As part of my dissertation project I really want to explore how creating art that makes people look slightly animalistic disturbs us (well at least disturbs us in western society). I have started experimenting with portraits based on photographs of girls looking natural but looking straight at the camera as I think this really confronts the viewer with the emotional reaction directly - as if coming across this human in the wild/real life/face-to-face.
I love it when you go camping or walking etc and you start to loose touch with your usual inhibitions... weeing in the woods, fields, not showering if there's no washrooms - just washing your face hands and feet, swimming in rivers getting muddy, sitting on the ground and sleeping on the ground, cooking with limited utensils, spending ages getting a fire going, playing and being imaginative and creative with the nature around you. Things that would mostly never be acceptable in your normal day-to-day living but yet are so natural to human beings.
I really want to explore our links with animals and how and why we have as a society seperated ourselves so much from our natural interactions with the world. We don't even look up at the sky half the time.
Books such as Lord of the Flies, programmes such as Island with Bear Grylls* and films like The Beach and Wild encounter this issue of our animal tendencies (in my opinion not just tendencies... we are all part of the animal kingdom really)... either warning us against it or just exploring it. I think people really worry that embracing animalistic ways means no rules and no order... but that is something the animal kingdom is absolutely full of.
For this project I want to explore the huge parts of life that link us despite our want of separation. The rawness of the animal kingdom is something artists also embrace; the raw truth behind our actions and behaviours. Art shows us our truth- the truths we usually avoid or don't face. But why don't we want to face them? The interesting thing about cultures and societies is our rituals; every animal and human is born, mates, and dies... and we all have rituals around this allowing us to continue and cope with celebration and loss so that it doesn't overwhelm us but lets us continue with survival of ourselves and our genes etc. Religions and other folklaw/tribal rituals do this. We face whats happened and move on. But gods and the spirits give us hope, give us a reason and an explanation. They allow us to continue surviving without driving ourselves crazy. I want to see what the rituals in the animal kingdoms are- if they too do this or if this is what defines us. I also want to explore the influence of animals as gods and spiritual motifs, and why those particular animals have been used? Throughout history we have been learning from animals and even chosen them as our gods. In today's society I think we need to respect and embrace these links in order to make people happier.
Working 9-5 sat in an office or school where you cant see a sky, the earth, or a plant (maybe just one cactus etc haha) then getting a stuffy train home, back to a closed in house and then perhaps to a boxy pub. No wonder people are getting so depressed. At least some people do this and get some social interaction with the other people around them, but what about those that don't. I really don't see the way a lot of people live there lives as a recipe for success based on our social and natural values that we have evolved to live with- being part of a collective society helping and being helped by others, working with the earth, with animals, gathering and collecting, being active and tactile with our environment. There's a reason you feel better after a run, and there's a reason you feel depressed and bored in the classroom/office room. It isn't natural for human beings to be sat on a computer all day.
I will be exploring and investigating the key themes that connect us all in the animal kingdom and the reasons for societies separation to this world.
* http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/tv/news/a593770/the-island-with-bear-grylls-to-feature-men-and-women-in-two-shows.html#~pneOgYvB7vagDD
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