I had never seen Penelope Umbrico's work until her lecture and was very interested in the way she spoke about her work. I love and fully appreciate the archival movement in art, though it does not necessarily reflect in my own. At least that is what I thought.
She spoke about many pieces, but I was most interested in her work with the mirrors, seen below. She scanned mirrors in the home decor catalogues and blew them up to actual scale, printed on plexiglass and cut to fit shape and dimensions. I hadn't been moved by a piece in awhile quite like I was with this one. Her goal had essentially been to give the viewer a sense of anxiety when they looked into the mirror and they were not there. I've felt like this so many times before but had never thought of a way to portray it. When she projected the image of the mirror, I actually felt panic...Why was I not showing up in the mirror? Where am I? I felt that my reaction was a pretty clear example as to why that work was so successful. It was a little depressing though. I felt like I was either dead or I meant nothing to these perfect-yet fake people.
Also, last year I had created a piece where I was trying to connect with people overseas who had the same last name as myself. At the time, I had no idea why and honestly, when the end of the semester hit, I still hadn't a good idea. When she spoke about empathetic relationships yesterday, it clicked. By me sending these cameras to relatives, I was learning to deal with the loss of my grandparents on my father's side (the Italian side). I was trying to reach out to more Italian's who would provide some sort of relationship that I had just lost. In Umbrico's work, her empathetic relationships were created through observations of these fake people who supposedly placed these objects in these specific ways and we were satisfying some sort of voyeuristic need to view it. Thats precisely what happened with my project in the end. I was archiving these people's lives who had the same D'Eugenio characteristic as myself and was viewing what their lives were like.
Another comment she made during her lecture that I appreciated was her advice on creating work that had similarly been done before. Her response: Who cares! Do it if it works for your project. I often times have an idea and then come to find out someone has already done something very similar. Then I think, well I can't do it anymore because this person will think I am copying them. Copying someone's work and creating work that is similar is different, however I still am unsure how I would feel if I were on the other-side of the situation.
During the discussion section she mentioned that she had "referenced the history of art" in her earlier work and used "photoshop to make them [her work] authentic." She really helped me figure things out with that comment. I use photoshop and alternative methods to make my work look antique, as if to ask for my voice to be heard by past generations because I (maybe) have no interest in voicing it about this one.
...I couldn't find any of her work where she attempted to make it look authentic. If anyone else can, please let me know!
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