Gerd Rothmann 
Dripping Nose No.2. silver 1976

http://kristyhsu.wordpress.com/2012/02/05/gerd-rothmann-an-uncoventional-dialogue-with-the-human-body/

'Scary Beautiful' Leanie van der Vyver 2012

http://cargocollective.com/Leanie/Scary-Beautiful

'Scary Beautiful' was Vyver's final graduation project at Gerrit Rietveld Academie in Amsterdam. Her aim was to start a conversation about the unrealistic ideals in fashion. Vyver is interested in the idea that people now have 'god like' powers to be able to transform themselves. She believes that the striving for perfection in beauty and fashion has reached a complete pinnacle and that it can't get anymore perfect. She highlights that we are now moving to the other side of perfection, turning into monsters. In taking the iconic heel Vyver has reflected this monstrous idea of perfection my slightly immobilising the wearer and pushing her posture to the limits.

Interview with Leanie van der Vyver: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MbjiqDhOEAw

By Pamela Reed and Matthew Rader. A New York based design collective that work in photography, graphic design and art. 
 <http://www.colectiva.tv/wordpress/tag/matthew-rader/>

'Clown' by Pamela Reed and Matthew Rader.
<http://www.colectiva.tv/wordpress/tag/clown/> 

http://www.reedandrader.com/

Franz West
 Lisa de Cohen with Adaptive, Vienna 1983,
Wood, papier-máché, and wall paint.

Franz West 'Adaptives' - photos taken at the Move Choreogrphing You exhibition at the Hayward Gallery
13.10.10 - 9.1.11

http://move.southbankcentre.co.uk/microsite/

In the 1970s Franz West created a series of plaster objects that were intended to be picked up and worn in order to challenge the traditionally passive relationship between the artwork and viewer. With this in mind it was interesting to experience his work at the Hayward Gallery. The set up involved two of his pieces that were placed high on black stands, two chairs, a video camera and a television. Although his pieces looked inviting I think the interaction felt slightly forced as it felt like the camera and screen demanded you to create a scene. The woman in the photo looked as though she knew West's ideas and she did not hesitate to to pick it up and put it on. The screen also removed a sense of play as it immediately translated the physical experience of wearing and playing into a visual experience for the wearer; you resultantly became conscious of how you looked rather than how the piece related to your body. However, this point highlights that the screen arguably increased the wearer's awareness of the object. Although this set up felt too controlled, I think West's pieces offer an interesting connection between sculpture and jewellery, something that I am interested in exploring.

Edward Burtynsky

  The Socar Oil Fields- Baku, Azerbaijan, 2006

The Discoverer Enterprise, a drill ship nearly three U.S. football fields long, floats on an oil spill disaster in the Gulf of Mexico on May 11, 2010.

 Breezewood, Pennsylvania, USA, 2004.

Densified Oil Drums -  Hamilton, Ontario, Canada, 1997

 Burtynsky is a Canadian photographer who captures the extreme impact of industry on our landscape. He was initially interested in the effects of consumerism and consumption, but later probed deeper into the main source, oil. He began a series that looked at the 'life cycle of oil', from extraction, to the populations' dependance and obsession with it's resultant products, to the final stage after consumption. His large scale photographs strive to illustrate the mass scale on which we are transforming our natural environment. Burtynsky interestingly explained that his photographs are 'meant as metaphors to the dilema of our modern existence; they search for a dialogue between attraction and repulsion, seduction and fear.'....'Our dependance on nature to provide the materials for our consumption and our concern for the health of our planet sets us into an uneasy contradiction.' I think Burtynsky demonstrates this dialogue very well as his photos are mesmerisingly beautiful yet the large scale of his images demands us to take notice. I find it fascinatingly devastating how we have managed to tailor the earth to suit our needs. It is however, refreshing to see landscapes that have been shaped purely by nature. 

In 2006, Jennifer Baichwal created a film titled 'Manufactured Landscapes'. It followed Burtynsky as he photographed the impacts of the China's industrial revolution on its landscape. His journey is also contextualised in relation to the impact of industry on the rest of the planet.

Left to Right: Deda Chicken Processing Plant, Dehui City, Jilin Province, 2005. Davis-Monthan AFB, Tuscon, Arizon, USA, 2006

Burtynsky' s images often appear as dynamic patterns, created by a mass of repeated elements.

 Silver Lake’s gold mining operations in Lake Lefroy, in western Australia. 2007

Burtynsky's photographs demonstrate a range of activities that manipulate the landscape, creating a series of manufactured reliefs and recesses. It would be interesting to translate this idea to the body, treating it like a landscape. Mini constructions would exist on the surface of the body, extending it's boundary, whilst recesses could be created by imprinting on the skin. 

http://www.charlesfreger.com/
I recently came across the work of Charles Fréger, a French photographer who is known for his anthropological representation of social groups. In 2011 Fréger embarked on one of his biggest photographic challenges, which he successfully achieved with intriguing results. He travelled across 18 European countries, from Finland to Greece, to capture the pagan celebrations of the 'Wild Man'. The wild man is a mythological creature, the son of a bear and a woman. Fréger's resultant book titled 'Wilder Mann: the image as savage' documents the continuing importance placed on myth and ritual. The 'wild man' tradition celebrates themes such as fertility, sexuality, death and rebirth. The costumes are constructed accordingly, using the local materials. The subsequent costumes all presented different elements of each country and highlighted the significance they place on certain characters. Fréger explained that the act of accumulating the portraits became a ritual in itself.

When I first saw Fréger's 'wilder Mann' portraits I thought they were connected to the perfomance artist Nick Cave, who creates dynamic 'Soundsuits' from found materials. However, they seem to be completely disconnected from each other. The first piece in Nick Cave's 'Soundsuit' series had relatively spontaneous beginnings. He had been contemplating the issues surrounding the colour of his skin, in relation to the beating Rodney King, a fellow black man. He discovered a park in Chicago with lots of fallen twigs, discarded and devalued, so he proceeded to gather and transform them. He cut  all twigs down to 3 inches  and wired them to a piece of fabric by drilling a hole in each twig. The result was a wearable piece that he referred to as a second skin. The heavy twig suit forced Cave to stand very erect but rustled as he moved around. With a background in dance, Cave felt that he had found a way to bridge the gap between art and dance. The intentions behind the pagan costumes, photographed by Fréger, and the wearable sculptures of Cave are very different. However, they both present the use of local materials to construct wearable piece that challenge the body's natural appearance.

From Left to Right: Charles Fréger- Costume of The Babugeiri, from Bansko, Bulgaria. Dressed in goat skins, originally symbolising fertiltiy, hold a procession on 1 Janury.  Nick Cave- Twig sounduit.

 Nick Cave 'Soundsuit' discarded flower ornaments.

Nick Cave- 'Creature Couture' photo-shoot for City Magazine, photographed by Ted Sabarese

Nick Cave Soundsuit invasion in Westwood Village, courtesy of the Fowler Museum at UCLA

In my previous post I included the work of Imme van der Haak, a dutch designer who has recently graduated from the Royal College of Art. Van der Haak's final piece was titled 'Beyond the body' which explored ideas surrounding the perception of appearance and identity. It involved two dancers who each wore translucent silk garments with the full bodies of other people printed on top. As the dancers moved, their bodies became confused with the images on the garments; disturbing the surface appearance of both dancer and print. Van der Haak explained that her work "focuses on altering the human form by affecting its figure with just one simple intervention".

Imme van der Haak 'Beyond the body' 2012

I previously incorporated this idea of using transparent material to overlay imagery into my own work. I printed a selection of my photographs and illustrations on to acetate and hung them on the body. The result was subtle merging between image and body. As in Imme's work the movement of the piece enhanced this confusion, my 'acetate jewellery' consequently worked better as hanging earrings.

Imme van der Haak's work plays with notions of 'normality', questioning the everyday things that we might take for granted. She does not intend to make work that shocks but instead attempts to offer a different angle, in particular reference to the human body. 

Imme van der Haak: Top- photos taken from the 'Elastic Mind' series. Bottom- Slakje 'little snail'- comments on the increasing use of animals as an accessory, both image and physical.

Left to Right: Joan Jonas 'Mirror Piece 1' 1969, Bohyun Yoon 'Fragmentation' 2004

Transforming the human figure through a 'simple intervention', the intention of van der Haak's work, has been explored by many people. The images above demonstrate the reflective power of mirrors to chop and distort the body without any physical transformation.