Week 1 Artist Research (1): Cildo Meireles Responses

To begin I thought in order to capture the invisibility/emptiness within black people/black body, I used milk due to its sharp white colour. Also, to capture depth and interiority to reflect what's inside of black people, I used a tall glass, so that you as the viewer are almost forced to look inwards. As the Artist had used glass coco-cola bottles himself, I felt it would be best to use glass too, to increase transparency and so that the dilution I was about to explore with the liquid was visible from all angles.

I diluted the water, into milk, which you don't see as it just simply looks like pure milk rather than milk which has been diluted with water. I purposely missed this first stage. The fact the viewer doesn't see the first or 'real' start of the dilution helps symbolises how much black inferiority and the taught negative ideologies of 'black' itself and the limiting self beliefs of blackness is so ingrained and infinite (this is the impurity of blackness/black - no original state) that there is no clear pin point of when it all started, and there's no clear pin point of when it will ALL end. That all you see in the glass is this illusion of pure milk - linking to Meireles' work where we assume it is pure coco-cola. To emphasise this, I made sure to add only a quarter cup of water first into the glass and then following on, half a cup of milk, so that the glass is completely diluted with the milk that it just looks like milk - purely. From looking at it you could never tell what it started out as before which increases the illusion, again emphasising the infinite inferiority of black/blackness. In completely diluting the water that it looks so white and looks like pure milk as a result, this marks how much this is the cost of the impurity of blackness and it being in such a fixed, infinite state. The cost of this is: we have no identity/true self/true identity, don't know who we are/purely are - our emotional cause/pain. We're simply just an empty shell/walking back body with no core (due to the the illusion of emptiness the colour white provides) This is the cost of the impurity of blackness and how much blackness has been tampered with that we have no identity/true identity as a result. - symbolises the chronic damage we carry.

To dilute this further, I remembered a technique from the past. I discovered you could create this explosion within milk by using fairy liquid and ink, that it creates these shapes and patterns within the milk. Linking to the notion of empty brokenness within black people/the black body. I saw these patterns as fragmentation of the milk, it creates these small fractured looked, cracked-like patterns. So I did this myself, where in the glass of diluted water into milk, I poured in some black ink, then dipped a paint brush in fairy liquid. After, I then dipped the paint brush onto the area the black ink was. Immediately, this created these fractured, fragmented patterns. This symbolises our irreversible brokenness within, as when you add the ink, it completely dilutes what it once was, its lost its original state permanently, for good. Showing, black people are in a fixed state of impurity. Just like with corners/cracks/breaks, brokenness within lines, once done, you cannot repair or reverse that line to what it originally was as a straight line, it's been done. Symbolising the damage is done for black people. This stresses this is our chronic damage which we carry, and not only doing we carry but have digested that it lives in us. This is why in the background you can hear these gulping sounds which I recorded myself, whilst drinking a glass of water but loudly. These loud, intense gulps represent how much black inferiority/the impurity of black itself has been so ingrained and stage by stage, has been digested so deeply. This is why as the the black ink is moving, creating patterns within the diluted milk, dissolving with the ink more, the gulps in the background comes in each time. Hence, the ink fractures and breaks more into complete brokenness. The breaking of the ink reflects internalisation, digestion of black inferiority etc. , as the more we have digested it, the more we break. This marks the intervention and disruption of the black body/black people. That we have drank it all in - leading to why we self-censor/self hating/narrative of blackness being controlled by superiors/white culture. - This is our chronic, physical pain most of us experience and live in/focus on- which only as a result represses our emotional pain/trauma/cause of the chronic pain we feel. That some of us never get to the root cause/the emotional cause/pain at all. However, regardless if we don't or do know and the chronic pain is repaired/stopped, it'll never repair the chronic damage or the irreversible brokenness we live with. It's permanent.

This is why I placed the glass of dilution outside, but against the grass. As grass/nature possesses this sense of superiority over humanity, it'll always survive and live no matter if there is a natural disaster or harm. It'll always grow back. Unlike humanity. This links to the reign of chronic damage over black people, as our chronic damage will always be superior over the chronic pain we experience. This is because the chronic damage will never be repaired, it'll always reign and live on. You can heal and grow, but you can't fix what's already been broken. This is the irreversible brokenness we carry. Emphasised also, by the form & shape of grass as its linear form still has corners, breaks in its directions to form the shape it is. Giving it the breaks/cracks it metaphorically has. Therefore, the shredded-ness and cracks of the grass, mirrors also the broken/fractured emptiness we carry. The diluted milk beside the nature acts an illusion of purity too. It only appears to be pure. Due to the connotations of nature being clean, natural, pure and milk being part of nature due to cows, animals. However, the glass of diluted milk in itself actually acts as an intervention, disrupting the purity of the nature its surrounded by - subverts from it. As its in a state of dilution - ultimately, in a fixed state of impurity, that its irreversible due to its dilution - symbolises the irreversible brokenness of black people. Nature helps personify we can grow and heal from the chronic pain, like plants etc. can, but never can repair the chronic damage left behind, just like nature being in the fractured, broken state it is through its shape and form, so it'll always survive and live on in its fractured, broken state.

as when something is broken can't repair it back to the way it was originally, so we can grow ad heal but the scars will alwats be left behind - the chronic damage.

DCP Specialism - 2nd Project: 'The Place We're In/You're In'

DCP Specialism - 2nd Project: 'The Place We're In/You're In'

Artist Researches/Outcomes

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