NEED FEEDBACK: my artist statement for Entfremdete Tod
Entfremdete Tod, or Alienated Death, is a nod towards Marx's Alienated Labor Theory. It looks at how we alienate ourselves from the experience of death, while capitalizing on the "look," and "glamour" of courting death.
I am constructing taxidermy to create forms which evoke a sense of Victorian nostalgia and a commercialized sense of death combined with modern photography transfer methods to produce a final work which encompasses the glamour of death and the dark experience and reality of death simultaneously.
My inspiration for this series encompasses a wide range of startling revelations about glamorized death not only found in the anorexia and bulimia of fashion models, but also in the production and marketing of Yankees sports fan caskets, a fascination with why courting death via drugs, smoking and drinking has its own distinct charm in our media, as well as personal experiences. The Thanatology course I took in college helped to open my eyes and I was able to analyze experiences with deaths among my family and friends and question why it became so taboo to still be grieving two weeks after a person's funeral.
All of my work explores the beauty in the unexpected - color, texture and contrast are fundamentals found in all of my work and Entfremdete Tod is no exception. The added element of form is a physical reminder of the bodies that death leaves behind, and in treating each piece as a Vanitas, leaving bones exposed, and utilizing images of bodies contorted in poses reminiscent of death, I allow my work to communicate between the beauty and the taboo that death encompasses.
I am constructing taxidermy to create forms which evoke a sense of Victorian nostalgia and a commercialized sense of death combined with modern photography transfer methods to produce a final work which encompasses the glamour of death and the dark experience and reality of death simultaneously.
My inspiration for this series encompasses a wide range of startling revelations about glamorized death not only found in the anorexia and bulimia of fashion models, but also in the production and marketing of Yankees sports fan caskets, a fascination with why courting death via drugs, smoking and drinking has its own distinct charm in our media, as well as personal experiences. The Thanatology course I took in college helped to open my eyes and I was able to analyze experiences with deaths among my family and friends and question why it became so taboo to still be grieving two weeks after a person's funeral.
All of my work explores the beauty in the unexpected - color, texture and contrast are fundamentals found in all of my work and Entfremdete Tod is no exception. The added element of form is a physical reminder of the bodies that death leaves behind, and in treating each piece as a Vanitas, leaving bones exposed, and utilizing images of bodies contorted in poses reminiscent of death, I allow my work to communicate between the beauty and the taboo that death encompasses.