Intervention 2

    Lots of signs are used during protests to show their voice in the matter when people can’t hear them. Most of them leave an impact on people because of how clever the words are, the image on the sign, or the information it has on it. People take their time to read signs, any type of signs, and it can make them react a certain way. I always wanted to use activism and art in my journey, especially making a poster of some kind to express my concern. At the moment, the most important issue that’s happening that not only affects me is making it illegal to have abortions. People that have a uterus most of the time have abortions due to financial problems, health issues, just not wanting them, and etc. We can do whatever we want to our bodies and it should be our choice because it’s ours. However, it seems that some people don’t get the memo and would like to control what people do to their bodies. There are multiple orphans in the system that need homes, however, they don’t care about the children or teens that are alive. They care more about the unborn child that still can’t breathe or think.

   I wanted my sign to be funny but also be on a little bit of the aggressive side. It was tricky to come up with something that no one had said or used during protests. I was inspired by a poster that was a picture of a cartoon baby getting thrown away, saying yeet. I just decided to yeet the haters too. I wanted to show that I didn’t care about the people that “know” what they were talking about when it was about our uteruses. I wanted them out of power and them to get kicked out, like the “child” that is “alive” in the uterus. “The streets shall be our brushes-the squares our palettes”, (The Interventionists, pg 133). I thought this quote represented the thousands of people walking down the street with signs and posters in their hands. Just that the citizens in the protest were brushing down the pavement with their brushes. Especially the signs that we made as a type of art. “It also presents risks, not only for artists, but for citizens, and even for the state as vanguard aesthetics appear to appropriate the very dynamic of the revolution itself”, (The Interventionists, pg 134). This reminds me of the struggle we are having with abortion rights and how it will affect everyone. Especially the attack protestors receive when on the streets to fight for their rights.

Final Project

For my self portrait project, I decided to do something personal and uncomfortable. Triggering warning for mention of sexual assualt and rape. I wanted to do something big, drastic, and something that made me outside of my comfort zone. My project is a collection of photos showing a normal day of my life. The only difference is that there are red handprints on my body and words/sentences. The red handprints represent where I have been touched without my consent. The words represent mostly what I was thinking during that time and only 2 things people have said to me. I wanted it all to be me, because I was my worst enemy, and still am. Throughout the collections of photos you see me getting ready, putting on my clothes, walking my dog, walking with my boyfriend, eating with him at a restaurant, making out with him, and finally me in the process of taking off the words and putting words of my own. In the last few photos, there are blue words and blue handprints. The blue words are contradicting the black words that were on me before. The blue handprints represent me giving me consent.

For the process of the whole thing, I was terrified. I didn’t want to think back on what happened, how I felt, and what I was thinking. During this whole process, it took us two days to complete, not back to back. My boyfriend helped me write the words, put handprints, and take pictures. The first day, it took us the whole day. I kept blocking myself from thinking about where they touched me so it was really hard to think back and tell him the words I thought when it happened. I would need a break, he would need a break, especially since I was going more in depth about what happened. The second day was easier since I didn’t have to think about it at all, and my boyfriend just had to write the same words as before, but less than before. With the blue, I had to come up with things that contradicted the black words but it was really hard to think of positive phrases to myself.

The message I wanted to bring to everyone is that consent matters, don’t assume that a person wants to do it even though they didn’t say anything, it’s not your fault, and that it stains. A lot went through my head on what I wanted to show to the audience, just like how I did the sexual abuse selfie. However, it didn’t feel like it was me, and it made me feel really disappointed with that selfie. This collection is almost like a redemption for me, to show who I really am and how I really felt.

I presented it to the class in a form of pictures of a narrative on sexual abuse and rape. I presented each photo on the screen and explained what I was doing in each photo. I wanted each photo to be taken in and possibly some people could read the words on my body. Each photo was presented back and forth so people could have more time. I received a lot of positive feedback on my photos and how I portrayed it. I was worried that this wasn’t what people were looking for but I ended up proving myself wrong. Some of my classmates that commented said how they were in awe, how I was strong to show something so impactful, and loved the amount of time that I put in. Hearing my classmates say that about my work that I was unsure of made me feel so relieved. My aspiration is to make “uncomfortable” subjects more seen and talked about. There should be more things talked about in classes, groups, within friends and family to bring awareness. When talked about, we learn more things about the topic and things we could do about it. For my portfolio, it shows a different type of illustration showing a narrative. I want my portfolio to have illustrations to always have a deeper meaning within.

    The artists that made similar works to art are Ana Mendieta, Cindy Sherman, Stephan Sagmeister, Ketty La Rocco. Ana Mendieta used her body as a medium and made us see how she was raped in her art. I expressed where the handprints were to give you an idea on where and possibly how I was sexually assaulted and raped. Cindy Sherman’s art meant sexual desire, criticism on media of woman, and domination, with photographs of herself looking up to someone past the camera. Stephan Sagmeister is a designer and asked his assistant to use the scalpel to cut his body to put in different designs on him. I decided not to harm myself with a scalpel and use markers, but it hurt just the same to put them on me. Ketty La Rocco was in an exhibition “The Body As Language: Women and Performance”, she would write over photographs of her hands positioned in gestures, to show her life as a woman. I thought this connected with me having words on my body as well. All of these artists are connected with this project together.

Resources: Trigger Warning on rape 

https://www.artforum.com/print/201801/fully-loaded-power-and-sexual-violence-73188

https://www.moma.org/artists/5392 

https://www.moma.org/collection/works/46055 

https://sagmeister.com/work/aiga-detroit/ 

https://www.artsy.net/artist/ketty-la-rocca

Intervention Project 3

 

https://www.tiktok.com/@dom_ninga/video/7031230018546191621?_t=8OL05Ph5ajG&_r=1

    For this project, I partnered with a classmate to create TikTok combatting smoking and vaping. We used a viral TikTok sound that is used to spread shocking stories. Many teenagers start vaping because many of them around them also vape. This is an opinion that vaping is healthier than smoking cigarettes, but that is not true. Vaping one Juul Pod is the same as smoking 20 cigarettes. I know multiple people my age that go through at least one pod a week. Vaping is also as addicting as smoking. Vaping can cause dependency. Vaping is still fairly new compared to the history of ciggerettes, therefore studies are still being conducted on the long-term effects of vaping. 

    My partner Ciara and I display the dangers of vaping and ciggerettes. Advertisement companies advertise to younger audiences by using crazy flavors and creating aesthetically pleasing packaging and products. 

Intervention Poster 2

 

    For this project, I created a Covid- 19 vaccine poster. I made the poster in October because of the pushback they were giving the government and health professor for promoting booster shots. Today I feel the importance of this poster has greatly increased. We're approaching another anniversary of the initial 2020 lockdown and covid rates of cases are the same as they were almost 2 years ago.  Even with the access to vaccines, covid transmission rates have grown. 

    This is a deadly virus that is spreading rapidly. Vaccines don't stop people from getting Covid, but they significantly lower your risks of great complications from this disease. Getting vaccines and wearing masks lowers the death tolls and limits the number of times this virus can mutate. Since many people worldwide are rejecting wearing masks and refuse to get vaccinated Covid mutates with each person that contracts the virus, and then it spreads to mutate again.

Short Essay gallery Visit

Gratitude Gifts: Kristy Lopez

Pain Atlas in Motion: Stephanie Tichenor

    Kristy Lopez's art piece Gratitude Gifts: Rescue, Abundance, Sorry, Adventure, Bloom, Lover's soup, support, Middle, Roots, Only, Leo is a piece that displays clay works. These were gratitude gifts to those that are close in her life. I loved the project in particular because she made gifts for those in her inner circles, as well as a gift for herself. Personally, I am a person that has gift-giving and words of affirmation love languages. This artist made me realize that you also have to be kind to yourself and show your own self gratitude.  Lopez also writes that she is a perfectionist, to which I relate to many aspects of life. I feel her project does a good job of expressing your inner emotions about those close to you and reflecting on yourself can be an enlightening experience. Her project encouraged me to do the same. I write letters to myself, thanking me for being me. I express to my friends how much they mean to me. 

    Stephanie Tichenor's Pain Atlas in Motion displays a puppet with sticker symbols that represent pain. I especially loved this project because it does an amazing job at depicting the different forms of feelings people can have about the personal pain they experience. The health care world seems to cater to Neurotypical people or the chart medical professionals follow may make people feel like outsiders. If one doesn't feel a certain way and struggles to express their experience, then it makes diagnosing them and creating a treatment plan difficult. In Tichenor's experience, she felt disliked by her healthcare providers and disconnected. Projects such as this raise awareness to how limiting our healthcare systems are and how they don't cater to those who need help. 

Final Project: #takeabreak

#takeabreak

 

    My project is titled #takeabreak. My project is based on mental health. Since the world has opened up since the initial lockdowns of 2020, many have forgotten that we are still in a pandemic. Millions of people around the world are still recovering from the burdens that lockdown and the pandemic have caused. Since the majority are back to their regular routines and there are fewer covid regulations, many don't realize the after effects we have faced as a population. Our economy is in a recession, there's a major labor shortage, and we still are facing a deadly virus. 

    Personally, life after the lockdowns for my family and I has been extremely difficult. The financial burden of a parent being jobless for part of the year still has its lingering effects almost two years later. Becoming an adult during the pandemic has been especially difficult for me and many others my age. Being stuck in a home with your family, not being able to branch out in your young adult years, and entering an economic decline is mentally draining. Today's youth are entering adulthood into a world that is crumbling. For a year, we sat at home watching the news and reading headlines about the daily death toll, watching scientists and doctors who can't understand this rapidly spreading virus, and watching people break guidelines put in place to protect us. It was something out of a movie that we experienced. 

    Returning to campus this semester has been a challenge. I'm in my third year of college, and this is my second semester in person. When starting college, I couldn't wait to go into the healthcare field, and I always loved science. I had a passion for education. Three years later, I changed my major. The pandemic has caused me to have a level of burnout I've never experienced. After spending months at home, we were forced into this rise and grind culture. Last spring I was a full-time student and worked 30+ hours a week, during the summer I worked 50+ hours a week, which caused a level of fatigue I've never experienced. This semester I decided to "take a break" and search for what I wanted. Academically this has been my worst semester, but I have ascended in other ways. Taking a break has allowed me to find calm in a storm. 

    My project is to encourage others to take a break. You don't always have to rise and grind. It is perfectly fine to take a break when needed. It is good to take a break when you are unsure of the paths you have taken. Taking a break can be enlightening to the paths you didn't take. Taking breaks can help you analyze and organize parts of your life you have neglected on the path you've taken. This is especially important for college students, your life is not a straight line. Taking a break allows you to think about your passions and think about who you are outside of your education.

https://www.tiktok.com/@dom_ninga/video/7041789722699730222?_d=secCgYIASAHKAESPgo8jgxTZmFO5DFTcyXX1Y5Ixj6i5mzNwm4P4EmBvU%2BVCdVocturx2SxNBPABhYmXQwCXo74UVZqnTnCWNfpGgA%3D&checksum=b1fba87eb67c8ba74aadb969c91b32aea42a37012d72b818b3905f8a43f33267&language=en&preview_pb=0&sec_user_id=MS4wLjABAAAACiA0tHfmJatpgmRoqWWsJIzMatPfOnJiIj1PlosgOnzhmn5iBsUdBquQSEDPziYZ&share_app_id=1233&share_item_id=7041789722699730222&share_link_id=3B0F2085-25CB-49FA-B669-61F30022CC90&source=h5_m&timestamp=1639595218&tt_from=copy&u_code=d9g349bmgmc3ke&user_id=6765081510951191558&utm_campaign=client_share&utm_medium=ios&utm_source=copy&_r=1

Final Intervention - StopTheTox

   Final Intervention

      For my final intervention, I opted to go a more comedic/parody route to touch on toxicity in pop culture, and give an example of one way I have actually seen people try to fight back against that. My commercial focuses on two new "inventions": The Shower and The GrowUpInator. One of these, thankfully, exists, while the other remains just a thought in my imagination. You see, the toxic gamers that run amok in servers or online lobbies all have some form of derogatory term or negative thing to say, so my character, in a sense, becomes toxic himself to strike back against that. While the persona put on in the commercial would love to tell a racist in a Call of Duty lobby to take a shower, or grow up, that will never stop them. What actually will stop the toxicity is ignoring these people, and as I have done, mute their mics in the game chat.

    Weird Al's 'Foil' music video served as inspiration for this project, as did infomercials on Channel Pix 11 in the early morning hours. It was not very hard to shoot the video, although a helping hand would have been useful. I didn't necessarily do a lot of research for the video, as a lot of it was my own writing, but browsing the r/pcgaming reddit forum showed me that I am not alone in noticing a trend of older male's being the main source of this nonsense. Being the only one who doesn't play on a PC, I have to listen my friend groups talk to their virtual opponents, with their opponents being incredibly toxic overall. (I suppose this is what happens when one plays League of Legends.)

    So, I generally have a good grasp on what is going on in the world of gaming, outside and within my circle. This is really why I decided to choose this topic, because it was not only something that allowed me to use my Media Arts/Film stuff for a big video, but also so I could show my thoughts on the idea of over-anger in gaming.  It was a thought that came to me after looking for YouTube parody commercials, or even the most recent Spider-Man themed Liberty Mutual ad. I enjoy injecting humor into these serious situations, while never losing touch of why I am doing it to begin with. It reminds me of the Guerrilla Girls billboard where they put themselves up against art museums in a snarky way. The quote on the promotion actually reads "Art is expensive! So is constructing new buildings! We totally get why you can't pay all your employees a living wage!"

    This all really goes back to meme culture, and how memes have sort of become new symbols against injustices, or have correlated through remade images. On the topic of memes made during Trumps presidency, Sage Lazzaro of Vice said that "Most are rooted either in expressing anger, mocking Trump, or collectively coping with the absurdity and even trauma of his presidency. " (Lazzaro) This is similar to what I've done, where I'm essentially rolling with the absurdity and letting it fuel my video a lot more. The toxic gamers I'm talking about have set themselves up for failure, which is not unlike the politicians who did the same during their runs, currently or before. 

    Building on the idea of these gamers setting themselves up and connecting back to politicians, Lizzie Fison of artsy.net said that "In recent internet history, politicians have set themselves up for ridicule by providing the perfect conditions for their memeification." (Fison) These young men spewing nonsense in game lobbies really do fall in line with politicians like Donald Trump who spewed nonsense and forced people to react in ways they might not have wanted to after hearing the things he said. It is a perfect comparison because both also may react in a childish manner when things don't go their way. Unfortunately, this means that my advice at the end of the video, where I say that ignoring these people is okay, may not always work.

    In conclusion, I am glad that I chose the topic I did, because it means a lot that I have a platform to speak on, even if my opinion isn't new or anything special. I made a video, put it on YouTube, added some tags, and now I am hoping that the right people will get to see it and share their thoughts on the matter. It is a  serious problem that hopefully I can help others take in better with a video that kind of puts down the people it is about.

Link: https://youtu.be/UB6bgL6P0hU