thesis writing — Ingrid Schelzel

Ingrid Schelzel

December 01, 2023

I am a multidisciplinary artist working within the bounds of technology and fine art. My work consists of design, performance, installation, video and programming, while speaking on topics of labor, trauma, and womanhood, most often interchangeably. My process begins with research and writing on a conceptual topic I feel drawn towards. Life and art are one, so I work on ideas that are a part of me and my identity. Play is an important part of my process of making, such as exploring new programs and niche processes of image-making through code. More often than not my initial idea changes throughout its conception. I rely heavily on the flow of production, letting myself be pulled into different territories or mediums when the subject demands it. In this way, my work is very process-based.

Throughout my time at MCAD, I’ve worked within many different mediums but gravitate towards the use of performance as a way of communicating concepts. My piece Clock In, uses performance of myself and of the viewer. Clock In consists of a programmed button on a solitary pedestal. The button controls a monetary value on a projection shown in front of the pedestal. When the button is pressed the monetary value goes up as well as the start of a video performance of myself. As long as the button is not pressed the value declines and the video stops. The value is representative of how much labor is worth every millisecond on minimum wage in America. This piece is a good example of how I use both technology and performance to communicate my concepts to the audience. The work speaks to the value of our labor as Americans but also the value of an artist's performance in relation to the larger conversation of labor.

My work for the thesis show uses many of the same concepts I’ve explored during my time as a student at MCAD: labor and womanhood. I've created multiple programs using a body tracking system, poseNet and Javascript in an attempt to render my body invisible in real time through the webcam on my computer. This gesture reflects the invisibility of female bodies through digital spaces, through a redaction of autonomy and degradation of identity to single pixels.

I’ve ended up creating two different distinct installation outputs for the programs I’ve built to further my ideas. The first output, currently entitled Non Playable Character, uses a performance of me with the program wiping the screen, and this is then projected onto a single tile in the women's bathroom. In this output, I am emphasizing women's labor in a subtle way. Using a small projection on a single tile reflects the “one of many” nature of labor in general. I have also chosen to make visible the code that I use to run this program, displaying a print out of the text on the wall. This acts to give context to the visuals the viewer is experiencing.

My second output of this process is another video performance filmed using my pixelated webcam program. In this performance, called Non Playable Character, I am dancing in my bedroom as many girls at 26-years-old have and still do as an act of joy and love towards oneself. I then take this pixelated video and break it down further with a video editing software, taking away “place” from the background and rendering it transparent. Then, as I continue this act of degradation and stripping away, I eliminate the saturation and detail so the form becomes a black blob, although life still remains. Then exporting this video using the ffWorks program, I create jpeg photos of every single frame. These frames I then print out again and throw off the top of a building, letting go and spreading my initial act of joy. This piece is taking my idea of invisibility and making it a ritual, starting with a somewhat recognizable performance of me dancing and ending up with still black and white images stripped of life, scattered and meaning less. This video performance is projected onto a single brick, much like the previous piece projected onto a single tile.

All of these works are about the disruption of womanhood and the self, highlighting the invisible role my identity plays in society.

Some artists that have inspired me in my work this semester include Rosa Menkman, a Dutch artist and researcher, specifically her project entitled 365 Perfect Decalibration. In this work, she builds software to develop an app that mimics that of a perfect filter app one might use for instagram touch ups, this app promises to “remove blemishes” and “lighten eyes” but layers the touch ups to an extreme degree and renders the face unrecognizable.

Another artist that has inspired my work this semester is Sabine Gruffat, a digital multidisciplinary artist from Thailand working with concepts of gender identity. In particular, her work entitled Antibodies has inspired my dive into female representation in digital spaces. Antibodies is a performance using a virtual reality headset that transforms your body into a female representation in virtual reality. The representation of self within the digital space is thin and exaggerated, the “ideal female body”. The work speaks on female representation in video games as “pro-Anorexic yogis, cyber-Hysterics, and rubber-boned ragdolls.”

These artists have been a point of inspiration and research in my process of developing my senior project. Outside of artistic inspiration, my project comes from a place of necessary intervention as I am a female in the digital space. My own body being perceived via the internet or social media has always been a point of interest for me as a digital artist but also as a performer. That being said, my own internet-self has inspired this project as well as the artists outside of myself.

Within the context of art history, I find myself working on the fringe of the unknown as a digital artist. Discovering and working with new programs and technology is one of the most important parts of my process, it offers new ways of seeing the world around me. This lends itself to a new facet of art, which is what's so exciting to me about being a digital artist, we can speak on “old” narratives in a new way, and hone in on contemporary culture like other mediums may not. Art and technology is a challenge as the art world sometimes rejects its legitimacy, but that challenge is what drives me to push the boundaries of what art can be. Looking forward, I intend to continue taking on that challenge and create work that showcases that for others.

Works Cited:

“365 Perfect Decalibration - ▋▅▉▝▊ || beyond Resolution.” ▋▅▉▝▊, beyondresolution.info/365-Perfect-Decalibration. Accessed 11 Dec. 2023.

“Sabine Gruffat.” SABINE GRUFFAT, www.sabinegruffat.com/. Accessed 11 Dec. 2023.