Weekly report 4
- Aug 13, 2018
- 7 min read
Week five and I am holiday and, not going to lie, I’m relaxing and really enjoying my time away. My report this week and next will be brief as I am spending the time reading and contemplating my findings and the ensuing work that will hopefully stem from this. I will list below some of the reading and listening I have done this week and will comment on or quote anything which I found interesting.
The Beauty Myth written by Naomi Wolf
I have read the chapters titled: "The Beauty Myth" and "Culture". The following quotes below are parts I found interesting and would like to investigate further in the studio or to inform our future work.
“Inside the majority of the West’s controlled, attractive, successful working women, there is a secret “underlife” poisoning our freedom; infused with notions of beauty, it is a dark vein of self-hatred, physical obsessions, terror of aging, and dread of lost control.”
“Beauty pornography – which for the first time in women’s history artificially links a commodified ‘beauty’ directly and explicitly to sexuality.”
“The quality called ‘beauty’ objectively and universally exists. Women must want to embody it and men must want to possess women who embody it.”
“The look with which strange women sometimes appraise one another says it all: A quick up-and-down, curt and wary, it takes in the picture but leaves out the person.”
“Airbrushing age off women’s faces has the same political echo that would resound if all positive images of blacks were routinely lightened.”
“Many of us are not yet sure ourselves that women are interesting without ‘beauty’.”
Within the chapters I have read I also found myself identifying with many of the behaviours written about. I have highlighted parts of the book and put a note saying “this is me”. The part that particularly rang true to me was writing about the way magazines sell you and image and a life style and if you buy into it you fully believe that you will wake up and be transported into this perfectly beautiful world with colour co-ordinated walk in wardrobe, Evian water always displayed in the fridge and perfectly applied make-up. When I am reading a magazine I always buy into this – the image and the lifestyle. This then leads to being continually disappointed when you can’ live up to the expectations that you have set yourself – only you set them and so you are always disappointing yourself.
In one section of the book it describes the link between women and beauty magazines as“the great umbilical cord”.I really liked this imagery and it is an idea I would like to investigate in the studio in a practical way.
Another point that is clearly pressed is that beauty is not universal and has many shapes and forms in different cultures, although, as this quote references: “the West pretends that all ideals of female beauty stem from one Platonic Ideal Woman”
This then brought me to the thought on creating a scene based around the concept of the 10 commandments – The 10 beauty commandments according to the West.– something to explore further.
Fake it ‘till You Make It written by Bryony Kimmings and Tim Grayburn
I have now read in full the play and the Forewords included in the published play text. I loved the play and the imagery within it. The fact that Tim wears elaborate head coverings throughout the piece is so symbolic of the way depression can feel, especially the head of knots and the head of clouds. It gave me insight into how to approach the delicate nature of depression and anxiety with comedy and light-heartedness so as not to create a self-indulgent piece about ‘poor me’.
Podcasts – Who Knew!!
I have never listened to a podcast until the last few days and I love them!! They feel like a really intimate and personal experience, especially when listening through earphones. I have used my sunbed time to listen to the following so far:
Susan Calman’s Mrs Brightside
Cariad Lloyd’s Grief-Cast
Deborah Frances-White’s The Guilty Feminist
The Susan Calman podcast lead me to find Jessie Cave who spoke to Susan about her chronic depression. She spoke about her ‘doodles’ that she started doing each day on twitter to vent her anxiety about love and her relationships – I had a look at them and really liked the way they were so painfully truthful and funny at the same time. I could relate and I’m sure many other women would as well. I would like to use these and the ideas within them when we are back in the studio.
Further Experiments & Ideas
Downfall of women – Peaches Geldof, Paula Yates, Whitney Houston.
Being held down with physical weight – sand bags, laundry, detergent etc.
More mask work
Using authentic movement to explore the themes.
Using interview technique to push and challenge our own perceptions and ideals.
Use the cut-up articles to create.
The great umbilical cord
10 beauty commandments
Jessie Cave - doodles
Sonia: Patterns and paradoxes
With Sarah out of the office, my brain went on holidays as well…
After feeling stuck in all of those definitions of beauty I just wanted to go against my natural instincts and focus on something else instead of pursuing clarification. However it’s me we are talking about, so now everything I read, watch or listen to, I try to find patterns and relations. This also makes me more aware of the paradoxes of the meaning of beauty and the behaviour of women.
The myth continues…
In 1949 Simone de Beauvoir said: “A myth always implies a subject who projects his hopes and his fears towards a sky of transcendence. Women do not set themselves up as Subject and hence have erected no virile myth in which their projects are reflected; they have no religion or poetry of their own: they still dream through the dreams of men.” (1997: 174)
In 1991 Naomi Wolf is still talking about myth, but in this case the beauty one, which “is always prescribing behaviour and not appearance… Most urgently, women’s identity must be premised upon our “beauty” so that we will remain vulnerable to outside approval, carrying the vital sensitive organ of self-esteem exposed to the air” (1991: 14). I thought this was really interesting because women tend to think they are being judged by the way they look like but that is a reflection of the judgement on their behaviour.
Reading these statements I remembered that I’ve had both labels (behaviour and beauty) imposed on me since I was a little girl… well since I was born. I usually rebelled more against the behaviour one J nevertheless, blaming my parents for those impositions and judgements would accomplish nothing and, as always we have to see things in the context they are in. They raised me with a set of morals and norms they thought were appropriate. They didn’t question them and… why would they? I question them every day and that makes living in our society a very stressing and anxious process.
Paradoxes of being a woman
I’ve also been reading Nietzsche for my research on anxiety and I found these interesting quotes that I relate with the paradoxes of beauty and behaviour… of being human really:
“Opinions: Most people are nothing and are considered nothing until they have dressed themselves up in general convictions and public opinions – in accordance with the tailor philosophy: clothes make people. Of the exceptional person, however, it must be said: only he that wears it makes the costume, here opinions cease to be public and become something other than masks, finery, and disguises. (1969: 178)
“What do you consider most human? To spare someone shame. What is the seal of attained freedom? No longer being ashamed in front of oneself” (1960: 193)
I’ve also listened to a few podcasts from “the guilty feminist” (http://guiltyfeminist.com/episodes/) which I found funny because of the way they express themselves but mostly because of the contradictions of what a woman should do and what she actually does/ thinks about… and then we initiate this cycle of blame because our actions are not according to our beliefs. I’ve never considered myself as a feminist but I do have strong morals and ideas that I crush on a regular basis. So I relate this to Wolf’s idea of behaviour being what’s at stake in being a woman.
I saw this video and had to send it to Sarah (actually who knew that the Turkish sky would send such a rain of videos and links right?). The social criticism is amazing and it made me laugh… “It’s funny because it’s true!”
Future plans and approaches
Continuing reading “Curious” by Rebecca Front
Continuing the research on social anxiety and depression
Listen to Susan Calman's Mrs Brightside (https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p0683q6p/episodes/player)
Record some voice clips with ideas from what I’ve been reading to, maybe, include in the scrip
Continue reading about Bobby Baker, whose draws have inspired me to draw specific situations when my social anxiety is running the place
Continue cutting scenes from last week’s videos to mash them up into one, to post here
Continue writing the script (relating mine and Sarah’s differences and the contradictions women face) with my ideas about how to put this into practice, to explain to Sarah when she gets back
Interesting stuff that happened:
My flatmates convinced me to go to the pub but said that if I wanted a guy to approach me I had to put make up on… unfortunately I forgot about the heels and the sexy clothes and to look approachable oh and to smile all the time… at least that’s what I saw all the other women doing.
I posted a photo of me with make up on, on my Facebook. I got more likes and comments on it than on more than three of my posts, about topics that matter to the world like the environment, education or the refuges, combined. All comments were from women.
…
Sarah let’s do a social experiment! You: full make up on, high heels, dress, etc. Me: none of those. Let’s go out and put those “10 beauty commandments” to the test!
Beauvoir, S. (1997) The Second Sex, London, Vintage
Nietzsche, F. (1969) On the Genealogy of Morals and Ecce Homo, Toronto, Vintage
Wolf, N. (1991) The Beauty Myth, London, Vintage
Comments