them said no, either because they didn’t have any or they were not permitted to loan those out.

Classrooms had become, as one teacher remarked “round tables and bouncy ball” environments. I inquired about furniture from recent school closures but unfortunately, most of the materials had been redistributed across the district or dumped.

It was a total crapshoot but I truly lucked out finding an older gentleman in Glen Burnie whose old, dilapidated house was literally teeming with over 40 school desks he couldn’t bear to part with. He had inherited them from a nearby church that closed down years ago. He couldn’t provide me an exact date but guessed the desks were from the 1950s.

Painting in progress

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Gaming in progress

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Installation views

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The show as well received and I was happy to see people sitting and fully engaging with my work.

An overall critique was that the space might have been too crowded. The heavy concepts contained in my work might have functioned better in a larger environment with more psychological breathing room.

Army of desks

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Class visit from Elements of Visual Thinking II

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Gallery talk with guest critics Sarah Jacoby and Kristen Nobles

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Deinstallation was an extremely emotional process, I burst into tears the moment I started peeling vinyl off a pedestal. A flood of fear overcame me – what if I never had the opportunity to share my work again?

What if this was the height of my artistic career? What if I’m not able to sustain myself as an artist? Will I have to go back to waiting tables?

My cohort mates chuckled at my sentimentality and neurotic rantings.

This show was only the end and the beginning.

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Easy come, easy go!

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NEXT STEPS Honestly, I have no clue. If you had asked me two years ago if this was the work I’d be making, I’d probably tell you to go to hell. I realize in the scope of commercial illustration ventures, my work may seem out of place.

However, I still maintain a strong connection to narratives, stories, and dreams. I use various materials to express my concepts and am no longer fixated on a single way of working. Drawing, of course, is still fundamental to my process. I still maintain a frenetic sketchbook practice. Currently, I’m looking at fellowship and residency opportunities to continue experimenting with an interdisciplinary practice and applying for gallery open calls. Though this work was not featured in my thesis, I also hope to develop my editorial portfolio and/or enter the world of publishing.

I’ll be traveling to Europe over the summer, starting in Germany and ending in Sweden.

It’s a big step for me since I’ve never traveled alone before, especially for an extended period of time. I think it will give me a lot of new perspective.

The only thing I can do now is keep moving forward, seeking and observing, refusing to fall into complacency. Like my parents who traversed across the world into the unknown, my only hope is to be brave. Even for all the spectacle of its failures, the Dream still propels us forward.

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Proposal for Socrates Sculpture Park’s Billboard Open Call, featuring three combinations from my slot machine

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