Utah contemporary artist Amy Jorgensen explains her Body Archive series:
"Body Archive began as an inquiry into the practices and aesthetics of historical criminal photography and associated assumptions of the photograph as a document of the moment, or a representation of truth – what Walter Benjamin describes as evidence of an occurrence. Technological innovation in contemporary forensic methodologies position the body as the central locale for the collection of residual trace evidence. As a culture we are spellbound by the potential implications found in skin cells, DNA strands, and microscopic fibers, as evidenced by the multitude of television series dedicated solely to the reporting and dramatization of criminal investigations.
This work examines our artistic and scientific expectations of photography and the body in challenging and transformative ways. Traditional notions of the body in art – the figure as object on view – are set aside to consider the body as an active participant in artistic process. I incorporate performance and photography with a willingness to use my own body as both test subject and subject matter in an investigation of personal and cultural assumptions linked to violence, media, the body, and photographic practice.
I explore the body as a site of experience, and the body as both repository and author of information. In an attempt to develop a document without bias and point of view, I place photographic emulsion, sans camera, on the surface of my body to record my actions. The images are created over time: minutes, hours. The resulting photographs are the striking visual residue of my experience: traces of
body fluid, clothing, skin prints, and the fine edges of body hair are evidence of my occurrence. I live in a body. And my body is an archive, my skin the surface through which I experience the world."
Amy Jorgensen was born in Milan, Italy. She received a BFA from the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston and Tufts University in 1997, and an MFA from the University of California, San Diego in 2002. She currently lives and works remotely in Utah.
To see more of Amy Jorgensen's available works through Mondo Fine Art, click HERE
Featured Artist: Amy Jorgensen
November 23rd, 2011Utah contemporary artist Amy Jorgensen explains her Body Archive series:
"Body Archive began as an inquiry into the practices and aesthetics of historical criminal photography and associated assumptions of the photograph as a document of the moment, or a representation of truth – what Walter Benjamin describes as evidence of an occurrence. Technological innovation in contemporary forensic methodologies position the body as the central locale for the collection of residual trace evidence. As a culture we are spellbound by the potential implications found in skin cells, DNA strands, and microscopic fibers, as evidenced by the multitude of television series dedicated solely to the reporting and dramatization of criminal investigations.
This work examines our artistic and scientific expectations of photography and the body in challenging and transformative ways. Traditional notions of the body in art – the figure as object on view – are set aside to consider the body as an active participant in artistic process. I incorporate performance and photography with a willingness to use my own body as both test subject and subject matter in an investigation of personal and cultural assumptions linked to violence, media, the body, and photographic practice.
I explore the body as a site of experience, and the body as both repository and author of information. In an attempt to develop a document without bias and point of view, I place photographic emulsion, sans camera, on the surface of my body to record my actions. The images are created over time: minutes, hours. The resulting photographs are the striking visual residue of my experience: traces of
body fluid, clothing, skin prints, and the fine edges of body hair are evidence of my occurrence. I live in a body. And my body is an archive, my skin the surface through which I experience the world."
Amy Jorgensen was born in Milan, Italy. She received a BFA from the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston and Tufts University in 1997, and an MFA from the University of California, San Diego in 2002. She currently lives and works remotely in Utah.
To see more of Amy Jorgensen's available works through Mondo Fine Art, click HERE