Performance of projected images and spoken word. Words spoken include:
Homogenize, Homogenization, Homogenized, White, Non-white, Whiteness, White supremacy, Supreme, Privilege, Natural, Nature, Mother nature, Mother, Monster, Freak, Freak Show, Show, Observation, Surveillance, Gender, Queer, Gender-queer, Gender-performance, Performance, Police, Punishment, Body, Mind, Body-mind, Ability, Otherness, Otherworldly, Meat, Soul, Meat-soul, Soul meets body, Breath, Breathe, I Can’t Breathe, Always Already, Other, Always Already Othered
Homogenized – 1. a: to blend into a uniform mixture. b. to make homogeneous. c. make uniform or similar. 2. a: to reduce to small particles of uniform size and distribute evenly usually in a liquid. b: to reduce the particles of so that they are uniformly small and evenly distributed. c: subject to a process in which the fat droplets are emulsified and the cream does not separate. (i.word.com)
Society does not see whiteness, nor do they see heterosexuality, able-bodies, privileged class, maleness, or patriarchal power. Society sees “Other” bodies that do not neatly fit into the categories it has established as the “norm.” This is problematic. Richard Dyer explains it in this way, "As long as race is something only applied to non-white peoples, as long as white people are not racially seen and named, they/we function as a human norm. Other people are raced, we are just people. … There is no more powerful position than that of being ‘just’ human" (2005,10).
Further, the whiteness we are “Othered” by functions to police, punish, and control our bodies thus creating groups of oppressed peoples, many differing groups of oppressed peoples ranging from various races, ethnicities, body types and sizes, sexualities, genders, classes, ages, and (dis)abilities. In the article “White Normality, or Racism against the Abnormal” by Alia Al-Saji, Al-Saji states that:
…racism affects almost every aspect of our contemporary lives, managing our relations to our own bodies as well as to those of others,
and indeed molding those bodies themselves. … the oppression not only of nonwhite races but also of whites who have been judged to
be abnormal. … I would say that these elements of identity operate to racialize the subjects to whom they are attributed. By being more
or less normalized or construed as abnormal, they position subjects differentially with respect to whiteness – as included in or excluded
from white normality. (2010,1)
I set out to visually express oppression caused by this whiteness by covering, visually smothering, those categorically deemed outside of white norms with visible and literal whiteness in the form of milky, white paint. My intent has been to find as much diversity as possible to smother in whiteness as photographic subjects, using their portraits to demonstrate the uniqueness of each person being, both covered in whiteness and, homogenized as a singular group of “Others” with the uniqueness of each person also being erased by oppression. In this manner, the photographs are intended to express the way in which whiteness is oppressing the individual and also how whiteness causes the added oppression of denying each person validation of individual identity and experience. The individuals disappear under white paint, under white oppression.
Homogenize, Homogenization, Homogenized, White, Non-white, Whiteness, White supremacy, Supreme, Privilege, Natural, Nature, Mother nature, Mother, Monster, Freak, Freak Show, Show, Observation, Surveillance, Gender, Queer, Gender-queer, Gender-performance, Performance, Police, Punishment, Body, Mind, Body-mind, Ability, Otherness, Otherworldly, Meat, Soul, Meat-soul, Soul meets body, Breath, Breathe, I Can’t Breathe, Always Already, Other, Always Already Othered
Homogenized – 1. a: to blend into a uniform mixture. b. to make homogeneous. c. make uniform or similar. 2. a: to reduce to small particles of uniform size and distribute evenly usually in a liquid. b: to reduce the particles of so that they are uniformly small and evenly distributed. c: subject to a process in which the fat droplets are emulsified and the cream does not separate. (i.word.com)
Society does not see whiteness, nor do they see heterosexuality, able-bodies, privileged class, maleness, or patriarchal power. Society sees “Other” bodies that do not neatly fit into the categories it has established as the “norm.” This is problematic. Richard Dyer explains it in this way, "As long as race is something only applied to non-white peoples, as long as white people are not racially seen and named, they/we function as a human norm. Other people are raced, we are just people. … There is no more powerful position than that of being ‘just’ human" (2005,10).
Further, the whiteness we are “Othered” by functions to police, punish, and control our bodies thus creating groups of oppressed peoples, many differing groups of oppressed peoples ranging from various races, ethnicities, body types and sizes, sexualities, genders, classes, ages, and (dis)abilities. In the article “White Normality, or Racism against the Abnormal” by Alia Al-Saji, Al-Saji states that:
…racism affects almost every aspect of our contemporary lives, managing our relations to our own bodies as well as to those of others,
and indeed molding those bodies themselves. … the oppression not only of nonwhite races but also of whites who have been judged to
be abnormal. … I would say that these elements of identity operate to racialize the subjects to whom they are attributed. By being more
or less normalized or construed as abnormal, they position subjects differentially with respect to whiteness – as included in or excluded
from white normality. (2010,1)
I set out to visually express oppression caused by this whiteness by covering, visually smothering, those categorically deemed outside of white norms with visible and literal whiteness in the form of milky, white paint. My intent has been to find as much diversity as possible to smother in whiteness as photographic subjects, using their portraits to demonstrate the uniqueness of each person being, both covered in whiteness and, homogenized as a singular group of “Others” with the uniqueness of each person also being erased by oppression. In this manner, the photographs are intended to express the way in which whiteness is oppressing the individual and also how whiteness causes the added oppression of denying each person validation of individual identity and experience. The individuals disappear under white paint, under white oppression.