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VR EXHIBITION: CHINA DOLL, Rated R
February 01, 2021 - April 30, 2021
Performance Documentation of Martine Gutierrez, CHINA DOLL, Rated R, 2021
We betray ourselves by denying the complex accounting of our identities. How do we unburden ourselves of the limits of language? We seem to re-name every time a new label is propagated—like a distinctive melody commercialized into a jingle. Everyone will have their 15 minutes of fame in the commerce of Identity. We are trapped in a labyrinth of our own making—an inescapable power structure. Unnatural blondes—re-born into the proximity of power are marked by tragedy. Another ingenue—another era of Marilyn—Anna—Diana—Candy—Brittany—Britney—JonBenét—another beautiful obituary for us to aspire.
CHINA DOLL is the experience of wanting to be “the image”so badly that you sacrifice what you truly need. Consume until you are—touching the flame—becoming the mold to break her. It wasn’t until manifesting into the bombshell that I could see my aspirations for what they truly are. The child inside has to say “I am not more beautiful as Britney Spears.” What does it take to recognize our stars are voids inherently as blank as mannequins? This famous aspiration of perfection—whether a personal or public impulse—is a piling of references. The application of those references curated into media—projecting the perpetuation of our colonial hierarchies. Blonde is the cheapest privilege you can buy.
A popular interpretation of INDIGENOUS WOMAN is that of autobiography—perhaps because embodiment is easier to assume and understand as truth. We all project ourselves before we are ourselves. It is the subtlety of saying am I this? vs. I am this. I seek to produce the very conduits of advertising that sell us the identities I disassemble—the mass of media. CHINA DOLL fortifies this process of fiction- making as study to go deeper into the fantasy of self vision—to see if the projection even exists. The titles INDIGENOUS and WOMAN are two words I do not claim ownership over. A reminder of the duplicity in language. CHINA—in this instance, is not a claim to nationality—but the homonym for porcelain—a white, vitrified translucent ceramic. A mis-translation for the fragility of our own ideals. The trading of wealth and value, or meaning. DOLL—the self objectification of the femme experience. Becoming is to conform to an aspiration of womanhood that is both sold and naturalized. Just as science diagnosed us as transgender—DOLL is generationally our contemporary—yet another moniker on the verge of assimilation.
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The Big Picture: Anne-Karin Furunes, Deborah Kass, Martine Gutierrez, Clifford Ross and Donald Sultan
January 28, 2021 - March 20, 2021
Press Release [PDF]