Iezzi Initial cut-up digitized

current practice

[steve: abstract please]

The difference here, is that the new piece is site-specific while the past work is mobile. In the past work the participation of becoming animal is experience by the viewers themselves while in the new work, the becoming is only viewed from outside, as I am representing the becoming in the video. The explicit use of video and text also differentiates the new work from the old.

My current work is an installation in a room and small attic-space which includes a video and a sculpture. The sculpture is a black wooden ladder covered in fur-like material which the viewer climbs to access the attic. The attic is pitch-black except for the light emitted by the video. It is a dark video of a moving, singing, mound of hair with a mouth [I imagine it to be a hand puppet, or is it computer generated?].{the character is actually performed by me and anni, hidden under a costume which resembles a formless, featureless mass of hair. there are holes in a few places of the costume where the mouth can come through, aand the skin around the mouth is painted a monstrous green} The hair sings a text which related to a human becoming a dog-like hairball. The ladder sits in the room surrounded by puppy potty-training pads, giving a clean area for the viewer to remove their shoes and climb the ladder. The work again relates to Haraway and Deleuze’s theories, this time offering a glimpse into a hidden space (through the looking glass) to bear witness to this person experience a strange type of becoming. The video includes a karaoke-like reading of the text, referring to the use of the medium as a way to shed social awkwardness.

The Work combines digital imagery, digital songwriting, and hand-crafted materials in a way that can be related quite obviously to a mode of contemporary art making. However, there is a slight critique of purely industrial (digital) modes of materializing which comes to being through the use of materials which are overtly hand-crafted. The ideas of becoming-animal/becoming-object directly relate to a human’s reconnection to the earth and all of its inhabitants (living and nonliving

[are the “non-living” objects? and once they’re in the world, why do we distinguish (if we do) between stuff that has been made industrially or by hand? I guess I’m wondering sometimes about values/labels of inherently “clean” or “good” attached to modes of production. Obviously profit-driven production is almost always harmful to the organism and lives, but I sometimes think all of the poisons and all that shit is all around anyway and in all of us. Like there is no clean body, which shouldn’t keep anyone from fighting violent harmful systems, but we’re all in it or something, ugh I don’t know..]

{i mean a “close look” both literally and figuratively, that being both as an actual nearness in proximity while investigating an object, but also the potential for deeper readings when interacting with objects in potentially new ways}and possible positioning similar to that of another being which has been oppressed by human structures.

i'm thinking about language, and i'm thinking the sounds of eating are a language we all speak together. perhaps also the sounds of pissing and shitting are on the same level. with animals these are the basic functions that we share in an elementary way. dogs and other animals are also receptive to human language. eating i think is the one simple thing that we share with animals. with objects it is more difficult because they are inanimate and often not moving or serving a function that resembles consumption or exhaustion of a material. something like a gas stove is an obvious example that uses a resource to function and also exhausts heat or another kind of gas. Metaphorically this type of thing is easy to call eating. It's the same sort of feeding. Things like gas are harder to make this metaphor with, unless you want to think about the geological processes which something like methane is formed from. this is the consumption of minerals and underground matter underground. This is bringing it back to nature, and then you can say nature is feeding this machine (the gas stove). I like to think since we all have these functions, then we exist on the same plane. Consume and create waste.

my attempt is to have the animal-eating-object transcend its level from the animal world to the human level. also as an object to transcend from the object level. so that we can break down this hierarchy between humans animals and objects. i want to exist on a flat plane with each other.

relation to larger context Repetitive sound, repetitive sound, bodily human sounds, naked bodies, knife, chicken, repetitive sound, helicopter in sepia, albino, mini skull bong, drums, fog, repetitive sound, homoerotic militant force, rituals. Slime mold, politics, sodomy, intra-actions, animals, particle physics, bacteria, homosexuality, species, mimicry. Budweiser, America, scaffolding, consumerism, career, barricade, totem, flag, blindman’s cane, masculinity.

Cady Noland this peice doesnt have a title yet 1989 budweiser and scaffolding construction masculine soicety heirarchy near the bottom far from american dream american flag touching the ground illegal act. rules about the flag/ symbol comsumerism heart of american myth. referenced by Noland critical of america ALex - making connections between things that at first seem unconnected slighlty altering these connections, merging. Symbols readymade objects, choices. dotn rely on symbolism. speak about and contextulize in his work.

symbole shes euating the bud can which is tese three coloursconsuming for the purpose of consuming consumerism is the heart of the americaln myth shis pieces uses the barracades the flag the blind mands cane strange sumbolic american totemts not giving much praise, critical of the entire myth in the mid-90s she disappeared cos she criticises celebrity alost when she became well known she disappeard this delights you

{yes, i think that we have to deal with all the things which are on this earth, both because we have made them, and because we can not escape them or pretend that we could go back to a time in which objects exist. i do think the hand-crafted can almost always be seen as a mode of production which goes against capitalism (my own belief says this is the root of the current ecological, social, cultural etc. status of human-kind) therefore immediately making a difference in the sense that you can curb human and animal oppression in many ways by doing things yourself by hand rather than looking for cheap, fast modes of materializing your desires} and could be used to illustrate these theories in an ecological context as well.

{there is of course a hierarchy being performed here in the scientific investigation of dogs by humans, but in that sense as we see that their neurological patterns are very similar to ours, we are perhaps also more able to respond with dogs on a more even, mutual level. i think that humans and dogs can have this mutual relationship simply by human beings realizing that this life that may be present before them is as complicated and important as their own}

i think it helps inform the origins of this mode of thinking in myself. I'm not fetishizing their practices, but this relationship that they have with the world has had a profound impact on my understanding of the world from a young age. This type of care for nature, objects, and each other is strong.

I think it's important to talk about where I'm from in relation to this. This was in the American Southwest, and also reserved land for the Tohono O'odham Nation of Native Americans. They use personification to refer to both plants and animals. They do this to give a deeper respect for things like the saguaro cactus (called a sun-gazer) so people can identify with it more than just as a plant. Through this policy has been passed in the state of Arizona so that it has become a felony to cut this kind of cactus down. I think that I'm trying to use this framework that I grew up very close to as a means to further this discussion of personification and empathy with plants and animals. Also the tradition of rug-making is an art-form from the community. I was also taught ceramics at a young age by the native people of Arizona, as well as an introduction to making rugs by hand. Now I am making them with a machine. There's a lot of ties to this community that I grew up with.

because we live in a late-capitalist society that is human-centric and because of this we value ourselves over animals and objeccts. so this is more of an attempt to soemhow breakdown that hierarchy and have us all exist on the same level and therefore empathizing and giving more care to each other.

Do these constitute the themes of my work, or as symbols of my work? These themes and symbols exist in the work which I have presented as both a foundation for my interests and as research to further my practice. I am interested in making connections between the symbolism of ritual/spirituality and politics/consumerism. My interest in researching filmic symbolism is to expand my video practice from direct references to the text to something possibly more symbolically linked to the text.

who can help me and why I’m feel I have a lot of skills in my tool box but writing doesn’t come completely naturally. I would like to move forward with that. I'm currently working on a dialogue with Anni. This is a companion to the film = what does it mean to move out of the city and find [found] an alternative?.

My peers and tutors can play a vital role in helping me to develope the text (through peer-review) in a way which is neither didactic nor nonsensical but rather vibrates in between the two. This text will come to inform the character's voice in the video. The thinkers who I am inspired by will help me to develop the theoretical and philosophical content of the work by exploring similar topics & fields of research. My peers can also help me develop this in the future by sharing their feelings on how they receive the work. I can also continue learning from material advisors who oversee the creation of my sculptures.

i am a keen collaborator and i would like to invite performers and possibly even people from the human-pup subculture to come and initiate interactions in the space. i don't know if every visitor will get down and begin eating out of the bowls, but if other people are already doing this in the space it can make this easier. potentially the entire public can become a collaborator in the work when they're eating in the piece. the animals as well. i could invite people to initiate these responses in the case the public doesn't go there on their own.

recycled materials would be good but i would prefer to do it either by exploiting the human or not exploiting nature. somewhere between recycled organic materials. Perhaps it could be done by breaking down old clothes and creating new yarns out of that.

katarina cameron could help you with this process.

yes she would be an excellent collaborator for this aspect of this piece, and sources tell me she would love to work with me on this.

what do you want to work on in my work i am interested in making these connections between thigns that at first seem unconnected and then trying to find through connection and repeathing t them altering slightly what new ideas can sort of come fromt hat merging of unconnected things everything can function symbolically readymade obejcts alot of sumbolism i dont rely on it i make work that attempts to speak about it an contextualise it more, thatn kenneth who just does these symbolufilmsm without contectualisng it

Interested in how to build dialogues to create art, rather than the conventional mode of art writing – somehow to use this form. [Steve will get back to you on dialogue forms.]

I find it necessary to make this type of work as I am interested to open up potentials for humans to foster a deeper connection to the world around them. Is it possible that we can come to see the “Transgressive” as something more constructive under the structures in which we live? Is it possible that this same transgression can lead to a greater connection with the self and others? [ hope so :)] My future work will continue to push me towards deeper understanding through continued research, more knowledge, more responsibility, more attentiveness, and more accountability in my practice as a move forward in my life. [Thanks for letting me read this!]

My future work could be a video, or similarly multi-media work which explores the history of people becoming objects (i.e. medusa turning men to sculptures) or animals (i.e. werewolves) otherwise read as “monsters”. I am interested in how the perception of this becoming could be dealt with or changed through different modes of representation. For example, can becoming a monster be put into a context in which this becoming is seen as positive and productive? [I think there is and I think this is super interesting. There are so many power relations in defining monstrosity but also potential for subversion. It’s a vulnerable and brave position to put yourself in, like to become monsterous to undermine normativity? It’s easier, too, in certain places than in others. Like a “monster” in a small town might be punished and has to hide, where as a “monster” in a city has the possibility to meet other monsters. What could invisible(as in not in the body’s appearance), positive monstrosity look like? {i also think that this idea of monstrosity can be used for such a subversive positioning, and i think invisibly the monster works simply as the force that is “other” and opposing the hetero-normative human-centric patriarchy under which we exist in a western context}This work could include “monstrous” sculptures such as the modified dog-bowl readymades which refer to a deeper human-object relation and connection. The work can employ this hand-made additional material (“customization”) to open up a conversation relating to the same theories and ecological interests of my prior work.

i'd like the promotion to be more of an invitation to participate rather than a typical art mailer. This typical one would maybe just be a photo of one of the sculptures or carpets. i think that the materials that i've create - the carpets, the bowls, and the structures outside - are only the result of the interaction that is more central as a concept. all the material comes from that central point. for me the invitation would be a short text inviting and explaining the work slightly. this is also so that the public intervention is not just passed by on the street, but rather so people know this is something they are actively invited to engage with and eat from.

In a room sits a hand-tufted rug. A oblong shape of white, similar to a pony's head sits on a ground of pink. These are the only two colors. A hand-embroidered information hang-tag is hanging from one corner of the rug.

On top of the rug sits a small table . No chair is necessary to sit at this table. The heavy wooden top is perched above four long, noodle-like, white, ceramic legs. The wood is varnished over it's natural color, and three Lisa Frank stickers are stuck to its surface.

Atop the table sits two large hand-made ceramic vases. Their presence is loud, and each is adorned with embroidered punk patches by their favorite punk bands, Crass and Dystopia. Each vase is filled with fresh cut flowers of a seasonal and local variety.

Next to the vases sits a large ceramic bowl flanked by a ceramic fork on one side and a ceramic knife on the other. The bowl and utensils are glazed in the same colors as the large vases. In the bowl sits a large amount of peanut M&M's candies.

who helped and why? the dog for me is an easy example, because the dog is the closest animal that humans can relate to in the sense of companionship and empathy. many people already have a close kinship with a dog. the dog can then be used as a device to illustrate the possibility of a certain empathy or relationship with things. it offers closer relationships to the bowls as well. i'd like animals to visit the show, and i would not say that only dogs are welcome. i would like any animals to come in and eat, whether its people's pets or stray cats from outside. the same goes for the outdoor eating stations. those can be eaten at by human art patrons or humans in need, but also by people who may be walking their dog or cat by or animals from the community.

research strands This past year a cousin of mine in Cornwall sent a set of Mason Cash dishes. A distinguished British label, one glazed set for each member of the family. For you, he sent two large bowls. They now rest on the kitchen floor between the sink and refrigerator, DOG imprinted one of the brims, and WATER on the other.

As recent scientific studies suggest, you understand both the words I say and how I say them, but you are believed to be unable to read. So then, why am I writing this text to you, and why has your (species) name been extruded off the side of the bowl. From where comes this human desire add language into your world. You do not reciprocate in speech with me and I have been lead to believe you are illiterate as well.

It is precisely your lack of language that excludes you from the human world. So with this bowl I am bringing you closer - a one-sided attempt at bridging the gap that separates us. I've used language for ages to communicate with my fellow humans, but we have only communicated in a language that is bodily, more involved with our energies.

Your name and you drink have been inscribed in english. The fact that it exists this way can only be in service for myself, perhaps a nod to the possible confusion of whom this otherly-shaped bowl belongs to, and what belongs inside of it. Its size accommodates your non-lingual dorsal. Yours acts as a consumptive fin as opposed to my linguistic muscle.

Regardless, you are my family, my daughter, albeit adopted. You come with me on vacations, you lick my mouth and I lick yours back and I will memorialize you when you die. Perhaps at your grave I will mark your space with something other than an english language transfiguration of an idea. I will find a more doglike way to portray your passing, bringing myself towards your world.

I believe these kinds of symbols can be used to further contextualize the spoken text presented within a video. Intra-actions, a concept conceived by Karen Barad, says that individuals (read by me as living, and non-living things) materialize through their coming together, and their ability to act emerges from within the relationship without their preexisting context. Using this framework, I am interested in expanding the structure of my film from only the subjectivity presented by the text into a more wholistic encounter.

connnections between footage from vietnam and these occult rituals, equating the military presence invietnam ans ths homeoerotic militant force bob mogue in the original writings .. more able to capture bodily sounds and human sounds mick jageger made a very abstract and obtuse piece relating to ritual stuff 1969 only three yearrs was when anton levay founded the church of satan, the embracing of human sins cause they are though of as normal animal functions kenneth anger started making simbolist film in the forties escape into nature and connection to nature the use of symbols in this intennse form is

This piece was inspired by such writes as Donna Haraway and Deleuze & Guattari. The Deleuzian concept of “becoming-animal” continues to inspire me, as does Haraway’s expansion of these theories in a contemporary setting. S&M culture comes to me as an aesthetic inspiration (black latex) and sound continues to motivate me as a potential immaterial expansion to sculptural modes of creation.

They live by John Carpenter is an important film for me. Its about Roddy Piper (an American Pro-wrestler) who finds a box of sunglasses which let him see the world as it really is. The world turns into this black and white place where everything like billboards and newspapers are just hosting propaganda. He's in this really dystopian capitalist society where all the visual world is controlling his mind. But he finds the glasses and is able to see what is really going on, and then he is trying to expose the truth of the capitalist world. The Adventures of Milo and Otis is a film about a cat and a dog who hang out and chat with each other and they're friends. This personification and human-voice is relevant even if its made for kids. [shows interviewer the trailer] These are nice because they're a little less obvious compared to something like Animal Farm. I try to not be didactic in my work but still make the work from a certain position. I don't like to force an idea that things are one certain way. It gives me a place to create art from, but I in no way want to say that these are the way things should be. The love for adventure and the adventure of love are the two most relevant themes in my practice.

i don't have any particular titles in mind yet, but i'm very inspired by Franz Kafka's The Cares of a Family Man in which he describes an object he calls the Obradek. I'm interested in this type of fantastic word that gives an object new meaning. It's short story in which he describes a creature that is actually a spool of thread with a piece of wood coming out of it. He describes it as if it is alive. It is actually just a waste-product from manufacturing. It's Kafka's critique of capitalism in which he gives this object its own validity by giving it a new name and looking at it in a way which elevates above just being the refuse of capitalist culture. Potentially something like fantasy words or maybe a direct reference to the Kafka piece could be informing the title.

I am interested in how these sorts of sexuality (from masculinity to femininity to queerness and beyond) can be deconstructed and used to inform seemingly unconnected facets of culture. I believe as Barad says that these things can come together to create new narratives and agency for themselves.

I believe these kinds of symbols can be used to further contextualize the spoken text presented within a video. Intra-actions, a concept conceived by Karen Barad, says that individuals (read by me as living, and non-living things) materialize through their coming together, and their ability to act emerges from within the relationship without their preexisting context. Using this framework, I am interested in expanding the structure of my film from only the subjectivity presented by the text into a more wholistic encounter.

My interest in Cady Noland stems from her symbolic critique of American culture, a culture which I am engaging with because of both my background and my interest in consumer-culture. She pieces her works together using disparate symbols to create stories surrounding the American Myth.

My interest in Kenneth Anger also lies in his critiques of American Myth presented in Invocation of My Demon Brother. Using images of satanic ritual, the Vietnam war, and homoeroticism, as well as an abstract repetitive soundtrack, Anger presents a fragmented narrative regarding the American military.

A: Judith Butler states “ . . . if gender is constructed, it is not necessarily constructed by an ‘I’ or a ‘we’ who stands before that construction in any spatial or temporal sense of ‘before.’ Indeed, it is unclear that there can be an ‘I’ or a “we” who had not been submitted, subjected to gender, where gendering is, among other things, the differentiating relations by which speaking subjects come into being . . . the ‘I’ neither precedes nor follows the process of this gendering, but emerges only within the matrix of gender relations themselves”

A: If everything is Nature, including fiction, and let's say fantasies, (as Haraway states) then am I inherently Veronica?

relation to previous practice I made a lot of work with found text, in some mode I felt confident in: reshuffling and reworking existing text,. I was attracted to Piet in order to find confidence in some form of autonomous writing, and exploring the modes in which this can be done: Previously, at the New School, I did a course on ‘writing an essay’. This is a mode I am not interested in. I want to create dialogues that talk about deep subjects but in the mode of conversation. I would rather take a position outside of myself. Loss of ego in art is important to me > I would rather have conversations in the work about that position: its possibilities and positions.

For my first group crit I performed with a vacuum and some instruments; read a half-recited text about someone who has a sexual-emotional relation with a vacuum cleaner. This was the first text I had written which had no ‘found’ elements. I think the text was quite strong> I usually write in fragments. But actually, the first para did what I have been fighting against: I explained the work. I feel I fucked something up by making an umbrella that the piece is nested within. “the vacuum cleaner functions as my ego”. I think people that view art are open to the possibility that meaning can be found through their own subjectivity. Now I’m making a video which is a document (sister piece) to the performance. This has a few sections of the text taken out (including the [incriminating evidence]). It is a way of working through it, like comedians and poets do all the time. I like this process of [reiteration].

Similar to previous pieces, the sculptural piece invites viewers to experience the work only if they agree to the terms which I have set (as in the rug/bowl piece). Again the work is deals with a dog-like becoming experienced by the viewer. [Could/will they combine and become part dog, part human?] {in haraway’s theories, when we interact with dogs, we are both becoming each other simultaneously, so when viewing a work of an artist becoming an animal, it is possible that the becoming of the viewer happens as both becoming-me and becoming-dog} Both works utilize a sculptural practice mixed with a media practice, where the first leads the viewer towards the latter. Sound plays a vital role in each piece. Similar aesthetics are seen through the use of high-gloss black paint referring to an S&M submission set-up where people are invited to use the sculptures while submitting themselves simultaneously. Both pieces use soft fabric as a friendly way to attract this interaction. [Something about this reminds me of dog owners that put clothes on their dogs, because the dogs have been geographically misplaced, and are not equipped with enough hair to keep them warm. Like aren’t chihuahas an ancient breed from mexico?] {im not sure on the age of certain types of dogs, but i am interested in how humans have tranformed the species over 10s of thousands of years to suit their needs and desires}

This work related to past works because I often deal with how people relate to objects and animals while considering the normative hierarchies which exist socially and culturally in my context. “My New Feelings Whip” is a piece which refers to a sexual love-relationship between a human-being and their vacuum cleaner, dealing with the structuralization of love and gender. This piece deals more with the relationship between humans, animals, and objects by facing them with a close work

My past work is an interactive sculpture comprised of a hand-tufted rug, an altered, found, dog-bowl and an audio piece which is connected to the bowl through headphones. To listen to the audio, one must lower themselves onto the rug, as the headphone cable is of a short length. The bowl and headphones sit in front of the rug, inviting the viewer to lie down.

The rug was tufted using a tufting-pistol which blasts wool through canvas. Various colored yarns were chosen to complete the design, which is an image of a dog’s brain as made by an MRI can. The wool of the rug is intentionally untrimmed giving the rug a shaggy appearance. The bowl is constructed of metal and earthenware clay and have been spray painted with a high-gloss black paint. The audio comes from an iPod which is hidden underneath the bowl. The sound in is a voice making indistinguishable mouth sounds and a Righteous Brothers song which has been slowed down 400%.

The viewer submits to the piece on their own terms and comes face to face very closely with the work. The audio is referring to the possible perception a dog would have when faced with our voice and music. This perception was created by me while studying various scientific studies done on dogs’ brains. The piece is meant to be friendly (by use of bright colors and the softness of the rugs) yet perverse (the sound and aesthetics of the bowl) at the same time.

the rugs look like cartographies. giving the idea of a map or a large floorplan. the rug itself has recessed tufts to hold the eating vessels. the rug operates as the structure that holds these things. the rugs are also MRI's of dog brains, informing the whole concept of the work.

the audio pieces include sounds of humans, animals, and objects all consuming. not to say that all objects have a consumptive function. it will be sounds of humans eating, animals eating, and objects say being filled if that is there function. also the sounds of objects being eaten out of gives the object a closeness with the action of eating. when a human or animal is eating out of a bowl and you're recording the sounds of the bowl, then you're bringing them closer to the same level.

some of the audio pieces come from within the dog bowls which are in the gallery space with the rugs. the audio is on headphones which come out of the dogbowls. the cords are at such a length that you have to be down on all fours like an animal to listen to the work. at the same time you are confronted with the food that's in the bowls. this forces the viewer to be interacting with the piece in proximity whether its because they are interested in the food or interested in the sound. both bring them down to the level of the animal.