Rees Mullins- Materialistic

 

3/20/2023: My installation has now been taken down, I have posted final images of my work and below is my artist statement:

Do I make You uncomfortable

Rees Mullins

There were 327 Anti-Transgender laws introduced in America this year, three of the laws were passed within the first two months of the year. As a transgender artist, I fear for my safety and the safety of my transgender brothers and sisters. Wyoming narrowly defeated two bills that would make life and transition for so many people difficult.

Around 80% of transgender people consider ending their own life, with 40% ending up attempting to take their own life. With youth being the most at risk.

As more and more anti-trans legislation is introduced, these numbers will only increase as we as trans people should not exist according to certain people.They consider gender affirming care for youth to be child abuse, when studies show that gender affirming care make transgender youth 73% less likely to experience suicidal tendencies. All of this makes me wonder why, why do they want people like me gone.

Do I make you uncomfortable?

This is the question I kept asking myself as I was conceptualizing this installation. It's hard to understand why it feels like the whole world hates you, instead of creating work that tries to figure that out ; I wanted to lean into it, I want people to be faced with the uncomfortableness, the pain that they cause. There comes a time when people need to recognize that unless things get better, unless people get over their uncomfort, kids are going to continue to die. If this piece makes you uncomfortable, good. I implore you to sit with that feeling and break down why it has that effect on you. If you disagree with my message, I want you to think about why you disagree; why does seeing someone who is transgender have any effect on you. I truly believe that once you start to break down why you are uncomfortable you can understand why it is a false notion, created by a fear mongering media. This cast in the center is me, being strung up by the world around me. It feels as though I am on display, when I walk around a restaurant to use the bathroom, when I am walking into Walmart, I can feel people's eyes on me. I can see these preconceived notions working their way through peoples heads, I can feel how their gaze pierces through me like daggers. It feels as though people are trying to understand me, but it also feels as though I make them uncomfortable. As if my presence is in direct conflict with theirs. There is a burden that comes with living your truest self on display.

   

03/06/23


    I have not made much progress on the gallery since I have been in New Mexico since Thursday. I have painted the floor yellow, after layering plastic and paper so the floor is not damaged by the paint. I am going to mimic the straps with neon yellow duct tape on the floor, mainly because I ran out of yellow paint to touch up certain parts of the floor (mostly the blue tape that is showing though). Later this week I am going to add straps and my torso armature, only adding the latex cast last.

2/27/23

    Instead of using fabric I am now going to just use paint on the walls of the gallery yellow. I have the paint color I want to use, I am going today to buy a gallon of this paint. UPDATE: I have, as of tonight, painted the walls in the gallery yellow, this ended up creating an effect where the space has this yellow light poring out of it. This makes my clean up much more difficult but i think the effect it gives pays off.

    I have started coloring my latex using foundation, setting powder, eyeshadow pallets and workable fixatives to give the latex a more skin like appearance. Originally I was going to use pastels and a triple glaze clear coat for the finish, but that continuously turned out horrible on the test latex I had. I think the makeup adds a very skin like finish, with the fixative not altering the finish in any way.

    I have decided to use I-Hooks to attach the yellow straps to the walls, while having knots in them and long tails that hang down. I think it might be interesting to play with the fraying ends of the strap instead of sealing them in some way.

   

     I am going to use pencil rod to create an armature for the torso so it can hang and keep its form while also allowing me to attach the straps to something that is more solid than the latex itself. I think I want to use thread and stitch around the latex and the pencil rod armature.  

 

 

 

 

Date posts and keep newest posts up top

I have started by creating a mold of my own torso, then I have layered latex within my mold to build up the skin like texture. After my first positive from the mold I have learned that I will need a lot more layers than i had originally planned, as well as a longer dry time in between each layer so I do not have large pockets of wet latex in my piece. Furthermore, I want to experiment with adding some form of armature to the interior to give the latex more rigidity and hold its shape better. One issue I noticed on my mold is that since plaster strips were used for the mold there is a slight texture left on the positive when removed. I have thought about using a very thin coating of petroleum jelly to smooth the mold without losing too much of the detail. There is some debate on whether petroleum jelly is safe to use with latex, but after some research I am willing to do some experimenting and tests to see if it would work. 

I would not use vaseline. Let me look at the piece. remember we will not be so close to view it so it may not matter.

Artist Inspiration:

Zhu Tian's "Babe" (2013)

    In this first artist inspiration I was really drawn to how Tian makes an everyday object very uncomfortable to look at. Her use of hair and rubber creates this disconnect from what you are seeing and what you are feeling about the object, forcing the viewer to be uncomfortable; an experience I hope to achieve with my work.

Janaina Mello Landini's "Ciclotrama" (2015)

    Landini uses rope to slowly take over a space, allowing the user to walk through the space but needing to interact with the rope by wandering around the path it creates. As the rope starts at the beginning of the gallery, it guides the viewer through the spaces as it branches out, forcing the viewer's path to change as they duck around the rope or step over it to enter. I am very drawn to how Landini uses the rope to force viewers through the space, almost as if the space is physically moving them through itself.  

Robert Gober

Ideation:

 

     Upon entering the space I want the viewer's eyes to immediately be bombarded by this overpowering yellow and white “wallpaper”. The use of yellow and white is to create a sense of uncomfortableness within the space (Source), while also making it hard to escape from since it will be so bright and overstimulating. This combined with the rope and the torso will hopefully give the viewer an adverse reaction to the experience.