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Discovery / Fashion / 5 FORMS OF FEMININITY

5 FORMS OF FEMININITY

WHO RUN THE (ART) WORLD?

PHOTOS BY BROOKE GARDINER
STYLING BY ANGEL JHANG
MAKEUP BY ALANA WRIGHT
INTERVIEWS BY MADELINE MACARTNEY

Brooke Gardiner photographs five female artists in our OC community to celebrate their contribution to the creative culture of NYC.
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“Whether it’s a t-shirt or not, the future is female” My friend said to me the other day over the dinner table. A creative director and female force of her own, I believed her. As much as New York is known for it’s creative culture, and the artists that go along with it, much of our perception of this world is through the internet; instagram has become our all-encompassing art gallery. A digital mood board, an open auction and a tunneled lense into an art community we otherwise wouldn’t have access to. Although nothing new, the concept of the “Art Girl” has been even more personified by a push for more creative outlets of expression, and the young women creating these networks in real life, and online. We talked to five female artists who prove that “art girl” doesn’t necessarily mean “internet Girl.”

Aba

Filmmaker



What is your creative outlet for means of expression? I am a filmmaker, it brings me so much joy. I also model and dance my ass off whenever I can.

Are you working on any projects right now?

I've just started a sort of film boot camp for myself. I am completely self taught so, I'm creating a series of films that I write, film, and produce in about two weeks time. This is helping me hone my skills and open up as a director and actor. It’s been kind of wild so far but my first film of the series, Bite, is now up on Vimeo.

My other most constant on-going project is my hair. I have been told so many times that my hair is outrageous, unkempt, and unprofessional. I took that so much to heart that for so long I would only wear my hair in traditionally acceptable hairstyles. Then I began to think about the way my mother would lovingly fix my hair in puff balls and barrettes in between our bi-weekly hair salon trips. I treasure that experience so much so I've decided to recreate that for myself as often as I can. Since I began this new relationship with my hair I have never felt more beautiful or sexy. I feel like I am finally fully coming into myself because I'm no longer scared of touching my own hair and somehow ruining it. It's a wonderful feeling.

What inspires you? And why?

I am inspired by any and everything I encounter. Right now though I have to shout out Edward Enninful for creating the culture. I am so so proud of him and the new era of British Vogue.

Daniela Lalita

Artist



You work within so many different artistic mediums, how do you see these various outlets engaging with one another? I see them naturally combining with each other. If anything, it seems unnatural for me to classify each form expression or medium, for what it conventionally is perceived to be. You know: music, fashion, theater, costume. I think we are living in a time where we must unify rather than separate and define. It helps me to simply create a story based on a metaphor and start from that, merging different mediums, based on my inner need to express a certain atmosphere or sensation, without feeling the urge to define them as separate artistic mediums. I enjoy providing otherworldly spaces for people to experience. Sometimes it bothers me when I find myself defining and classifying everything around me.

You have an incredible interactive website! Where did the inspiration come for this and was coding something you had experience with prior or, if not, how did it come about? The website! It took months in the making. It began as an idea to create a teaser for the short film I released in my most recent show “Madre”. I had a discussion earlier this year with a very close friend of mine, about the nature of games, and how experience is a game; and that is, in fact, why games are games. They are appealing because they mimic the structure that we live by. Goal, danger, path, reward. A game can be just crossing the street. So I thought of creating my own game! I went very deep into the computer games I would play when I was a lonely pre-teen back home in Peru, click and point games, mainly horror, mythology and historical war games. Through the experience in my website, they would be introduced to one of the characters in the “Madre” show, the Seeker, while having to watch glimpses of the short film.



Having grown up in Peru and now living in New York, how do you seek out creative communities in new places?

I think that growing up in Peru has definitely shaped me into appreciating hand made, one of a kind pieces. There is a sense of appreciation for the ancestry; for the continuation of tradition. I got to work for one of my favorite persons in the world, Titi Guiulfo, who is committed to ensuring that the ancient Peruvian native textile traditions are neither lost, nor forgotten. She seeks to introduce artisans from low-income regions into the world of modern fashion, without forcing them to give up their ancient and traditional roots. The women I got to work with were hardworking, dedicated, humble, and insanely generous of their knowledge and insight, regardless of the harsh experiences they had gone through. And by harsh I mean surviving poverty and withstanding the dangers of living in a deeply misogynist country where the femicide rates are one of the highest in the world, where most of them, or many women they know, have been sterilized, beaten and silenced. I have a genuine respect for them. I seek out a true sense of devotion, passion, dedication and generosity in creative communities, where the goal is not individual success but rather communal growth.

In creating your own work, what is the most therapeutic part for you? Are there certain forms of expression that you gravitate towards more than others?

I love hand sewing, I hand sew all my pieces. It takes so much longer, but it is so worth it. It is a form of meditation and a way of introducing myself into the characters. Handmade objects allow creation to be very personal. Starting from zero and building from nothing is something I find quite amusing, even when it comes to making music, I gravitate towards additive synthesis (which basically means making everything from scratch, even the sound wave). There is a strong sense of authority in it all, a strong sense of control; the illusion of omnipotence.

If someone were to ask you for some inspiration, what is a book, piece of music, or some form of art that you would recommend to them?

I recently read an essay Robert Moog wrote about the future of music called simply “Electronic Music”. It was written in 1977 and has such a strong take on the introduction of new forms of music and their relationship with perception and the human mind; it's fascinating. A song: I’d say listen to Peter Zinovieff’s “Agnus Dei”. Electronic music pioneer and founder of EMS. He was also the first, or one of the first persons to own a computer at his house. Inspiration? Well. Look at babies, look at trees. Try and look beyond the self. It is easy to be consumed and feel sorry for oneself and not look into other people’s experiences. Identify what you consider to sound or look unappealing and figure out why. What is the root of rejecting it if not something that simply makes one uncomfortable. The essay I mentioned speaks loads about that and how we are programed to react aggressively towards new proposals, coming to unconsciously reject forms of innovation. We are more primal than what we think.

Morgan Connellee

Model / Dancer


What are some of your favorite NYC spots to hangout?
I love places in the city that feel like old New York. Fort Tryon is beautiful. I go to Central Park on the weekend to the Conservatory Pond or the Jackie O. Reservoir. Veniero’s is not to be missed. If I’m seeing friends at night, I go to Dimes.

How does your background in dance affect your modeling? Dance teaches me body language, how to express a mood with posture, with hands, and the eyes. It is all performance. That is what I think about when I’m on set, how I can bring to life the character that the photographer wants to capture.

What creative outlets of expression do you have that are unique to NYC? I am volunteering with Wide Rainbow, an after-school arts program that hosts workshops with artists in New York. The children we work with are most inspiring to me, in the way that it feels like I’m ever experiencing the world for the first time, with them. I’m in awe of the way they go looking for the poetry in everyday life.

How has your personal style evolved over the last few years? What inspires it? For me, style is about character more than anything else. I wear my mood. I wear whatever I can fall asleep in. I wear clothes until they fall apart.

What is some music you have been obsessed with recently? I’ll Try Anything Once by Julian Casablancas, Carnival of the Animals: XIII. The Swan by Camille Saint-Saëns, Our Song by Taylor Swift

Emma Kohlmann

Artist



How is the creative culture in New York different from other places? I feel very lucky that I grew up in place where art is accessible just on the street. People on subways are art. There is vibrancy that you don’t get in other places. I like that the city can be a small town, running into people is a daily habit of mine.

Does having a large social media following affect your work and the way people understand it? How would things be different if social media didn’t exist at all? Besides being from New York, I spent a lot of time in rural areas. Social media is what helped me look beyond my scope. It made me reach out to those I admire, foraging relationships with people in the virtual world. Using social media as a way to show appreciation and connection is how I prefer to use it. If it didn’t exist I think it would definitely be harder to connect but it would be the same for me. I would be writing more letters.

Where do u find other cool inspiring female artists in NY? I think when I table at the New York Art book fair at Moma PS1. I always feel like I meet so many new people every year. It’s incredible to see how many productive women are out there.

What other creative outlets of expression do you use, other than the mediums you are typically known for? I studied dance when I was in high school. There is side of me that wishes I was still performing. I try to make dance a daily ritual.

What is your morning routine like? 7 AM coffee, studio, walk around, studio. For the most part the mornings are my best time to work. I wake up to go to the studio and do it all over again.

Zoe Bullock

Model / Filmaker



How does living in New York inform your art?

New York feels like the epicenter of capitalism in countless ways, having access to the true scope of the distance it creates between humans, where the more money you have, the more freedom you can create for yourself, the more space, the more time you have access to. When you don't have money, it can feel like a cage, living in a closet, half your life spent underground, surrounded by concrete, weather conditions that are trying to kill you, and other humans that don't give a shit about you. Of course this also means that it is painfully beautiful, because when you do get a moment of relief or you finally gain access to something it is ten times as sweet, ten times as glorious; the light at the end of fall, a moment of quiet alone in a room, a window, shameless humans, cultures all piled together, desperation, etc. I can make money here, which informs my art by paying for it to happen.

Do you find yourself collaborating with friends often? How does that add to the dynamic of your work?

The kind of work I am committed to making is entirely collaborative, the most brilliant films in existence come from the assembly of minds that fit together, or provoke each other in some way. The most exciting thing to me about filmmaking is the opportunity to disassemble power when it rears it's head and to try to teach that process. I have the great privilege and fortune to live in the same city as my best friend going on thirteen years. We are very different, but we share a set of core values. There's a certain kind of shaking we want out of the world, a kind of undoing and revealing of humanity, even if it's performed through different methods, so when we work together there are more bases covered I believe.



Where do you find your greatest support system?

I feel most supported by feminist critical race theory and my mother, Laura Bullock. They both have the ability to unravel the world and help me expand my vision, never giving answers or solutions, instead providing me with languages that allow me to further my own deconstruction. They make me feel stupid, in other words.

What is your ideal recipe for a day of very chill self-care?

I think I have moments of caring for myself, but mostly they're by accident and probably caused by survival instincts: eating, sleeping, drinking water...

Being a model and also a filmmaker, how does your fashion style translate to your artistic vision?

I want to create characters, and find them within myself. What we have learned and gained access to and been exposed to can be written in the clothes we put on and how we present ourselves, but only to a certain extent. Fashion is a horrifying industry, and at it's best boring, when it ceases to be about people.

FILED UNDER: FASHION, CULTURE, ART, ART GIRLS, WOMEN, JEWELRY, BROOKE GARDINER, MADELINE MACARTNEY, ANGEL JHANG, ALANA WRIGHT, ABA, MORGAN CONNELLEE, DANIELLA LALITA, ZOE BOLLUCK, EMMA KOHLMAN
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