Tuesday, November 17, 2009

RAIQ Proposal -- Technologies of Life Lines

This is the most recent conference-proposal I've written (I wrote it today!). Here, I describe the project and the aspects I would like to examine at the 'Hi-Tech, Lo-Tech, No-Tech?' conference held by the Regroupement des Arts Interdisciplinaires du Québec (RAIQ) in May 2010.

Project Description:


Life Lines is an interdisciplinary relational-aesthetic project that reaches across the domains of social science, photography, curation, and psychotherapy.

Since 2006, I have been photographing people’s scars and asking them their stories – of the ways they got their scars, what their scars mean to them, and what they mean to other people. Stemming from my personal interest in bodily difference, early experiences as a surgically-saved “miracle baby”, and my studies in narrative therapy, Life Lines has become an internationally collaborative project, with contributions from people of all ages, across many ethnicity and class divides. After writing or having transcribed their narrative, participants are invited to become part of the online segment of the project, which can be found at http://www.onlinelifelines.blogspot.com.

I am proposing an interactive, semi-scholarly presentation at the Arts Interdisciplinaires: Hi-Tech, Lo-Tech, No-Tech?  conference as an avenue for opening up an exploration of the many different kinds of technology that go into a project such as this. In past presentations, I have asked the audience to discuss their own experiences of scarring and ‘unsightliness’, examined various ways of visually representing ‘difference’ (e.g. scarring, disability), and critiqued the project through lenses of both the arts and the social sciences. For the RAIQ conference, I would like to focus on the ways that we use different technologies to traverse the same terrain, and the different results those technologies yield within this project.

For example, many of the scars exhibited in Life Lines are the result of surgery. Medical technologies have evaluated this particular zone of the body, found it unsatisfactory and have endeavoured to ‘correct’ it through the means of the scalpel. It is a sensitive area. In having their scars photographed, participants are in some way allowing that zone to be re-assessed; the technology of the camera follows the lines inscribed by the scalpel. It is a repetitive action, a second technological invasion.

And then there is the question of the narrative: according to Anthropology, story is one of the oldest creative technologies. Stories are used to convey information in a compelling way, to give structure to that information so that it is remembered clearly, and to create both a sense of personal identity and a feeling of belonging. In telling their scar stories, participants are once again re-working those particular zones of their bodies.

What do the different levels of technology provide, and what do they lack? What various visual and social representations of the body do they convey? What is the participant’s experience of each technological examination of his/her/their body?



Presentation Abstract:

Svea Vikander will discuss various levels of technology and their methods of assessment and display as they apply to her relational-aesthetic project, Life Lines. Published online at http://www.onlinelifelines.blogspot.com, Life Lines is a space for people to photograph (or to have photographed) their scars; they are then invited to write their story of having acquired the scar, with a description of its importance to them and to other people. Scalpel, camera, narrative – all work toward a representation of a bodily zone that is considered ‘unsightly’ or taboo. What does each technology provide in this process, and what does it deny?


Images Attached:

Tamara





Andrea (Self-Portrait)



Kevin
 

Shara
  

Peter (self-portrait)







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