Jessica Tatara
Spring 2016 Thesis
Protective Art
Enter a space of metallic imagery and books shot by guns, walk on bullets, and fathom the garments that could survive violent attacks while saving your life. This constructed, fantastical, yet horrific environment transforms into a psychological and architectural space confronting the callous mind and the open mind. Today, consuming screens threaten our existence with news footage feeding into war, chaos and disaster. Sandy Hook Elementary, Columbine, Santa Monica College and Virginia Tech. Were those just sound bites, flashes of hi-def information that became part of every-day life to you in your media feed swarm? Do you stop to reflect on the fragility of the future? Who, in the nests of education, faces threats on a daily basis? Why are school shootings gaining momentum? Background checks, increased security presence, metal detectors, and funerary memorials, are those the solutions to safe school citizenship?
I designed wearable art constructed by myself and my mother to shield those who are vulnerable to unexpected attack. The designs include prototypes for a knife attack-resistant book-bag, a protective gown, secret slip, shoes, hood, cloak, children’s wear, a ballistic hat and eyeshades. The book-bag can hold your Crayolas and calculator and at the last second act as a shield to cover you from weapons. The gown has a bodice made of Kevlar, a material that theoretically can stop a bullet and a blade, with a skirt made of emergency blankets whose shiny silver material echoes the disco ball. The Kevlar baby onsie is a red and black suit that protects infants from gun shootings and flying debris as well as knife attacks. The eyeshades are covered in Kevlar fabric and illustrate Paul Virilio’s quote “There are eyes everywhere. No blind spots left. What shall we dream of when everything becomes visible? We’ll dream of being blind.” These glasses are about seeing a vision through your imagination. My fashion sculptures explore identity, power & powerlessness, self definition and protection theory in contemporary society. These fabrics, Kevlar, Ballistic nylon and Mylar, reflect the reality of our times as there have been over 430 school shootings in America since 1764 (Middleton, 2007) I introduce protective art and a memorial that highlights the youths’ lives taken all too early by violence on their school grounds. Does this space provide the audience with a place to hold further dialogue about how today’s youth and weapons of mass destruction go hand in hand?
While my process involves a search for solutions and altruism, I recognize that there are unfound answers awaiting discovery. The installation reflects those who mourn and those who became divine through heroism by saving lives or voicing scholarship in the face of the moment. Through this installation the audience can perceive multiple losses and individual feeling. The backdrop of Mylar is a reflective surface incorporated for aesthetics and functions to protect “The aluminized coating is conductive to radio frequency (RF) waves and will collect some of that energy and not allow it to radiate to the other side of the Mylar sheet, thus blocking or shielding some portion of the RF energy,” (Adachi, K. 2012). The bullets on the ground of my installation are the same caliber bullets that have been fired in school shootings in America including Columbine and Sandy Hook Elementary. The books shot by guns reveal bullet holes and exit wounds on paper. What is the shape of a bullet hole? Is skin as fragile as paper? Public memory joins the past of both greatness and devastation to the future of peaceful potential invincibility with my inclusion of protective wearable art.
This memorial becomes a protest against war and pain. Just like Mario Savio fought for Free Speech, I fight for achieving intellectual freedom & expression through Art. I am transitioning garments to be worn in an age that is “post traumatization & post televisual terrorism” Virilio reflects, by using fabrics that can potentially save a person's life from knife attack or gunshot. I propose a peace movement, a moment of calling citizenry to action by collaborating with art and imagery that is representational of human greatness in terms of peace not war. I propose my Kevlar shield as art that legitimizes the individual self by way of empowerment and not victimization. The installation and artworks give the audience distance, space and time to begin thinking about the sacrifices and reflecting upon history in the making.
Daniel Boorstin wrote, "one of the oldest of man's visions was the flash of divinity in the great man." Could it be, that humans are endless dreamers, wandering in between imaginative possibilities and composing or defining or guessing what is real and how close they can arrive to the divine nature of being? Is there a yearning to see humanity in a super realm in the eyes of our shared existence? If creating that vision happens by construction with tools of thread, ink, glue, Mylar, ballistic fabric, Kevlar, sequins, paper and mechanics, then flashes of divinity can be manpowered, manifested and recorded as artifact.
Collaboration is essential to this work for many reasons: Multiple perspectives are more just than a singular Piagetian perspective when it comes to examining school shootings and public memory. I wrote a letter and offered classes nationwide the notion of writing a piece in response to the following line from my poetry "A tear full of bullets, a bullet full of tears…" The classes could write individual poems, free-writes or collaboration. This writing focuses on gun shootings in schools, safety, and solutions. The writing serves as a symbol of civic engagement and historical significance of the moment represented by contemporary art. I felt that society's voices, especially scholars, were being drowned out by the over-spoken, loud and intimidating callous and horrific news media.
After receiving my letter and poetry, students from Santa Monica City College of CA wrote back with a collaborative poem in the form of Renga, a Japanese linked haiku, titled “A tear full of bullets and a bullet full of tears.”
…Tears of tears, tears of bullets
Tears of tears full of bullets
Droplet of Iron
Horizontal Rain Can Kill
Full Metal Teardrop… (Padilla, M. & Class, 2015)
The writers and I demonstrate that poetry and creative writing, when fashioned as a collaborative work, achieves multiple perspectives through time and space. Our collective minds build a society that reaches toward each other with problem solving as it realizes what Paul Virilio calls "the age of televisual terrorism" and does the unexpected. The voices of scholarship are not apathetic as this poetry is not an example of deterrence but functions in the conscience of catastrophe.
Together, we can imagine new possibilities. Boorstin's idea, "fantastic possibilities engage our imagination without taxing our understanding" suggests the spark of imagination is the ladder to divinity. My art heightens human potential to perceive human fortunes within manufactured dreams. Dreaming of a safe school can be made. Viewing humankind encountering violence and asking it to stop with love and art, documented as Poetry, Sculpture and Protective Art, suggests that utopia can be built for humans to experience. The art is proof that this vision can be translated. The heroes of such a utopia are those who came unarmed or rescued those who were acting with peace during those traumatic days. Those are the supreme beings and fathoming them is made easier within our context of producing imagery. It is not the media's sole purpose to create a calloused culture. Our own civic action can declare what future is upon us. Sharing ideas through art and illustrating the attempts of science explains how humanity approaches divinity. The ability of men and women to make buildable society with reflections on reality that resonate with the imagination is a fantastic expression of humanity collaborating with greatness together. Concerning the lives of the students, teachers, writers, sculptors, artists and audience members who worked to orchestrate the phenomenal effects, the final thesis bestows sublimeness, "that the lives of great men 'all remind us, we can make our lives sublime," (Longfellow, 1893). Is my art a product of historical reality of the times? Do you venture back into the world of cotton, cashmere and silk… or do you protect yourself in Art with the fashionable shields of Kevlar, Mylar and Ballistic Nylon? Is culture a weapon? Is culture the peace and piece of utopia? The future will tell...
Bibliography:
Amato, Joseph A. “Surfaces: A History,” University of CA Press: Berkeley, 2013
Boorstin, Daniel, “ The Image: A Guide to Pseudo Events in America” Atheneum: New York, 1971
Bruno, Giuliana, “Surface” University of Chicago Press: Chicago, 2014
Fraser, Kennedy. “The Fashionable Mind, Reflections on Fashion 1970-1981,” Alfred A. Knoff: New York,
1981.
Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth. “The Complete Poetical Works of Longfellow”. Houghton Mifflin
Company: Boston, 1893
Middleton, Richard. “Pontiac's War: Its Causes, Course and Consequences.”Routledge: New York, 2007
Padillia, Dr. Mario & Class. “A tear full of bullets… A bullet full of tears Renga.” Santa Monica, CA: 2015
Rubenstein, Ruth P. “Dress Codes: Meanings and Messages in American Culture 2nd Edition,” Westview
Press: Boulder, CO, 2001
Virilio, Paul, “The Paul Virilion Reader,” Columbia University Press: New York , 2004
Website:
http://educate-yourself.org/cn/microwaveshielding09jan12.shtml
Artistic Influences:
Frank Oz, Michael Jackson, Prince, Jim Henson, Walt Disney, Ansel Adams, Julia Butterfly Hill, The Beatles, Olympians, Keith Harring, Ted Streshinsky, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Mario Savio, Martin Luther King Jr., MTV, June Jordan, Kevin Radley, Dr. Mario Padilla, Richard Hamilton,
Basquiat, Claude Monet, Carolee Schneemann, William Wordsworth, Michael Plette & My Mother
Spring 2016 Thesis
Protective Art
Enter a space of metallic imagery and books shot by guns, walk on bullets, and fathom the garments that could survive violent attacks while saving your life. This constructed, fantastical, yet horrific environment transforms into a psychological and architectural space confronting the callous mind and the open mind. Today, consuming screens threaten our existence with news footage feeding into war, chaos and disaster. Sandy Hook Elementary, Columbine, Santa Monica College and Virginia Tech. Were those just sound bites, flashes of hi-def information that became part of every-day life to you in your media feed swarm? Do you stop to reflect on the fragility of the future? Who, in the nests of education, faces threats on a daily basis? Why are school shootings gaining momentum? Background checks, increased security presence, metal detectors, and funerary memorials, are those the solutions to safe school citizenship?
I designed wearable art constructed by myself and my mother to shield those who are vulnerable to unexpected attack. The designs include prototypes for a knife attack-resistant book-bag, a protective gown, secret slip, shoes, hood, cloak, children’s wear, a ballistic hat and eyeshades. The book-bag can hold your Crayolas and calculator and at the last second act as a shield to cover you from weapons. The gown has a bodice made of Kevlar, a material that theoretically can stop a bullet and a blade, with a skirt made of emergency blankets whose shiny silver material echoes the disco ball. The Kevlar baby onsie is a red and black suit that protects infants from gun shootings and flying debris as well as knife attacks. The eyeshades are covered in Kevlar fabric and illustrate Paul Virilio’s quote “There are eyes everywhere. No blind spots left. What shall we dream of when everything becomes visible? We’ll dream of being blind.” These glasses are about seeing a vision through your imagination. My fashion sculptures explore identity, power & powerlessness, self definition and protection theory in contemporary society. These fabrics, Kevlar, Ballistic nylon and Mylar, reflect the reality of our times as there have been over 430 school shootings in America since 1764 (Middleton, 2007) I introduce protective art and a memorial that highlights the youths’ lives taken all too early by violence on their school grounds. Does this space provide the audience with a place to hold further dialogue about how today’s youth and weapons of mass destruction go hand in hand?
While my process involves a search for solutions and altruism, I recognize that there are unfound answers awaiting discovery. The installation reflects those who mourn and those who became divine through heroism by saving lives or voicing scholarship in the face of the moment. Through this installation the audience can perceive multiple losses and individual feeling. The backdrop of Mylar is a reflective surface incorporated for aesthetics and functions to protect “The aluminized coating is conductive to radio frequency (RF) waves and will collect some of that energy and not allow it to radiate to the other side of the Mylar sheet, thus blocking or shielding some portion of the RF energy,” (Adachi, K. 2012). The bullets on the ground of my installation are the same caliber bullets that have been fired in school shootings in America including Columbine and Sandy Hook Elementary. The books shot by guns reveal bullet holes and exit wounds on paper. What is the shape of a bullet hole? Is skin as fragile as paper? Public memory joins the past of both greatness and devastation to the future of peaceful potential invincibility with my inclusion of protective wearable art.
This memorial becomes a protest against war and pain. Just like Mario Savio fought for Free Speech, I fight for achieving intellectual freedom & expression through Art. I am transitioning garments to be worn in an age that is “post traumatization & post televisual terrorism” Virilio reflects, by using fabrics that can potentially save a person's life from knife attack or gunshot. I propose a peace movement, a moment of calling citizenry to action by collaborating with art and imagery that is representational of human greatness in terms of peace not war. I propose my Kevlar shield as art that legitimizes the individual self by way of empowerment and not victimization. The installation and artworks give the audience distance, space and time to begin thinking about the sacrifices and reflecting upon history in the making.
Daniel Boorstin wrote, "one of the oldest of man's visions was the flash of divinity in the great man." Could it be, that humans are endless dreamers, wandering in between imaginative possibilities and composing or defining or guessing what is real and how close they can arrive to the divine nature of being? Is there a yearning to see humanity in a super realm in the eyes of our shared existence? If creating that vision happens by construction with tools of thread, ink, glue, Mylar, ballistic fabric, Kevlar, sequins, paper and mechanics, then flashes of divinity can be manpowered, manifested and recorded as artifact.
Collaboration is essential to this work for many reasons: Multiple perspectives are more just than a singular Piagetian perspective when it comes to examining school shootings and public memory. I wrote a letter and offered classes nationwide the notion of writing a piece in response to the following line from my poetry "A tear full of bullets, a bullet full of tears…" The classes could write individual poems, free-writes or collaboration. This writing focuses on gun shootings in schools, safety, and solutions. The writing serves as a symbol of civic engagement and historical significance of the moment represented by contemporary art. I felt that society's voices, especially scholars, were being drowned out by the over-spoken, loud and intimidating callous and horrific news media.
After receiving my letter and poetry, students from Santa Monica City College of CA wrote back with a collaborative poem in the form of Renga, a Japanese linked haiku, titled “A tear full of bullets and a bullet full of tears.”
…Tears of tears, tears of bullets
Tears of tears full of bullets
Droplet of Iron
Horizontal Rain Can Kill
Full Metal Teardrop… (Padilla, M. & Class, 2015)
The writers and I demonstrate that poetry and creative writing, when fashioned as a collaborative work, achieves multiple perspectives through time and space. Our collective minds build a society that reaches toward each other with problem solving as it realizes what Paul Virilio calls "the age of televisual terrorism" and does the unexpected. The voices of scholarship are not apathetic as this poetry is not an example of deterrence but functions in the conscience of catastrophe.
Together, we can imagine new possibilities. Boorstin's idea, "fantastic possibilities engage our imagination without taxing our understanding" suggests the spark of imagination is the ladder to divinity. My art heightens human potential to perceive human fortunes within manufactured dreams. Dreaming of a safe school can be made. Viewing humankind encountering violence and asking it to stop with love and art, documented as Poetry, Sculpture and Protective Art, suggests that utopia can be built for humans to experience. The art is proof that this vision can be translated. The heroes of such a utopia are those who came unarmed or rescued those who were acting with peace during those traumatic days. Those are the supreme beings and fathoming them is made easier within our context of producing imagery. It is not the media's sole purpose to create a calloused culture. Our own civic action can declare what future is upon us. Sharing ideas through art and illustrating the attempts of science explains how humanity approaches divinity. The ability of men and women to make buildable society with reflections on reality that resonate with the imagination is a fantastic expression of humanity collaborating with greatness together. Concerning the lives of the students, teachers, writers, sculptors, artists and audience members who worked to orchestrate the phenomenal effects, the final thesis bestows sublimeness, "that the lives of great men 'all remind us, we can make our lives sublime," (Longfellow, 1893). Is my art a product of historical reality of the times? Do you venture back into the world of cotton, cashmere and silk… or do you protect yourself in Art with the fashionable shields of Kevlar, Mylar and Ballistic Nylon? Is culture a weapon? Is culture the peace and piece of utopia? The future will tell...
Bibliography:
Amato, Joseph A. “Surfaces: A History,” University of CA Press: Berkeley, 2013
Boorstin, Daniel, “ The Image: A Guide to Pseudo Events in America” Atheneum: New York, 1971
Bruno, Giuliana, “Surface” University of Chicago Press: Chicago, 2014
Fraser, Kennedy. “The Fashionable Mind, Reflections on Fashion 1970-1981,” Alfred A. Knoff: New York,
1981.
Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth. “The Complete Poetical Works of Longfellow”. Houghton Mifflin
Company: Boston, 1893
Middleton, Richard. “Pontiac's War: Its Causes, Course and Consequences.”Routledge: New York, 2007
Padillia, Dr. Mario & Class. “A tear full of bullets… A bullet full of tears Renga.” Santa Monica, CA: 2015
Rubenstein, Ruth P. “Dress Codes: Meanings and Messages in American Culture 2nd Edition,” Westview
Press: Boulder, CO, 2001
Virilio, Paul, “The Paul Virilion Reader,” Columbia University Press: New York , 2004
Website:
http://educate-yourself.org/cn/microwaveshielding09jan12.shtml
Artistic Influences:
Frank Oz, Michael Jackson, Prince, Jim Henson, Walt Disney, Ansel Adams, Julia Butterfly Hill, The Beatles, Olympians, Keith Harring, Ted Streshinsky, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Mario Savio, Martin Luther King Jr., MTV, June Jordan, Kevin Radley, Dr. Mario Padilla, Richard Hamilton,
Basquiat, Claude Monet, Carolee Schneemann, William Wordsworth, Michael Plette & My Mother
